ECONOMY AND CREDIT. ITS 



something* saleable. A horse is dead capital : it does- 

 not multiply, nor yet produce anything, and yet how 

 many more horses most young farmers keep than they 

 need ! It will take £22 to buy anything of a horse ; 

 the same money will buy a nice " feather" bird, which 

 will give at least £12 a year in feathers. The bird is 

 not more likely to die than the horse, and they will both 

 cost him about equal in keeping. In three years the 

 horse will have decreased, say £5, in value ; the bird 

 will have increased £20. So that, after three years, the 

 gain to the young farmer, by having sold the horse and 

 bought another bird with the money, will be £61. The 

 same thing runs all through. One man takes two spans 

 of oxen to manage a large farm, while another gets 

 along equally well with only one, and in their place has 

 a dozen cows, giving a dozen calves and a lot of butter 

 every year; whilst the other man's extra oxen are 

 decreasing in value. 



This is one of the main reasons why those who 

 commence with a considerable capital so invariably lose 

 it. They will not study economy, or else they rush to 

 the other extreme ; and whilst they are lavish in their 

 private expenditure, are so stingy about their farm 

 expenditure that they let their birds die for want of 

 feeding ; they will not put up good sound fences, and 

 consequently their men's time is half taken up looking 



