The Milan exchange. (Milan, Gibson County, Tenn.) 1874-1978, 1879-04-10
FRENCH FARMING.
The Everyday Life of the Farmer - Their
Homes, Food, Manners and Customs.

Homes, Food, Manners and Customs.
A pleasantly-written article in HdT-
peT's Monthly gives us some very clear
pictures of agricultural life in the North
of France 1t differs from that In the
South, and perhaps also from that of
other portions. The farmers family,
with whom the writer stayed, were pros
porous the grandfather having made
considerable money and bought house
once belonging to a noble family. A
widow and three sons now own 1t, rent
ing q part of it to a farmer on shares,
who is called a granger. If he paid his
rent in money he would be called a
renter.
The house is of one story; the walls
are twenty-eight inches thick; there is a
kitchen and four large rooms. The
floors are all Of brick or tile. There is
not a carpet and but one looking-glass
in the house. The garnet is used as a
granary. At the front of the house is
barn-yard, woodward and wel-yard.
The well stands in front of the door.
The farmers cottage is of stone, one end
of it being the stable.
The family has hot coffee, vegetable
soup, toast and wine for breakfast. The
sons sit down to it with their hats on.
They bake sixteen-pound loaves of
bread every two weeks, the loaf meas
dring half a yard across. They have
dinner and 4-o'clock lunch of bread,
wine and piece of pie; and supper of
vermicelli, warmed-up beef, goats milk
cheese and cherries. The cooking is
mostly done on the hearth, the chimney
being large and Old-fashioned. They
have a range with five small CRATES in it.
They use charcoal and use it very spar
ingly. In winter there is a stove in the
mothers sleeping-room and then the
whole family lives there. They keep
Good Friday, and one of the boys goes
a-fshing-that is, he draws the water
from little pond near by, and picks
the fish out of the mud at the bottom.
They have blue berries and omelet and
cooked prunes. On Sunday they have
vermicelli soup, boiled beef and carrots,
cabbages stewed with one or two little
pigeons taken off of the nest, and chick
ems. black coffee and rum.
They dance on Sunday afternoon, al
though the priests are opposed to it.
Hired women get from $40 to $50 a
year, but they do not get as much to eat
as they do in the United States. AL
the family wear wooden shoes, costing
about II cents pair. They can wear
them a month. They make a great
Gathering on the tile floor.
The farmer rents eighty acres, and
can put by something every year. He
is bachelor, and his family consists OF
his mother, brother and uncle. Hired
men get $50 year. The farmer and
his family had good business habits
but they cannot read nor write. Then
fuel is of the trimmings of trees, oak
saplings, and broom or furze. They
| have no moving or reaping machines
but during harvest hire eleven men
These men have soup, omelet, bread
cheese and salad; meat once day, pork
or bacon, and wine at all four meals
When it is hot they take off their shirts
and work with their bodies thus stripped
even in the presence of the hired
women. After the harvest they viii
have a revel, when there will be boiled
ham, rabbits stewed with wine, bread
and salad ard wine The hired hands
work until Sunday noon, then they be
gin to drink and keep it up until Mon
day evening. The well-to-do farmers
have neither tomatoes, cucumbers mol
melons. 1t would require the labor o.
/ another man.
The women help" or dOmestics
spend a good share of the day watching
the cattle while they are grassing, fol
! there are no fences. She comes home
to help prepare the meals. She take:
/ her knitting and even her distaff fol
spinning into the field with her, anC
she milks the COW or the goat three
times day.
One ofthe sons keeps a hunting dog
and horse, but no buggy, for in France
it would be scandalous to take a CIR
out riding.
The farm is planted in the following
manner: In vines, about ten acres; IL
/ meadow there are twenty; in wheat, five
in potatoes, five; in oats, two and hall
Maize or Indian corn is also sown, bu
only to be fed green to cattle. 1t is GU
at the height of about two and hal
feet, when quite tender, and is given tc
the animals in their stables. Grass
seeds are never sown in this district
| but, when q field has been cultivated
and the harvest gathered, whether o.
wheat, oats or anything else, then they
do not fatigue the ground, even in the
plain, the second year, but animals
Craze under the care of a shepherd OF
/ shepherdess and generally of a shep-
herds dog. Pierre values his shepherd
dog at 100 francs; but his mother tells
me that he is worth about half thai
sum; that her son puts that value on
| him because he loves him; he was worth
it once, but now he is getting old. The
shepherd dog is only taxed l franc a
wear. the others 5. Meadows in France
and never titled. They endeavor to
water them, and If there is no stream
they try to find spring, where they
make deep hole or pond, and thence
conduct the water by means of LITTLE
bitches or canals. You can see mead
ows on the sides of the hills crossed
lengthwise by these bitches. Those
meadows are rarely MANFRED, the
manure being wanted for the vines
which pay better. One-third of the
manure is put upon the wheat, and two
thirds on the vines. Generally by the
beginning of June the water ceases tC
flow through the meadow bitches
There are usually two cuttings of grass
| taken from the meadows, one in June
and July, the other in September and
October; but if not well-enOugh grown
: it can be pastured. Some meadows
, have not been plowed for 300 years, and
some have not been broken up for 9