LIVE STOCK breeders' ASSOCIATION. 1 87 



comes the farmer and stockman must get the best relief possible un- 

 der the present system. The question is forever settled that a rail- 

 road is a public highway, and as such is subject to control and regu- 

 lation. We may not be able to reach their secret coffers and prevent 

 rebates and discriminations, but many evils and extortions can be 

 corrected if we will use the machinery and powers that we have. And 

 the farmer's mam power is kicking. Again we must get up steam 

 by the farmer's yell, and while the President is advocating federal 

 regulation, and an increase of power of the Inter-State Commerce 

 Commission, we ought to begin to yell, and yell so loud that our rep- 

 resentatives at Washington will hear the echo, and will be afraid to 

 come home until they do something to relieve the people from the 

 greed and grasp of the railroads. 



SHOULD WE FEED THE CROPS ON OUR FARMS OR SELL 



THEM ? 



(D. T. Mitchell, Woodlandville.) 



Or in other words, is it best for a farmer to feed his crop to his 

 stock on the farm — cattle, hogs or sheep — or sell the grain product? 

 There are only two phases that I will attempt to bring out of this ques- 

 tion in the discussion of this subject. The farmer will necessarily be 

 influenced in answering this question by his view-point. If he regards 

 as the foremost of all important questions, the piling up of dollars — if 

 he thinks more of a plethoric bank account than he does of a bright 

 son or a sweet daughter — or if he thinks it is no rebellion against nature 

 to commence life with a vigorous, productive soil and leave it worn 

 out, an ugly waste place, fit only to mar the beauty of nature and re- 

 quire of the next occupant an accession of more wealth than he has 

 put to his own account to restore its fertility, then he will pursue that 

 course that will bring to his possession the greatest number of dollars. 

 In doing this I think he commits a sin, in an agricultural sense, un- 

 pardonable. I do not believe that any man has a moral right to take 

 the resources that the Divine Creator has put into our hands and waste 

 or abuse them, and the selling of crops from the land must necessarily 

 entail this condition. It is a sin against the resources that have been 

 committed to his care for a wise purpose. 



We have all heard the remark — I have at least in my own com- 

 munity: "Well, this land will last and continue to produce, I suppose, 

 as long as I live or I shall want it," carrying out the idea that the Al- 



