LIVE STOCK breeders' ASSOCIATION. 189 



sented in this meeting — the hve stock breeders and corn growers — in- 

 ckides the major portion of the whole field of Agriculture. It has been 

 said that there is nothing new, that the discoveries of today are the 

 forgotten knowledge of former times. Were this literally true the task 

 assigned me — that of indicating new methods for the application of 

 farmers and stockmen — would be an impossible one. In the presence 

 of an audience such as I am facing, composed as it is of learned college 

 professors, bright and quick-witted students and successful farmers and 

 stockmen who possess the cumulative knowledge that comes from long 

 years of experience and research, it would be presumptuous for me to 

 attempt to specify any new or unheard of methods. But we are all more 

 or less prone to forgetfulness, hence what I may say will be to you as re- 

 minders rather than innovations. 



REAPING WITHOUT SOWING. 



Knowledge is of no practical value unless applied. There was a 

 time in this country when the custom of sneering at what was designated 

 as "book farmin' " was widespread and popular and its votaries delighted 

 to belittle the agricultural press and every farmer who sought to gain 

 information thereby about his calling. Now the intelligent, progressive 

 farmer could not get along without these harbingers of progress. Through 

 their aid he may be said to reap without sowing — he garners the net re- 

 sults of the experience of thousands of other farmers and skillful in- 

 vestigators without himself having to undergo costly and vexing ex- 

 periments. The disposition to realize on this species of "reaping" may 

 be called a "new method" for the reason that not more than one farmer 

 in ten takes and reads agricultural papers. May be this statement ap- 

 pears overdrawn ? Mentally survey your own community : What per 

 cent of those of your acquaintance can prove by their system of farming 

 that they read agricultural papers? In our editorial rooms we receive 

 a large number of agricultural exchanges, coming from all parts of 

 America — without a single exception each and every one of them strenu- 

 ously and persistently advocate the sheltering and proper care of farm 

 implements. Recently, while making a ten-mile drive in a certain South- 

 west Missouri county — one of the best, too, in the State — I noted the 

 binders, mowers, plows, cultivators and other implements left in fence 

 corners and other unsheltered places, and calculated their aggregate 

 worth at conservative values — there were over $2,000 worth left out 

 doors, to rust and rot away. Possibly some of you pure bred stock 

 breeders would say that the owners of those implements are "scrub" 

 farmers. Maybe they are — but the biggest display of unsheltered im- 



