“It is a problem old and hoar,” I said, and sat down on the floor. “It is a problem that will grow more frightful as the sad years go, unless you farmers realize that laborers are human guys. They want to live a normal life, each with his fireside and his wife, and not be packed in garrets bare up forty miles of winding stair. “If I were farming, Mr. Dabbs, instead of selling rosewood slabs, I’d build some nifty little shacks, to house my toiling Jills and Jacks. I’d say to men I hired, ‘You see, you do not have to live with me; you have your house in which to dwell, a garden and a cow and well, a rooster and a Dorking hen, which things appeal to honest men.’ “When you take up that sort of thing, your men will stay with you, by jing.” Then Mr. Dabbs sat down by me. “There may be truth in that,” said he. “I’m blamed if I don’t try it out, so let us see some plans, old scout.” We figured there for half a day, and when the patron drove away, he hauled a load of joists and jambs, and seemed as chipper as nine clams. CLASSY HOMES The barber who is bald as blazes can’t sell me tonic for my hair, and all his fine and ringing phrases strike me as merely heated air. The tailor who is looking shabby can’t sell me clothes, howe’er he tries; his eloquence seems vain and flabby, his course of conduct is not wise. The jeweler, whose watch is gaining, or losing, seven hours a day, might spend a week or two explaining his wondrous skill--I’d go my way. If I were selling battle-axes, I’d see my own the best in town, as slick and clean and smooth as wax is, a thing of fair and wide renown. One lumber man is always telling what kind of homes the folks should build, and he lives in a rocky dwelling, with bargain counter fixtures filled. And men who listen to his spieling remark, “Why don’t you build, yourself? Your home is punk, from floor to ceiling, from kitchen sink to pantry shelf.” The lumber man, more than all others, should show his faith in what he sells, should demonstrate, to men and brothers, that his own home is wearing bells. Then he can say to John and Alice, who think of putting up a home, “Come out and see my little palace, examine it, from porch to dome. Of goodly points it has a number, I think it good and up to date; it shows what one can do with lumber, if he has got his head on straight.” The workman who is always fussing can’t ply for me the monkey wrench; the preacher who is always cussing can’t lead me to the mourner’s bench. The lumberman whose home is rocky can’t tell me what I ought to build; though he be eloquent and talky, the force of all he says is killed. NECESSARY GOODS