330 HOW TO GET A FARM, 



learn how to manage it. It has been well said, that 

 tools do not make the workman, but the trained 

 skill and perseverance of the operator himself. It 

 is proverbial that bad workmen never yet had a 

 good tool. Some one asked Opie by what wonder 

 ful process he mixed his colors. &quot; I mix them with 

 brains, sir,&quot; was his reply. 



Having secured possession of a farm, let the 

 young man cling to it. JSTow, when land and its 

 products have been daily rising in price, with butter 

 at half a dollar, and hay at twenty-five dollars per 

 ton, be not led away from this honorable and inde 

 pendent occupation by the seductive glitter of some 

 apparently golden prospect in the distance some 

 chance in city life, where there may be less of bodily 

 toil, more of what the world calls honor, but less of 

 real comfort. On this subject Mr. Henry H. French 

 gives us an instructive caution : 



&quot; You are tempted to exchange the hard work of the 

 farm, to become a clerk in a city shop, to put off your 

 heavy boots and frock, and be a gentleman, behind the 

 counter ! You, by birth and education, intended for an up 

 right, independent, manly citizen, to call no man master, 

 and to be no man s servant, would become, at first, the 

 errand boy of the shop, to fetch and carry like a spaniel, 

 then the salesman, to fill the place which, at best, a girl 

 would fill much better to bow, and smile, and cringe, and 

 flatter to attend upon the wishes of every painted and 

 padded form of humanity to humbly suggest to rakes and 

 harlots, as well as to starched and ruffled respectability, 

 what color and fabric best becomes the form and complexion 

 of each and finally to become a trader, a worshipper of 



