248 
February 7, JD20 
HOPE FARM NOTES 
What farm work is going on now? 
The weather is sueh that about all we 
can do now is to get out our supply of 
wood. We have hauled about 15 cords to 
the house already. The snow has made 
it possible to haul this out on the sled. 
What kind of wood for fuel? 
We use mostly dead chestnut. It is 
not considered of much value in the mar¬ 
ket—the wood yards in New York will 
not buy it—but we find it makes a quick, 
hot fire when well dried out. Hickory, 
oak and birch are worth more for other 
purposes than fuel. Our chestnut was 
all killed by the blight, and we work it up 
as best we can. 
How do you handle this wood? 
We' cut out 1 the dead chestnuts and 
leave the harder wood standing. The 
trees suitable for posts are put one side. 
The others are split and cut into 12-ft. 
lengths and hauled to the house and piled 
close to the shed. When the time and 
weather is right a neighbor comes with a 
buzz saw and gasoline engine and cuts 
these sticks up into stove wood. The 
chunks are thrown into the shed, where 
they keep dry untft wanted for fuel. 
Do the women ever help to split and 
carry in wood? 
No; not while we have all these chil¬ 
dren about. The women would not do it. 
I think they would strike and refuse to 
cook a meal if the men or boys did not 
provide dry fuel. I would certainly back 
them right up in < it, for this fuel propo¬ 
sition is the man’s job. 
Do yon believe these stories about the 
woman being compelled to wade out in the 
snow and get her own fuel? 
Yes, because I have seen it done. When 
I lived in the West I used to see women 
wade through the snow to a green log 
and cut a few sticks or chips off. They 
had to dry them out in the oven before 
they would burn. One Winter, when I 
was out of a job, I struck a farmer for 
work. He said he had nothing to do, but 
his wife spoke up and said that was the 
first chance she ever had to get some good 
fuel. “ Put him on the tcood pile!" said 
she, and though the farmer growled, she 
had her way. I spent most of that 'Win¬ 
ter cutting and splitting wood. I think 
that farmer felt that it was mostly use¬ 
less labor, but the woman stayed by me, 
and when I left there was a wood pile 
nearly as large as a house. I have often 
felt that Winter job was about as near 
to religious work as anything I ever at¬ 
tempted. 
Do you mean to say that a man can 
practice religion with an ax? 
He surely can—pure and undefiled! 
Some men go to church once a week and 
think they do their full religious duty by 
that performance. Before you nominate 
them as first assistant to some saint, go 
and look at their wood pile! There is 
where you find either the bloom or the 
pimple "on the face of a farmer’s char¬ 
acter ! I have heard bankers and rich 
men say they would hesitate to take a 
chance on lending money to a farmer who 
would not provide an abundance of dry 
fuel. It would be regarded as evidence 
of a failure to realize the importance of 
necessary details. I have also heard ex¬ 
perienced women say they never would 
marry a farmer unless he realized the im¬ 
portance of dry fuel and a convenient 
kitchen. 
What about the farmers in your section? 
Practically every farmhouse in our 
neighborhood has its ■wood shed or big 
wood pile. Many of us use coal for a 
part of the fuel, and the cash we must 
pay for it compels us to see the impor¬ 
tance of having the wood cared for. There 
may be cases where the women carry m 
wood or cut kindling, but they are very 
rare. Through lack of practice, I think, 
the average woman here would hardly 
know how to handle an ax. They may 
feel compelled to do farm work now and 
then, but the wood-pile job belongs to the 
man, and I think the women should keep 
away from it. 
Is there any sale for timber? 
Not very much in our locality—prob¬ 
ably because there is not enough of it. 
We hope to get a few oak trees to the 
sawmill and have them cut into 2x4 lum¬ 
ber. Then there are a number of good 
whitewood trees that ought to be valu¬ 
able. White birch has value for making 
spools, and we could furnish 30 cords or 
more. We may be able to get this off 
before Spring. Right now seems to be 
the time for selling timber. 
