Year: 1873




BOYS.


The farm is or should be, source of
profit to the farmer. That is poor farm
indeed that does not pay for good cultiva-
ton. Two things go badly together, poor
farms and poor farmers. A good farmer
may make poor farm pay, while poor
farmer can rarely make any farm pay. That
farm must be so rich that it needs no dress
ing, and so wcedless as to need no hoeing,
and the seed so self-vegetating as to plant
and grow itself, without care, to be profta-
BILE to poor farmer. But as profitable as
good farms are to good farmers, there is fire.
quently a cry heard, Farming don't pay %
and one would think so to ride over the
country and see how often "shingle" is at
taohed to a place on which is scrawled or
painted, This place for SALE" or."This farm
for SALE" Often these farms appear as de-
sirable, at least to the passer.by, as one could
wish-rocky sometimes, certainly, but never
theless one can rarely see why, with its good
buildings, in good repair, pleasant location
and surroundings, it should not be desirable
as The farmers pleasant home, and profitable
for cultivation. There are certainly causes
for this state Of things. but the apparent
cause is that Farming don't pay" There
are some reasons why it does not pay which
are worthy Of notice.


First. A dissatisfaction at the farmers
plodding life, especially with farmers boys
City life is often preferable to country life
on farm. Tickling the earth with hoe"
in the spring, and then having to wait until
autumn to see it "laugh with a harvest"
seems altogether too long TO wait for remu-
neration, and then not to know just what the
crops are going to be aud how well they will
pay, is thought to be poorer encouragement
than some place on job team, or in a store
or office, with the prospect of present real
ization of thirty, forty, fifty or sixty dollars
per month. But in this apparent superiority
of advantage there is an increase of expense,
both necessary and incidental, which is for
gotten, as is also the terrible increase of ex-
thought of in the estimate Of all advantage
to be gained by the change. But alas both
are often forgotten, especially the latter, and
the golden hues of the morning gild the
sky of life's prospects, and the low hanging
cloud is unnOticed. So there is a restless
ness and desire to be slmething besides a
sun-browned, tough, healthy, sinewy farmer,
and the boys want to pack right up and 60
to Boston, New York, or elsewhere, for
more remunerative business than farming
then the father is left alone, and "help is
scarce" and he thinks he cannot afford to
hire and pay as good wages as men want for
other business, and so concludes to "sel
out" with the plea that "farming don't
pay" There is, however, ono uncontrovert-
able fact apparent, to wit: if farming don't
pay nothing pays, for man who "was formed
Of the dust of the ground" finds that the
food for his sustenance comes from the same
earthly source And behind all other occu-
pations stands the farmer-to feed all the
rest, and his farm is beneath them for their
support, and he who tills the soil is therefore
the most independent Of all men, for he can
not only support himself and family, but all
the world besides must come to his granaries,
potato bins and stalls for food, and beg for IL,
too, il not easily obtained. No matter how close
the times are or how "hard" money is, he and
his can live, for he stands next to nature her.
self, and she rarely fails to yield enough at
least for his support-for as "summer and
winter cannot fail while the world stands"
neither can "seed time and harUeSt." But
she does not yield without care and toll. He
is a lazy man any way who expects to live
without work, and he must starve or die in
the pOOr-hOuse, or dishonesty get his living
by his cunning devices, who tries the expert
ment Of living without work. Honest work
is honorable, no matter if it does bronze the
face, color the hands and soil the clothes
and no man should despse that sort of toll
which comes 50 near nature that one can get
his own living and cheat nobody in doing SO,
and then can, at an honest, fair price, help
his neighbor, who honestly spends his time at
other trades, TO lire The plOw, hoe and
scythe are excellent antidotes of idleness, and
4 means Of honest livelihood when rightly
used.


1t is, however, noticeable what vast diff
ference there is in different men on farms as
we'll as in all other trades, One man will
run farm all out when another will take it
and make it pay in spite of all the embar-
rsssing circumstances in which he found it,
and all by the use of that quality wraPt up
in our yankee word thrift


We have said farm is, or should be, a
source Of profit And now, although we
have limited at some of the ways, we wish to
notice some Of the things which will make it
Improbable, and which will never fail to do
80, and the poor farm is not to blame for it
either We have in mind specially our New
England farms, because even they, rocky and
often bleak, are rewarders Of intelligent toll.
The first drawback to the success Of the farm