Norwich bulletin., 1910-01-22

seems hard and unreasonable to him | that he should have to blister his hands | with the rough hoe handle, or waste i his time the multiplication table. ! The trout brook and the "sWimmin'- | hole" and the ball field offer much more attractive opportunities for the investment of his energy. Moreover | the farmers boy-and it is of him that I am chiefly thinking-has few chances | for com pairing his disadvantages with | the disadvantages of those in other | lines of work He knows, to the bot tom, the last hard, hurting facts about farm work, but he seldom sees or hears the similar side of other avocatiOns. Of l them he gets but superficial, surface views. It is small wonder that occu- pations of which he sees only the pleas ant side attract him. while the voca-
 ton in which he finds himself and of whose hardShipS he has daily experi- ence repels him and drives him to dis content
 When we are bewaiIng the tendency
 of young folks to leave the farm, it
 a little how the situation finds itself in their eyes. Can't we put ourselves
 in their places? If that is too big strain on our selfishness, can't we, somehow, bring back to our memories our own boyllOod experiences and feel ings2 Can't we recall how things used to seem to us, then, and thereby get at least an inkling of how they are prob ably seeming to the youngster trailing dejectedly and sorely behind us upon some irritating and odious task?
 It is barely possible, if we could do this, that we might see one reason why so many lads want to get off the farm.
 We might also perhaps discover, by taking sufficient thought, how we could make things easier and pleaSanter for them, their way
 know some farmers, brought up hardly and sternly, who are so over loaded with self-conceit and bump tiousness as to think themselves exact ly the stuff" the training they had exactly the right training for all; the hardships they endured exactly the proper fitting to make all boys grow into the same superior sort of men they consider themselves as being. There's no use talking to such critters They invariably know it all, or think they do, and are as impervious to reason as a chopping- block. But most of us have some little modesty hidden away in dark corners, anda re not quite so cer- tain that we are absolutely and com pletely all right and patterns for future generations We love the old farms, even their rocks and stun1ps; we want the juniors to love 'em, too. We find real satisfaction in the art of farming; we want the juniors to find the same. We have learned whole lot about the science of agriculture; we want the juniors to start where we leave. off and carry their knowledge farther-into
 
 of deeper mysteries.
 Therefore we do not want them to get disgusted with the farm before they have learned it's boundaries Yet many of them do. How can we pre- vent it?
 think one way is along this line caIioW f wye young sei1s things; they haven't found out how rough the world really is; they haven't our hardened hands nor our developed muscles nor our dull ed sensitivenesS to pin-pricks; the scratches which we hardly notice are bloody wounds upon them; the little ills we suffer in silence send them into sobbing paroxysms the wage of sweat and toll we uncon plainin gIy pay be- with it. they pay because we exact it and they do not know what for. They cannot see things as our older eyes see them. Yet they are generally open to -argument-if the argument is one they are able to understand. And they are appreciative of right treatment-if it is really right to their comprehen- sion, which may or may not be like ours. You can drive a horse to water. but you can't make him drink. You can make the boy stay on the farm and do the work until he is of age. but you can't make him stay one day longer, if he has been so managed to hate the farm and it's work. More flies are caught with moIasses than with vine 2dr. bOyS-dflu IItll. lOO-cdn SOule- times be led where they can't be driv- en. You can call a cosset lamb in any direction by walking ahead and shak- ing the grain measure; you can steer a pig by getting behind him and pulling his tail in the direction you don't want him to go. In one case you find out the lambs disposition and take ad- vantage of it; in the other you do the same with the pig.
 Aren't your own youngsters as well worth studying and humoring as sheep and swine?
 am not arguing for course of cod