FARM LABOR. 



145 



union labor societies, and our ten and eight hour systems of labor ; 

 all very well so far as they have a tendency to elevate man, and 

 to make labor more effective for good. Yet all this bustle, hue 

 and cry about being the laboring man's friends, should be accepted 

 with a very wide margin of allowance, as being more the work of 

 demagogues and designing politicians, as a means of foisting them- 

 selves into place and power, rathter than as indicating a sincere 

 desire to make labor honorable and to contribute to the real wel- 

 fare of the laborer. 



Early in the history of the world agricultural labor was the only 

 occupation of man ; and from that period to the present it has been 

 the most important of all industries. Not antagonistic to any 

 other honest employment that has grown out of the world's pro- 

 gress and development, but stretching out its arms to cherish and 

 foster all, as a faithful parent does his children. Yet agricultural 

 labor has not and does not to-day, command that respect and 

 remuneration when compared with other kinds of labor, that its 

 importance demands. This may be owing in part to the wide- 

 spread ignorance prevailing in the farming community, to the old 

 fogyism that holds on with a death grasp to the old ideas, ways and 

 measures of our fathers, grandfathers and great grandfathers, not 

 considering that progress is a law of nature, and that something 

 new in the condition of things is constantly developing which 

 demands a corresponding change of action to reach the end in 

 view ; or it may be owing in a great measure to the false estimates 

 of character made by men in other occupations of life Young 

 men are oftentimes noticed while pursuing their studies, but if 

 force of circumstances compel them to lay aside their books for 

 manual labor they are passed by unnoticed. Well do I remember 

 when a young man and attending the academy, a certain legal 

 gentleman who was considered a model of good citizenship, took 

 special pains to give me a friendly shake of the hand and other- 

 wise encourage my efforts to acquire some knowledge beyond that 

 imparted by the district school. But after school books were 

 exchanged for the goad-stick I was no longer recognized by that 

 gentleman. You can judge of my surprise better than I can de- 

 scribe it. Being young and knowing little of life I wondered what 

 I had done to forfeit his good will. I thought of his cordial greet- 

 ing while a student, and could it be possible that he would thus 

 treat me because 1 was at work ? Too much of this feeling is 

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