, 1884-10-07
PULLING FODDER.
A Rural Task for a Modern Philos-
ospher.
He Dives Down INTO the Tricks of
Trades and shows How One
Glass Gouges the
Ofher


We are pulling fodder now. I've hired two
men to pull by the day and two to pull by
tie hundred bundles. l want 70 see which is
the cheapest But they get me anyhow, and
l can't help It. II they pull by the day they
don't make $50 good bundles aIiece. which
they ought to make at rs cents a day, and il
they pull by the hundred they make over 900
bundles, and some Of them arc mighty light.
But IL is all right | reckon. Theysare watch
ing me and / am watching them. IL is the
same old siory-capital against labor. There
are tricks In all trades- You can count the
hands in a bundle, but you can't count the
blades in a hand, and 50 they can make them
heavy or make them light according to pay.
PVe hired cord wood cut by the cord and
they can pile IL 50 loose that a pack Of hounds
can follow a fox right through it and never
touch a hair. But 1t is no deep laid scheme
70 cheat you. They are just sloshing along
and you can settle with u darkey easier than
with any creature upon the earth. A mean
man can pay them in bacon at Is cents n
pound and -four at when the cash would
buy one at 10 and the other at 3, and he can
cheat them 20 per cent. in the weights and
they Will never know any better and never
care.
The Lord never made such an easy wsus-
pecting creature as a free Niger. There are
white men who take advantage OF them and
cheat them and get their labor for their Wit
ties and clothes, but the darkey is sure of a
living anyhow, for II he can't earn it he can
steal IL, so 1t is all right anyhow and the races
keep about even. Some farmers are tricky
too, when they take chickens TO town the
sickly ones ara sure to go, and the best po-
tatoes are put on top OF the basket. The
richest pine is on the outside OF the load,
and some rotten corn will get in the shelter
when tho meal Is for market. The
merchant has his tricks too. He will
bait you with something for less than
cost and make it up on something else at 80
per cent. To keep up with hard competition
he will sell you shoes with pasteboard soles
and nails that break in two under the ham
mer. and shoddy goods of all sorts, for his
customers want everything at the lowest
price whether it is good or bad, and it is
buckle and tongue whether the merchant can
get ahead of his customers or they get ahead
OF him. One thing Is certain, when tho mer-
chant forgets to charge anything 1t Is lost,
forever lost II he makes a mistake In change
or weight or measure he hears OF 1t II 1t is in
his favor, and il it is the other way maybe
he don't l don't know for certain.
The miller mixes corn meal with his -four
nowadays. They all do it up north and our
millers say they have to do it too TO keep up,
and they comfort themselves with the idea
that 1t u healthier and better, even though 1t
Is u fraud upon the consumer. The baker
gives six loaves for n quarter instead of five,
and that satisfies his customers, though the
five weighed just as much as the sir do now.
Anything to satisfy and keep the psople calm
and serene. There is a power Of comfort in
going home and showing up their bargains.
It proves that you are smart in a Grade, or
popular with the merchant, and that shows
how smart a good merchant is for he can
make ninety out of one hundred customers
believe he likes them better than anybody.
Civility and a little pleasant fattery is
splendid capital for a merchant. II my wife
was to hear accidentally that c merchant In
town told somebody that she had the p~rettiest
and best hammered daughter In the comnun-
ity she would go right there to trade and
wouldn't Jew him down on anything.
But the biggest frtlud of all is in the mar
rying business. and the man Is guilty of it
heap oftener than the woman. I'm not talk
ing about the regular society woman In a
town or a city for l don't think that any
body can cheat her, she is generally an ice
berg in n passel of fine clothes, and she don't
know how TO do anything but read novels
md visit, but the average girl who marries
for love Is oftener fooled thai the average
man. The time used to be when a man
didn'tb begin to forget his wife until he had
been married ten or fifteen years, but now
he forgets her in a few months and won't
stay home of nights If he can help it. Some
nice sweet-tempered young married
women may be seen nowadays walking TO
the end of the piazza about ten times in fifteen
minutes looking up the street for her husband,
but he don't hardly ever come according to
time. Folks didn't do that way in my days,
and my sort Of folks don't do it yet. Mrs.
Arp don't have to look up the road for me.
No, sir. I'm on hand before she wants me.
/ am. This shows the good effect Of early
training, and sol am obliged to advise the
young women to break in their husbands As
soon as possible. You can manage a colt
mighty easy with care and kindness, but it
is almost impossible to reform a balky horse.
There are the tricks of the lawyers that
would ill a book and are too tedious to men
ton, and the tricks of the doctors and the
politicians and the patent medicine men.
The editors help them last fellen out and di-
vide the profits. They don't certify to the
lies, but they keep them spread out before the
people and scare them mighty nigh to death
with their awful pictures Of snakes and hor-
rible things. Well, it Is a wonder that any
body has got anything, for it looks like most
everybody is trying to get what everybody
has got, and they take the highest cut to do