THE AGES OF A FARMER.

Dominion, Volume 1, Issue 49, 21 November 1907, Page 4

THE AGES OF A FARMER.

FROM CITY TO SHEEP STATION. NEW CHUM AND ARISTOCRAT. The evolution of a farmer, is made up of several stages. First, there is tho stage of the land fever, when he is prepared to throw up everything to go on the land. It is an evidonce of a roturn of.sanity. It is tho budding age of reason, though those whoso eyes aro still unopoucd call it insanity. . Then there is tho solection of crop. For a quick return, and tho discharge of much pent-up energy, the seductions of dairying stand unrivalled ; and a scratch mob of rejects is therefore gathored together with much rapture and nervous trepidity, It is the ago of now-chum-ism—an ago that becomes a pyramid of costly errors. It is ail age of plod, but an ago 01" coining. Tho ago of repentance always follows. Tho old captivity of tho city finds its parallel in the. now tie of the dairy herd, and a yearning develops to sell. Money. has been coined, energy spoilt, the craving for labour satisfied. Thoro remaiqs but 0110. longing— liberty. But ono ideal—to sit down at ease and see tho work performing itself, without effort of one's own. It is tho tired ago. It is the ago of graduating. It is the stage, that resembles that of a student who has coached hard for his degree. What has fate now in store? Will the ambition be roalised? The spirit has striven to its utmost capacity to realise a vaguo ambition that has now bceome at last concrete. The whole future depends on the spinning of a coin. Tho exam, is upon' him. Will 110 graduate and float into tho happy, smooth waters beyond, from which tho tide novor turns back ?.. .Or will 110 fail, and bo soured for life—a miserablo, tempest-tossed malcontent? A -Ran with no hope, ho ambition.. A man in a groovo. Perhaps he succeeds. Prospects are good, and somebody comes along, eager—as he himself was eager ono day—to take up his burdons. And interests chango hands. . It is tho sweet, swift ago of bartoring. An ago when gold jinglos in peals of rich music as it ,has never jingled boforo. An ago of opulenco, of ready cash. A flitting moment of lavish extravagance, when wives and daughters and SOll3, if they act quickly, may have fond ambitions realised out of the paternal purse. Then comes the last age—the ago from which there is no looking back, tho ago in which repentance never ontprs—the ago of sheep-farming. It is an era of blissful, luxurious,, careless ease..- An unruffled epoch of a realised dream. All age in which work comes along only a few times a year, but pleasure every day. A happy paradise, where gold rolls off tho sheep's backs in rich yellow flakes —ail age of spare time, of rccroation. An age that yields in the sweets of "society," tliat gives time and scopo to lot tho mind look out at last beyond the narrow boundaries of tho daily routino. 110 has won his degree. He is at last a sheep farmer. • He. has graduated, and is at long last a bloated farming aristocrat.