The farmer and mechanic. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 18??-19??, 1911-12-05

u the supply flOuSe, WHICH HIS hCi6A
Dor, Jim Mulekin. came up with a
| single bale Of cotton on his one-mule
wagon.
Henry had passed the last sack OF
oats into the warehouse, and Jim
sang out:
Hi. Henry. you buying supplies,
too?"
NO" said Henry, ST am selling
supplies for fellows like o to buy.
Are you going to sell that ~cotton?"
YES" said Jim, Il have got to sell
it to settle with the supply company
for the meat and feed I got all sum-
n,er, and I have got to bring more.
too, but my old mule could only haul
one bale over these roads, and when
1 have settled up I will have mighty
little left to live on this winter"
Have you not raised any corn or
oats or hay?"
well. I raised a little corn, but the
summer was so dry that I did not get
| enough to feed my mule through the
winter, to say nothing Of. meal for
the house, and I had to kill my pigs
because there was not corn enough to
finish fattening them, and the meat
is poor stuff. and I shall have to buy
meat another summer. I'll have to
buy cotton seed hulls, I guess, for my
mule and SOW, and by the time this
summers mortgage is settled, I will
nav to make another on next years
crop. I can't grow anything but cot
ton, because that is the only thing /
can get n out Of"
WELL said Henry, II do not find
it that way. I raised a good GRO of
cats, fully SO or more bushels an acre,
and I have just sold so bushels for
65 cent a bushel. I have not sold a
n1.,o - oA- 1865 l. - 49, -
sell any till h price is better, though,
IL fact. at the present price, 9 cents
a pound, there would be some margin
for me, for I have kept an accurate
account, and nay cotton has cost me
less than 5 cents a pound. Then I
have all the peavine hay I can feed.
In fact, I have got to buy more stock
to eat up my hay and the corr slower
that I hav had shredded. And I
traded my cotton seed at the mill for
meal, and I am going to feed that,
too, and I hope to have manure
enough in the spring and during the
winter to cover over the crimson
Glove that I shall turn under for
corn. And I shall probably have some
corn to sell in the spring. but as I am
fattening a good lot Of hogs and some
beef cattle I shall not sell any corn
yet. I broke my pea stubble well and
soWed 1t to crimson clover which I
shall turn under for cotton, and save
a goodly part OF the fertilizer"
But said Jim. "it must take a
good lot of money to farm your way.
/ have only one mule, and I can't
break and like you do and can only
work SO much land in cotton and corn,
and I have nothing to work with but
a plow."
YES" said Henry" a few a
g I was in the same condition. and
L determined to get out OF it. I got
some good books on farming and took
The Progressive Farmer and began to
study farming as q profession. I went
IN debt for another mule and went to
work to pillow my land better and put
it into a regular rotation Of crops, and
[ have stuck to it. Last spring, when
cotton was away up in the figures, I
did not do like you and a lot of Others,
Plant every acre I could pillow in cot
ton, but l stuck to the regular rota-
ton n made a bale and a half an
acre, made SO bushels of oats and the
same or corr that was planted on
crimson clover sod. I have saved in
the b of cultivation by getting a
t~wo-horse cultivator, a weeder and a
smoothing harrow, and I get over the
land SO fast that the grass has no
chance Then l always have clover to
turn for corn and cotton and never
have any bare land wasting fertility
In the winter rains. and nv farm is
increasing in productiveness every
year. Jim, you had three times as
much land in cotton as / had, and I
, made more cotton than you did and
made h oats and peavine hay and
corn besides"
That's So" said Jim. but your
land is rich and mine is poor"
Yes" said Henry, land ms and
was as poor as yours when broke
away from the old practice and went
to farming. and it has grown richer
, because / ave farmed it and have
put more humus into it, and have
raised forage and fed it and made
manure-and made something on the
stock. too. Don't you see, Jim, hat
you are no better off today than you
were last spring? In fact, you are
worse off, for the price of cotton has
I drnnnP6 and ~n,, hoxa rofL;-- elsa