AN APOLOGUE OR APPLE-LOGUE.Twomen planted out each one hundred apple-trees. In six or seven years they began to bear. One had spared no pains to bring his orchard into the highest condition. He had constantly cultivated the soil about them, scraped off the rough bark, washed them with urinated soap, picked off every worm and nursed them as if they had been children. The other, pursuing a cheaper plan, simply let his trees alone; but the moss, and canker-worms took his place and attended to them every year. When the orchards began to bear, the careful man had the best fruit, and the careless man covered his folly by cursing the nursery-man for selling him poor trees. In a year or two the careful man had two bushels to the other’s one from each tree. Not to be outdone, the latter determined to have as many apples as the former, and set out another hundred trees. By and by, when they bore, the other orchard had so improved that it produced twice as many yet; another hundred trees were therefore planted. In process of time the first orchard of one hundred trees still sent more fruit to market than the three hundred trees of the careless man, who now gave up and declared that he never did have luck, and it was of no use to tryon his soilto raise good fruit.1. When a man is too shiftless to take good care of two horses, he buys two more, and gets from the four what he might get from two.2. A farmer who picks up a cow simply because it is not an ox, andis, nominally, lactiferous, and then lets the creature work for a living, very soon buys a second, and a third, and a fourth, and gets from them all, what he should have had from one good one.3. A farmer had one hundred acres. Instead of getting seventy-five bushels of corn to the acre, he gets forty and makes it up by cultivating twice as many acres; instead of thirty bushes of wheat he gets twelve, and puts in acresenough to make up; instead of making one hundred acres do the work of three hundred, he buys more land, and allows three hundred to do only the work of one hundred.4. A young woman, with a little pains, can have three times as many clothes as she needs, and then not look so well as a humble neighbor who has not half her wardrobe; wherefore, we close with some proverbs made for the occasion:Active little is better than lazy much.Carefulness is richer than abundance.Large farming is not always good farming, and small farming is often the largest.
Twomen planted out each one hundred apple-trees. In six or seven years they began to bear. One had spared no pains to bring his orchard into the highest condition. He had constantly cultivated the soil about them, scraped off the rough bark, washed them with urinated soap, picked off every worm and nursed them as if they had been children. The other, pursuing a cheaper plan, simply let his trees alone; but the moss, and canker-worms took his place and attended to them every year. When the orchards began to bear, the careful man had the best fruit, and the careless man covered his folly by cursing the nursery-man for selling him poor trees. In a year or two the careful man had two bushels to the other’s one from each tree. Not to be outdone, the latter determined to have as many apples as the former, and set out another hundred trees. By and by, when they bore, the other orchard had so improved that it produced twice as many yet; another hundred trees were therefore planted. In process of time the first orchard of one hundred trees still sent more fruit to market than the three hundred trees of the careless man, who now gave up and declared that he never did have luck, and it was of no use to tryon his soilto raise good fruit.
1. When a man is too shiftless to take good care of two horses, he buys two more, and gets from the four what he might get from two.
2. A farmer who picks up a cow simply because it is not an ox, andis, nominally, lactiferous, and then lets the creature work for a living, very soon buys a second, and a third, and a fourth, and gets from them all, what he should have had from one good one.
3. A farmer had one hundred acres. Instead of getting seventy-five bushels of corn to the acre, he gets forty and makes it up by cultivating twice as many acres; instead of thirty bushes of wheat he gets twelve, and puts in acresenough to make up; instead of making one hundred acres do the work of three hundred, he buys more land, and allows three hundred to do only the work of one hundred.
4. A young woman, with a little pains, can have three times as many clothes as she needs, and then not look so well as a humble neighbor who has not half her wardrobe; wherefore, we close with some proverbs made for the occasion:
Active little is better than lazy much.
Carefulness is richer than abundance.
Large farming is not always good farming, and small farming is often the largest.