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It was now the dead of winter. Everything was frozen
up; but though cheerless without, it was far from being so within. My
little library, well supplied with books and the literature of the day,
afforded me an intellectual banquet which never palled upon the appetite.
Here my desk was ever open; here pen, and ink, and diary were constantly
at hand, for entering down my expenditures and receipts, with facts and
observations for future use. Thus conveniently provided, and all my life
accustomed to accounts, I found no difficulty at the year's end in
ascertaining to a dollar whether my first season's experience had been one
of loss or gain. I give the particulars in full—
Cost of stable manure
and ashes................$348.00
Plaster and
guano, not all used.................. 20.00
Ploughing, harrowing, and
digging up the garden 30.00
Cabbage and tomato
plants...................... 30.00
Loss on my first
cow............................ 7.00
Garden
seeds................................... 8.00
Cost of six
pigs................................. 12.00
Corn-meal and
bran..,.......................... 28.00
Dick's wages for six
months..................... 72.00
Total $455.00
Here was an outlay of $455, all of which was likely
to occur every year, except the two items of loss on cow, and cost of
buying cabbages and tomato-plants, which have subsequently been raised in
a hotbed at home, without costing a dollar. The great item is in manure,
amounting to $268; and this must be kept at the same figure, if not
increased, unless an equal quantity can, by some process, be manufactured
at home.
Then there was the following permanent outlay made
in stocking the farm with fruit:
Strawberries for six
acres................... $120.00
Raspberries for two
acres................... 34.00
804 Peach-trees, and planting
them.......... 72.36
Total
$226.36
This constituted a permanent investment of capital,
and would not have to be repeated, so that the actual cost the first year
was, as stated, $455. My own time and labor are not charged, because that
item is adjusted in the grand result of whether the farm supported me or
not. There was also the cost of horse and cow, ploughs, and other tools;
but these, too, were investments, not expenses. They could be resold for
money, no doubt, at some loss. A portion of that capital could therefore
be recovered. So, also, with the large item of $226.36, invested in
standard fruits; as, if the farm were sold its being stocked with them
would insure its bringing a higher price in consequence, probably enough
to refund the capital thus invested.
It is fair, therefore, to charge the current
expenses only against the current receipts. The
latter were as follows:
Sales of blackberry plants................ $460.00
"
cabbages.......................... 82.00
" tomatoes
........................ 120.00
" garden products..................
80.00
" pork.............................. 49.00
Total $791.00
Current expenses, as
stated............... 455.00
Profit................. $336.00
This was about $1.25 per day for the two hundred
and seventy-five days we had been in the country, from April 1st to
January 1st, and, when added to our copious supplies of vegetables, fruit,
pork, and milk, it kept the family in abundance. I proved this by a very
simple formula. I knew exactly how much cash I had on hand when I began
in April, and from that amount deducted the cost of all my permanent
investments in standard fruits, stock, and implements, and found that the
remainder came within a few cents of the balance on hand in January. I did
not owe a dollar, and had food enough to keep my stock till spring. The
season had been a good one for me, and we felt the greatest encouragement
to persevere, as the first difficulties had been overcome, and the second
season promised to be much more profitable. I considered the problem as
very nearly solved.
It will be noted that no cash was received for
strawberries, and herein is involved a fact important to be known and
acted on by the growers of this fruit. Most men,
when planting them, say in March or April, are impatient for a crop in
June. But this should never be allowed. As soon as the blossoms appear,
they should be removed. The newly transplanted vine has work enough thrown
upon its roots in repairing the damage it has suffered in being removed
from one location to another, without being compelled, in addition, to
mature a crop of fruit. To require it to do both is imposing on the roots
a task they are many times unable to perform. The draft upon them by the
ripening fruit is more than they can bear. I have known large fields of
newly-planted vines perish in a dry season from this cause alone. The
writers on strawberry culture sometimes recommend removing the blossoms
the first year, but not with sufficient urgency. I lay it down as
absolutely indispensable to the establishment of a robust growth. Thus
believing, my blossoms were all clipped off with scissors; and hence,
though stronger plants were thus produced, yet there was no fruit to
sell.
