Dodge City times. [volume] (Dodge City, Kan.) 1876-1892, 1885-12-31
GERMAN FARMERS.

GERMAN FARMERS.
What an American Agricultural Saw
Among the Peasants Of Germany-How
They Live and Work.
Interesting as these old cities are,
with their quaint buildings and galleries
filled with pictures one of which often
gives interest to an hours study, and
much as one finds to amuse him in
watching characters and modes of do
ing things in the street, yet found my
self homesick for the country and q
sight of farmhouse with the familiar
surroundings; it had been so long since
had seen nice sward in front of Il
cozy home, we'll stocked garden, a
neat barnyard with proud Leghorns or
Black Spanish strutting about disput-
ing rights with the golden bronze turk
eys, and barn, at this season bursting
with riches, that said to myself: Il
will take trip around in this garden
spot of Germany and feast my eyes on
the riches an old civilization can give.
l know what farm is at home, but we
are young people; we sacrifice every
thing to the almighty dollar; here,
with thousand years of civilization, l
shall find in perfection what we have
in embryo. So, with anticipation
whetted by long deprivation, l planned
a pedestrian tour, avoiding the railway
routes, that might have the real coun-
try flavor.
AS we got away from the city l could
not cease praising the soil, and as there
are no fences here, it was singularly
like one of our rolling prairies-hardly
stone to be seen, rich 1oamy soil.
Winter grain was all coming up with a
"good start; mile after mile of beets
or chiccory, all the roots averaging a
foot in length should say, tremendous
crops; women by the hundred on their
hands and knees, generally having an
old piece of sacking to creep on. some
with spade-handled spuds digging up
the roots, arms and backs like Amazons;
others with cleaver knives creeping
after the diggers, and dextrouSly chop
ping the tops off, then piling the roots
one side; turnips, some ready to dig.
and in other fields Just coming up-cv-
identity no early freezing here. Inn
mense factories to grind the sugar
beets and chiccory every few miles;
teams, almost continuous. going to and
fro, loaded with roots. over roads like
a floor so splcndidly macadamized; yet
in the fields, following the diggers,
were plows at work, showing abundant
help and teams. Potatoes now being
dug-how? Always by women, on
their knees, with short-handlcd rakes,
and with their hands; their heads tit d
up in red colt On kerchiefs. their dress
the universal blue calico that graces all
German women. As they turned to
look at us, their faces seemed cast in
one mold hard, red, wrinkled, their
dress only distinguishing the sex; 9TH
erwise, they were as coarse, rough, I'M
calmly, as the men.
But all this time not a farmhouse!
After awhile l saw cluster of tiled
uildings, that seemed jammed to-
gether in this prairie; evidently here
was the home of this multitude owning
the rich soil had passed with curious
eyes. As / came nearer and nearer,
the picture had made of the homes in
America came up in bold relief Good
Heavens! is this the way farmers in the
richest section of Germany live? On
one side of some houses were living
rooms, on the other the stables; the
''bcst to do" had their houses separated
from the stables only by 4 yard; all
reeking with manure; not spire of
grass, not Il flower growing out of
doors; here and there was vine grow
ing up the side of the house; but so
sOrdid was the appearance of every
thing, fear the vines were cultivated
but for the money value of the grapes
they might yield. The children gcner-
ally were running wild-being those too
young to work-black with filth.
In front of many houses were
three-inch pipes, bringing the
liquid manure to proper height for
the big cask that carried it to the
fields. 1t was common sight to see
the crop of beets banked up not ten
feet from the front doors of the dwell
ings. In fact, there were enough dis
gushing sights and smells in that first
village to call an indignation meeting
in any American town. l looked in
vain for the prettily located church,
SNiioui>tOV ny viz SiSSh ana tho
commodious sheds for the carriages; or
the village school, nesting under the
spreading oaks; or the inviting inn,
with broad approach, and the comfort
able stables; in fact, everything that
makes an American village or farm
house attractive was wanting here. The
least rcpulsive house was the beer-sa-
loon, with riddled target over the
door,
We went through half dozen such
villages, differing, the one from the
other. in the degree of filth and re-
pulsiveness.
But is it to be wondered at? Can
stream rise higher than its source?
Where women are treated as beasts,
can homes be better than kennels?
Where all the ablc-bodied men are in
the army, what can women do but
work in their place?-Eanorer Ger
many Cor. Country Gentleman.