if not better, opportunities, especially where land in small
tracts is available near the large cities.

_The Farmers' Advocate_ (Topeka, Kansas) says of lands which ten
years ago were among the much advertised "abandoned farms" of the
eastern states: "All over the eastern states where farming twenty
years ago was pronounced a failure under Western competition there
has sprung up this intensive cultivation. Violets are grown in one
place and tuberoses by the acre in another. Celery is making one
man's large profit near Williamsburg. Special fruits are cultivated.
Currants are grown by the ton and sold by the pound, yielding a
profit. This is in progress over the entire range of farming."

At Hyde Park, a little village three miles north of Reading, Pa.,
there is a small farm owned by Oliver R. Shearer, who may be said to
be one of the most successful farmers in the United States. This
farm contains 3-1/2 acres, only 2-1/2 of which are cultivated, but
they yield the owner annually from $1200 to $1500. From the profits
of his intensive farming, Mr. Shearer has paid $3800 for his
property, which, besides the land, consists of a modern two-story
brick house, with barn, chicken-yard, and orchard, the whole
surrounded by a neat fence. He has also raised and educated a family
of three children.

There are no secrets, Mr. Shearer says, about his method of farming.
A study of conditions, the application of common-sense methods and
untiring energy, he asserts, will enable others to do what he has
done, but that most men would kill themselves with the work.

In an agricultural exchange a small farmer tells that he makes a
living and saves some money from a ten-acre farm. Before he was
through paying for his land, which cost $100 an acre, building his
house, fences, and outbuildings, he went in debt $1300, having about
the same amount to start with. He is near a good market, and in five
years has paid off the debt, and has been getting ahead ever since.
He raises poultry and small fruits, and says that it is a good
combination, as most of the work with poultry comes in winter, while
he can do nothing out of doors. He maintains that a ten-acre farm
rightly managed will bring a good living, including the comforts and
some of the luxuries of life, and says: "This I have fully
demonstrated, and what I have done others may do."

_Maxwell's Talisman_ says:

"E. J. O'Brien of Citronelle, Alabama, received $170 clear from an
acre o