FARM AND DAIRY.

Taranaki Daily News, 22 November 1917, Page 8

FARM AND DAIRY.

man's woniqxfl capacity. Tlii> Irish Homestead says:—The caoacity for work is' largely a matter* of habit. We remember talking to a 'Donegal farm laborer, who told us ho wan dissatisfied with life in Donegal and went to Glasgow, where lit* got some..workalong with a gang working on the roads. The first day'lie worked he thought he would die—it was so hard. His bones and muscles aehed, hut necessity drove him back next day and the day after, and he found in a week's time the work was not. unendurable, and in a month's time he could work along with the gang at ease and leave off at the day's eloro with a spring still in his limbs. Ho said if he had remained until the end of his life in Donegal he would never have known of what work his body was capable. The same thing was noted at a tim? when, we believe, Mr. (jladstone was Premier. A great row was made because of the underpayment of agricultural labor in a northern shire—wo believe, Northumberland. ■ The\ northern men Worked by piece-work, and some philanthropist brought up a lot of Dorsetshire men to work at the same work and rates to prove their equal competence alongside the northern men. The Dorsetshire' men were well accustomed to the workit was not new to them—yet they actually earned lower wagos in the month by piecework than they had earned by day wages in the south. They could not keep up with the northern laborer. The whole thing was largely a matter of habit, as with one. Donegal laborer,, who forced himself to be equal to the work, and found when he had learned the methods and rhythm, of work of .his fcjlownawics that, tie could it as readily and casilyi.as lie could keep at his old work on the' kyid. ' ,■..-', ,

So in the grass' district's thn;,|!'a<lition nf tillage lias'bee-n lost.', Meal "<W not know what t1i0.y,.-ca», ; elo,: Sv 1 iV.^.iti*|ii ncd men elsewhere do 'find regard 'as a: fair day's work, and, harms no standard, they do just wlint their employer submits to. This■inefficiency becomes a tradition, for we are all cmvturcs of habit, and a law standard set unconsciously l>ci*mcs the standard- f«r'the-4tii!>«-t-'«VeTi where the laborer is his own employer—that is, when lie is a small fanner.