214 THE FACE OF THE FIELDS 



farm of the coast and the stock farm of the prairie 

 will yield alike a living; and if, when that day 

 comes, there is no more "Promised Land" for 

 the American, it will be because we have crossed 

 over, and possessed the land, and divided it among 

 us for an inheritance. 



When life shall mean a living, and not a 

 dress-parade, or an automobile, or a flying-ma- 

 chine, then the clam farm, with its two or three 

 acres of flats, will be farm enough, and its aver- 

 age maximum yield, of four hundred and fifty 

 dollars an acre, will be profits enough. For the 

 clammer's outfit is simple, a small boat, two 

 clam-diggers, four clam-baskets, and his hip- 

 boots, the total costing thirty dollars. 



The old milk farm here under the hill below 

 me, with its tumbling barn and its ninety acres 

 of desolation, was sold not long ago for six thou- 

 sand dollars. The milkman will make more 

 money than the clam man, but he will have no 

 more. The milk farm is a larger undertaking, 

 calling for a larger type of man, and developing 

 larger qualities of soul, perhaps, than could ever 

 be dug up with a piddling clam-hoe out of the 

 soft sea-fattened flats. But that is a question of 



