SEED-TIME ATO HABVEST. 
27 
Mowing the Highways. 
About fifteen years ago I purchased a 
small farm in New Jersey, only a short 
ride from New York city. About the first 
job by way of commencing improvements, 
consisted in removing the rubbish, briars, 
bushes and stumps from the highway, and 
grading on both sides of the beaten track, 
so that a mowing machine could be driven 
on both sides to cut the grass clear down to 
both gutters. I asked permission of an ad¬ 
joining neighbor to “sleek up” also the 
highway along his farm. As a remunera¬ 
tion for my labor he agreed to permit me to 
mow the grass in the highway along his 
farm. The job took two of us, with team, 
plow’, scraper and harrow about one day, 
to level and smooth about half a mile in 
length of the highway. Where there was 
no grass, seed was sown. The next season 
the grass along my farm and the farm of 
mj' neighbor, was much heavier than in 
any of the adjoining fields. As the carriage 
track occupied only about eight feet in 
breadth we mowed more than two acres of 
heavier grass than was cut on eitner farm. 
Need I say anything farther on this sub¬ 
ject to induce farmers to sleek up and level 
off the borders of the highway ? Why not 
grade and smooth off the surface of the 
highway, when such land will yield as 
heavy grass as any other part of the farm ? 
Besides the consideration of economy, or 
profit, a highway along one’s farm, kept 
in a neat condition, gives travelers good 
impressions of the general character of the 
occupants of the farmstead. Respected 
reader, “you know how it is yourself.” 
When you and I travel about the country 
and see the borders of the highway pro¬ 
ducing nothing but beautiful grass, we 
usually infer that the owner, or manager 
of the farm understands his business and 
is a thrifty farmer. On the contrary, when 
we see on both sides of the beaten track of 
the highway, almost impassable hedges of 
bushes, brambles, briars, thistles, and nox¬ 
ious weeds, we say at once that such dis¬ 
figuring blotches indicate a lack of thor¬ 
oughness on the part of the owners of the 
land. Whenever I travel about the country, 
whether in New Jersey, New England, or 
New York State, I pass a great many nice 
farms, where the highways indicate that 
the proprietors of the land need a good 
boss to get out all hands, at certain times, 
when they do not know what to do, and 
direct them to cut up the bushes, pick up 
the stones, grub out the snags, fill up the 
hollows and grade the street, so that a car¬ 
riage can be driven clear down to the gut¬ 
ters without fear of turning over. There 
will always be days, or parts of days, dur¬ 
ing haying and harvest, when the boss will 
say, “I really do not know what job can be 
done to-day.” At such a time “pick up 
and sleek up” the highway.—E. E. T. in 
The Husbandman. 
HUSBANDMAN! 
—TWELFTH YEAR. 
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