Missouri Country Life Conference. 251 



farm in England that had been in one family for eight hundred 

 years. In one case I saw land that had been in use two thousand 

 years, and it is said this land produced more the past year than it 

 did the fifty years ago. This is brought about by careful rota- 

 tion of crops through cultivation and high fertilization. I saw 

 three growing crops in one field — potatoes, beans and rows of 

 grapes — that is, the potatoes were planted between the rows of 

 grapes and the beans were planted in the grape rows, the vine 

 of the grapes being sticks for the beans. 



The American farmer usually does things on a larger scale 

 and he hires much of his help. He lives to himself. In a sense he 

 is usually a land speculator, that is, he is ready to sell at a fair 

 profit and buy elsewhere. He has been taught from early boy- 

 hood to avoid obligating himself to pay the debts of another. 

 The Europeans say the American farmer is less of a farmer than 

 a speculator in land. 



European rural credit systems follow a division of short- 

 time personal credit societies and long-time land mortgage asso- 

 ciations. For short-time credit co-operative societies are formed 

 and in lieu of capital credit is pledged, sometimes with limited 

 liability of its members but often unlimited — that is, when a 

 farmer becomes a member of a co-operative society he pledges 

 his entire worth for the debts of the society. In Germany these 

 societies have reached their highest state of development. 

 Throughout that empire there is one equal for every one thousand 

 population. It is not difficult to determine the financial stand- 

 ing of a borrower because of the simple methods, property assess- 

 ment and title registration. Every farmer is his own capitalist. 



These short-term credit societies throughout Continental 

 Europe are generally federated. The organizations for the 

 provision of personal credit facilities are as highly developed as 

 are the systems of commercial banking. The prevailing rate 

 of interest paid by the farmers for the short-time loans is from 

 four to five and one-half per cent. The terms offered European 

 farmers are generally better designed to meet the peculiar re- 

 quirements of agriculturists than are the terms obtainable today 

 by the American farmers. 



The personal credit organizations have the form of co- 

 operative societies. As I stated before, very often the members 

 of these societies assume unlimited liability for the debts of the 

 society, while in other cases the societies take form of limited 

 liability. As a rule, in European countries the law makes little 



