6 AGRICULTURE OF MAINE. 



There are other conditions, too, that tend to reduce food 

 production, which can and ought to be changed. The present 

 great boom for good roads — which is worthy in itself and 

 which everybody approves, especially those who ride over 

 them — is now done during the months of May, June, July and 

 August and it takes from agricultural labor thousands and 

 thousands of days' work direct from the farming class which 

 ought to be producing food. The farmers work upon the 

 highway not only for the income that it gives them, but also 

 because they are interested in the good-roads movement. 



It seems to me that the roads could be advanced even more 

 than they are now and not interfere with the actual work of 

 food production. The custom should be established, or the 

 example set, of preparing the roadbed to be graveled during 

 the autumn and leaving it until the late fall or winter before the 

 gravel is put on. The following spring the gravel could be put 

 in place by the road machine and the work entirely completed. 

 This would leave the agricultural community free to work on 

 the farms during the crop-growing months of summer and 

 the compensation for the work on the road would come as a 

 sort of gratuity, because many farm teams are idle, or nearly 

 so. during the winter months. 



If efficiency and economy were being consulted it seems to 

 me that this is the way this qiiestion should be handled. At 

 any rate, it would leave a very large population of the agricul- 

 tural community at liberty, during the summer months, to 

 engage in some kind of productive labor, and would make for 

 the prosperity of the agricultural community in the state, not 

 only by having the crops to dispose of but would, also, accom- 

 plish the desired end of having acceptable roads. 



This same tendency at the present time prevails throughout 

 the entire length and breadth of the nation and is one of the 

 principal causes for the reduction of the crop output that has 

 been so noticeable of late years. The United States as a whole 

 has ceased to be a meat exporting country and is now a meat 

 importing country. The shipments in corn and wheat have 

 dropped materially in the last few years and it seems as though 

 there was a mania for everyone to engage in non-producing 

 pursuits, all of which tend to increase the cost of living. 



