AS TIMES change, the women are demanding less work of slavish drudgery, more freedom and a more refined home.

From which cause bachelor farmers are frequently faced with a perplexing problem.

A working farmer – and the majority necessarily have to work for their living – cannot afford much refinement of taste and habit.

There is the girl who is fairly well educated and kept from all the more disagreeable tasks: How is she going to help efficiently the man who begins farming with small capital?

I have known such a family of attractive girls left loverless, while others less charming were married – happily we hope – and the over nice ones were reduced to take half a loaf because there are never enough well-to-do or gentlemen farmers among the eligibles.

So it comes about that when you meet a nicely-bred girl at a farmhouse, you do not accept her just as she is, but you wait to hear that she really is a great worker in the mornings; that she rises at 6.00am; flies about in the kitchen and dairy; bakes; washes and cooks plain and fancy dishes; besides being an expert in poultry or cheese or butter – not otherwise may she justify her nice apperance and manners.

This kind of girl tells me that she is willing to work as hard as anybody all morning, but she objects to dirty work after two o'clock. So either, she must change her outlook, or she must be content to be left rather too long, or she must look elsewhere for a man.

(So wrote Gretchen (Margaret Shanks) in one of our earliest albums)