PREFACE. 



" A useful book may live from age to age, 

 And those unborn may read its printed page." J. W. BARBER. 



THE chief object of this little volume is, to instruct the young 

 farmer how to perform the various operations of the farm in a 

 skillful, economical, and workmanlike manner. From my early 

 boyhood I have been engaged in the cultivation of the soil, and 

 I have always experienced a very great disadvantage and incon 

 venience in not having a text-book to assist me in putting tools 

 and agricultural implements in proper order, and in handling 

 them with skill and dexterity. Knowing well what difficulties 

 and embarrassments a young farmer is sure to meet with, and 

 understanding what instructions he will be most likely to need, it 

 has been my aim to supply that knowledge which has for so long 

 a time been called for by the young farmers of America. I have 

 not written for farmers of mature age and long experience, to 

 whom the contents of most of these paragraphs may appear too 

 common-place, but for the sons of farmers, and those who are 

 leaving the merchants' counters and the mechanics' shops to en 

 gage practically in that honest, honorable, and noble calling the 

 cultivation of the soil. 



I have come directly from the farmer's workshop, from the 



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