1168 New York State Agricultural Society 



the end of the current farm year (wliirli Avith me begius on 

 Xovember lirst), the farm will have begun to pay something on the 

 interest account. I believe that it can be made to earn five per 

 cent, over and above all charges of every kind, on a valuation of 

 $80,000. I am not sure that we shall not learn how to make it 

 pay even more. We have a dairy herd of sixty head of cattle, 

 and about twenty-five hundred laying hens. We have a young 

 apple orchard of sixteen acres, which is six years old, and a peach 

 orchard of eleven acres, also six years old. When ^Iv. Brill 

 took charge I had barely fifty acres of land in good tillable condi- 

 tion, and most of that was included in the two orchards. Xow I 

 have one hundred and fifty acres of tillable land, all in first rate 

 condition, as the result of draining a swamp of forty acres, and of 

 cleaning the farm of stone. I have a stone-crusher, and have 

 spent between $17,000 and $18,000 in breaking up old stone walls 

 and boulders that were in my fields. But in our neighborhood 

 crushed stone can be sold ; and I have sold more than $10,000, 

 in value of this crushed stone, and have on hand, crushed and 

 partially crushed, about $4,000 worth. When this work is entirely 

 completed, I think I shall have cleaned up my farm, so far as 

 stone is concerned, at a net cost of $30 an acre, including in this 

 sum the work of my own teams, charged at $."> a day. 



I give you these details, because I want you to appreciate that 

 my knowledge of the farmer's problem is not based upon farming 

 conducted as an amusement, without regard to cost ; but upon 

 farming conducted on a business basis. I have had the advantage 

 of whatever working capital was necessary, and what I have done 

 could not bo done without capital ; but my interest has been to 

 demonstrate, if jDossible, that capital can be advantageously 

 applied here in the East to the cultivation of the land, if the land 

 is cultivated by modern methods and with good business judgment. 



When I first began to live at Broad Brook Farm, which is the 

 name my farm bears, I was unable to buy even a quart of milk, 

 and until I could purchase a cow I had to import all the milk and 

 cream used in my household. I now have a dairy herd of sixty- 

 two cows, and sell practically all of my dairy product in the 

 neighborhood, ev(>n during the winter. People now say that T have 

 an exceptionally good market. The market was there before I 



