Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1889-11-23
FARs AND ORCHARD.
SOME OF THE REASONS WHY BOYS
LEAVE THE FARM.
The Good Farmer-A Source of Pocket
Money-Corn and Cotton
Farm Notes.


Farm Notes.
The causes which lead boys to leave the
| farm are perhaps as many and varied as
those which prompt mature men to leave
the pursuits they have long followed, and
embark in new enterprises. Lack of in
terest is cause which is of itself enough
to turn any employment into drudgery
1t is the willing hand which makes light
| work in every department of labor. I'm
patience at the slow results of continued
hard work is another cause of discomfort.
The ready money does not keep pace
with the needs and desires of the boy on
the farm.
1t is not always the case that the boy
inherits the taste for his fathers calling.
The shoemaker's son dislikes the smell of
leather, preferring to clerk in store.
The merchants son, deriving the benefit
of his luxurious belongings, develops arts
tic tastes, and ignoring the promising po-
sitlon which his fathers industry has Sc
cured for him, enters upon the uncer-
tainty of an artists career. The mill OPP
orators and the engineer look forward to
being able to retire to little farms of
their own, as the most restful prospect in
life. Thus it may be seen that it is not
unusual to change the occupation in life
and try new scenes and pursuits.
But there is another reason. which
should not be overlooked, why boys do not
stay on the farm. Farmers are, uncon-
sciously, perhaps, educating their sons
away from the farm. The farmer and his
wife won their broad acres by the most
pinching economy and hard work, sus-
tanned through it all by the thought that
they were securing a comfortable home for
themselves and good inheritance for their
children. While bearing the heat and
burden of the day, they dwelt with salts
faction on the thought that their son would
not need to drudge so increasingly in his
turn, but would find the way made smooth
for him. In the fathers boyhood there
was little time for study. Fortunate in
deed was his lot if he could attend the dis
trict school three months in the year, do
ing chores night and morning. But with
their son the father and mother mutually
resolve it shall be very different All the
coveted avenues of learning, closed to the
parents, shall be open to the boy. For
this they plan and contrive, never doubt
ing but that their son will prize the prlvi-
leges as fully as his father would have
done.
But perhaps the path is made too smooth.
The boy who pored over problems by the
light of faring pitch-pine knot, set in
the wall of his cabin home, was stimulated
by the difficulties in his way. Now that,
in the case of his son, these difficulties are
removed, the stimulus seems to have gone
also With every inducement of leisure
and opportunity the desire to study seems
passive, and the father finds to his disap-
pointment, that the object for which he
toiled is undervalued after all. For his
son is quite content with a superficial edu-
cation, and regards farming as beneath
him. An instance Of this kind came to
my notice when visiting at a prosperous
farm home The only son was in his
twenty-frst year and attending the Nor
NAL School. He was pale and nerveless,
seeming to lack exercise. By the way in
L
that his primary education was neglected.
His father told me that he kept hired
man in order that his son should have
good education and not be hindered by
having to work.
There were a writing-desk and some
shelves of good books. for which the father
alone seemed to have use. The active,
wide-awake, intelligent farmer found time
to read, study and write amid all the
labors attendant upon the profitable man
agement of a ninety-acre farm. He ex-
perimented with soils, he believed in the
rotation of crops, and he had opinions or
the live subjects of the times. Which was
the better educated man of the two? The
son seemed to think a careful display of
his watch-chain an important duty, but he
could not join in the animated discussions
of the neighbors at an evening call, and he
only incidentally knew that there had been
fearful shipwreck at Samoa.
The monotonous routine of crops of
wheat, corn and potatoes, alternating with
potatoes, corn and wheat, has doubtless
often served to weaken the bonds between
the boy and the farm. The new era of
small fruit raising has an opposite ten
u6ucN. OdlCIIlS W tuS pUpuldI tdSt6 III
raising luxuries for the table, for which
immediate profits are returned, seems like
an assured business. The brisk trade, the
competition, the necessity of strict methods
of dealing, which of themselves are sure
ties of good regulations, all combine to
stimulate the boys energies, and he looks
over the ground with new ideas of its ca
pacity and development. His interest is
aroused, and there is seldom a relapse into
the old, sluggish indifference after that.
The sense of proprietorship is strong in
the youth 1t should be gratifed wherever
possible, for it also implies responsibility
and trust.
| The absolute possession of colt, for
which the boy is alone responsible, will do
more to endear the home larm to him than
any other argument that can be brought
! forward. And no more harm can be done
him than to disregard his rights to the
| ownership. In some cases a share in the
| fruit evaporator or the incubator has
proved paying investment for the father
to make The farm is not endeared to the
boy as to the father, who planned, saved
and worked to obtain it, redeeming it from
the original forest perhaps, and seeing it
grow INTO fertility IN MS care. Lime may
bring appreciation, but for the present give
the boy tangible interest in the farm, a
portion of land or an interest in the crops,
and see what the effect viii be.-Anna E.
| Treat, in Cincinnati Commercial Gazette.
THE GOOD FARMER.
If there are any happy families it seems
as if ii should be good farmers. But there
are several prerequisites to constitute a
happy farmer. 1t is utterly impossible to
be good farmer or happy man without
a good wife. One is of no account without
the other, and they must be just suited for
each other in industry, temper and taste.
They must have a good farm, not large, a
comfortable house, neat and appropriate.
They must be out of debt and their farm
suitably stocked with the most profitable