The Baltimore County union. [volume] (Towsontown, Md.) 1865-1909, 1870-02-19
WI Farming Pay ?

When urge the superior advantages OF ru-
raj life, am often met by the objection that
Farming don't pay.
That, if true, is serious matter. Let us con-
slider
| do not understand it to be urged that the
farmer who owns large, fertile estate, we'll
fenced, well-stocked, cannot live and thrive by
farming. What is meant is, that he who has
| little but two brown hands to depend upon can
not make money, or can make very little by
| farming.
think those who urge the point have very
inadequate conception of the difficulty encoun-
tered by very poor young men in securing good
start in life, no matter in what pursuit. came
to New York when not quite of age, with good
| constitution, fair common-school educaton
| good health, good habits, and pretty fair trade
-(that of printer.) l think my outfit for a
campaign against adverse fortune was decidedly
better than the average yet ten long years
elapsed before it was settled that could re-
main here and make any decided headway.-
Meantime, drank no liquors, used no tobacco,
attended no balls or other expensive entertain
mens, worked hard and long whenever could find
work to do, lost less than month altogether by
sickness, and did very little in the way OF help
ing others. judge that quite as many did
worse than | as did better and that of the young
| lawyers and doctors who try to establish them
selves in their professions, quite as many earn
1 less as earn more than their bare board during
| the first ten years of their struggle.
John Jacob Astor near the close OF long
diligent, prosperous career, wherein he amused
laIge fortune, is said to have remarked that, if
he were to begin life again, and had TO choose
| between making his first thousand dollars with
| nothing to start on or with that thousand max
| ing all he had actually accumulated, be would
deem the latter the easier task. Depend on it,
yonng men, ii is and must be hard work to earn
your first thousand dollars. The burglar, The
orger, the blackleg, (whether he play with cards,
with dice, or with stocks, may seem to have a
quick way and easy way Of making a lhousan
dollars but whoever makes that sum honestly,
with nothing but his own capacities and ener-
gies as capital, does very good 6ve-year work
and may deem himself fortunate if he finishes it
so soon.
have known men do better, even at farming.
recollect one who, with no capital but good
wife and four or five hundred dollars bought
(near Boston) farm of two hundred mainly
rough acres for So, 500, and paid for it out OF its
products within the next five years, during which
he had nearly doubled its value. | lost sight of
him then but have no doubt that, il he lived
fifteen years longer and had no very bad luck,
he was worth, as the net result Of twenty years
effort at least $500, 900. But he would rise at
O. clock of Winter morning, harness his span of
horses and hitch them to his large market wagon
loaded over night drive ten miles into Boston,
unload and load back again, be home at pretty
fair breakfast-time, and hastily swallowing his
meal be fresh as daisy for his days work in
which he would lead his hired men, keeping
them clear of the least danger of falling asleep.
Such men are rare, but they still exist, proving
scarcely anything impossible to an indomiabe
will. would not advise any TO work so un-
mercifully seek only to enforce the truth that
great achievements are within the reach of who
ever will pay their price.
Az energetic farmer bought some twenty-five
years ago, large grazing farm in Northern Ver
mont, consisting of some $50 acres, and costing
him about So, 900. He had a small stock of cat
tle which was all his land would carry but be
resolved to increase that stock by least ten per
cent. per annum, and to to improve his land by
cultivation, fertlizug, clover &C., that it would
amply carry that increase. Fifteen years later,
he sold out farm and stock for $45, 900 and
migrated to the West. l did not understand
that he was specially hard worker, but only
good manager, who kept his eyes wide open, let
nothing 60 to waste and steadily devoted his en-
ergies and means to the improvement of his stock
and his farm.
Walking one day over the farm of the late
Prof. Mapes, he showed me field of rather less
than ten acres, and said:
~ bought that field for So, 400 year ago last
September. There was then light crop of corn
on it, which the seller reserved and took away.
l under drained the leid that Fail, plowed and
sub soied it, fertli2ed it literally and planted it
with cabbage and when these matured sold
them for enough to pay for land, labor, and fer
tilizing altogether"
The field was now worth far more than when
be bought it, and he had cleared it within fifteen
months from the date of its purchase. l consd-
er that good operation. Another year, the
crop might have been poor, or might have sold
much lower so as hardly to pay for the labor
but there risks in other pursuits we'll as in
farming.
A fruit-farmer, on the Hudson above Newburg
showed me, three years since, field of eight or
ten acres, which he had nicely set with Grapes,
in rows ten feet apart, with beds of Strawberries
between the rows, from which ne assured me
that his sales exceeded 500 per annum. pre-
sumo his outlay for labor, including picking,
was less than $500 per annum but it cost some
thing to make this field what it then was. Say
that he had spent 81 900 per acre in under-drain-
ing, enriching and tiiling this field, to bring it
to its condition, including the cost of his plants,
and still there must have been clear profit here
of at least $500 per acre.
might multiply illustrations; but let the fore
going suffice. readily admit that shiftess farm
ing don't pay-that poor crops don't pay-that
it is hard work to make money by farming with
out some capital-that frost, or hail. or drouth,
or insects, may blast the farmers hopes, after he
has done his best to deserve and achieve success
but insist that, as general proposition, COOP
Farn,ing DOES pay-that few pursuits afford as
good prospect, as full an assurance of reward
for intelligent, energetic persistent effort this
does.-Hordce Greeley.