Delaware tribune. [volume] (Wilmington, Del.) 1867-1877, 1870-02-17

EVERY LOCALITY HAS ITS ADVANTAGES AMI
DISADVANTAGES.


EVERY LOCALITY HAS IT'S ADVANTAGES AND
DISADVANTAGES.
From Mr.. Greeley's third article in the
New York Tribune, on "What l know
about Farming" we extract some views rea-
tive to the best locality, in which to buy
farm. He says:
When my father was over sixty years old,
and had lived some twenty years in Erie
County Pennsylvania, he said to me; :"
have several times removed, and always to-
ward the West; l shall never remove again;
but were / to do so, it would be toward the
East. Experience has taught me that the
advantages Of every section are counterbal-
anced by disadvantages, and that where any
crop is easily produced, there it sells low, and
sometimes cannot be sold at all. shall live
and die right here hut, were | to remove
again, it would not be toward the West"
This is but one side of truth, and give
it for whatever it may be worth. Had my
father plunged into the primitive forest in
his twenty itih rather than his forty-fitth
year, he would doubtless have become more
reconciled to pioneer life than he ever did.
would advise no one over forty years of
age to undertake, with scanty means, to dig
a farm out of the dense forest, where great
trees must be cut down and cut up, rolled
into log heaps and burned to ashes where
they grew. Where half the timber can be
sold Tor enough to pay the cost of cutting,
the case is different but know right well
that digging farm out of the high woods is,
to any but u man of wealth, slow, hard
task, Making one out of naked prairie, five
to ten miles from timber, is less difficult, but
not much. Jle who Can locate where he has
good timber on one side and rich prairie on
the other is fortunate, and may hope, if his
health be spared, to surround himself with
every needed comfort within ten years. Still,
the pioneers life is rugged one, especially
for women and children and | should adj
wise any man who is worth 81, 600 and has a
family, to buy out an improvement"
(Which, in most cases, badly needs improv-
ing) on the ouiskirt of civilization, rather
than plunge into the painless forest or push
out upon the unbrokcn prairie.
He who has y farm already, and is content
with it, has no reason to ask, "Whither shall
| go." and he may rest assured that thor
oughly good farming will pay as well in New
England as in Kansas or Minnesota. adj
wise no man who has a good farm anywhere
and is able to keep il, 10 sell and migrate.
| know men who make money by growing
food within twenty miles Of this city quite
as fast as they could in the West. II you
have money to buy and work it, and know
how TO make the most Of it, believe you
| may find land really as cheap, all things con
sidered, in Vermont as in Wisconsin or Ar
kansas.
And yet believe in Observation-Disclosures
that there are thousands in the Eastern and
Middle States who would improve their cir
cumstances and prospects by migrating to
the cheaper lands and broader opportunities
of the West and South For, in tho first
place, most men are by migration rendered
more energetic and aspiring; thrown among
strangers, they feel the necessity of eXertion
as they never felt it before. Needing almost
| everything, and Obliged 10 rely wholly on
| themselves, they work in their new homes
as they never did in their old ; and the con
sequences are soon visible all round them.
"a stern chase is long chase" say the
| Sailors and he who buys a farm mainly on
| credit, intending to pay for il out of the pro-
ceeds, finds interest, taxes sickness, bad
seasons hail, frost, drOutb, tornadoes, floods,
| &c, &c., deranging his calculations and i'm
| pending his progress, until he is often i'm
PEELED to give up in despair. There are men
who can surmount every obstacle asd defy
| discourago mcnt-thcNe need NO advice; but
there are thousands who, having little means
and large families, can grow into a good
farm more easily and far more surely than
they can pay for it and these may wisely
seek homes where population is vet sparse
and land is consequently cheap. Doubtless,
some migrate who might better have for
borne; yet the instinct which draws our race
toward sunset is nevertheless a true one.
The East will not be depopulated but the
West will grow more rapidly in the course
OF the next twenty years than ever in the
past. The railroads which have brought
Kansas and Minnesota within three days
and California within week of us, have
rendered this inevitable
In closing his article, he refers with spe-
cial favor to the South, whore lands are Still
very cheap 1t is better iimbercd, in the
average, than the West; the climate invites
the unopened mines and unused water pow
or call loudly for enterprise, labor and skill
1t is absurd to insist that the soil is exhausted
when not one=thrd Of it has ever yet beer
ploughcd. donot advise solitary migration
to the South, because She needs schools
roads, bridges, mills, &C., &c, which The
solitary immigrant can neither provide no
well do without; and have no assuranc,
that he, if obliged 10 work out for prescn
bread, would find those ready to emplo,
and willing to pay him hut let hundred
northern farmers and mechanics worth$ ,00l
TO $4,000 each combine to select Ohrougl
chosen agents. and buy ten or twenty thous
and acres in some Souhcn State, embracin
hill and vale, timber and tillage, water
power and minerals, and divide ii equtabl
among themselves, after laying 1t out witt
roads, a park, village-plat, sites 70
churches, schools, &c, and am contiden
that they can thus make pleasant home
+ more cheaply and speedily there than amos
anywhere else.
A good story is told of Tioga count
: merchant, who agreed TO take farmer