The Baltimore County union. [volume] (Towsontown, Md.) 1865-1909, 1881-01-22
NOT A PLEASANT LIFE.
Farmers Wives and their Neods--Ths
Homo on tho New Farm.


Homo on tho New Farm.
Mrs. Clara Colby of Nebraska read a
very sensible paper before the Women's
Congress at Boston on the ills which at
tend the life of the farmers wife. Her
pictures of the characteristics OF exist
ence on farm were drawn chiefly from
observation of the farming communities
Of the West and of the far West but
the life she describes is little different
from that we see in the agricultural por-
tions of even the Oldest States at the
East.
Mrs. Colby first spoke of early mar
riages as fruitful of many troubles
Matrimony IS easily undertaken in rural
life, and the country girl assumes the
cares Of a household and of maternity
at an age when city and village girls are
still AT school. Her health is likely to
break down in consequence, her nerves
to become shattered, and the hardships
which severe poverty adds to the many
which are necessarily incident to farm
life in its beginning make her old pre-.
maturely, and she may add another to
"the long list Of farmers wives who are
found in our insane asylums."
When a country boy thinks Of start
ing out for himself in life, his first care
is to look out for a wife among the
neighboring girls. Perhaps there are
not many competitions to interfere with
him, and If he is likely young fellow
he is not apt to find il hard to win a
helpmeet. He is not after money, nor
a fine social alliance. All he wants is
wife, and because lie has nothing to
offer but his heart the girl is none the
less ready to accept him. Worldly con-
siderations do not effect her choice Of a
husband.
She receives COW and feather bed
as her dowry, and he gets team from
his father rs his capital in business, after
having given his word under parental
authority up 10 the age Of twenty. one.
This, Mrs. Colby says, is the common
custom throughout the region of which
she knows, and it is substantially the
same rs that prevalent in the old States.
The couple may begin housekeeping
on rented farm, one-third Of the pro-
duce Of which comes to them for their
toll. II they get more than bare sub
sistence, il must be an exceptionally
good year for crops and prices. Per-
haps some Of the young men may be
able to buy their own farms, or make
first payment on them. In the East the
oldest and in the West the youngest son
generally stays at the homestead, but
the life is apt to be irksome to him, and
at last he plucks up courage and goes
after his brothers to new fields in the
West.
The most eastern States for these
pioneers nowadays are Iowa and Mime
sofa, but the chief objective points are
Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas, and Texas.
Dugouts, unhealthy and gloomy at the
best, may be their first habitation, and
even when houses are built they are
small, inconvcnient, and finished only
by degrees. The women's work in them
is peculiarly trying. "No one only
familiar with the comfortable homesteads
Of the East, can form any conception Of
what farming is to the Western woman.
The fuel is not under cover, the water is
hard to draw. When the land is bought,
and not homesteaded, there are the
payments to be met and until the land
is clear the farmer feels that nothing
must be expended for comforts in the
house."
Debt and poverty rest over these
homes, overwork breaks down the wo-
men, who may rebel against the hard
ships Of their lives, and seek to change
them by escaping from the bonds Of
matrimony. divorces are frightfully
common among the farmers of the
West" Mrs. Colby tells us. And even
when the farmers wife sees her husband
gaining in prosperity she finds no less
ening of her arduous labors. They may
rather increase. "More stock, more
grain and fruit, more help to the farm
CT, all these mean more work to the wo-
man. She can seldom procure help, for
such IS there is naturally seeks the
town." Besides taking care Of the house
and the children, she must look after the
poultry, and, her husband having no
time to "potter" in the garden, she must
plant, hoe, and gather such vegetables
rs she needs for the table. She is cook,
nurse, washmaid, chorc boy, gardener,
all in one. She losesregard for her per-
sonal appearance, and perhaps becomes
an untidy drudge, careless Of beauty in
herself or her surroundings. "Any,hing
will do at home, or is good enough for
the family. They live, as they tell you,
dogs life Of it, but without thought
that they are in any way responsible for
their wretchedness."
They do not even have the diversion
and excitement Of buying their own
clothes. GAS a rule, the husband makes
the purchases, even to procuring his
wife's dresses, while she rarely or never