Southern standard. (McMinnville, Tenn.) 1879-current, 1890-07-26
i arttt 2.#t4r4sfe,
Hold Fast.

Persistency wins. The gods are in
league with the stout, steadfast heart.
The iron will moulds and moves.
.Sticktoativeness is a good substitute
for brains, and alone will accomp-
lish the more. Vacillation moves, 1t
is true, but it advances only to fall
back and never gets beyond a short
arc; steadfast purpose may prove
more slowly, but always forward,
till the prize is seized.
Farming is good business, when
made business of. Idleness, ignor-
ance and thoughtlessness never
made money in the banking house,
mandatory or store; they have
never made money on the farm. The
same elements that bring financial
success in the city, bring it in the
country. The same traits of charac~
ter are the foundation stones of pros
perity and happiness everywhere.
Farming does pay, when it should
pay. A knowledge that is never sat-
isfed with its own attainments; an
enterprise that continually submits
to good judgment; an energy that
will not rest short of achievement
these bring success in agriculture, in
manufacturing, or in commerce.
Too many men are dissatisfied with
their occupation when they should
be dissatisfied with themselves. Not
the farm but the farmer is at fault.
Farm work is not mean work, unless
meanly done. If rightly done, it is
as much brain work as manufacture
ing or trading. If the farmer is dis
satisfied with his work because it is of
low grade, he convicts himself of
being a low grade farmer. Farming
is hard work, but then it is healthful
work. 1t tires, but it brings a good
appetite and sound slumber. The
farmer is not crowdedin a foul factory
confined in a small Office. And if the
work is hard, what of that? Who
has found easy work that is well paid
for? Labor saving inventions makes
farm work much easier for the mus
cles than it was thirty years ago. If
it taxes a man too much now, it is
because he is behind the times or
lazy.
The man who, born and bred in
the country, desires to leave his farm
and got to the city, is to he pitied
somewhat, and likely more to be
despised. He is to be pitied because
he is foolish enough to suppose that
in the city he would get the same pay
for less work or more pay for thesame
work. Cities are crowded full of
laborors. Even those most skilled in
city occupations find it hard to get
steady work at living wages. He
has not that skill required in the city;
he must be a common laborer; and
among common laborers competition
is to the death. On the farm he has
skill; in the city he has nOt-On the
streets, excepted. How can he eX-
pect to receive more for labor with
out skill than for labor with skill? II
he engages in business in the city he
encounters competition as sharp, and
against it he must contend without
the aid of special training. We are
almost justified in calling it sheer
luck if he is successful, in competi.
ton with a hundred that, though
trained in their business all theil
lives, must fall in nine cases out Of
ten. Almost every man who leaves
the farm and engage in business in
in the city, loses all he has. Better
is it to hold fast. The farm is a Ger
tainty; the city problematical, save
the well-nigh certainty offailure. L
is poor policy to sacrifice skill; bette
to hold fast to it.
Some men are continually tryinl
to change their work on the farm
They have as many pet notions as ;
spoiled baby. One scheme is scarce
ly off until another is on. Something
else always promises better thar
what they have. Truly, they "neve
are, but always to be, best" Whel
they have planted much corn, the!
wish they had given their land t,
wheat; when the land is wheat, the.
regret that they did not plant corn
When potatoes are a dollar bushel
they plant large area in potatoes
There are enough of them thus t,
make the supply of potatoes mucl
greater than the demand; potatoe
are then very cheap and they plan
no potatoes this year; the result is
scarcity and good prices; then the,