404 THE FAT OF THE LAND 



and thus " discount the seasons" ; remember that 

 interdependent industries are the essence of fac- 

 tory farming ; employ the best men you can find, 

 and keep them interested in your affairs ; have 

 a definite object and make everything bend 

 toward that object ; plant apple trees galore and 

 make them your chief care, as in time they will 

 prove your chief dependence. These are some 

 of the principles of factory farming, and one 

 doesn't have to be old, or rich, to put them into 

 practice. 



I would exchange my age, money, and acres 

 for youth and forty acres, and think that I had 

 the best of the bargain ; and I would start the 

 factory by planting ten acres of orchard, buying 

 two sows, two cows, and two setting hens. 

 Youth, strength, and hustle are a great sight bet- 

 ter than money, and the wise youth can have a 

 finer farm than mine before he passes the half- 

 century mark, even though he have but a bare 

 forty to begin with. 



I do not take it for granted that every man 

 has even a bare forty ; but millions of men who 

 have it not, can have it by a little persistent self- 

 denial ; and when an able-bodied man has forty 

 acres of ground under his feet, it is up to him 

 whether he will be a comfortable, independent, 

 self-respecting man or not. 



A great deal of farm land is distant from mar- 

 kets and otherwise limited in its range of pro- 

 duction, but nearly every forty which lies east 