When shall you begin pruning? 
Probably in February—depending on 
the weather. We do not prune heavily— 
about all we do is to cut out the interfer¬ 
ing limbs or those which grow too much 
into the inside of the tree. An open 
head to admit the sunshine on a tree is 
like an open mind in a man—to admit 
fair argument or thought. Give this to 
the tree or the man and it does not make 
much difference bow he shapes up, pro¬ 
vided the variety (or breed) is right and 
the tree or the man has a fair chance. I 
never could explain on paper just how 
vve would train any particular tree. I 
should have to see the tree and study it, 
and then point 1 out to the student or owner 
just why I should do certain things. 
Tht RURAL. NEW-YORKER 
Then, after we got it done, the chances 
are that some expert would come along 
and prove by his rule that we were all 
wrong. I think most good fruit growers 
observe certain general rules in pruning 
and then go by “instinct.” 
But is your comparison between trim¬ 
ming the tree and the man or boy fair? 
Why not—up to a certain point? If 
you want a good apple tree you must be¬ 
gin with the yearling. You must have 
in your eye what that tree ought to bo 
when it comes into bearing. Then with 
your thumb nail or a knife you can shape 
that tree by cutting out. -buds or twigs 
when they are small. If you wait until 
these buds or twigs have grown to big 
misshapen branches you can cut them off, 
but there will always be scars and danger 
of disease, and the shape will never be 
just what you want. Of course, in order 
to do that work properly a man must have 
had experience so as instantly to jump 
the years of growth between the bud ami 
the big branch. The beginner or the un¬ 
tried back-to-the-lander thinks that shap¬ 
ing and pruning a tree is an easy, me¬ 
chanical job, because he sees the old- 
timer go at it without hesitation. It is 
not half as much mechanical as it is 
mental. 
That may all be true, but udiat has it 
to do icith training a boy? 
The principle is pretty much the same. 
The ideal way to bring up a boy is to 
prune him as we would the tree— in the 
bud. Get his habits right to start with. 
For instance, some boys begin early in 
life to think it is smart 1 to sneer at people 
or disregard the rights of others so long 
as they have their own way. I know 
people yho encourage that, thinking it 
will develop the boy into a strong and 
dominant man. Such people should read 
‘The Magnificent Ambersons,” by Booth 
Tarkington. The young man in that 
story was not properly trained in his 
youth. Later the big, interfering branch 
was cut out of him with painful effect. 
But who can trim the average boy? 
His father ought to do it, but the aver¬ 
age father has what he considers more 
important things to do. I do not know 
how anything can be more important than 
the developing of a lively boy into a sound 
man—but the average father cannot see 
it. Usually such a man (if he be success¬ 
ful) knows far less about his own boy 
than dozens of others do. As a rule the 
mother has more influence over the boy, 
but there is a certain pride or standard 
of character ■which the boy can only ob¬ 
tain from bis father. And not from 
father’s preaching, but from his practice 
of life. I have spent some little time 
looking up the record or family experi¬ 
ences of the men and women who come 
along telling the public how to raise chil¬ 
dren. My estimate is that 00 per cent of 
them are unmarried men and women, or 
married people who never had any chil¬ 
dren ! 
Is that actually true? 
Well, look around among the teachers 
and lecturers you know of, and see 
how many of them have actually raised a 
boy or girl into a high quality man or 
woman ! It is a strange thing, but you 
rarely find people who have raised large 
families who are willing to tell how to 
train a child. We have had in our fam¬ 
ily, at various times, ID different children. 
You would think that ought to give any 
woman authority to discuss the matter, 
but I cannot get mother to write or speak 
on the subject. Yet, if I remember 
rightly, before we were married, as a 
young school teacher, she could and would 
tell you just how to raise a child ! 
