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PAGE SIX TARMERS’ UNION DEPARTMENT FARM NOTES. The largest factor in obtaining and holding customers is personality. Farming has become a science, and needs to be studied from books and up-to-date papers. Potatoes should be cut for planting in good generous pieces, but two eyes are all that is necessary. Every farmer should have the fac ulty of making friends. He should study human nature and act upon his judgment and not upon impulse. Every farmer should be a reader. He should know what every depart ment is doing in the world, and the best methods cf the most successful. He should read farm and other pa pers. Heavy rains are useful. When the water stands on the ground the high 'and low places may be seen and the places liable to be washed may be found. Farmers should so act that no one should ever doubt their honesty; they should so appear that no one would question the cleanliness of their pro duce, and should so speak that no one would doubt their good intentions. Bean growing is regarded as one of the most unprofitable crops grown in the East. The yield is small, and when the vine with the root is taken off the field, the soil is greatly im poverished.—Texas Farmer. SHALL THE HOME MERCHANT BE PATRONIZED? It is stated that two mail order houses in the city of Chicago did a business of $80,000,000 last year. This is another fair sample of mon opoly swallowing up the business of the country. This monopoly is fos tered almost entirely by members and non-members of trades unions, who buy their tools from such houses; by fanners who buy many articles that they use. Taking for granted, as a matter of argument, that perhaps at times, some small sum of money might be saved on a purchase for which the farmer or other buyer must pay before he sees the goods, can any member of any society or any in fact in the United States, afford to not patronize his local merchants? In the building of any vast busi ness, whether it be a tobacco tmst, an oil trust, a beef trust, a railroad trust, or a merchandise trust, those who assist in the building of such vast aggregations of wealth by pat ronizing it, will find the day when that power is turned on them, and they will lose more than they have gained. By sending the money away from home, the person who patronizes the mail order house impoverishes his local merchant; prevents his local merchant from bringing on well-as sorted stocks or large stocks of mer chandise; prevents the local merchant from employing more help, which usually comes from the ranks of his patrons; prevents his local merchant from assisting worthy local enter prises, either the church, lodge, fac tory or political movements, that are nearly always for the benefit of his local community. It prevents the growth of popula- WATSON’S WEEKLY JEFFERSONIAN. tion in the community in which the patron of the mail order house lives, and in that way reduces the value of land, in which the farmer in particu lar is interested. The greater number of people in the community, the better the price of the land. By patronizing the mail order houses, the person patronizing such houses is often deprived of the privi lege of buying many articles that he needs immediately that would be of great benefit to him, and whose cost could probably be saved many times over if he could but be supplied at once. By refusing and failing to buy from his local dealer, he loses the oppor tunity of buying goods that he actu mail order houses buy seconds and he could pick out the best and the cheapest. It is a well-known fact that mail order houses get the most of their business based on low-priced goods, and when a low price is named, inva riably, low class goods are furnished. It is also a well-known fact that mail order houses buy second and goods of low quality. As a rule, of course, they keep some standard goods that they offer at less than legitimate profit, which blinds the mail order house customer and makes him be lieve that everything the mail order house offers is good quality and low in price, w T hich, of course, is not true. It behooves every person, whether he be farmer, mechanic, professional man or capitalist, to buy everything that he needs from his local merchant when it is possible to do it; to do ev erything that he can to encourage the local trade and local manufacturers. The sympathy of your own people is a thing much to be desired and very much needed. It is a fact, and can be proven, that many former successful merchants in communities that were prosperous previous to the advent of the mail order houses, have been bankrupted and reduced to poverty, and the peo ple in such communities can get only the bare necessities, and have to make frequent trips to nearby towns in or der to make selections that they for merly could obtain at home from their local merchants. I appeal to all persons to patron ize their local merchants always, and to never let the small difference in price on a few articles stand in the way of patronizing the local merchant, for in the communities in which the farmer, in particular, as well as the mechanic, professional man, and cap italist reside, the value of real es tate will be reduced, and in the items of butter, eggs, chickens, live stock, fruits and vegetables, farmer will lose more by being deprived of a market for such produce close to home, for these things that probably would otherwise go to waste, than any small difference he might pay his lo cal merchant or local manufacturer for their goods, wares or merchan dise. Is it consistent to undertake to fight the trusts with one hand, the trusts that have reduced the price of labor and farm produce to such an extent that your calling is the poor- est paid in the land, and help the trusts with the other hand, because these trusts are willing to sell to you in some instances at a price slightly lower than your local merchant can sell the goods to you for and get a living profit?