d on many
circumstances and is usually a matter of first importance. No man
should borrow more than a banker or other reputable business man
considers a safe investment.

Usually there is no better counselor as to a safe investment than the
local banker. The banker should, and generally does, stand in much the
same relation to the financial welfare of the community as the
physician to its physical, the minister to its moral and spiritual
welfare. The inexperienced person, even if he does not need to borrow
money, would do well to consult some responsible banker in the
neighborhood before making an investment in farm lands.

The young man should, as early as possible in life, open an account
with the local bank, not merely for the sake of the habit of saving
which this will encourage, but in order to come into personal business
relations with the banker. Instead of concealing from the bank his
business operations, he should seek the advice of his banker on all
important financial matters.

On an average, every farm changes hands at least three times in a
century. Every farm, therefore, must be acquired by purchase,
inheritance or gift at more or less irregular intervals. In the
neighborhood in which the author was born, there is not a farm but has
changed hands since he can remember. In many cases the farm is now in
the possession of a son; in some instances in that of a grandson of
the owner as known by the writer in his boyhood days. In this
particular community the acquirement of a farm by a person not related
to the former owner has occurred in relatively few instances.

As a rule, when the farm has been acquired by a son, the latter has
operated the farm as tenant or partner for a period previous to his
ownership and during lifetime of the father. In some instances the son
has boarded with the parents or the parents with the son and his wife;
or, in the case of a daughter, with the daughter and son-in-law.

Where there are several heirs, as is apt to be the case, the son
operating the farm is required to purchase or rent the interest of the
other heirs, unless the farm is large enough to be divided, which is
less seldom the case than is popularly supposed. Thus, if there are
200 acres of land worth $50 an acre, and five heirs, the young farmer
may inherit $2,000, and be required to assume the remaining $8,000 as
an obligation. He may borrow this money at the bank, placing a
mortgage upon the farm, thus settlin