Proceedings of the Farmers' Club. 893 



for ten dollars an acre ; he gets unimproved, well situated, at five 

 dollars, and more remote at three dollars an acre. The industry that 

 would give him just a living if he continued the life of a hireling, 

 will, in ten years, make eighty acres, that cost him perhaps nothing, 

 and perhaps $400, worth from $1,000 to $2,000. This is the reason- 

 able and average expectation on western farming lands well chosen. 

 Now, in what way can a day -laborer, in old communities, set before 

 himself any reasonable hope of winning a fortune of $1,500 or $2,000 

 in ten years? Now, let us look at it in the east: If a poor man 

 has special knowledge and skill, if he can raise hot-house grapes, and 

 make 15,000 good hard head of cabbage by the 10th of July, he can 

 afford to go in debt for a patch of land near a city, and by hard toil, 

 early and late, he may work off a mortgage, and find his land doubled 

 in value as garden land, and doubled again from the growth of the 

 town near which he bought. Some have made fortunes in just this 

 way. But it should not be attempted by a moneyless man, except, 

 on three conditions: 1. He must be an expert gardener. 2. He 

 must work like a slave. 3. The choice must be good. 



Here we are met by the question, what land is in fact the cheapest, 

 rich soil near a city, selling at from $200 to $1,000 per acre, or fertile 

 prairie near the Platte, or the Kaw, or the Kepublican at $1.25. It 

 depends, I answer, on the use a man makes of it and the time he 

 proposes to hold it. Looked at as a speculation, as a temporary 

 investment, I would say buy a patch near a city, and allowing 100 

 loads of manure annually to the acre, raise celery, cabbage, lettuce, 

 beets, and onions. Looked at as a winning of a permanent home, I 

 would say, go more than a thousand miles westward and buy half a 

 section, if he can, and eighty acres if he can no more. While pre- 

 senting the case in a purely commercial light, and every man should 

 take that view, with others, I protest against a judgment against 

 farming adventures because they do not always pay ten per cent. 

 Ten thousand business-men are paying from $100 to $3,000 a year to 

 life insurance companies, and the ruling motive is to secure peace of 

 mind as to the future of loved ones that would be stripped by death 

 of their sole protector. Their course is a wise one, and life insurance 

 companies rob death of half his terrors ; but suppose the same money 

 were as regularly applied to securing the fee simple to a modest yet 

 productive home? On a farm some things are a certainty; there 

 can always be bread enough and milk enough, and an abundance of 

 some sorts, perhaps full variety of fruits. With unwise management 

 even, and irregular industry, the wants of the body can be met ; 



