620 ANNUAL REPORT OF THE Off. Doc. 



change for my own home in this country, "the home of the brave 

 and the land of the free." 



THE REAL FARMER. 



By LOTTIK KKMMBRKR, Bethlehem, Pa. 



There are quite a number of jokes cracked at the expense of the 

 farmer or the "Reuben" as city folks delight in styling him. But, 

 after all, the cities are crowded with more genuine Reubens — two 

 to one — than can be found out on God's broad acres. 



Look at the lists of financial wrecks strewn along the shores of 

 the city. See the thousands who are "taken in" by get-rich-quick 

 concerns, by wild-cat schemes, by foolhardy speculations! Who 

 are these victims? Where did they come from? Born and raised 

 in the backwoods, and this their first experience at "making money 

 without work?" You might think so, but the truth is they are city- 

 bred and have been raised on the very threshold upon which they 

 met their Waterloo. They are the men who paint the farmer in 

 all sorts of comic dress and manner; they are the ones who imagine 

 that the farmer is lacking in brain power, and that the life he leads; 

 is one continual happy-go-lucky affair — an occupation that requires 

 no study and which only calls for muscular labor. 



The fact that a man was born and raised where brick houses and 

 pavements predominate, is no more proof of intelligence than is 

 ignorance established by birth on a farm. As an unknown writer 

 puts it, "The farmer of the stage and of the humorous press is 

 about as near like the real farmer as the caricatures of 'Uncle Sam' 

 are like the real Americans. The man who buys the gold brick is 

 not the ungrammatical scarecrow in cow-hide boots and ragged hat, 

 'with a little bunch of whiskers on his chin,' but the man who thinks 

 the modern farmer looks like that." 



The truth is, the American farmer is up to date, and in most 

 sections enjoys most of the conveniences of the city, and these, too, 

 coupled with advantages that city folks do not have. Electric lights 

 and gas companies are extending their lines to the rural districts; 

 the electric cars go by the farm house door; the telephone is found 

 in the country home, and the free delivery brings the mail direct. 

 All these conveniences are costly in the city; they are comparatively 

 cheap on the farm. 



As the prosperity of the country is measured by its crops, the 

 farmer surely hold the entire situation in his hands. Who is to be 

 pitied? He who is free and independent, who enjoys a purity of 

 food, of water, of air, of life? Or, he who is a slave to others, who 

 is compelled to eat food and drink water that savors of contamina- 

 tion, who breathes in his lungs a polluted air, and whose life is one 

 beset by temptations? Is it hard to determine who is to be pitied? 



The farmer, as a rule, is a cautious individual, does not gauge his 

 work only for the present, does not provide only for to-day and 

 let to-morrow take care of itself, but provides for the future, not 

 only for himself, but for future generations. The prosperity of the 



