The Redwood gazette. [volume] (Redwood Falls, Minn.) 1873-1940, 1874-10-22
Large or Small Farms.

The strongest argument, in our opin-
ion, in favor of large farms IS that they
can be worked more economically by the
employment of labor-saving machinery
than small ones. Farm labor has be-
come SO high-priced, and at the same
time 50 inefficient, that farming can only
be made profitable by substituting as far
as possible iron and wood, in the form of
machinery, propelled by blind, insensate
or brute force, for muscles moved by hu
man intelligence.
A farmer cannot afford to use ma
chinery unless it will save labor enough
to pay interest on cost, repairs and wear,
or depreciation in value from use. Ii
he has but few acres of grain to drill in,
a few acres Of corn and potatoes to plant
and cultivate, few acres of grass to
NOW, rake up and draw into the barn; u
few acres of grain to reap, etc, etc, he
cannot afford to keep grain drills, corn
and potato planters, sulky cultivators,
mowers, sulky rakes, and horse forks,
reapers and other expensive machinery,
for they would not save to him labor
enough to compensate for the cost of
keeping them.
But if farm is SO large that the breadth
sown to grain, for instance, will keep a
drill employed during the entire season
of sowing, and reaper employ ed during
the entire season OF reaping, the saving
in labor in single season might 60 far
toward paying the cost of those machines.
Perhaps it would not be exaggerating to
say that farmer on 200 acres, raising
ordinary farm crops, will hardly require
more help to do his work, in addition to
the machinery he would be warranted in
keeping, than would farmer on eighty
acres, without the laborsaving ma.
chinery.
The only way small farmers can avail
themselves of the advantages of labor.
saving machinery is by cooperating. If
three or four small farmers would unite
and purchase all necessary machinery to
be used in sowing, cultivating and har.
the strongest economical objections
against small farms.
In our opinion the most important con.
siderations in favor of small farms are of
q social and political nature. Small
farms bring farmers into proximity SO
that they can enjoy that neighborly in.
tercourse so pleasant and so necessary to
the development of many of mans high.
81 QullIIlCSs my u1SbAC 0uA0A SNAAOOl
districts and large schools, and many
other social advantages which cannot be
enjoyed in sparsely-settled rural dis
trict.
Not the least among the beneficent eff
fects of small farms is their tendency to
make patriots. A hireling who possesses
no real estate, no home of his own, has
less attachment to country, less interest
ina good, stable government, than one
who has home and property that must
be unfavorably affected by unjust and
oppressive laws, or by riots and disorders
in society.
To sum up the matter we shall have
in our opinion, the highest ideal of rura
society when our country is divided uI
into small farms, and those farms are
owned and worked by an educated
moral and patriotic yeomanry, will
sense enough to unite and cooperate fol
their mutual Reconsideration Rura
Home.
PEACH MARMALADE.-Take small ant
imperfect clings; they will not admit O
being removed from the stone in piece
of uniform size and shape, but you Cal
pare them, and after cutting from tn
stone place them in porcelain KEITH
with one pint of water to two quarts o
fruit; boil them until soft; take off ant
put through sieve with wooden potat'
masler. Then return to the kettle
adding one pint of sugar to every quar-
of prepared fruit; bring to boil ant
seal while hot. 1t can be sealed withou
the addition of the sugar, and when eate
let it be sweetened with white sugar t
the taste. 1t then greatly resemble
fresh peaches,