e acre is sufficient for cleaning up land, and that in two years
the goats will eat all of the underbrush from woodland, such as
briers, thistles, scrub oak, sumac, and, in fact, any shrub
undergrowth. They need no other food than what they can secure from
the woods themselves. Consequently, the income from the sale of
mohair is nearly net.

The more nearly thoroughbred the goats are, the better the mohair
and the higher the price. The meat of the Angora goat is superior to
mutton, although if sold in the market under the name of goat meat,
it commands only half the price of mutton.

As an example of the Angora's utility in cleaning up land, the
Country Gentleman says: "Mr. Landrum exhibited ten head at the
Oregon State Fair. In order to demonstrate their effectiveness as
substitutes for grubbing, he left them on three acres of brush. At
the end of the second year the land was mellow and ready for the
plow."

It might be possible to build up a business in clearing lands for
others by means of a herd of Angoras.

CHAPTER XIX

HOW TO BUILD

If you find an "abandoned farm" on which the buildings are worth
more than the whole price asked, as frequently happens, you are all
right. Even if the buildings are somewhat dilapidated, you can fix
them up for a few dollars. But in buying small plots of ground,
larger farms have to be broken up. If you buy from the resident
owner, he may sell you five acres off his larger tract, and keep his
house to live in. Certain it is that if a farm of 100 acres is
subdivided into twenty five-acre farms, at least nineteen new houses
must be built, although sometimes an old barn can be made into a
fair residence.

If you can do no better, it is possible to start by tenting. An
outfit large enough for a family of six would be about as follows:

1 wall tent with fly, 10 X 14, for sleeping 1 wall tent with fly, 10
X 14, for dining

1 old cook stove (to be erected outdoors), 2 floors, 10 X 14, at $5
each

Brown tents, at least for the sleeping rooms, are best; they last
longer, are cooler, and do not attract the flies; though indeed we
need not have house flies if we keep the horse manure covered
up--they are all bred in that. If the tents are in the shade, the
cost of the cover or fly can be saved in the dining tent; but it is
necessary in the living tent, because wet canvas will leak when
touched on the inside. To make the tent warm for the winter, we must
bank up to the edg