FIFTH ANNUAL YEAR BOOK — PART VI. 593 



There are still many things of which I wanted to speak, as having kitchen, 

 dining-room, pantry and cellar just as convenient as possible, plenty of 

 cooking utensils of a good quality, and then the best of care taken of them , 

 a range that is faultless, cistern pump in the house, or near the kitchen 

 door, and plenty of shelf and cupboard room, of replenishing the bedding, 

 table linen, etc. , during the winter when their is more leisure; and of various 

 other things, for you see this subject is practically endless, but time forbids, 

 and I must say what it were best to say even if all else were left unsaid, 

 namely this: Be the master-workman; get your work so well in hand that 

 it does not drive you, that you have time to seek improvement in this and 

 other lines, and be satisfied with nothing short of success. 



EDUCATE THE FARM BOY AND THE FARM GIRL, 



John Thompson, Associate Editor Firmers'' Tribune, Before the Osceola 

 County Farmers^ Institute. 



We are living in an age of keen competition — in an age where we must 

 call upon every resource at our command if we expect to achieve success . 

 We are not living in an age where mere physical power is valued as the 

 highest attribute of man, but we are living in an age where skill and mental 

 power, forethought and ability count for more than mere brute strength. 



The customs that prevailed when our grandparents were children are ob- 

 solete. With all due respect for our ancestors it must be admitted that in 

 the natural course of events we have outlived their methods. It could not be 

 otherwise for we have labored diligently. The world can not stand still. 

 Science teaches that nothing in nature remains at a standstill. We must 

 either advance or^ retrograde; we must either go forward or backward. We 

 have chosen the former, not from our own initiative perhaps, but because 

 our good parents and remoter ancestors were moving in the same direction; 

 we have simply marched forward, onward and upward in all lines of human 

 endeavor in obedience to the unswerving laws of evolution. There was a 

 time in the history of the world when intelligence, brain power, courage and 

 honor did not count for so much as they do today. There was a time in the 

 evolution of the organic world when brute force or fleet foot counted for 

 more than it does now. At that time, gigantic creatures, animals of great 

 strength and power were developed because it was advantageous to them to 

 develop strength or speed or cunning as the case required. The law of the 

 survival of the fittest has ever been in operation and it remains in full force 

 today. Only the fittest survive in any age. This age demands that man 

 must become intelligent; this age demands that we must cultivate our intel- 

 lectual faculties, our moral force. We can not go against the laws of na- 

 ture, we may think for a moment that we can, but sooner or later we are 

 bound to find that we must bow our heads and succomb to the inevitable. 

 If, therefore, our future success and prosperity, our future happiness and 



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