Campbell's 1902 Soil Cultuee Manual. 



101 



TO THE BOYS AND GIRLS ON THE 



FARM. 



We caDnot close these chapters without a few wwds of friendly 

 counsel to the boys and girls on the farm. 



Don't leave the farm. Stay on the old farm homestead, where you 

 were born. It is the best home on earth. 



Don't try to get away from nature, but get nearer to her if possible. 



Drink her pure waters; eat her unadulterated foods, and breathe her 

 sweet, pure air. These will combine to give you, and continue to .^ive you, 

 the rosy faces you wear, the buoyant, hopeful hearts that beat in your 

 breasts, and the innocence and honesty that protect your lives from evil. 



Remember that George W ashington was a farmer and was proud of 

 his calling, that, also, of the splendid galaxy of our great men whose dis- 

 tinguished talents were devoted to the service of their country as states- 

 men or presidents, since Washington's time, and whose fame is the greatest 

 of all the nation's sons, the most of them were farmers, or joined agricul- 

 ture with their public service or their professional pursuits. Daniel 

 Webster, New England's greatest lawyer and statesman, was a farmer, and 

 often left the Senate or Cabinet and returned to bis farm on the quiet 

 shore of Marshfield to follow the plow behind his favorite oxen. 



He often said that he might frequently be found elsewhere but his 

 heart could always be found at Marshfield. We have never met a great 

 mind that did not love the land and long to settle dow^n on some spot of 

 ample acres where he could drink in the ambrosial delights of fields, 

 meadows, and pastures with herds and flocks. Do not, my young friends, 

 doubt, that to be an intelligent, progressive farmer is a higher vocation 

 than any profession you can choose. 



No matter how far you have pursued learning, or to what degree of 

 refinement and elegance your accomplishments have reached, you will need 

 them all to take first rank as a farmer. Chemistry, physics, and astronomy 

 are the present necessarj- equipment for the leaders in the science of suc- 

 cessful farming; and languages and the classics are a substantial aid to 

 enable you to become counselors and instructors, and capable to teach 

 others w^ho are ambitious to learn to be first-class tillers of the soil. 



Do not look down on farming, as a business, or permit anyone to dis- 

 parage it in your presence without just rebuke, for it is far superior to the 

 business of the tradesmen, or the "middle men," so-called, in any capacity, 

 the latter of whom, especially, live like the scavenger sparrow^s, on "pick- 

 ings." 



Do not measure the importance and consequence of a business by 



