IN DAKOTA, 145 
I have tried to make the way plain. 1 would make 
it all smooth and pleasant if that were possible. But 
it is not. There are disappointments, trials, dis- 
couragements here, as everywhere, and succcess can 
be won only by persevering labor. When it has been 
achieved, it means a home, competence, independence, 
and ought to mean happiness. I have shown how 
success has been attained by others. 
Whether you can win it depends altogether upon 
yourself. 
There are three other objects which I have had in 
view in this work, namely: 
First. To stimulate my brother farmers to make 
their homes more comfortable and beautiful. It can 
be so easily done, and for the little time and money 
required, nothing brings so large a reward. 
Second. To lighten woman’s work on the farni. 
The lives that many farmers’ wives are compelled to 
lead are little, if at all, less slavish than were those 
of the Indian squaws who dwelt here before them. 
There is something worse than cruelty in this, and it 
is altogether needless. 
Third. To show the importance of good farming. 
In this lies all the difference there is between success 
and failure. Thorough cultivation of the soil is rea- 
sonably sure to be rewarded with abundant crops, 
while careless. slovenly tillage brings only disappoint- 
ment and failure. 
In the years to come, when these broad and fertile 
prairies shall be dotted all over with the homes of in- 
