154 HUMAN FACTORS IN COTTON CULTURE 



move because they believe that just over here they can 

 make better crops, "get a holt of some money," "come 

 out better'n we did last year." The Department esti- 

 mated in a study of reasons assigned for shifts by 3,360 

 tenants in Kentucky, Tennessee, and Texas that 20 per 

 cent of the moves indicated progress up the tenure lad- 

 der for renters and croppers. Partial or complete crop 

 failure accounted for 14 per cent of moves for croppers, 

 and 9 per cent for share tenants. The desire to obtain a 

 farm better adapted in size, soil, and improvements was 

 assigned as reason for moving by 25 per cent of the 

 shifting croppers and 31 per cent of the share tenants. 3 

 Elizabeth Madox Roberts has performed a service to 

 art and truth in The Time of Man by her presentation 

 of the tenant as forever moving in search of the unreal- 

 ized yet to be attained. Like many of his more fortunate 

 brothers, the tenant lives on hope with his daily bread. 

 It may be that moving is the one luxury that comes in 

 the dull and monotonous round of the tenant life. "Mov- 

 ing day means a different thing to every member of the 

 family, but on the mothers the most burdensome part of 

 it falls. To them it means the labor of taking down and 

 packing up in the wagons all the family possessions, . . . 

 traveling to the new place of existence, cleaning, scrub- 

 bing, and placing the household goods." 4 To the children 

 there is nothing quite so thrilling as moving day. Miss 

 Roberts, writing from first-hand knowledge, describes 

 convincingly the pleasure of the tenant child at explor- 

 ing each new house to which the family comes. If so, it is 

 a cheap luxury, and who shall begrudge it to their hard 

 lives ? 



3 Ibid., pp. 595-96. 



4 Lucy C. Crisp, Raleigh News and Observer, Jan. 10, 1926. 



