Year: 1859

some twelve dozen saved up, and intend to


try the market to morrow


Times are as hard here as ever, and no
prospect of their being any better for the
present There are great many starting
for Pixies Peak in search of gold, and
many more would GO if they could get
away. Speculation has nearly ruined Min
nesota for the present; but we are in hopes
there will be something left of it after all.
| 1t has many real advantages, which will
make IL great State some time. The land
speculation is about over; but farms are
really worth as much as ever, and if there
was capital enough to work them to ahvan-
tage. money might be made here as we'll as
in the older Western States. There are per-
haps nine tenths of the people here mostly
or quite as poor as myself, and that is poor
enough. Each farmer might keep fifteen
or twenty head of cattle if he could get
them, and cultivate from twenty-five to
forty acres of crops if he had the land broke
and pair of horses to do the work. have
raised forty bushels of shelled corn on one
acre the past Summer, and my yield would
no doubt have AVERAGED that if the squir-
rels had not pulled up so much just after it
came up, and I could have hoed or cultiva-
ted it in season. As it was, l only got $50
bushels from eight acres. We have the
wild morning glory here, which is the
worst weed l ever saw. 1t grows very
if not attended to In time climbs the corn
and winds round the stalk so tight that it
girdles it and prevents its coming out. It
is easily kept down if taken in season and
plowed often. One of my neighbors clear
ed field of ten acres this Summer by plow-
ing four times both ways, and pulling
round the hills wherever, the plow did not
reach. l think We can raise corn nearly as
cheap here as they can III any part of the
West If we could have horses to cultivate it |
in season. But the idea of raising corn by
hand -hoeing for thirty cents the bushel is
discouraging. My neighbor. who had
claim five months after mine, had 81 900
to begin with. His crop last Summer was
90 bushels of wheat, 100 of oats 900 of
corn, 500 of potatoes, six of beans and three |
of peas, from twenty nine acres. He did |
the work with one pair of horses and an
average of one man for six months He |
kept six cows and fattened ten hogs and |
yoke of oxen, while my sixteen acres, most |
ly cultivated by hand hoeing, and one COW
and one pig, has not produced enough to
furnish our family with the recources of
life


"If the land does not come into market
this year, il the Homestead bill should pass,
$500 would put ME on my feet, for I can
change off. my steers for one horse, and
with the money buy another horse, wag-
on, and few things to relieve our most
pressing wants, and I could, with horse
team. do nearly all my farm work alone,
and sell wood enough in town next Winter
to buy all that is needed for the family /
might, by preempting my claim. and mort
gaging the land to some of the Shylocks |
hereabouts, get the money by paying SO
pei. cent. per annum for it-S144 year
for $500. dare not do it. had better
give half my claim for preempting the
whole, sell the remaining half for what |
can get, and go to Pixies Peak or the d.
at once. iaa aas .zfI4uslas


1--WE were very thankful for the paper
sent with the letter. and should be very
glad to have you send US papers occasional
ly, as am unable to take one this year I
have been a club subscriber to the N VI
Tribune for two years, and / miss it very |
much. Ii seemed a kind of connecting
link which bound us to the rest of the hu-
man family


That is the climax OF privation surely.
To be reduced to corn bread and pork fat is
hard; to see ones little children ragged and
shoeless. is harder; but to be cut off from
communication with the rest of the human
family, to miss the weekly coming of the
Tribune, is hardest of all. The picture of |
squatter life drawn above, without the |
slightest idea that it would ever find its way |
into print, is, We fear, too correct a resem |
blance, not of one case only, but of very
large number.