POETRY.

Globe, Volume XXII, Issue 2116, 4 December 1880, Page 3

POETRY.

FARMER BEN’S THEORY. “ I tell ye it’s nonsense,” said Farmer Ben, “ This farmin’ by book* and rules, And eendin’ the boys to learn that stuff At the agricultural schools. Rotation of crops and analysis! Talk that to a young baboon! But ye needn’t be tollin’ yer science to me, For I believe in the moon. “If ye plant yer corn on the growin’ moon, And put up the lines for crows. You’ll find it will bear, and yer wheat will, too, If it’s decent land wher’t grows. But potatoes now are a different thing, _ They want to grow down, that is plain 5 And don’t you see you must plant for that When the moon is on the wane. “So,in plantin’ and hoein’ and hayin’ time It is well to have an eye On the hang o’ the moon —ye know ye can tell A wet moon from a dry. And as to hayin’, you wise ones now Are cuttin’ yer grass too soon ; If you want it to spend, just wait} till it’s ripe, :i And mow on the foil o’ the moon. “ And when all the harvest work is done, And the butcherin’ time* come ’round, Though yer hogs may be lookin’ the vsry best, And as fat as hogs are found. You will find yer pork all shrivelled and shrunk 'When it comes to the table at noon— ■ All fried to rags—it it wasn’t killed At the right time of the moon. “With the formers’ meetin’s and granges now Folks can talk till all is blue ; But don’t ye be swallerin’ all ye hear, For there ain’t mor’n half on’t true. They ere trying to make me change my ways. But I tell ’em I’m no such coon 5 I shall keep right on in the safe old plan And work my farm by the moon.”