396 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



Sept. 



DIVISION OF LABOR IN" FARMING. 



Within the recollection of middle-aged people, 

 great changes have taken place in the household 

 industry of farmers' families. Many who now 

 buy their own, and much of their children's cloth- 

 ing ready-made, were dressed in their childhood 

 with garments that were spun and woven, cut 

 and made, by their mothers and sisters, with a 

 few days' assistance, perhaps, on the winter coats, 

 by the tailoress of the neighborhood. The transfer 

 of the loom and spinning-wheel from the family 

 to the factory is very differently regarded by dif- 

 ferent individuals. Some think that the result 

 of this change will be the gradual loss of that 

 industry, tact and independence, which has given 

 character to the people of New England, while 

 others take a more hopeful view of the subject. 



Whether we lament or rejoice over this change, 

 it can be regarded hut as a manifestation of that 

 "spirit of the age," an evidence of that tendency 

 of our times, which merges the individual in the 

 mass, which substitutes associated for solitary 

 labor, and thus makes even the baleful atmos- 

 phere of the factory more attractive than the pure 

 air of heaven. Hence we are not surprised to 

 see by the census returns, that, while our cities 

 and villages are rapidly increasing in population, 

 many thinly settled portions of the country are 

 gaining but slowly, some are stationary, and not 

 a few are actually decreasing in population. 



Farming has been generally regarded as neces- 

 sarily an individual or solitary business. The 

 hand that fells the trees, must drive the team, 

 thresh the grain, guide the plow, swing the scythe, 

 sell the produce, buy stock, dress the pigs, and 

 do up all the various jobs and chores, in doors 

 and out, that fall to the lot of the farmer. 



The division of labor, which, anomalous as it 

 may sound, must be called the first principle of 

 association, and the use of machinery, which may 

 be termed its second principle, has been sup- 

 posed to be inapplicable to farming, except to a 

 very limited extent. 



These limits are, however, extending every 

 year. At the West, it is common for one indi- 

 vidual to equip a "breaking-up plow," and devote 

 himself exclusively to this one branch of farm- 

 ing, during the entire season. Another goes the 

 rounds with a patent reaper, and some one else 

 with a threshing-machine. Several individuals 

 in Massachusetts have purchased machines, and 

 have done up the mowing for their neighbors, 

 during the past two or three seasons. It is also 

 a common practice near large towns, for milk- 

 m.en to do the marketing of this article for their 

 neighbors. 



We find, however, in the Oliin Farmer, an ac- 

 count of a new application of this principle. Mr. 

 Lysander Pelton, of Gustavus, Trumbull county. 



Ohio, has established a cheese factory, where the 

 curd from more than two hundred dairies is man- 

 ufactured into cheese. He has erected suitable 

 buildings, with sufficient shelving for three hun- 

 dred and fifty tons of cheese. In April, he con- 

 tracts with all the farmers within a district of 

 eiglit or ten miles square, who are willing to sell 

 their curd, which is collected by Mr. P. and M'hich 

 employs from six to eight teams. The agreement 

 is that the curd shall be sweet, and that ten pounds 

 of it shall make seven pounds of cheese. "For 

 two years past the price has been 4A cents per 

 pound net." The curd from each dairy is sepa- 

 rately tested at the factory, and its amount of 

 shrinkage, Avhich is various, determined by ex- 

 periments ; if over 30 per cent., the excess is de- 

 ducted ; if less, it is added. The curd is sliced 

 and ground fine by machinery, and the whole es- 

 tablishment is arranged in factory style, and with 

 strict regard to convenience and neatness, and 

 great pains are taken to retain the best possible 

 flavor. Mr. Pelton contracts f(*r his cheese di- 

 rectly with shippers, and it Is stated that ''no one 

 who has dealt in his cheese has lost on it," al- 

 though country merchants in Ohio generally com- 

 plain of losing money by their operations in this 

 article. The last season, Mr. P. contracted for 

 all the cheese he could make, not to exceed three 

 hundred tons, but in consequence of the drought 

 he does not expect to exceed two hundred tons. 



The Avriter of the article which we have thus 

 condensed, believes that these two hundred dairy- 

 men would realize less money from the sale of 

 their cheese if manufactured at home, than they 

 now do from the sale of the curd ; thus making 

 a clear saving of the labor and care of manufac- 

 turing, preserving and selling thcin — a saving 

 which no dairy-woman will call a trifle. The rea- 

 son for this belief is, that if manufactured in 

 these various households, there Mould be not only 

 two hundred different sizes and shapes of cheese, 

 but as many qualities, which, when carried to 

 market, a few at a time, would be sold for less 

 money than Mr. Pelton pays for the curd. 



Of itself, this Ohio speculation may be a small 

 affair ; but, as suggesting the possibility of ap- 

 plying to agriculture those principles of combi- 

 nation, of labor-saving machinery, and of the di- 

 vision of labor, which have done so much for 

 manufactures, we regard Mr. Pelton's cheese 

 factory as one of those signs of the times that 

 deserve a passing notice and a passing thought. 



Land Measure. — Every farmer should have a 

 good measure, a light stiff pole, just sixteen and 

 a half feet long, for measuring land. By a little 

 practice he can learn to step a rod in five steps, 

 which will answer very well for ordinary farm 

 work. Ascertain the number of rods in width and 