But with the millions spent on educa¬ 
tion and for “child welfare ,” it ought to 
be comparatively easy to raise a child! 
I am glad you think so, for I like to 
see evidence of cheerfulness in the hu¬ 
man race. As for me, I think raising 
a crop of good children the hardest, the 
most self-denying and the most important 
work in all the world. The more public 
money that is spent on “education” and 
child welfare, the harder the job becomes, 
because men and women are more inclined 
to shift the burden into the hands of 
teachers. The fact is that you cannot 
raise a crop of good children by proxy. 
The teacher and the college cannot do it 
for you. The child has got to have the 
background of a home in order to prove 
worth while, and the boy, in particular, 
has got to have a father who is in some 
way, living or dead, some sort of an ideal 
character. I know of cases where the 
father died when the boy was young. 
The child grew up to regard father as an 
ideal character, and his ambition was to 
equal that ideal. ►Some of us know only 
too well what the father really was, but 
do you suppose we would ever try to 
convince the boy that his ideal is all a 
dream? If we did succeed in making him 
see the truth of it, we should simply 
smash the sacred vessel on the altar of his 
soul. There is another thing to keep in 
mind. Some men seem to think they can 
carry on a lot of mean habits or worse, 
on the sly, and not let the children know 
of it. Wrong! It may be possible to 
deceive the girls for a time, but sooner 
or later the boys will “get wise,” and as 
the result of that wisdom you will won¬ 
der, some years hence, why your boy isn’t 
straight. It will be an even chance that 
you will attribute the weakness to moth¬ 
er’s family. So here you have it again : 
If we expect to train boys and girls into 
good men and women, "we hare got to 
do it ourselves.” n. w. c. 
Coffee Prices Are Up 
Brit 
There’s No Raise 
In Trice Of 
Instant 
POSTUM 
Try this delicious table 
drink, of coffee-like 
flavor in place of your 
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Note the satisfaction, 
not only to purse but! 
to Health., and you’ll 
continue *to drinks 
this deli<ghtful family 
beverage.. 
* 
L. 
T/iez-e's a Reason* 
Made by Postum Cereal Company 
Battle Creek . Michigan. 
J 
Why Apples Fall 
If your apples drop off the trees before they are 
ready to pick—if a windstorm in the fall shakes a 
large part of your apple crop to the ground, it is a 
severe disappointment and a heavy money loss. 
Apples fall either because the fruit is unsound or 
because there is not strength enough in the twig 
to hold them on. 
This loss is usually unnecessary. It can be elim¬ 
inated almost entirely. Sound fruit, free from 
insect damage and disease, that stays on the tree 
until harvest time is the result of spraying with 
REO. U. S. f AT. OFF, 
TRACT MARK REGISTERED 
PYROX does more than kill the codling moth and other 
leaf-eating worms and bugs. It does more than prevent rot, 
scabs and other fungous diseases. For the beneficial effect 
that it has on the foliage of the tree—making the leaves a 
rich, healthy green color—gives strength to the twig, causing 
the apples to hang on in spite of even very strong and severe 
windstorms. 
Apple trees sprayed with PYROX carry their fruit right up 
to the time to pick; the apples color up on the trees; they are 
free from insect damage and fungous blemishes. Spray your 
apples this year with PYROX. Your crop will be bigger, 
and because they are so smooth and sound the apples will 
practically sell themselves. 
PYROX is easy to use—just measure out the right amount and 
mix with cold water. It is a smooth, creamy paste, free from grit 
and lumps, and will go through the finest nozzle. It eliminates 
the worry and work of preparing separate chemicals. 
Be sure to arrange for your supply of PYROX early. Have 
your local dealer reserve what you will need. Write today for 
your copy of the new Pyrox book. 
BOWKER INSECTICIDE COMPANY 
43-A Chatham St., Boston, Mass. 
1002 Fidelity Bldg., Baltimore, Md. 
712 Conway Bldg., Chicago, ill. 
