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so many of the older farmers present. He would speak 

 on the general principles and then on the detail work. 

 We first want to know what is meant by general and 

 special farming. And he would endeavor to clearly de- 

 fine the two. The general farm is what is represented 

 by the typical New England farm of fifty years ago, 

 when the farmer raised very nearly everything he used, 

 sold but little of his produce and exchanged or bartered 

 for desired articles and bought scarcely anything. They 

 had their barns full of hay and stock and everything need- 

 ful was at hand. No one special crop was raised to re- 

 plenish the farm or increase the income, but a general 

 production. 



Now special farming implies that you devote your- 

 self to one or two special crops, by which you receive your 

 income and to which you devote all your energies. It 

 does not imply that you cannot raise other things for 

 home use. The general farm offers the attraction- of a 

 happy home for yourself and children, but the special one 

 is the farm to make money. The man of today to make 

 money must keep step to the music of the nineteenth cen- 

 tury, and your profession is as much a one as theology or 

 law. A few years ago our county was dotted over with 

 little shoe shops where a good boot or shoe was made; to- 

 day this business is all done in large factories, and one 

 man does one part and one another ; and it is so in most 

 all branches of business, a specialist performs a certain 

 portion of the work; today you can build a house much 

 cheaper than formerly, owing to the specialist and ma- 

 chinery to complete the different parts, and wages are 

 very much higher. It is so in farming, a specialist in 

 farming can raise more in his line per acre at less cost 

 and more remunerative prices than formerly. Today a 

 man raises one kind of crop and buys the rest as it is 

 more profitable, such as hay, grain and so forth ; also the 

 stock farm is equally divided in its limitations, in that 



