356 FARMERS' INSTITUTES. 



What a change has come over us within a few years! Our farms are nearly 

 all cleared now. The superstition in regard to improved breeds of stock is 

 fast clearing away and better opinions relative to educational needs of the 

 farmer are entertained. 



One of our most intelligent citizens of Charlotte recently showed me a 

 feather from a Brahma rooster that he went to Battle Creek to see. He told 

 me the rooster was worth 8100 and he was well paid for his trip over to see 

 him. Another has a Short Horn bull for which he paid $700, and I have 

 heard no one say he is not well worth the money. 



I have a boy living with me who was born in the city of East Saginaw and 

 lived there until he was over fifteen years old. He has been with me nearly 

 two years, and says he is goiug to be a farmer. He is attending our district 

 school, studies evenings, and believes a farmer should have a good education. 



A few evenings ago I found in his book, not feathers from chickens, but a 

 lock of hair. He told me whose head it was from. I asked him if the girls 

 used that sort of a book mark. "Yes, Josie has a lock of George's hair and 

 Jennie has some of Charlie's. Josie says her's represents blood that will tell, 

 for George is going West to engage in stock raising. Jennie told her that was 

 all right; it would be a good place for her and Charlie to go visiting. Charlie 

 had just joined the Grange, and as soon as his education was good enough he 

 was going to enter the Agricultural College, and when he graduated from 

 that he was going to have his father's farm and, * I think, Josie, sometime 

 he will be governor of Michigan, and you will be pleased to have the gover- 

 nor and his wife visit you! ' " 



You see he is not pining to be a dry goods clerk. 



POULTRY. 



I know of nothing in farm life better adapted to open the business world 

 to the little ones than raising poultry. Here they can get their first lessons 

 in stock raising; and, as early impressions are most enduring, be careful how 

 you teach. Let your poultry house and yard be comfortable and cleanly. 

 Keep poultry that you will be proud to show to your neighbors, have a sepa- 

 rate place where you can keep three or four of your choicest for breeding, for 

 this is the only way in which you can excel in raising choice fowls. Pure 

 breed does not imply perfection. Nature never repeats herself, and where 

 there is a difference there is a choice. A friend once showed me a brood of 

 pure brown Leghorn chicks. He pointed out two of the pullets which, he 

 said, he would keep to breed from. I asked : What is the difference, being 

 all of one brood and pure bred? He then placed side by side the two extremes 

 in form. The difference was so great that my question seemed very foolish. 



Help your children to keep a debit and credit account. Furnish them 

 with old barrels in which to store the cleanings from coop and yard, and if 

 they will deliver you the manure in barrels in payment for rent of ground and 

 buildings you will have driven a sharp bargain; but if your poultry is allowed 

 to roost in the barn on the farm implements, on the edge of the wheat bin, 

 on the cutter dash in the summer and on the buggy dash in the winter, the 

 gross credit side of the account would not pay the rent. 



I will illustrate the value of poultry manure by relating a circumstance with 

 which I am acquainted. A young man rented a field of eleven acres for a corn 

 crop, paying cash rent. The land had been rented several years and was badly 



