Page:The Yankee and the Teuton in Wisconsin.djvu/42

 care. Some sections grew tobacco, in connection with which much hand work was indispensable. This crop also called for care in seed selection, in germinating, and in preparing the ground for the reception of the young plants. Beet culture for sugar making involved perhaps not less care, and doubtless more hand labor. Of similar but less particularity was the growing of root crops for stock feed, the orcharding, which was general, and the vine dressing, incident to the business of special districts.

There were, of course, many farmers and farms in the region indicated and in other contributory regions, which were not so widely different from the average of those in America. Yet, on the whole, it can be said that the German husbandman, in training and habit, was analogous to our modern truck farmer or orchardist, rather than to our general farmer. He was a specialist in soils, in fertilizing and preparing them for different crops, in planting, stirring, weeding, irrigating; in defending plants against insect pests, seasonal irregularities, and soil peculiarities; he throve by hoeing, dragging, trimming, pruning, sprouting; by curing and conserving plants, roots, grasses, grains, and fruits. His livestock economy was incidental, yet very important. It supplied the necessary fertilizer to maintain soil productivity; it afforded milk, beef, pork, butter, cheese, wool. It gave him his draft animals, often cows instead of oxen, and economized every bit of grass and forage which his situation produced.

Improvement of livestock appears to have affected southwestern Germany prior to 1850 very little as compared with the pastoral countries of England, Holland, Friesland, and north Germany. The animals kept by the village farmers were therefore not remarkable for quality. But they were usually well housed, and the feed and care they received made up in considerable measure for the absence of superior blood.