The Yale expositor. (Yale, St. Clair County, Mich.) 1894-current, 1900-01-26
Sunshine and Shadow on the Farm.

Sunshine and SHADOW on the Farm.
The Following is q paper read by Miss Sarah
| Mckenzie, OF Mt Salem, at the Farmers Insti-
tute here this week.
Picture, we may, this old earth of
ours without one ray of sunshine to
smile upon it. What is our picture?
Do we behold the fresh green meadow,
the babbling brook, the verdant forest,
or the cattle upon thousand hills?
| Nay, picture Mother Earth without
her sunshine and she is Mother Earth
no more. Naught but barren mass
of burned-out rock unable to nourish
| the smallest and meaneSt of animals or
vegetable life. For, from the smallest
twig to the giant of the forest; from
the little brook that runs through your
meadow to the mighty Amazon; from
the tiniest creeping thing to the mon
arch of the jungle; yea, and lord of Gre
alton, himself, are not only nourished
but owe their existence to the pure,
holy rays of Gods sunshine.
Yes, to the sunbeams. Sunbeams
that fall, perchance, through your
window, that fall upon your neighbours
threshold.
But what of the shadows? Great
would be the CONSERVATION IL Apollo
with his sun chariot should fail some
morning to drive up above the eastern
horizon. After few moments re-
Election we must say that the tempo
rary shadows are but a second blessing,
a blessing sent to neutralize the first.
In my subject, Sunshine and Shadow
on the Farm, we all know that, in COM
parison to the streams of sunshine
flooding broad acres of the farmer, the
shadows cast by impending objects are
very trihing
So, speaking fguratively, will strive
to show like comparison between the
sunshine, or the bright side; and the
shadows, or the dark side of the farm
er's life. Of all the rays of sunshine
none are more eagerly grasped than
that of health. And no wonder that
priceless sunbeam is coveted by all;
for what matter if we have the talent
Of Shakespeare or a Mozart, or
possess the wealth of a Rothschild and
have not health wherein is the profit or
pleasure?
Wholesome food, pure air, and suffi.
Gent exercise are the main springs of
good health.
Surely these are the farmers heri-
tage. Who dare deny him his right of
L
garden, his orchard his apiary, his
poultry yard. and his flocks and herds
supply him with the choicest of fresh,
pure food? Food unadulterated by
the hand of the manufacturer or mid
dleman.
Who, with his active outdoor life
has better chance to inhale the life
| giving oxygen, to breathe air untainted
by the factory's smoke or the alleys
filth?
AS to sufficient exercise, my farmer
friends will vouch for it. But bear in
mind that work and plenty of it is
Gods blessing instead of his curse.
Remember, that although your lot be
hard-its harder still to have no work
to do.
The sunbeam "good health" smiles
very bountifully upon the farmer; and
what is the result? Statistics show us
that the average life of the farmer is
very long i'll comparison with the lives
of people engaged in other pursuits.
Is not his ruddy face and sturdy form
everywhere familiar? And does not
the farm send every year thousands of
her healthy young brain and Drawn to
enrich the city's impoverished blood.
The rays of intellectual sunshine
that crosses the farmers pathway have
been often lightly spoken of by un
thinking people. What / took as even
greater affront to the agriculturalist
than Markham's poem, the man with
the hoe classed in intelligence as a
brother of the OK, was remark /
heard concerning certain woman
the wife OF q professional man, whom,
the speaker said was wholly unadapted
for her position as such, but, judging
from her. mental capability and her
perfect adaptability to feed pigs, milk
cows, gather eggs, and hoe the garden
she had better have chosen farmer
| for husband. S. ii. Peabody has said
that in the six million farmer boys in tho
United States today lies the hope of
our government. That they will be
the leaders in every department of the
nations life, power and prosperity.
He is but judging from the past and
present. And are they sons whose
mothers are adapted only to farm
drudgery? Many an intellectual giant
of today points with pride to the old
omestead-speaks with reverence
almost divine of the dear mother who
so wisely guided his childish footsteps
and laid the foundation for his bril-
liant career.
But few weeks since / heard two
prominent teachers of high schools
acknowledge that in their experience
they found that the boy and girl from
the farm-the boy and girl who learn
their a, b, abs, in the little white school
house are, when put side by side with
their city and village cousins their
peers and even superiors mentally.
The rays of intellectual sunshine
that fall upon the farmer are exceed
ingly bright, but they shine with no
greater luster than shines that priceless
sunbeam morality.
Far removed from scenes of moral