PROGRESSIVE FARMING. 31 



"We must regard these troublesome enemies with the philos- 

 ophy thus expressed by a modern writer : 



" Great fleas have little fleas upon their hacks to bite 'em, 

 And little fleas have lesser fleas, and so ad infinitum; 

 And the great fleas themselves in turn have greater fleas to go on, 

 While these again have greater still and greater still and so on." 



Naturalists could render no greater service to the community 

 than to investigate the habits of parasitic animals for the pur- 

 pose of ascertaining whether it is possible to introduce or in- 

 crease them by artificial means, so as to aid the farmer in his 

 warfare against the insects that prey upon his crops. 



The good farmer will be a careful observer of the weather. 

 Not only during harvest, but at all seasons, the farm work for 

 the day often depends upon the weather probabilities. "We 

 must remember that storms do not come by chance, but in obe- 

 dience to certain atmospheric laws which are yet imperfectly 

 understood, but which manifest themselves in certain well-known 

 phenomena, preceding or accompanying these disturbances. 

 The system of weather reports inaugurated by the national gov- 

 ernment is unquestionably destined to tfe of immense value, not 

 only to commerce, but to agriculture. It is almost certain that 

 at no distant day the weather bureau at Washington will be able 

 to predict the arrival of a storm at any particular point, with 

 almost as much certainty as the arrival of the railroad train or 

 steamboat. It will only remain to devise a system of signals by 

 which this information can be transmitted over the country, 

 to enable the farmer to prepare for a storm several hours in 

 advance. 



I have thus mentioned some of the contingencies against 

 which the farmer can be more or less guarded ; but there are 

 others which are beyond his control or foresight. 



The farmer's business is with the great forces of nature. He 

 may lay his plans with the utmost skill and prudence, and 

 drought, or wet or cold may destroy them all. His success, 

 however, will depend upon the exactness with which his opera- 

 tions conform to the laws which govern the elements. In this 

 respect his business differs from every other. The manufac- 

 turer, for instance, takes a piece of dead matter, like cotton or 

 steel, and makes of it what he chooses. He knows beforehand 



