82 THE LURE OF THE LAND 



as a human being is not to be denied, and I would be 

 the last one to seek to deny it. But when this is done, 

 the farm laborer must become more efficient and do 

 better service while he is employed, or else proprietary 

 farming is also doomed. 



ADVANTAGES OF LABOR SAVING MACHINERY. 



The use of various kinds of machinery for lessening 

 the burden of labor has a two-fold advantage. In the 

 first place it cheapens the production of the crop, by 

 introducing economies into the cultivation and handling 

 and in the second place it has a salutary effect upon the 

 laborers themselves. I have noticed that the laboring 

 man, as a rule, on the farm works much more earnestly 

 and cheerfully in connection with some kind of ma- 

 chinery than he does when depending solely upon his 

 own exertions for the effect produced. The big farm, 

 therefore, with its reapers and binders, corn harvesters, 

 gang plows, traction engines, thrashing machines, and 

 ensilage cutters, becomes a kind of a social center, and 

 in fact is a village. This makes the farm laboring man 

 much more contented and much more efficient. 



The human animal is gregarious even in his physical 

 exertions, and a group of men work better together 

 than scattered around at different points. When I have 

 five acres of potatoes to cultivate with the hoe, and have 

 five men to do the job, if I put them all abreast, each 

 one in his own row, they will hoe over a greater area and 

 do a better job than if they are split up one by one 

 and allowed no communication. Hence the proprietary 

 farmer who employs a dozen or more hands is certain 

 to have a more contented body of laboring men, more 

 cheerful and more efficient, than the small farmer who 

 hires a single individual who works by himself. 



