Norwich bulletin., 1909-10-16
A FARMERS. TALK ID FARMERS
A Practical Lesson on Lambs-What Can Be Done to Raise Prices when the Middeman is Offering Too Low Prices-The Competition Among Farmers Like Other Competitions God Helps Those who Help Themselves.


 be little meaner than we in some ways; probably we're a bit meaner than he in some others We're all poor miserable sinners" and the cir cumstance that We only say so on Sunday doesn't alter the fact that we are so all the week. Tt is naught, 1t , is naught, saith the buyer; but when he is gone his way then he boasteth." That was human nature three thou sand years ago; 1t is today. That it's mighty poor sort of human nature should inspire us to a reformation of our own brand, rather than a denun- citation of the other fellows. For really, you know, we're not responsible for him in any such degree as we are for our own dear selves.
 Moreover and furthermore, the fact that somebody else is greedy and us for being fools. A neighbor of mine, in large market in the nearest city. saw farmer sell two carcasses of lamb good lamb fat lamb--the other day, al l. cents pound, dressed, at the very time WI cn I was getting and he could have got 16 cents a pound. Now that marketman wasn't any more to blame for buying the meat for less than it was worth than MT. Farmer was for selling it for less than it was worth. It takes two to make bar gain. The one can't buy unless the other will sell. The buyer couldn't have picke. up that extra four cents unless the farmer had thrown it away.
 But every farmer is competing against every other farmer, and we're all cutting our own throats," you say. Don't you suppose the middleman has any competition? Don't, you suppose his rivals are eager to cut his busi- ness throat? He has got to keep his ears wide open and his weather eye lifting and his bargain sense alert all the time or he will find himself out generalled and driven from the field. He has got to look out for his own interests, and you and I have got to look cut for our own.e We aren't sup posed to safeguard him, and you may be sure he isn't 'cosseting us.
 We farmers must protect ourselves, if we are going to have any protection. That seems to be the law of things. That more organization wouL. help along in this line is probable. That a wider circulation of knowledge about market needs and supplies would help is also probable. But all those helps we must wait for and finally get only in combinations and as compromises. There remains the chance offered to individual foresight. and individual judgment and individual self-restraint Right there Is field where each one of us can help himself. Whatever gain he secures in that area he secures per- manently and for himself. Whatever profit he wins in that way goes to his own pocket.
 We don't have to keep in the rut somebody else has made. We are not compelled to do things just as father did them, or as the neighbors do them There is no occupation on earth which affords opportunity for wider diversiication of work and pro- duction than ours. If we can't raise wheat at profit, how about potatoes? If potatoes won't pay, we can try rye. If none of these things produce a prof it, there's the fruit orchard or the veg etable garden. If sheep and lambs fail how about eggs and broilers Why, I could go on and fill up this column with a bare catalogue of the various sorts of farming which are open to us. Nor are we absolutely at the mercy of any one market. Often we can make our own markets: often We can play two against each other.
 But anyway, and in any case, If we aren't getting fair pay for our work and our products, the very first per- sons to haul over the coals are our selves and not somebody else. The chances are certainly even that we are ourselves largely and wholly responsi- ble. "The fault, dear Brutus, Is not in our
 stars, But .n ourselves. that we are under
 lings."
 
 Brawn and brains are requisites for success in this world. A man can't be a farmer without brawn; surely I | am not going to insult the guild to which I am proud to belong by pre- suming that it's members are shy on brains. No; the trouble is not that we haven't brains. but that so many of us W w)n't use what we've got. God helps them that help themselves" Sid- | ney said 1t in the 18th century; Her vert in the 17th; Benjamin Franklin in the 18th; you and I have the right | to say 1t in the 20th.
 THE FARMER