Oxford Democrat. [volume] (Paris, Me.) 1833-1933, 1912-07-09

When travelling in the Old World If W,
see a magnificent building, with beauti
full grounds, adjoining an ancient de
mesne of oak, and coming out of ths
doorway fat old dowager, whose every
move suggests exclusiveness, and with
her . young dude with q monocle anC
cane, the question arises in our mind
Do these people fit the place? A mag
nificent place, truly, built by strong, vir
| lie men two hundred or five hundred
years ago; but do these people fit il:
Could they have conceived the idea!
Could they have built il?
Sometimes when travelling over the
country and looking at the magnificent
farms In the Mississippi Valley, the ques-
tion also arises: Does the farmer lit the
place? His farm has been built by the
great farmer of farmers, and apparently
with infinite pains continued for many
generations. The glacier has ground
the soil finely and deposited il to a great
depth. Waters are hid beneath the sur
face, or in the more rolling sections, per
ennially pour from the underlying rock
on which the glacier deposited its bur
den. Vegetable matter has been accum-
ulaiing ever since the glacier left Ii. A
magnificent foundation; a magnificent
structure. Does the farmer fit IL?
Sometimes he does. On this super
structure he has founded a home. 1t
may have cost much or it may have cost
little; but the home that fits this place
has a'cerrain character so6Gt It that mas
no definite relation TO i's cost. IL is
slightly. The other buildings match the
home. Everything is neat. The fences
are in good repair. The roads are
dragged after every rain. The orchard
il well trimmed; the garden nicely
planted and cultivated by q boy and a
horse, instead of girl and a hoe.
Evidently this man fits the farm and fits
tue place.
IL the we'll is long distance from the
house and near the outbuildings; II the
gates are off the hinges; il the house
gives no evidence of paint; If there are
neither flowers nor vines around it, II the
hogs and chickens have access to the
garden; if the fences are three-strand
barbed wire, sagging here, and there
broken; IL the machinery is lying out OF
doors since used last year; If perennial
weeds such as burdock, wild parsnip and
horse nettle are in evidence; If the fields
have sort of sad look; if there are un-
drained sloughs or open gullies or stag
uant ponds anywhere; then we conclude
that the man does not fit the place any
better than the dowager and the dude MT
the palatial home in the Old World.
Do you fit the place? We see other
farms that are evidently not owned by
the man who tills the soil, who is renting
by the year, with no hope or promise OF
continuance. 1t may be that he fits the
place. 1t may be that the place does
not fit him; for there is many tenant
who, IL he had the opportunity, would
change the appearance of sorely neg
lected looking place. Even with no op-
portuuity, and no encouragement, for
his own sake and the sake of his family,
and without pay, he is often trying to
make the place something worth looking
after. If he had any encouragement he
would make it fit a good neighborhood.
l. the landlord trying to make the place
fit the neighborhood, or is he simply try
ing to get all he can out of IL and saying
to himself, after me the deluge. What
has posterity ever done for me?"-
Walace's Farmer.