Year: 1874

FARM LIFE IN THE FUTURE.


The Winter is past, and if the rains are
not yet "over and gone" in the language
of the Sacred Song, the trees are putting
forth their green leaves, and everything in
nature is rapidly assuming the habiliments
of Spring. The great industry of the coun-
ty, farming, has taken new lease of &C
tivity and an army of stalwart arms and
strong confiding hearts is pressing forward
for the prizes of another year, to be gath
cred and garnered beneath the glow and
heat of July sun and the dreamy haze Of
golden October.


An advance of no inconsiderable import
ance has been made by number Of the
farmers of the county, we are led to believe,
over previous years, in assuming position
looking to bettering their condition in the
future, both as individuals and as class.
A more fraternal spirit has been awakened
among agriculturists and they are coming
to understand and act upon the principle
that what is the interest of one is generally
the interest of all. The farmer single
handed and alone, owing to his spirit of
self-imposed isolation, has been compelled
to meet the combined influence of almost
every other industrial pursuit, nearly all
which have associations and "unions."


The farmer has been found ready to
enter into secret arrangement against his
fellow farmers with any sharp trader that
came along. If he had stock to sell he
would willingly bind himself to secrecy
against his neighbor at the request of the
stock dealer and give the shrewd and not
over scrupulous drover every advantage in
operating singly and secretly with each
farmer in the neighborhood, and those who
were weak and ine1periencedin in the business
were easily victimized by the middle man.
And so also with other articles of produce,
where the strongest motive, self-interest,
existed to make common cause in pro-
curing the best market prices, by associa-
tion and mutual understanding, it too often
happens that the opposite course is pursued.


This is only one class Of advantages to
be derived by the farmer in seeking a more
perfect association and cooperation with
his brother farmers. The educational and
social aspects of the case reach out and
point to vast fields for improvement, from
which untold blessings await the agricul-
tural interest. There is no industry which
has so many and great inducements for
cooperation as that of farming. The
every day life experiences of the farmer, if
contributed to common stock, would
aggregate an amount of useful information
of inestimable benefit to every member in
the neighborhood, which he cannot acquire
in any other way.


The necessary isolation of families en-
ployed in agriculture, makes the social
question one of the greatest importance,
and the necessity to meet the strong induce
ments which the towns and cities hold out
especially to the younger members of the
family-to enjoy the natural craving for
society, calls loudly for counter influence
from the rural neighberhoods. Too much
hard labor and too little social intercourse
and recreation is the bane of the country
life. This problem presses as hard for a
solution as an increase of crops and greater
remuneration for the capital and labor
invested in farming. Association and CO.
operation by the system of Oranges or any
other plan of association that is properly
carried out, points the way to overcome
these evils. The corrupting influences of
the cities and large towns must be counter
acted by the purer and more healthy life of
the country, and there is no time should be
lost in organizing the social forces which
pervade the rural home, to check the rank
growth of moral weeds which is spreading
SO rapidly over the land, aided as it is
by the modern modes of rapid transit,
steam and electricity. This frightful moral
pestilence which walketh at MONDAY may
be seen in every avenue of public life, from
the capital of the nation down through
every State and municipal government to
the smallest village. Its great primary
school may be found in the saloon and vii
lage greg shop which foster idleness and
vice in their many fold forms. To shine in
borrowed plumes, to eat the bread of idle
ness, at no matter whose expense, and to
riot in luxury and laugh to scorn honesty
and integrity, and ape religion by ostenta-
tious display of church service, is the
malady of the day which rises from the
overcrowded streets of the towns and cities,
a moral malaria, like the fever breeding
miasma of stagnant pools.