Show HOW TO SUCCEED ON A FARM Intelligence and Refinement Keep the Boys and Girls on a Farm By Margaret in the Mother's Maga-X DeGraff is the wife of a northwestern farmer whom the writer met last spring at her country She told him this The farm comprises acres of mixed and was originally a grasshopper DeGraff is the mother of three sons and a The City children have nearly everything they see or do glossed over for I have noticed that city parks and playgrounds are better kept than most patches of woods on- and there are a million and one things for even the children of the very poor to see and think Too many country children confront only a dull horizon line in home and and on the first chance of freedom they are gone like quail before the yelp of the hunter's The first year of our marriage my husband and myself found looking at a farm which the grasshoppers had even down to the clothes on the We were miserably and a child was We were not educated in the ordinary sense of the We both but with a great hunger to all the good we could and a dream-desire born of youth to never become as dull as Many a night before the oldest child and son was born we sat on the home porch wishing and planning not alone for our own but for a future of the child our eager desire being that it should always- wish to work with One night my husband said am too ignorant to be the father of a I must know I'm going to begin to have no advantage over was my I feel my own ignorance May I study with I was twenty-one and he That night T laid my hand in and we vowed our child should never feel that we were behind our age or not abreast of There is- the first keynote- of action in gaining control of a Parent after parent never seeks refinement is certainly very true of country progress and simple The growing keenly alert to the rapid advancement the world is becomes ashamed of the parents and dull and runs to less substantial One of neighbors does her kitchen work barefooted and comes to meal Her gowns would not even become a The family has but father and mother lack good The father eats with his removes food from the dishes with his and uses coarse He is a successful but he knows nothing but the and in his mental sky not a single star The daughters and a son were educated in our common district and then sent away for higher Children Hated When they returned home they had learned that there was something else in life besides unclean-liness and They ridiculed their parents before their made it plain they were ashamed of their and finally sought new homes ingratitude of the mother complained to ignorance of I whispered to At the time we bought an old-time Mason Hamlin organ these people said we were and When we papered each room of the so that there was harmony of colors and the rooms were cosily we were called and By the old method of mail delivery we received every new book and daily newspaper we could afford pay Then pur critics said we were and thought ourselves than our f instead of feeling that H merely trying to better than we of the 1 rapidly for several years I absolutely refused h eight and ten hours a kitchen- m tidy and W when I got tired and W housework shut iJ K where it I took a baft k on fresh sat in tW or the shade of the mt and took part in the I soon found that sh method of resting and chats the current of my thought me to do more work in than I formerly had done be intelligent m bolstered by good reading t is one of the best t the world to get a th out of a It is useless V wi me or any sane person th rests cannot be Money did not come fast In fa but we were prudent Wei ho into debt but of- ce it pays to be in debt of debt is not such a n many people make it out toV aland we steadily added in a a way to our I U frankly we did not watch i bank account one-half as cl as we did our health and tal 1 Most of the farmers abol worked twelve and a Husband would will not kill my soul and 14 he any financial f there is in this He I later in the morning than i neighbor left work d spent more time about the and subsequently the than any associate sniff But he was always to ing for new labor-saving new ways to conserve his Gains Began to Show- In two years' time hW were the plumpest and in the They rested than did other W J they worked they Husband method of sheep culture Many farmers came and then laughed J But in eighteen months' sheep and wool were 4 ow to Succeed on a Farm from Page zen buyers who passed over the 1 rub stock of the He planted his wheat and ed his handled his not in conventional but in w ways new to our but Ed to scientific His re-si came but it was and Every Ren he quit he did just as He bathed and changed The children had at a well Kan smelling and they said younger Kry buyers and prospectors Eie to our home to talk business they found books and pic-toes and music in every nook and decent and a place pt did not smell of kitchen heat The children were My when they worked and but in the home they They did not lew what it was to see untidy or an untidy place of and they had parents they idd talk to on any As time passed on they visited homes and saw other p privacy of their minds inevitable child comparisons were What they were brought up in and what surrounded other children was carefully The greatest compliment I ever received was from my youngest son after a visit to a neighboring he threw his arms about my neck and exclaimed I do love my We made the farm and farm-work a mixture of romance and useful facts for the What the lightning and breeding and hot suns and cold winds did for the soil and crops we took the children into as of their they saw its true relation to work-life and This of putting into farm home-life and field-life thought and feeling has worked so successfully with our children that the senior boy is a the second oldest is a practical dairyman on land of his own adjacent to the junior is superintendent of our farm and the daughter runs hennery All four children received high school city except to annually visit its wonders has no attraction for Once a year we all have a-dip into the Twin Cities and and we have been to Washington We owe no one in this world a although no great wealth is in our but we have gained Immeasurable precious and a lasting mutual companionship in work and Our family is a |