36 WORCESTER COUNTY HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. [1897. 



and afterward carry out plans with perseverance, and gardening will 

 be found a successful, pleasant and congenial occupation for women. 

 Women are beginning to think about these things. Many of them 

 could do much better at agriculture than to work for the very low 

 wages paid for woman's work in the cities. Don't think I would 

 have you do any field work. It is not so much labor and muscle nowa- 

 days as brains and machinery. Don't do your work first and think- 

 ing afterwards, but think and plan first and then work. Here is an 

 illustration of what has been done : Miss Sarah Hewitt, daughter of 

 Abram S. Hewitt, ex-mayor of New York City, is an expert in many 

 of the practical details of caring for a horse, such as shoeing, of 

 which most women know scarcely anything. Her trim figure, as she 

 sits on her horse with ease and full control of the animal, is familiar 

 to every one in the neighborhood of her father's great farm at Ring- 

 wood, N. J. It is not only in riding that Miss Hewitt proves herself 

 to be an advanced woman in the best sense, that of being able to 

 make herself really useful. She superintends all the workmen, about 

 2d, on her father's estate. The farm covers 2,000 acres and is all in 

 a high state of cultivation, save that reserved for park-like grounds. 

 Miss Hewitt believes in farming in a business-like way, and she 

 knows exactly what she has a right to expect from each employ^ on 

 the place. She is a strict disciplinarian, but there is not a man who 

 would not go through fire and water for her. She understands horses 

 from their noses to their heels. It is no figure of speech that she 

 knows their heels, for she can shoe a horse as w^ell as any farrier in 

 the State. It is a sight that has been enjoyed by her friends more 

 than once, that of this dainty young woman hammering a refractory 

 shoe into shape on an anvil and afterward measuring it to the foot of 

 her favorite mare. She is too fond of horses to place a hot shoe 

 against a hoof and she insists that the shoe shall always be cooled 

 thoroughly before it is applied. Slie is quick in her movements, and 

 there are blacksmiths in tiie neighl)orhood who freely admit that slie 

 can shoe a horse in less time than they can do it well. She docs that 

 as she does everything, on scientific princi[)les. It is a well known 

 fact that horses have as many different traits of temper and disposi- 

 tion as human beings. Miss Hewitt seems to understand a horse 

 intuitively, and it is said that she never failed to conquer any horse 

 that she ever took iu hand, and that, too, without any means save 

 those of kindness. 



The question is often asked me : What can woman do (or what can 

 I do) to gain a living by flowers, fruits or vegetables ? Did you ever 



