THE DRILL SERGEANT AND THE DAIRY FARMER.

Dominion, Volume 4, Issue 1198, 5 August 1911, Page 13

THE DRILL SERGEANT AND THE DAIRY FARMER.

Sur-Mnjnr-General Godley's reply to the members of tho Farmers', tliiion seems to have satisfied those gentlemen, but the troublo is that while tho Farmers Union is composed of all shades uml degrees of farming, only one class is represented at the conference—that is, sheep and cattle breeders, or shall we say the big farmers. There may be a representative of tho smaller dairy farmer at the meeting. If so, ho is silf'nt. The gentlemen at the conference speak very lightly of supplying horses for their employees to ride to drill, and it is very good of them to help our General; also, very fortunate they can afford to do so. Our General "hoped formers would be able to. lend their horses to employees, as it. would improve the horses. If I might, suggest it. I think it would about cook the most of them. "Wo don't no to r>"d plough with well-bred horses. Mr. Kevins (Tenui) "thought they should he rni].• -■ iod to lend their horses." Evidently that was an up-country joke. I think it only fair to our leader to placo the facia before him.

llin average farmer of the present day is not exactly his own master. The original owner of the land, as a rule, lives in a (own. Ho lias gone through, I think they call it, "the heat and burden of tho day" (although I think if the truth were told the present occupier carries tho burden). As a rule, the greater

number of farmers have a fair-sized and pretty healthy "monkey" to iml (samo call it a mortgage). Then comes tho wifo anil family. 1 do not speak of rates and taxes—they are so small. And what with wages, general expenditure, also losses, a man lias to be careful, so as lew horses and as many .cows are kept as possible. Iho average dairy farmer keeps two horses. One, to go to the creamery, is usually a lialt-dniuglif. the other is an all-round nag. lie helps the creamery horso to pull the plough, etc., takes the tainily to town, and sometimes is ridden 'i°-n , s ' oc ' c sa '°- Say tlial sale day is drill day. The farmer will have to drive his stock on foot, or the employee -will bayit ti walk to drill, which would be awlnvard for a cavalryman. Of courso the farmer could bay another horse, but he would liavo to sell a cow, and as a cow will produce, say. .£lO per year, and the horso would bring in nothing (only to the Defence Force), and would liavo to bo shod, it means a very expensive scheme of defenco for the farmer. It is very well for Sir Joseph Ward to talk about Imperialism. Of courso it sounds all right, but if you exact too much from the working farmer you are laying an axe to the backbone of the country, and that means paralysis. As an interested farmer, I read the General's reply to the Farmers' Union representatives, and could scarcely reconcile somo statements. Ono was that farmers' employees unable to borrow the master's horso would have to walk, and would be drilled'in tho infantry, and in . consequence would be taken to camp in Ike summer. That seems a strange time to take it farmer's man from him, but if tho employee can borrow tho horse he goes into camp ill the slack time (June). , Then, again, objection is taken to the taking of a man's employees in batches, as at first suggested. It would, tho General says, "be a great drawback, and would strike at the root of military efficiency. Half, at one time and half at another would stultify the whole thing." It seems to me, sir (only a farmer), that the requirements of tho military authorities and the imperative necessities of the farm arc out of sympathy, ov shall I say "not understood"? Personally I'm with most farmers in favour of a moderate system of training for our l»ys, but I trust the. scheme does not develop into too much military and too little farming, for if so it will mean friction, and that is to be deplored.—l am, etc., PLOUGHSHARE. '