"Yes, but you don't know Joe Williams, Al," persisted his friend.
"Well, who is he, then, that he never heard of electricity?" demanded
Al.
"Oh, he's heard of electricity all right; but you see he's not progressive—he has no 'git up and git,' as they say around here. Of course, he expects to find electric lights and concrete sidewalks in town, but electric lights on his farm and good roads from here to town would never enter his head," was the reply.
"Has he always lived here? Doesn't he ever get far enough away from home to know what the rest of the world is doing, or is he just plain lazy?" asked his friend.
"Neither, Al. In fact, he spent two years on the big farms in the West, and I had hoped he would wake up our farmers with new ideas when he came back and bought the old homestead. But I've been disappointed. He's one of those powerful men, who thinks that farming is a matter of physical strength rather than thoughtful planning. He doesn't seem to see the advantage of headwork. True, it's going to take a lot of hard work to redeem this old place with its dilapidated buildings and broken-down fences, but headwork will help a lot. Why, do you know, Al, the acreage wasted by rail fences on this farm alone would raise enough corn each year to send a boy to college."
"Yes, and what's more," he continued, "here's an old pond full of the richest soil in the whole county—soil that's been washed down from the fertile fields for years—to say nothing of the drainage from three big barns; and what does it produce?—nothing. Do you know, if I owned this farm, I'd open the gates and let the water out, put in some drain tile and plant this bottom land in corn. Why, when that corn got ripe, you couldn't find a ladder long enough in the county to reach up to the ears, the stalks would grow so high."
"Well, that would be some tall corn, John," laughed his friend, "but I've no doubt it's just as you say—this bottom would raise fine corn. Speaking of that, you ought to see some of the corn I've seen in the bottom lands out in Illinois and Iowa, But what about electricity if you do away with the dam?"
"Do you see those two beech trees down there, near the fence where the brook cuts in between the two steep banks?" asked John pointing.
"Yes, I do," said his friend.
"Well, do you notice how the banks approach each other at that point? A thirty-or forty-foot dam built across there would back up the water over an acre or two of ground in there—that land is unfit for anything else—and it would give them all the water they'd need for cutting ice in the winter and swimming in the summer; and as for electricity, a little direct-connection unit run by gasoline and setting in one corner of the garage, where it would be near at hand, would do the trick nicely. You know, Al," he continued, "the trouble with our farmers is they don't manage right. Now take Joe Williams here for an example. Here's wasted water power; he's still turning the old grind-stone by hand, and probably will all his life, unless someone wakes him up. Then here's this good bottom land wasted. Why, it was only last week he came in to see me at the bank to borrow a thousand dollars—said he was going to get married and needed some money to set himself up in housekeeping, as he's put all his money into buying the farm. Said he's going to marry a woman who's used to a little better than farm life, and, now that he's got his brother's boy helping him, he would like to put on another team."