WILL FARMING PAY? 15 



I have known men do better, even at farming. I 

 recollect one who, with "no capital but a good wife 

 and four or live hundred dollars, bought (near Boston) 

 a farm of two hundred mainly rough acres, for $2,500, 

 and paid for it out of its products within the next five 

 years, during which he had nearly doubled its value. 

 I lost sight of him then ; but I have not a doubt that, 

 if he lived fifteen years longer and had no very bad 

 luck, he was worth, as the net result of twenty years' 

 effort, at least $100,000. But this man would rise at 

 four o'clock of a winter morning, harness his span of 

 horses and hitch them to his large market-wagon 

 (loaded over night), drive ten miles into Boston, un- 

 load and load back again, be home at fair breakfast- 

 time, and, hastily swallowing his meal, be fresh as a 

 daisy for his day's work, in which he would lead his 

 hired men, keeping them clear of the least danger of 

 falling asleep. Such men are rare, but they still ex- 

 ist, proving scarcely anything impossible to an in- 

 domitable will. I would not advise any to work so 

 unmercifully ; I seek only to enforce the truth that 

 great achievements are within the reach of whoever 

 will pay their price. 



An energetic farmer bought, some twenty-five years 

 ago, a large grazing farm in Northern Vermont, con- 

 sisting of some 150 acres, and costing him about 

 $3,000. He had a small stock of cattle, which was 

 all his land would carry ; but he resolved to increase 

 that stock by at least ten per cent, per annum, and 

 to so improve his land by cultivation, fertilizing, 



