OUT-OF-TOWN PLACES 



that shrewdness which has thus far been so 

 characteristic of their efforts. 



Again, we have no regularly educated plow- 

 men in America. Every man who farms five 

 acres of land thinks he can plow — nay, he is 

 in doubt if anybody in the world can do it bet- 

 ter. But good plowing is a thing of educa- 

 tion, as much as good preaching, or carpenter- 

 ing, or shoemaking, or writing. Nothing 

 but experience gives the final and effective 

 handling. With the wonderful division of 

 labor in all old countries, every agricultural 

 laborer has his special province and domain of 

 work. And if is quite absurd to suppose that 

 a man who plows only a month out of the 

 twelve can have anything like that due know- 

 ledge of the craft, which one acquires by hand- 

 ling the plowstilts every day, for a hundred 

 days in succession. It is quite true that under 

 a European sky — whether of Belgium, France, 

 or England — tillage can be carried on far into 

 the winter, and that, therefore, there is more 

 occasion that a man be educated for the special 

 office of plowing. But whatever occasion may 

 be, the fact remains the same that, while 

 in Belgium and in Great Britain there is an 

 annual crop of apprentices to the plow, in 

 America there is none. Every man who can 



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