HINDRANCES TO SUCCESSFUL FARMING. 103 



or even thirty pounds of butter, is too much of a lift and 

 strain for any woman, except she be very robust and strong. 

 Churning and working butter in a chilly cellar or milk-room, 

 for the coolness of the place to make the butter firm, [)lung- 

 ins; her hands and arms into ice-cold salted water when she 

 ought not, lifting l)uckets of cream and bowls of butter, have 

 laid many a wife under the green turf, a sacrifice to her hus- 

 band's i::reed and her own ambition. 



Laborers. — The difficulty of hiring good farm laborers is 

 certainly a great hindrance, and the solution of this important 

 question is far oif. 



Farmers have tried sendimi; to the cities for immiijrants, 

 but not always, perhaps not generally, with satisfactory 

 results. The men are ignorant, unskilled, often stupid when 

 no worse. A new-comer on a farm in Vernon, a few years 

 ago, was on one Sunday morning given the oil can, and 

 directed to go out and grease the wagon ; and he did, top, 

 body, wheels, boot, and even the cushions. The owner Avas 

 not pleased nor grateful, nor did he attend divine service 

 that day. Another was told by a farmer in a neighboring 

 town to take a brush scythe and bog hoe, and clear up the 

 weeds and brush on a certain lot, unfortunately out of sight. 

 He returned the second day and reported that he had finished ; 

 and he had, so thoroughly that not one was left of four hun- 

 dred apple trees set on the lot two years previously. The 

 owner being one of the world's people, I was told that the 

 English language was considerably torn to pieces ; but the 

 unfortunate lal^orer, being a fresh German, didn't fully com- 

 prehend the situation. Such experiences are not calculated 

 to improve the temper, nor to inspire us to cultivate our 

 forei2:n relations. 



Improved animals. — A farmer, to be successful in his 

 stock raising, if he cannot afford thoroughbred animals, 

 should by all means grade up his stock of all kinds by the 

 use of a thoroughbred male, which is always obtaina])le at 

 some neighboring farm. For ordinary purposes of the dairy 

 and for the shambles, irrades are better than thorouirhbreds, 

 and there is no better evidence of thrift in a farmer than to 

 see him carefully improving his stock in that way. 



ImpJements. — A farmer should buy the best implements 



