Montana news. [volume] (Lewistown, Mont.) 1904-191?, 1905-07-12

Ihlco Mont, june IS 1905.
Dear Comrade: For fear that you
may get out of touch with the farm
ing element | now take my pen in
hand to let you know that | have
been much discontented of late and
hope these few lines will find you in
the same fix. For the past ten days
| have put in my time fighting potato
bugs. | have sprayer that does
the business all right and can get
over my patch in about four hours;
then along comes a shower and
washes off the poison and can do
it all over again. But that makes
work and anything that makes work
must be blessing to the poor man.
1t also makes fellow think, and
have been thinking lately that the
average American farmer is the big
gest ass that roams the prairie. If
anything is lacking it is that he has
not learned to kick effectively. Bugs,
grasshoppers, mosquitoes, worms,
skunks and other vermin, drought.
rain, hail, frost and cyclones the
farmer has to contend with before
he gets a crop. After months of
steady battling with nature he per-
haps finally gets a crop, and then he
goes up against the leeches.
In order to get his crop to the
market he has to have the aid of
elevators, cattle pens, railroads,
refrigerator cars, ect., all of which
belong to the other fellow, and the
other fellow fixes the price, the
farmer pays for the use of them when
he gets his crop to market. The
other fellow fixes the price on it
there, and the farmer can take the
price or ship his stuff back home.
Naturally he takes it, and as he
counts it over and balances up the
accounts of his years work he dumb
ly wonders why it is that so much
work brings so little money. A
dozen little pleasures that he had
planned go vanishing away in the
dim distance. That little visit that
he and wife had intended to take to
see the old folks will have to be
postponed for another year, the
Christmas presents for the children
will have to be cut down, the ad-
dition to the house cannot be
reached and they can add but little
to their already scanty wardrobe.
He buys a cheap hand me down"
suit of clothes for himself and a
calico dress for his wife, and the
wife spends hours mending his old
overalls, where new ones could be
made in minutes if the people owned
the machinery of production, while
the southern farmer burns his cot
ton to raise its price.
never see a man with a pair of
patched overalls on, but think of
the unnecessary waste of some
woman's labor.
But hope springs eternal" in the
farmers breast. His wife cheers
him up with the remark that next
year there may be better prices.
Times may be better. There may
be failure of crops in India (ac-
compained by famine) or better
yet Russia and England or some
other foreign powers may go to war
with each other accompanied by
prayer.) Anyway the farmer is
tickled to death because he has his
job left. He thinks he has cinch
on his job when the fact of the mat
ter is, the job has a cinch on him.
The proletarian-the worker in
sweat shop, factory, mine or mill
can quit his job and leave the smoke
and dust and CRIME and noise and
tramp out through the country for
month or two. where he can enjoy
the songs of the birds and the scent
of the flowers, and the sunlight and
the beautiful blue sky; he can bathe
in the rivers, lie on the green grass,
drink pure water and he will lose
n. n - a