58 THE LURE OF THE LAND 



wonder, therefore, that the farmer breaks down, long be- 

 fore his time. He is shaggy and gray at forty, shriv- 

 eled and wrinkled at fifty, stooped and trembling at 

 sixty, he has gone to his eternal rest at seventy. 



But there is a bright side to the picture. 



The farmer of the future will be the youngest man 

 of his years in the whole community. His step will be 

 resilient, his eyes bright and his joints flexible at an 

 age when he now is old. From the very nature of 

 things the man on the farm in the future should be the 

 healthiest of all human animals. He will have access 

 to pure, fresh, wholesome foods, which may be easily 

 well cooked. His hours of labor will be shortened, yet 

 made more efficient. His life in the open will give 

 vigor, endurance, and power to resist infection. He is 

 not likely to be tempted to indulge in alcoholic liquors. 

 He will learn in the near future that the use of tobacco 

 is wholly unnecessary, filthy, and reprehensible. He 

 lives nearer to nature than any other person and ought 

 to love nature better than any one else. Some day he 

 will have pure, clean water, free from sewage or surface 

 infection, to drink. He will go to bed early and rise 

 at daylight. He will see the sun rise as well as set. 

 His exercise will develop the physical man symmetric- 

 ally and thus give a healthy dwelling for a healthy mind. 

 Some day he will be wise enough to lose faith in quacks 

 and nostrums, advertised in newspapers and maga- 

 zines. The " Reuben " of the hoary " gold brick " 

 trick will " get wise " also to these vicious attempts to 

 utilize his gullibility in respect of alleged cures. The 

 itinerant peddlers of nostrums, cocaine and consump- 

 tion cures will discover a falling market and a better in- 

 formed customer. It is pathetic to think of the sick- 

 ness, suffering and death in rural districts that have 



