Middletown transcript., 1896-02-15

fertilizing. Potash and phosphoric
acid is probably what the orchard most
needs to produce good fruit. What
ever nitrogen is needed may be Sc
cured by growing and plowing under
crops of clover. Plan to cultivate and
fertilize the orchard for three or five
years, to discover whether or not
larger and better crops may not thus
be secured. DIR. G. G. Croft, in Inde-
pendent.
WHAT CAUSES THE HARD TIMES.
| III. Cooley Green in the Country
| Gentleman says: These are times when
we see superfluity of extravaganza
and hear not little about economy.
The one, like the poor, We have al
ways with us; the other has become
history-a thing of the past which we
read of, but seldom see.
/ Economy is said to have been the
means by which our fathers were enabl-
ed to build these fine, large farm houses
that we see scattered over the country,
and withal paid off their mortgages, so
that they owned their farms clea 81
incumbrance. Surely our fathers a.i,i
grandfathers must have built those
spacious dwellings, for none of us Of
the present generation could get money
enough together to do it, though we
handle annually more than they ever
dreamed of. The fathers of old built
commodiously and filled their homes
with sons and daughters. The present
occupants, for. lack of the sons
and daughters, Gil those ancestral
halls with Brussels carpets, plu.h
furniture and bric-a-brac, and cover
tie broad acres not with an at
mosphere of th.ift and plenty, but
with bonds and mortgages which will
be entailed upon generations to come.
This is the fashion of the times, and
President Cleveland is merely follow
ing the fashion when he covers the
country with blanket of bonds. The
making of bonds and mortgages is no
crime. 1t becomes necessity. The
cause, not the effect, is the crime. Ex-
travagance is the cause; bonds and
mortgages, private and national, are
the legitimate effect, and he who re-
fuses to give his bond for debt which |
he cannot presently pay, is, to say the
least, poor manager.
These things have now gone so far |
that the situation has become sugges-
tive, and our wise men in legislative |
halls and in periodicals are telling us
how ii has all come about. One blames |
the tariff for ii; a second charges it to |
gold monometalism, a third to the ex |
travagance of legislative appropriations.
A few are honest enough to charge it
to an almost universal lack of economy
in personal expenditure.
In the days Of long ago, farmers
sons would often hire out summers.
chop wood winters, putting all they
could save at interest for few years,
buy small farm, marry a farmers
daughter, raise family, and mean
while pay for the farm.
Now we see farmers sons sporting
fast horses, waiting on fast girls, pay
ing 500 to $100 year for cigars, spend
ing as they go all the money they can
get honestly or otherwise, marrying
latter having sown their wilds oats),
looking about for some easy employ
ment with big pay. going from town
to town, boarding or rooming, and
learning the whole vocabulary of the
gromblers about hard times.
Economy is left out of that vocabul-
ary. 1t has no place there. If it were
to be put in, there would be no room
for those other magic words which :,
sound so big and mean SO little, by
which our political huckstes are enab
led to soar SO high on the atmosphere
Of popular disappointment. If the
people could so curb the prevalent am
bition to excel in outward appearance
rs to lop off the habits of expensive +
that is included in !
the term luxurious living---and be |
content to live soberly, righteously and
within the limits of legi-
Innate earnings, hard times with far
mers would soon cease.
The State Grange of California, says +
he San Francisco Chronicle, instruc. b
ed its committee on education to pre- ]
,are plan for systematic home study S
IN the affairs of rural life, with special o
eference to the better equipment of a
armers for business transactions. The p
has accordingly arranged
Rural Study Circle of California.
The object of study is to be the pro- II
luction and disposal Of farm products. n
Studies relating to the disposal of pro- r
ducts, including transportation and "
are to be directed-as to W
distract principles involved-by the de- 9,
,artment of economics of Stanford o.
University, but facts relating to mar q,
lets, freights, demand and supply, ex- I,
sting and probable demand for various =;