For the farmer is always poor. If it were otherwise he would not be a farmer. A very little experience on the farm and less observation of men about him show him that there is more money in mechanical or mercantile business, to say nothing of other callings, than his own. But he is handicapped from the start, no matter if he begins young, and while he still is a bachelor. When he has a family on his hands he is simply helpless so far as the possibility of change goes. The average farmer lives in hopes that in time his children, of whom he generally has many, will be of some assistance to him. Frequently his hopes are apparently fulfilled for a short time. But children are not as steady as grown people. They roam about in any time which they have to themselves. They reach the villages. They learn of a life which contains less toil and more comforts than that to which they are accustomed, and one by one they begin to intimate a desire for a change. It is utterly out of nature for the farmer to disregard this desire. No matter how much he may love their company he knows in his inmost heart that a change from farm life to some sphere of activity which is less exacting would be a benefit to them physically and mentally, possibly morally also. His sons endeavor to become salesmen in stores, or to be clerks in lawyers’ offices, or solicitors for one business enterprise or another--anything to avoid the persistent and wearing drudgery of the farm. His daughters, in spite of the boasted independence of the farmer, and of his family, are very easily persuaded to go into any factory that there may be in the vicinity. It is not that they love home less, but they love companionship more, and, being like human beings everywhere else, they are keenly sensitive to the cheering influence of money--real cash received once a week instead of a possible balance to the family’s credit at the village store at the end of the year.