The New Bloomfield, Pa. times. (New Bloomfield, Pa.) 1877-188?, 1877-07-31

| splasn up your snirt sleeve, you Degln 10
wonder whether this really Is the bright
world that you always thought IL was,
and whether you will be called upon to
draw water from deep well with an Icy
pole In the other land beyond the skies.
1t is during the winter that the farmer
throws aside the drudgery and hard
work Of the farm, and engages In the
sport of cutting and hauling out cord
wood. Next to making tatting there Is
scarcely any labor more easily done than
breaking out wood-road through snow
three feet deep, and then chopping down
trees, splitting and cutting them into
cord wood, then hauling load of II fif-
teen miles to market, and then stand In
the street all day, and finally sell II for
So cord, and take your pay in some
thing you don't want. When / think
of this easy way of earning dollar L
have to hire stout man to hold me
down into chair, in order to keep me
from plunging out and buying wood
lot
When spring fairly sets in, then 1t Is
that the farmer begins to realize that he
owns farm, and that he Is sturdy
| yeoman. He starts out with his plough
to turn up the furrows in the glad earth.
How beautifully the poet sings about all
this, and how nice it sounds If the poet
ry Is good think there Is charm
about u poetic lie that does not exist In
prose.
For delicate invalid a course of treat
ment consisting of holding plough for
fifteen hours day, through rocky
field, would be likely to make another
man of him in q short time. 1t might
possibly be dead man, but still II would
be another man, held plough once
and helped to break up a piece of new
land. Through the kindness of friends
was taken into machine shop and re-
built over as well as the machinist could
do the job. have never seemed to feel
exactly right since, but don't suppose
ought to blame the man. He said my
arms were both pulled out of the sock
cts and was all stretched out of shape,
and he did as well as anybody could for
me. 1 shall not hold a plough again as
long as hold my reason, and when that
leaks out of me 1t will not matter much
what hold or what holds me.
When farmer wants little play in
stead of putting out his croquet set, he
turns to and builds piece of stone wall.
Building stone wall is more exciting
|
than playing billiards, for there is more
variety to it. Amateur billiards always
reminds me of the itch, there is so much
scratch to it, but building stone wall is
diversified something to do all the
time, like catching fleas.
No one can realize the charm of dig
ging round a big rock, and getting
chain under it, and twitching it onto q
drag, or of getting crowbar under it
and lifting and straining on it, enough
to strain the whole Atlantic ocean, and
then of having the bar slip, and the
stone roll back, barking shin, or other
wise bruising you, while you plunge for
ward with force enough to drive your
head into the ground. say no one can
realize the charm of this, unless he has
sat on fence, as / have, and seen it
done.
The bug problem to the farmer is a
stupendous one. 1t amounts to more to
small farmer than it does 10 the big
gest hotel proprietor in the country. A
good smart chambermaid, and bottle
of douple B poison, will fix bed so
that you can plant man at 8 o'clock at
night and have to haul him out of bed
with a steam tug in the morning, he will
sleep so soundly.
The potato bug is native of the West.
He originated in the canons of Colorado
and may be called an offshoot of that
section. The State is rammed full and
loaded down with them. They formerly
lived on wild plants, but one of them
went up to Denver on little pleasure
trip, and at the hotel there he had some
fried potatoes, and they struck him as
being about the best thing to quiet hun
ger he had ever lighted upon. He went
home and advised his brethren to go
East, and they simply packed up few
collars and change of clothing and
started. The potato bug dawns on the
farmer very rapidly; he sees his pota-
toes nicely up, their green tops remind
ing himthat potatoes in the fall at a
dollar bushel are better than serpent's
tooth or thankless child, and he goes
to bed dreaming of wealth pouring in
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