—Up-to-date Farming. GALLANT FIGHT OF THE COTTON FARMERS. The Southern cotton farmer, long the uncomplaining victim of specula tors, stock-jobbers, market manipula tors and middlemen, has at last been thoroughly aroused and is now dem onstrating to the world his capacity for taking care of his own interests. The great number of the farmers, the absence of business education and training and the difficulties of secur ing concerted action have made the task of welding them into an efficient organization a difficult one. But as every great crisis brings forth a lead er, so the crisis that has come upon the cotton farmers has developed leaders among them capable of com bating the ablest generals ‘on the other side. Under this leadership the farmers have set themselves to the task of fixing the price they shall receive for their cotton. The preliminary stages of this contest have passed and the last desperate stages have now been reached. With upwards of two mil lion farmers welded into 'an organi zation they fixed fifteen cents as a minimum price for this year’s crop. To accomplish this purpose it was necessary to perfect arrangements w’hereby money could be borrowed at a low rate of interest to enable them to hold their cotton off the market un til the proper price levels were reach ed. Ample provision had been made for these loans and all was going well until the financial stringency devel oped, when the farmer suddenly found himself unable to borrow money and insistent demand was made for pay ment of loans already contracted. Un less relief was promptly found this would mean the sudden dumping of the bulk of the crop still remaining in the hands of the farmer, a break in prices, and all would be lost. The resourcefulness of the farm ers’ leaders in this crisis is what challenges our admiration at this time. Many expedients have been re sorted to and the sum of these will, we believe, save the farmrs from the effects of what would otherwise have been a disastrous rout. Unable to obtain loans from banks they have completed arrangements for large loans from European bank ers, and soon many thousands of bales of cotton will go to Europe and there be held in bonded warehouses until the farmer desires to sell. While it would ordinarily be more desirable to get loans from home bankers on the cotton stored in local warehouses, yet since this is impossible, it is better to take foreign loans than to sacrifice the cotton and give up the fight. Un der this foreign loan plan the cotton will be stored in warehouses and held until the owner desires to sell; and as it must ultimately be sold to for eign spinners this arrangement will enable the farmers to deal directly with them. Again, the influence of their organi zation has been sufficient to secure from the President and the secretary of the treasury assurances that a large portion of the proceeds of the new bonds and certificates issued by the government will be turned into Southern banks to aid the farmers in marketing their crop successfully. Another expedient is the issuance of certificates based on cotton. If a clearing house certificate based on stocks and bonds is good enough for emergency currency, the farmer can see no reason why certificates is sues on bales of cotton are not equally as good. These and countless other protect ive measures indicate that the farmer is not dismayed by the situation, but is steadily and intelligently holding to the course previously laid out, viz.: To reach that state of independence where he can price the product of his farm. Success to him. —Dallas Democrat. THE WEST WILL STAND BY THE SOUTH. The Farmers’ Union is being ac cused of helping to bring about this panic. Now, brethren, if we are guilty of causing such a stir-up, and financial embarrassment as this, be cause the Southern farmer has put his cotton in the warehouses, let’s tie up everything that the magnates eat and let them chew on their money. Os course, we realize that the East ern gamblers that sell the futures on cotton, corn, wheat and tobacco, as well as everything else that the farm er produces, would like to cause a panic. -Now, stay with them till “Hades freezes over,” and then spike our shoes and cross over, and carry the tidings to our other cohorts. We must stand by the South. The powers have commenced it, so stay with them. The farmers, as a rule, have no money in the banks; but have the bulk of their products stored. Hold all you have, quit the markets. Let them feel their panic; meet the railroad boys boldly, as organized la bor, and help them, as a braver and truer set of men never lived. We Missouri people are staying with you. Don’t sell anything for less than the “National Union Price.” The vic tory is ours if we don’t give in. They have sold your cotton, so let them pay for it. Loyally, yours for the F. E. & C. U. H. A. JENKINS. Thayer, Mo., in the Farmers’ News Scimitar. FARMERS’ UNIONS AND LABOR UNIONS. Farmers are the producers of all the necessaries of life —commodities without which the human race could not exist, certainly not on a plane above that of the savage, and without which domestic animals must seek the haunts of their wild ancestors. The great army of wage laborers constitute the most important class of the farmers’ patrons. The most of • their earnings go, or would go if per mitted to flow in their natural chan*