390 



THE IRKIGATION AGE. 



the fields that can be done and these boys can go 

 fishing or indulge in other recreations that their 

 hearts might desire. 



They are given three good, nourishing, appe- 

 tizing meals each day and their work makes their 

 appetites worth while. The mother always has 

 some cake or sauce or fruit or some other delicacy 

 in the cupboard or in the cellar, if they want to 

 lunch between meals. 



They can go to town occasionally in the eve- 

 nings, in the buggy or on horseback. 



They are not the sons of a rich farmer; just 

 those of a good, substantial, clean citizen, who 

 works with them, who is interested in them, who 

 tries to give them the best of education and other 

 things which a boy wants and likes, that his means 

 afford. 



Compare them with the city boy or man. The 

 city boy does not get up so early, 'tis true; but once 

 out of bed, it's generally a hurry-up breakfast, a 

 rush for a street car or train, riding for half an 

 hour to an hour; probably standing up in a stuffy 

 car; then work and work in the big city means 

 grind, grind, grind; fight, fight, fight. There are 

 a dozen others at your elbow ready to jump into 

 your place the moment you falter; if you show a 

 bit of weakness ; if your health breaks down. They 

 are there all the time ready to grab your job. And 

 over you watching your every move is the em- 

 ployer and the bosses he hires, driving, driving, 

 driving. 



It is never ending competition and struggle. 

 It is excitement, the battle for dollars, the clash 

 with other men of equal or greater ability that 

 keeps the city man at high tension all day long. 

 He fairly grabs his lunch at noon time, gulps it 

 down with his eye on the clock and rushes back to 

 work. He goes home at night thoroughly ex- 

 hausted. Two to one the strain of the day or his 

 hurried, unmasticated lunch has destroyed his ap- 

 petite for the dinner awaiting him. He goes to bed, 

 sleeps hard too hard, no doubt, and turns out 

 when the alarm clock rings for another day, just 

 like the day before. He finds little time if any 

 for recreation. If he does, his income, even though 

 it is what the farmer boy would consider very 

 large, does not afford him many of the so-called 

 pleasures the big city offers, if he is at all provi- 

 dent. And when opportunity affords, he is the 

 happiest person in the world to get away from it 

 all for a day, out into the country, close to nature. 

 And yet we found two of these three boys dis- 

 contented. They are yearning to go to the big 

 city; to "make a place for themselves" in the 

 world. 



We admire ambition in any boy. We believe 



it should always be fostered, but as a city man who 

 must admit he loves the strain and the strife and 

 the competition of the big town, and who is not 

 at all soured about his lot in this old world, we say 

 tc these boys and to all farmer boys and we say it 

 from the bottom of our heart : 



"STAY ON THE FARM." 



There is lots more real joy to be gotten out 

 of life on the farm than in the city. The farmer 

 boy has a bigger and better chance to "make a place 

 for himself" right on the farm than he has in the 

 city. His opportunities for money-making and ac- 

 cumulating are greater than the average city boy's ; 

 so are his opportunities if he wants to enter public 

 life. Of course if he has some particular aptitude 

 for one of the professions, the city may offer a big- 

 ger chance. As for just going to the city to work, 

 we say again and even more emphatically : 



"STICK TO THE FARM. You'll be lots 

 happier in the end." 



It Pays 

 To Clean 

 Up the 



Farm 



Have you cleaned up around the 

 farm this year? Don't you 

 think it would be a good plan to 

 do so? Get ready to start the 

 new year in "spick and span" 

 shape. It's going to be the big- 

 gest year the American farmer has ever had and 

 you want to be in shape to take advantage of all 

 your opportunities. If everything is in its place, 

 you are not going to waste any time hunting for 

 a stray tool, or a piece of 2x4 or some other ar- 

 vicle which you may want in a hurry. Time is 

 money, on the farm as much as any other place, 

 today. You cannot afford to throw away any 

 money or its equivalent, time. 



On a large percentage of the farms in any 

 community things are not kept well cleaned up and 

 there is a condition of disorder rather than neatness 

 and tidiness. Is this because it pays better to "let 

 ihings go" than to be continually picking up and 

 straightening up and arranging and putting away 

 machinery and gathering boards and kindling wood, 

 and the thousand and one other things the neat 

 man on a farm sees to do? Or is it that some are 

 naturally neat and others slovenly? Or would it 

 pay better on all farms if everything was kept 

 "spick and span" at all times? 



We believe it is the experience of many of 

 the best farmers, not only in America but all over 

 the world, that it pays to keep a farm orderly, and 

 that there is no better motto, not only from the 

 standpoint of "peace of mind" but also from that 

 of economy, than "a place for everything and every- 

 thing in its place." 



