Farmers' Institutes. 3D 



ELEVENTH INSTITUTE. 



The Eleventh Farmers' Institute was held in the Town Hall on Wednesday, 

 March 7th. The meeting was called to order by President Lester T. Osborne of 

 Alford, at 11 a. m. President Osborne then introduced William P. Sessions of 

 Hampden, who read an excellent paper on "THE ECONOMICS OF FARMING." 

 Important points are as follows : 



No two farms are exactly alike in soil, situation, or hardly one principal char- 

 acteristic. Some of us are remote from markets, our farms are composed of hill- 

 sides and hollows, with precipitous mountain pastures strewn with rocks, while 

 brush and ferns are struggling to overmaster the grass which in our father's time 

 gave luxuriant feed to sheep and cattle. Others are located on the deep soil of 

 the valley close to market. Between these two extremes are the rest of us. It is 

 manifest that no single course of action can guide all of us to success. There 

 must of necessity be diversity of crops, and these crops will be marketed differ- 

 ently according to location. While the tiller of a mountain farm will depend up- 

 on sheep, young stock or but + er- making for an income, he who dwells near the 

 city will of course sell his milk, and while the first must make grass and fruit his 

 dependence for a money crop, the latter, being blessed with a garden soil, can 

 . choose among the great variety of vegetables from which to get his income. 



There are, however, some general rules which will hold good with all who till 

 the soil. Here is one : 



He that by the plow would thrive 

 Himself must either hold or drive. 



We all accept this as truth. Still, I believe that many a New England farmer 

 interprets it too literally, and by endeavoring to perform too much of the neces- 

 sary labor with his own hands curtails his ability in other directions equally im- 

 portant. To be successful the farmer must have a clear brain. Observation and 

 experience have taught me that excessive labor will bring clpuds across the mind, 

 alike in kind if not in degree to those which come from sloth and dissipation. A 

 clear head and active brain cannot long be supplied by the farmer who says, 

 "Come, boys !" and always carries the butt- end. Years since I was blessed with 

 a friend, an old man who had been successful in life. He had from poverty and 

 obscurity won a high place in society, amassed a fortune and was esteemed by all 

 who knew him as a man of rare judgment. This friend once remarked that it 

 would be a pecuniary blessing to me if I could by some accident be incapacitated 

 for labor for at least one year. I wonderingly asked why he thought so. He 

 said : ''You work too much and too hard. Your men expect too much of you, 

 depend upon you to set the pattern for the day's work in amount as well as in 

 quality. You can make or save $~> with your brain while you can earn one with 

 your muscle, and if you wish to get ahead you will have to work less with your 

 hands that your brain may be in condition to work more to the purpose." I be 

 lieve he was right. I can look back and see w r here my business has suffered from 

 lack of brains. Economy and good management are cardinal virtues in farming, 

 and perhaps economy in its broadest sense includes both the others. One of 

 Webster's definitions of economy is, "that management which expends money to 

 advantage." Another is, "a judicious expenditure or time, of labor and the in 

 struments of labor," 



To succeed one must have intelligence, patience and persistence, and withal 

 a leaven of audacity. Native talent or smartness comes to the front in farming as 

 in all other pursuits. The keenest of us all can gather ideas which will be of use 

 — from farmers' clubs and gatherings and from the agricultural prints. We must 

 ever be on the alert to increase our knowledge. The right idea may come from 

 an unexpected source. We need courage to carry out the plans our judgment 

 approves. One great trouble is that we do not do as well as we know how. There 

 seems to be something about our calling that makes its followers conservative. 

 Most farmers can theorize famously. They will tell you truly what outlay will 

 pay the best, — that it will pay to drain certain lands, to remove the stones from 

 certain fields so as to allow the use of labor-saving tools and machines, that it will 

 pay to improve farm stock because it costs no more to keep a good animal than a 

 poor one. Still, many of them do not attempt any of these improvements. Too 



