Barbour County index., 1882-05-25
Farmers Daughters.

Mil, in Indiana Farmer
Iw,s talking 10 farmers daughter
the other day, and naturally, 1t seemed
we dropped into cOmplainlngs, and we
each revealed the fact that she was
discontented. 1 asked heI what she
intended to do for living, and she
answered: "Oh, L don't know; l
want to get away and make money
somehow. If 1 could go to school a
little more 1 could teach; but they
can't spare me-"
knew that all her life had been one
round of cooking, and milking, and
churning; of washing, and scrubing,
and ironing. 1 knew that her father
was a wealthy farmer, granger and -
leading church member. He has a
good farm and a coy barn-such a
coy barn!-and money in bank. And
when 1 looked at the ugly old farm
house, with its black door and small
windows, its calves, and pigs, and
chickens running in undisturbed tran
quillity over the yard, did not won
der that she found it unattractive, and
that she wanted to 'get away" The
finer sensibiljties of her woman nature
were awakening, and they called for
something better. j, for one, do not
blame the farmers daughters for being
dissatisfied. / know how much they
have to make them so. When will
these farmers learn that the "life is
more than meat, and the body than
rainment?" When will they cease
considf ring it waste of time to send
their children to school, or a waste of
money to pay for books and magazinesP ?
Why will they spend their money
giving the heather chance to be lost,
when their daughters are actually
suffering for something to readP They
toll and sweat, wasting the souls best
earnings in providing for the poor
frail body that, were it not that it is
the temple of the soul, would be worth
no more to us than piece Of wood or
a stone. They reverse the positions
and make the rightful master serv-
ant. Their time is wholly occupied
in providing for temporal wants.
Holland tells us that farmers are
afraid to be educated, or refined, or to
cultivate the beauties of nature, lest
they be thought "5tuck up" He says
that their finer nature, being neglected,
becomes sluggish and dormant. When
they go to sleepthey merely go to roost;
when they eat they stuck away grub"
that they surprise their backs with
clean Shirts" and when they marry
they "hitch on" In all these we
recognize more truth than poetry. Per-
haps it is true the world is what we
make it; but the sad part of the truth
is, that some of us cannot make it
what it ought to be, or what we wish
1t to be. If the natures that are given
US with the existence that is thrust up
on us are sluggish and stolid, we must
suffer the consequence throughout
time and eternity.
No matter what we may do to erad-
icate the baser part, we can never at
tain the higher standard we might
have reached if loving and cOnsiderate
parents had helped to prepare the way
for us. We hear a great deal said
about the dignity and nobility of the
labor; we see the truth of this in the
results of the lives of such men as
Hugh Miller, Agassiz, and our old time
patriots. But labor having no good
end in view; labor that is merely mus
cular expansion and contraction for
the sake of making and keeping money,
is only a method of soul-murder. We
need never be afraid Of labor, provided
we work with the right spirit. Anna
Dickinson used to clean street crossings
to earn money to pay for books.