THE FARMER'S TTAR AGAINST MONOPOLIES. 453 



from sunrise to sunset through the long Summer days 

 until nature itself fairly gives way. I do not exag- 

 gerate ; I have seen the haggard looks and heard the 

 weary sighs of overworked farmers' wives in the East 

 and in the West. I have seen broad acres of highly 

 cultivated land groaning under the abundant crops, 

 good houses and barns, fine stock and money to the 

 farmer's credit in the bank, but the order and cleanli- 

 ness that reigned in-doors in harvest time, when twenty 

 hungry men sat around the farmer's board, as well as 

 when the family only were there, were too often pur- 

 chased at the price of the premature old age of the 

 wife. Anything that will break in upon this tread-mill 

 life which, though not quite universal, is altogether 

 too common, should be hailed with joy by the farmer 

 and his family." 



Now the Grange proposes to change this state of 

 affairs, and render to the farmers and their families one 

 of the greatest services that can possibly be done for 

 them. It offers them the means of improving their 

 social intercourse, of adding to their pleasures, and of 

 improving their condition mentally as well as socially. 



" The social feature of the Order," says J. C. Abbott, 

 Deputy of the National Grange, "consists in being 

 associated with ladies who are admitted as members of 

 the Order, and upon whom the four degrees of a sub- 

 ordinate Grange are conferred. Other Orders close 

 their doors against women, and shut her out from their 

 councils. But believing that she is the help-meet of 

 man, and that we need her counsel, as well as her aid, 

 we open the doors of the Grange and bid her welcome. 



" At the regular monthly meetings of the Grange a 

 feast is held, the ladies supplying a bountiful repast of 



