SUiyiMER MEETING AT CHILLICOTHE. 61 



hear their side of the question, and are more or less inlluenced by it. We hear 

 repeated in the usual doleful whine that " I wanted to raise an orchard the very 

 worst way, but it seems lilio I can't," and we are reminded of the time when Abra- 

 ham Lincoln attended a dancing party, and approaching Miss Todd, who afterward 

 became Mrs. Lincoln, said in his peculiar idiom : ' Miss Todd, 1 should like to 

 dance with you the worst way." The young lady accepted, and he hobbled 

 around the room with her. On returning to her seat she was jokingly asked by one 

 of her young friends: " Well, Mary, did he dance with you the worst way?" 

 " Yes," she replied, "the very worst." Not being on the witness stand, I cannot 

 affirm to the actual truth of this story, but whether true or not, it serves my pur- 

 pose as an illustration. 



When fruit-trees are planted ' 'in the very worst way." and then left " in the 

 very worst way " to shirk for themselves "in the very worst way," nothing else 

 but utter failure need be expected; and this slip-shod way of doing things, which 

 many so-called farmera for so many years have followed, is another of the uneven 

 roads that lead away from the farm. It is surprising, indeed, that all who let 

 things run themselves in this shiftless manner do not finally bring up at the front 

 door of that institution known as the poor farm. 



It would be easy to multiply instances of the queer performances of men who 

 cut wonderful capers under the name of "■business." "The Kingdom of Queer '* 

 must be surprisingly well populated if we may judge by the number of lunatics 

 who escape and settle— or, more correctly, unsettle — in the United States. Learn 

 to wait persistently and work bravely, and never say "die," nor write the word 

 " failure " on your banner. 



There is one road which is open to all who live on the farm, and which in- 

 cludes in its foundation the principles of all true progress. It is broad enough to 

 include all human wisdom, and he who travels »long this flower-gemmed highway 

 may achieve the grandest and noblest results of which a well-balanced chjiracter 

 is capable. 



The world's typical great men are those who have lived nobly and truly while 

 they worked for others. Not he who is the most talked of by the public press or by 

 the world, but he who has done most to inspire in others a nobler manhood and 

 womanhood. Not he who has the largest bank account, but he whose bank account 

 has done the most helpful deeds for others. Character is more than achievement, 

 and he truly lives, who, putting wealth of some sort into his life, brings out of it 

 for himself richness of character. 



To do,, and be. and dare all for humanity and the world is a noble privilege, 

 and beginning on the farm, our influence may widen and deepen'until the eflfeet of 

 our character is felt to the ends of the earth. This is now and will ever be the 

 privilege of the farmer and his family ; and in the evolution of character which 

 gives life to a great nation, our farmers' boys and girls will yet occupy the most 

 brilliant positions in the world's history. 



