80 Missouri Agricultural Report. 



over the country telling the story of how to make farm life better. 

 Every influence in this country is asserting itself on that one 

 proposition, because the country life is the very lifeblood of this 

 nation. Without it all business must, more or less, go down. 



In my travels over the country I have taken some very 

 long trips, and the people are all wanting to know what we are 

 doing over in Pettis county and how we are doing it, so that if 

 we are accomplishing anything worth while somebody else can 

 help do the same thing. 



I, maybe, might refer just a moment to the county farm 

 adviser, he is sometimes called, and I wish they had another 

 name for him. That doesn't tell any story about him. He is 

 scarcely in any sense at all an adviser, and "expert" is worse 

 than that. Sometimes call me "Professor," and I wish they 

 would not do it. They call everybody "Professor," from a 

 college president down to a street fakir, and, according to 

 Webster's Dictionary, it is about right. "Farm Helper" will 

 not quite do, because we do so much that is not farm work at 

 all. A vast number of questions come up about their troubles in 

 town, their lawns, their gardens, and other things. Sometimes 

 it is a case of arbitration and the county man has to be an arbi- 

 tration bureau; these things have to be considered. Some 

 farmers have raised the objection and say: "Why not mer- 

 chants have advisers, why not bankers have advisers?" Why, 

 they do, and the best advisers that money will buy. The 

 Wabash Railroad and the Burlington Railroad and the Santa 

 Fe Railroad have the very best advisers that money will buy. 

 The President of the United States surrounds himself with the 

 brightest intellects in the nation to advise him. The Governor 

 of the State surrounds himself with men of the best capacity to 

 advise him in his work. 



Why only a little while ago I was invited to attend a bankers' 

 convention over in Boston and talk to them for thirty minutes — 

 give them a little advice, if you please. In other words, they 

 wanted to know what they could do to make farm life worth 

 while. They took me over by a special train, as good as the 

 Wabash builds, stopped off with me at Niagara Falls for six 

 hours that I might see the Falls, and kept me in Boston from 

 Sunday morning until the Saturday morning following. And 

 then took me over to Albany, and on Sunday sent me down the 

 Hudson to New York City, and while I was in New York City — 

 by the way, did you ever feel the lonesomeness of the crowd 



