LIFE'S CHOICE
PERCY read these words as though they were his own; and perhaps we
may say they were his own, for, as Emerson says: "Thought is the
property of him who can entertain it."
The mother listened, first with wonder; then with deepened interest,
which changed to admiration for the language and for her son, who
seemed to be filled with the spirit which had led Lincoln to see the
problems and the possibilities of the farm life in a light that was
wholly new.
"Surely those are noble thoughts," she said, "from a noble and wise
man. I shall only hope that you will find some opportunity to make
the best possible of your life. We have such a small farm, and the
land hereabout is all so high in price that to enlarge the farm
seems almost hopeless. In part because of this difficulty it had
seemed to me that greater opportunities might be open for you in
other lines. Don't you feel that you will be greatly handicapped in
the beginning?"
"Perhaps," said Percy, "in some ways; but not in other ways. We hear
on every hand that this is an age of specialists, that the most
successful man cannot take time to prepare himself well for many
different lines of work; that he must make the best possible
preparation in some one line for which he may have special talent or
special interest; and then endeavor to go farther in that line than
any one has gone before. When I first wrote to the State University
I asked how long a time would likely be required for me to complete
all the subjects that are taught there, and the registrar replied
that, if I could carry heavy work every year, I might hope to take
all the courses now offered in about seventy years. In considering
this point of preparation for future work, it has seemed to me that
if I leave the farm life and devote myself to law or to engineering,
I must in large measure sacrifice about ten years of valuable
experience in practical agriculture. I have learned enough about
farming so that I can manage almost as well as the neighbors; and
without this knowledge, gathered, as you say, in the school of
experience, I can see that serious mistakes would often be made.
"You know that Doctor Miller bought the Bronson farm two years ago.
Well, he has been giving some directions himself concerning its
management. He has had no experience in farming, and last year,
after he had the new barn built, he directed his men to put the
sheaf oats in the barn so they would be safe from the weather. He
did not understand that oats must stand in the shock for two or
three weeks to become thoroughly "cured" before they can safely be
even stacked out of doors; and the result was that his entire oat
crop rotted in the barn.
"People who have lived always in the city sometimes express the most
amusing opinions of farm conditions so well understood even by a
ten-year-old country boy. I recently overheard two traveling men
remarking about the differences which they could plainly observe
between the corn crops in different fields as they rode past in the
train.
"'Some fields have twice as good corn as other adjoining fields,'
one remarked. 'How do you account for the difference,' asked the
other. 'oh, I suppose the one farmer was too stingy of his seed,'
was the reply.
"I am convinced that there are hundreds or perhaps thousands of
valuable facts that have been acquired through experience and
observation by the average farm boy of eighteen or twenty years that
would be of little or no value to him in most other occupations; and
in this respect I should be handicapped if I leave the farm life and
begin wholly at the bottom in some other profession. Perhaps
agriculture is not a profession, but I think it should be if the
highest success is to be attained."
"I surely hope you will be successful, Percy, and your reasoning
sounds all right; but other occupations seem to lead to greater
wealth than farming."
"I very much doubt," replied Percy, "if there is any other
occupation that is so uniformly successful as farming, in the truest
sense. It provides constant employment, a good living, and a
comfortable home for nearly all who engage in it; and as a rule they
have made no such preparation as is required for most other lines of
work.
"But there is still another side to the farm life, Mother dear, or
to any life for that matter. Your own life has taught me that to
work for the love of others is a motive which directs the noblest
lives. If agricultural missionaries are needed in India, they are
also needed in parts of our own country where farm lands that were
once productive are now greatly depleted and in some cases even
abandoned for farming; and. if the older lands of the corn belt are
already showing a decrease in productive power, we need the
missionary even here. If I can learn how to make land richer and
richer and lead others to follow such a system, I should find much
satisfaction in the effort."