mon method in use. The
first irrigation comes early in the spring before growth has advanced
much, and the successive waterings after the harvesting of each crop.

SECTION LXX. LIFE IN THE COUNTRY

As ours is a country in which the people rule, every boy and every girl
ought to be trained to take a wide-awake interest in public affairs.
This training cannot begin too early in life. A wise old man once said,
"In a republic you ought to begin to train a child for good citizenship
on the day of its birth."

[Illustration: FIG. 289. BEAUTY FROM FLOWERS AND GRASS]

[Illustration: FIG. 290. A COUNTRY ROAD IN MECKLENBURG COUNTY,
NORTH CAROLINA]

Happy would it be for our nation if all the young people who live in the
country could begin their training in good citizenship by becoming
workers for these four things:

First, attractive country homes.

Second, attractive country schoolhouses and school grounds.

Third, good country schools.

Fourth, good roads.

If the thousands on thousands of pupils in our schools would become
active workers for these things and continue their work through life,
then, in less than half a century, life in the country would be an
unending delight.

One of the problems of our day is how to keep bright, thoughtful,
sociable, ambitious boys and girls contented on the farm. Every step
taken to make the country home more attractive, to make the school and
its grounds more enjoyable, to make the way easy to the homes of
neighbors, to school, to post-office, and to church, is a step taken
toward keeping on the farm the very boys and girls who are most apt to
succeed there.

Not every man who lives in the country can have a showy or costly home,
but as long as grass and flowers and vines and trees grow, any man who
wishes can have an attractive house. Not every woman who is to spend a
lifetime at the head of a rural home can have a luxuriously furnished
home, but any woman who is willing to take a little trouble can have a
cozy, tastefully furnished home--a home fitted with the conveniences
that diminish household drudgery. Even in this day of cheap literature,
all parents cannot fill their children's home with papers, magazines,
and books, but by means of school and Sunday-school libraries, by means
of circulating book clubs, and by a little self-denial, earnest parents
can feed hungry minds just as they feed hungry bodies.

[Illustration: THE QUEEN OF FLOWERS FOR THE HOME]

[Illustra