Free
land is gone. The last acre of available farmland has now passed into
private or corporate hands.
I see a time when the farmer will not need to live in a cabin on a lonely
farm. I see the farmers coming together in groups. I see them with time
to read, and time to visit with their fellows. I see them enjoying lectures
in beautiful halls, erected in every village. I see them gather like the
Saxons of old upon the green at evening to sing and dance. I see cities
rising near them with schools, and churches, and concert halls and theaters.
I see a day when the farmer will no longer be a drudge and his wife a
bond slave, but happy men and women who will go singing to their pleasant
tasks upon their fruitful farms. When the boys and girls will not go west
nor to the city; when life will be worth living. In that day the moon
will be brighter and the stars more glad, and pleasure and poetry and
love of life come back to the man who tills the soil.
Hamlin Garland
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