from Boston commission
merchants. The Minnesota farmer cannot supply his breakfast table with
oranges, grapefruit or oatmeal. Many of them buy, if not their bread,
at least their flour, and also their butter. The fact that the city man
indulges in high living is no argument in favor of the country man
expecting less wages. Some of those things which are necessary to make
the country an ideal place to live are expensive. Some of them are more
expensive to obtain in the country than in the city, as, for example,
educational facilities. In justifying his purchase of an automobile, a
young farmer recently stated that his wife had certain cares,
responsibilities and even privations which her city friends did not
have. He thought that the automobile would help to offset them.

To my mind there is no more ideal place to live and rear a family than
in the open country when the conditions are what they should be and
may be. I believe, however, it is well to insist that it costs
something to live in the country as well as in the city if one lives
as well as every farmer has a right to expect to live.

Let us now consider the steps necessary in order to arrive at a fair
estimate of the labor income. To make the matter concrete, we will
assume a farm of 200 acres worth $60 an acre located in central
Pennsylvania on a limestone clay loam soil over 1,000 feet above sea
level. This farm is to contain 20 acres of timber, a 30-acre apple
orchard two years old, 40 acres of pasture, 96 acres of cultivated
land divided into six 16-acre fields. The rest of the 200 acres
consists of small yards, roadways and waste land. One-half of each of
the six 16-acre fields is to consist of a rotation of maize, oats and
wheat, each one year, and hay three years, the latter clover and
timothy followed by timothy. The other half is to consist of maize,
barley, followed by alfalfa four years. In the young orchard there
will be grown for a few years potatoes, tomatoes, cabbages and garden
peas. After the orchard attains a size which forbids these intertilled
crops, a portion of the pasture may be broken up so that these market
garden crops may be raised. There will be kept six horses, 20 milch
cows, 20 ewes of some mutton breed of sheep, five brood sows and 50
hens.

First of all, let attention be called to the broad knowledge of
farming required to operate this moderate-sized and comparatively
simple farm. The crops to be raised are maize, oats, wheat,