No. 5. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 261 



dustries of Pennsylvania in the cheapness of the food of our toilers 

 and in the enriching of those who produce the food back upon the soil. 

 My friend who recently came to this country from Belgium and 

 traveled over it in a ])rovisional capacity, pointed out that the thing 

 that impressed him wherever he went was the terrible waste of our 

 people. We throw away almost as much as we save of the products 

 of our industry and the bounty of our soil. I was completely mad 

 the other day when T saw a fellow selling apples from a huckster 

 wagon with a half-bushel measure, all kinds of apples mixed up, 

 as we Dutch would say, "verhuddled," until you did not know 

 whether he was selling Northern Spies or Ben Davis or rotten 

 apples or sound apples or good apples or bad apples. Of course he 

 got nothing for them and he did not deserve anything, selling them 

 in that way. I think we should begin with a study of the soil and 

 follow that with a study of seed and follow that with a study of 

 treatment of that soil for the reception of the seed and following 

 that we should trace the growing crop until it reaches a point where 

 it is fit for the market ; then study the method of marketing and sell- 

 ing, tracing that thing out step by step and at each step, reducing 

 the whole procedure to a scientific thing and you will find that in- 

 stead of 35% of the market price of your food stuffs going back to 

 the farm, 50% or 60% would go back to the farm. Why, next to 

 the automobile business, the most extravagant business in America 

 to-day, is the marketing of our farm crops. We are throwing away 

 with the air of prodigals the very wealth that ought to go back in 

 terms of better treatment and enrichment of our soil. 



Now I was born on a farm, I am not talking to you from a text- 

 book; I am talking to you from, a hillside farm, which, at points, 

 was so steep that when apples fell off the trees they alighted in the 

 public road at the foot of the hill. I know something about this thing 

 and I know what T am talking about for the central counties of 

 Pennsylvania, and I wish you would make it, as a body here, a 

 matter of scientific study and then those of us that are committed 

 by you to the important task of organizing the service for the 

 farmers ought to take these various activities and organizations that 

 are working for the farm, and organize them into the largest and 

 most economic service we can possibly have in Pennsylvania. 



I want to say to you very frankly that T have in mind some treat- 

 ment along that line of this problem and T want your co-operation 

 and your considerate judgment upon the matter when once it is suf- 

 ficiently matured to lay it in proper form before you. I am just 

 glad to be here, to look into your faces for a minute, to sit in this 

 Congress of important men and entrusted with a vastly important 

 service, together with the one w^oman who belongs oflScially to your 

 family, and to tell you that always and everywhere, every one of us 

 from your Governor up, should stand absolutely steadfast for better 

 treatment of the soil and better conditions on the farms of Pennsyl- 

 vania. (Applause) 



