Clarksville weekly chronicle. (Clarksville, Tenn.) 1873-1890, 1879-03-08
What Salary does a Farmer Re-
ceiVe?

/ What salary does N Farmer Re-
ceive?
He receives the equivalent of a
larger salary than ninety-nine out
of a hundred of them are willing to
| admit. They underestimate their
| own profits, and over-estimate prof
| it's of men living on a salary.
There is great difference among
those who live by farming. A great
many work the soil because they
cannot live by anything else. Many
of this class hardly deserve to be
classed as farmers. They lower the
standing of farming as business.
believe there is no business by
which a man can live 50 well with
50 much neglect, as in agriculture.
Still nothing better repays good
care and ability. It is rather slow
to yield brilliant returns at the out
set 50 in any business. The far
mer's profits are concealed in the
rise of land-in improvements, by
ditching, clearing, building, more
land, more tools or better stock. Most
farmers have no idea what it costs
to live. They forget to figure in the
pork, poultry, mutton, butter, -four,
vegetables, ETC., etc. The salary
man lives entirely by his individual
efforts. In estimating a salary, we
must do so by looking at the privi-
leges enjoyed, the hard work to
brain and muscles, and the gain in
property and Improvements.
/ am personally acquainted with |
two brothers in Michigan, who |
,fn k<aA nE
twenty years ago. One Of them,
after good education, went to far
ming, the other to teaching. They |
had only few hundred dollars to
start with. The one who followed
teaching, for the last six years, has
received annually from two thous-
and to two thousand seven hundred
dollars. One third of this amount |
would be called q large salary by
nine-tenths of our farmers, who can
save as much each as does the teach
er referred to. The former of the
two brothers under consideration,
owns and works small place of
seventy or eighty acres which he Is
improving. He has good
buildings. He owns a small cheese
factory. He is out of debt. He has
lately bought fifty acres more of land
worth $1,000, and from previous ex-
perience, he is certain he can save
$500 a year above all expenses, to
apply in payment on his recent pur-
chase, He easily keeps up with the
teacher in accommodating wealth. He
works no harder. The natural tact
of the two men for work and busi-
ness was not much different while
they worked together on the home
stead. The farmer in question is
not an old fogy in any sense of the
word. He is all the time looking
for new and better implements; but
he is very cautious about buying
any of them until he has seen them
tried, and knows that he can make
good use of them. He does not
make costly experiments, but he is
every year trying some new vege-
tables, or grasses. He is improving
his stock by some purchases, and
by "natural selection" He wastes
no money in rushing from one de-
partInent of farming to another. He
keeps cows, raises some corn, alittle
wheat, some hogs, hay and grass,
some fruit and poultry. What he
has earned has come by legitimate
farming. Some would call him
little conservative. He IL very eau
tious, saving, industrious, but he
dresses well and lives well.