Keowee courier. [volume] (Pickens Court House, S.C.) 1849-current, 1899-01-19
BILL ARPT FARMERS.
Cotton Not the Only Urop---The Drum
mer's Monkey Story.

AoA . "AVHhoJ SevkSs ,- ~ -.
s Not long ago one-horse farmer
from the backwoods came to our
town with two bales of cotton and
sold it for s oents a pound. This
was his entire crop and he was com.
planning bitterly to one of our mer-
chants and said that tho farmers
would perish to death in another
year If there wasn't some change for
the better. A mischievous drum
mer, standing by, said "Well, my
friend, you must quit raising cotton
or else buy some monkeys to pick it
out. Over in India and Egypt they
make the monkeys pick their cotton,
and that is what's the matter. A
monkey will pick thousand pounds
day and he feeds on the seed. So
it costs hardly anything over there
to raise cotton, and our farmers in
Mississippi and Texas have sent over
for hundred thousand monkeys,
and they will be over here in time to
pick the next crop and the price
will 60 lower still, and if you don't
get yon q monkey c: two you had
g better quit growing cotton, for you
can't compete with Monkeys" The
old man took it oil in seriously and
said : "Well, what is poor farmer
to dc if he hasn't got the money to
buy the monkey2"
"Grow something else," said the
drummer. "Grow corn and wheat
and sorghum and potatoes. Plant
apple and peach trees, raise chick
ems and eggs, and yearlin calf or
two to sell. Get up soon and stir
around lively and make every men,
Der of your family work. Work at
something, for if you don't you will
perish out. Go back home and
take new start. Don't sit down
and grumble and blame somebody
else with your poverty. Quit cot
ton until you can buy half a dozen
monkeys"
Tho man went back home and cir
culated the monkey story, and for
ten miles around the one-horse far
mers have sworn off from raising
any more cotton. That's what they
tell me. They say that before the
war the poor man couldn't compete
with the rich mans niggers, and
now since he has lost his niggers he
is buying monkeys to take their
places, and TIE poor man won't have
any chance at all.
Of course there is no truth in this
story, but there is q good deal of
philosophy. New methods, new
plows and new machinery are the
monkeys, and if the poor farmer
does not work early and late he will
keep poor. | know some country
women who make more money on
their chickens and eggs and butter
than their husbands do on their cot
ton and wheat. Little things well
nursed count up more than big ones.
The thrifty farmer always brings
with him something to sell when he
has to come to town. Some fowls
or eggs or potatoes Or shoat OF
some fruit in its season. There is a
good home market for all these little
things. In fact, if we leave out cot.
ton everything the farmer grows
brings about the same old prices of
ten years ago, and everything he has
to buy, except coffee, is much cheaper
now than it was then. Everything
that is made of cotton is so per
cent cheaper and everything made
of iron or steel or tin is 100 per cent
cheaper Beef and pork and chick
ems and turkeys and eggs and wood
and potatoes and apples and peaches
have not come down o nickle in ten
years. Labor is little cheaper, not
much. We still pay the same for
cooking; and washing and work in
the garden. If anybody has q roa-
son for complaining of hard times it
is the town people we have every
thing to buy. The farmer who is
not in debt and owns his farm is bet
ier OF tIan he ever was anu the
prudent renter can pay rent and
make money farming.
But Of course thore is a large
class of shiftless, unthrifty people
who will not succeed at anything,
and they blame everybody for it but
themselves. Cobe says that the Lord
had to make poor folks to keep rich
folks in money, and so Cobo is con.
tent in being poor, for it is the Lords
will, | know folks who have not
planted frnit tree and who will not
even plant agarden. Poverty makea
somo folks shifty and others indiffer-