It must also be remembered that my entire profit
consisted of the single item of sales of plants; hence, if there had been
no demand for Lawtons, or if I had happened to have none for sale, there
would have been an actual loss. My having them was a mere accident, and my
luck in this respect was quite exceptional. Unless others happen to be
equally lucky, they may set down their first year as very certain to yield
no profit. With persons as inexperienced as I was when beginning, no
other result should be expected.
Winter is proverbially the farmer's
holiday. But it was no idle time with me. I had too long been trained to
habits of industry, to lounge about the house simply because no weeds
could be found to kill. The careful man will find a world of fixing up to
do for winter. As it came on slowly through a gorgeous Indian summer, I
set myself to cleaning up the litter round the premises, and put the
garden into the best condition for the coming season. The verbenas had
gone from the borders; the petunias had withered on the little mound
whereon their red and white had flashed so gayly in captivating contrast
during the summer; the delicate cypress-vine had blackened at the touch of
a single frosty night; the
lady-slipper hung her flowery head; all the family of roses had faded;
the morning-glory had withered; even the hardy honeysuckle had been
frozen crisp. From the fruit-trees a crowd of leaves had fallen upon every
garden-walk. Plants that needed housing were carefully potted, and taken
under cover. The walks were cleared of leaves by transferring them to the
barnyard. Bushes, trees, and vines were trimmed. Every remnant of decay
was removed. The December sunshine fell upon a garden so trim and neat,
that even in the bleakest day it was not unpleasant to wander through its
alleys, and observe those wintry visitants, the snow-birds, gathering from
the bushes their scanty store of favorite seeds. The asparagus was covered
deeply with its favorite manure, and heavily salted. Tender roses were
banked up with barnyard scrapings,
and every delicate
plant protected for its long season of hybernation.
Dick had his share of
exemption from excessive labor. But I kept him tolerably busy for weeks in
gathering up the cloud of leaves which fell throughout the neighborhood
from roadsides lined with trees. No manure is so well worth saving in
October and November as the falling leaves. They contain nearly three
times as much nitrogen as ordinary barnyard manure; and every gardener who
has strewn and covered them in his trenches late in the fall or in
December, must have noticed the next season how black and moist the soil
is that adheres to the thrifty young beets he pulls. No vegetable
substance yields its woody fibre and becomes soluble quicker than leaves;
and, from this very cause, they are soon dried up, scattered to the winds,
and wasted, if not now gathered and trenched in, or composted, before the
advent of severe winter.
My horse, and cow, and pigs, all slept in leaves.
Their beds were warm and easy, and the saving of straw for litter was an
item. As they were abundant, and very convenient, Dick carted to the
barnyard an enormous quantity. Placing enough of them under cover, he
littered all the stock with them until spring. The remainder was composted
with the contents of the barnyard, and thus made a very important addition
to my stock of manure. Thus the leaf-harvest is one of importance to the
farmer, if he will but avail himself of it. A calm day or two spent in
this business will enable him to get together a large pile of these fallen
leaves; and if stowed in a dry place, he will experience the good effects
of them in the improved condition of his stock, compared with those which
are suffered to lie down, and perhaps be frozen down, in their own filth.
The fertilizing material of leaves also adds essentially to the enriching
qualities of the manure-heap. Gardeners prize highly a compost made in
part of decomposed leaves. The leaf-harvest is the last harvest of the
year, and should he thoroughly attended to at the proper time.
The leisure of the season
gave us greater opportunity for intercourse, both
at home and abroad. The city was comparatively at our door, as accessible
as ever—we were really mere suburbans. "We ran down in an hour to be
spectators of any unusual sight, and frequently attended the evening
lectures of distinguished men. It was impossible for the world to sweep
on, leaving us to stagnate. How different this winter seemed to me from
any preceding one! Formerly, this long season had been one of constant
toiling; now, it was one of almost uninterrupted recreation. How different
the path I travelled from that in which ambition hurries forward—too
narrow for friendship, too crooked for love, too rugged for honesty, and
too dark for science! Thus, if we choose, we may sandwich in the poetry
with the prose of life. Thus, many a dainty happiness and relishing
enjoyment may come between the slices of every-day work, if we only so
determine.
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