Vermont watchman and State journal. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1836-1883, 1873-05-21
Health of Farmers.

Agriculture should be the most eunobling
Of all yocations. 1t would be if farmers
cultivated the earth as teachers develop the
head, and preachers educate the heart
Teachers and preachers aim to train the
thoughts and feelings to truth and love, to
utility and happiness. Farmers should train
the earth to produce such crops and fruits,
aud such only, as are conducive to the best
health and highest welfare of human be-
ings. Then would their calling be trans
formed from one Of degrading drudgery and
intermiuable toll to one of refinement and
luxury. The terminating seeds, the wav-
ing grains, the luscious fruits, so suggestive
Of the source Of all life and all blessing,
and the harvest season, so typical Of a res
direction and Immortality, ought to make
the life of an agriculturist continual
pastime. And this would be the farmers
life, if farming was managed as it should
be.
Farmers have unoqualled natural advan-
tages for health, strength, and longevity.
The statistics of disease and the tables of
mortality, however, are against them. This
is not due to their vocation, but TO the mis-
uses of it. No class, as a whole, is probab-
ly SO utterly reckless Of health conditions.
So far as our acquaintance with the habits
of farmers is concerned-and it has been
extensive 1T compels the conclusion that,
as rule, the dietic habits Of farmers are
worse than those of that class who have
the means Of choosing for themselves. Fried
dishes several times a day, with several
| fried articles at each of the three meals, is
one< of their common dietic denominations !;
dried beef, old cheese, and pickles are
among the common relishes, while lard and
saleratus make their richer dainties nlec-
tious aud caustic. We have seen on a
farmers table, fried pork, fried eggs, fried
potatoes, and fried griddle-cakes for break
frst--fried ham, fried hominy, parsnips for
dinner, aud fried sausage and fried dough-
nuts for supper-all the frying done in lard.
No class is so troubled with canker, erysip-
elias, tumors, cancers, and humors, as far
mers and the excessive use Of pork, lard,
fine -four, rich cakes, and greasy pastry,
are enough to account for it. In dietic
habits, our farmers are sadly misled by the
agricultural journals, nearly all of which
pander to their prejudices and hatter the
morbid appetites by recommending and
commencing swine-breeding and pork eating,
while they fill their kitchen column with
recipes for making rich and palatable pud-
ding, pies, cakes, and other complicated
dishes, which no stomach ever carried in.
side Of human body could long tolerate
without death or dyspepsia.
The essential need Of farmers is plain,
wholesome food, properly cooked. This
would give them much more available pow.
er for work, relieve them of many of the
dstresses and expenses of sickness, add
many years to their life, and render old age
"grecn" and normal, instead of dry and
decrepid, as it is in most cases under exist.
ing habits. We recommend to their study
such works as Hydropathic Cook Book
Hygienic Hand Book, Fruits and Farnacea,
and Miss Colman's articles on "Seasonable
Dishes etc.-The Science of Health.