PREPARING TO FARM. 33 



very little, cannot really afford to attend even an 

 Agricultural College. He can acquire so much of 

 Science as is indispensable in the cheaper way I have 

 indicated. Re cannot wisely consent to spend the 

 best years of his life in getting ready to live. 



He who has already mastered the art of farming, 

 and has adequate means, may of course buy a farm 

 to-morrow, though he be barely or not quite of age. 

 He has little to learn from me. Yet I think even 

 such have often concluded, in after years, that they 

 were too hasty in buying land that they might 

 profitably have waited, and deliberated, and garnered 

 the treasures of experience, before they took the grave 

 step of buying their future home ; with regard to 

 which I shall make some suggestions in my next 

 chapter. 



But I protest against a young man's declining or 

 postponing the purchase of a farm merely because he 

 is not able to buy a great one. Twenty acres of ara- 

 ble soil near a city or manufacturing village, forty 

 acres in a rural district of any old State, or eighty 

 acres in a region just beginning to be peopled by 

 White men, is an ample area for any one who is worth 

 less than $2,000. If he understands his business, he 

 will find profitable employment hereon for every 

 working hour : if he does not understand farming, 

 he will buy his experience dear enough on this, yet 

 more cheaply than he would on a wider area. Until 

 he shall have more money than he needs, let him be- 

 ware of buying more land than he absolutely wants. 

 2* 



