The Vermont watchman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1883-1911, 1890-09-03

inducements offered to young men and
women in manufacturing towns-and
the nearer those towns are TO the farms
the easier it is for them to go there.
The great encouragement given to our
manufacturing interests by legislation
has had the intended effect to increase
the pay of factory help, and thus to
put up wages on the farm. This leads
directly to the abandonment of the
poorer paying farms-which are the
abandoned " ones in every instance
THIS is not by any means an argu-
ment against the protective system.
High wages for working men are a sign
of national advancement. On the farm
il is harmful only so far as the farmer
is unable to avail himself of farm ma
chinery to get as much or more work
done for the same money as before.
When to this is added more thorough
knowledge of their business, the farmer
should naturally be more prosperous
than before, because the local markets
of the manufacturing towns become
increasingly profitable to him.
To considerable extent these adj
vantages to the farmer have been multi
fed, because our railroad system has
worked against the interests of New
England farms, discriminating unduly
against the local farmer in favor of the
West. The farmers could rectify this
at the first session of the legislature, if
they would. That they do not, shows
what the next and probably the greatest
evil of all in this connection is-the bad
quality and small quantity of the edu-
cation given in our rural sch FOOLS. An
uneducated or ill-educated comm unity
is always weak one politically. This
is why the cities and villages control
the rural districts, although the latter
can usually control them.
in Vermont, the general excellence of
our soil, as compared with other settled
parts of New England, has made farm
ing sufficiently profitable to keep the
greater part of our capital invested
in agriculture. Manufactures have
uniformly sprung up first in New Eng
land, and prospered most, in those por-
tions where farming was least profit
able. Vermont is behind in manu-
features for the same reason that she
is ahead in in agriculture.
NEVERTHELESS, there can be no
doubt that it would be a decided ad-
vantage to all of us if we had in the
state such manufacturing industries as
have built up the large towns of south
ern New England. Though these
towns are near to us, and constitute
our principal markets, yet we do not
get from them the advantage we should
receive if there was large manufac-
turing population within wagon haul of
a good number of our farms. Made
thus independent of railroads, farmers
so located can easily compete with the
West; and such farms are the ones that
are still valued at high prices in New
England, and are rarely for sale.
DOUBTLESS it would have been adj
vantageous to Vermont if, instead of
sending men and money to the West,
it had kept both at home, and built up
more such industries as those of St.
Johnsbury and Brattleboro. Hereafter
we think this will be more commonly
done; but nothing would hurry it along
faster than an intelligent railroad man
agement, for factories, no less than
farms, require cheap and handy trans
pOrtatiOn.
Too much weight is given, in esti-
mating the progress and condition of
farming in New England, to the mere
numbers of the farm population. The
Maine Farmer remarks, in this con-
nection, that comparatively few men
are now employed in harvesting the
hay crop. Many farmers have no eX-
ira help, and others but a few days,
right in the thickest of the fight The
mowing-machine, the horse-rake and
: I
is equally true in other branches
of farming, but perhaps as note
worthy fact is that the large families
which used to mark the Yankee farm
er's home, bring out such a flock of
tow-heads " about the doors of an
evening, and make such long pro-
oauoiAp oh Il .,1a