THE COMMENCEMENT OP OPERATIONS. 10 



gone before him — for thousands of years — have learned a good deal, 

 and what they have learned has been w^ritten'and printed. Other 

 farmers are trying experiments, the results of which are as valuable 

 for him as for them. Men in other walks of life have applied their 

 knowledge to finding out how plants grow and what influence is 

 exerted on them by soils and manures. Their discoveries have 

 been published, and many of them have been approved by practice 

 on farms. Altogether, this constitutes more knowledge about 

 the operations of the farm than he could gain by experience if he 

 lived ten lives, and spent every day of all of them in the most 

 energetic work on his farm ; — more than he could '' think out 

 for himself" if he were to keep up a steady thinking until 

 Doomsday. And it is, very much of it, knowledge which he, 

 as a farmer, needs to have, just as much as a doctor needs to 

 know what others have learned of medicine. 



The best use he can make of a portion of his money is to spend 

 it for agricultural books and papers, and the best use he can make 

 of his leisure time is to spend a fair share of it in reading them. 

 Let his neighbors call him " book farmer," if they will, and let 

 them decry " theories ;" he will work none the less faithfully for 

 any thing he learns out of agricultural books, and in the end 

 he will find that a ton of hay will cost him no more because he 

 knows something of the principles of hay-making, and of the laws 

 which operate in the growth of grass. The condition of his farm, 

 ten years hence, will be a sufficient answer to those who have 

 ridiculed his habit of reading about farming. 



Still, he should read with great caution and with judgment. 

 There is a great deal in agricultural books, and still more in agri- 

 cultural papers, which is crude and fanciful, and which cannot 

 be successfully applied in practice. While he should read faith- 

 fully, he should make use of what he reads only with great care, 

 and avoid trying, at least on a large scale, any thing which is not 

 actually proven to be suited to his case. 



The first of his out-of-door operations should be to make a map 

 of his cleared land, with the division fences, and the location of 

 the buildings. This map need not be very accurate — what is 



