THE FULL CORN 395 



in the best of weather, and being bone-dry there 

 was no suspicion of tag about it. Eight teams fed 

 the machine and they finished the business in a day 

 and three-quarters, and had I put on ten teams the 

 engine would have kept up to the power, and would 

 have easily got through in a day and a half. My 

 threshing bill amounted to a hundred and twenty 

 dollars including hire of three teams. 



My total receipts that year amounted to one 

 thousand one hundred and ninety-one dollars, 

 the wages for the year I had kept down to two 

 hundred and three dollars, seed oats and barley 

 had cost me fifty dollars. My stores amounted to 

 a hundred dollars, but I had visitors which increased 

 the number of my household for some weeks. 

 Binder-twine, machine-oil, and repairs came out 

 at about a hundred dollars, giving me a profit of 

 nearly seven hundred dollars on the year's working. 



It was not good, but the profit was made in a 

 year distinctly below the average in harvest return. 

 Most farms reckoned that they drew two- thirds 

 of the average crop that year. Also I was working 

 down, " lying low," I had not enough horses, not 

 enough labour, also not enough capital ; I had to 

 move very gently. It was, however, just possible 

 to pay the interest of the mortgage, and five hundred 

 dollars of the capital, and it was enough to prove 

 to me that farming on the prairie properly done is 

 farming easily done, and that, worked out on a well- 

 thought-out plan, it is a practical and should be a 

 highly profitable means of independence and wealth 

 for women as it has always proved for men. But 

 on every side my neighbours had obtained their 

 land as a gift from the Government, or at least one 



