STATE DAIRY ASSOCIATION. 301 



mind that the son would never make a lawyer and had been looking around 

 on Brier Cliff Farm on the Husdon and studying the proposition of fit- 

 ting up a farm for his son. The last remark the father made to me was : 

 "There are greater opportunities on the farm than in any of the profes- 

 sions" — and that from a professional man. I will never forget it so long 

 as I live. I fully believe that to be true. 



I have been through this, have worked on the farm sixteen hours 

 a day until I could work no longer. I used to be told repeatedly that 1 

 was making a mistake in working too hard, that I could afford to hire 

 somebody to do the work I was doing, but I had been educated that 

 way and could not get out of the ruts. It is hard to get out of the ruts 

 you are raised in. 



But to go back to your question, next to the man or woman — there 

 are women successfully managing dairies ; we have some in Illinois that 

 we are proud of, and I don't know why there should be any great differ- 

 ence between the women on this side and the other side of the Mississippi 

 — perhaps the next important point is the cow. This subject, the cow, 

 has been treated so nicely, so intelligently by Prof. Haecker and will 

 be later by Mr. Glover, that I am not going to say much about it. There 

 are other men who can handle that point better than I can. 



ALFALFA. 



Now I learn that your State grows corn successfully, grass and 

 clover and I don't know what more you need. 



(Mr. Patterson — We need alfalfa.) 



I don't like to talk much about that. I do it at the institutes, but 

 mainly in telling of my failures and we get information from the audience. 

 But my failure was in having it frozen. I am feeding alfalfa meal shipped 

 from Ohio, Western Kansas and Colorado, alfalfa ground in the mill. 

 ■ I will tell you while I am on it — this talk is going to be hash — a 

 little of this and a little of that — I find that we have been doing a little 

 experimental work in a business-like way ; we have not gone down to 

 the bottom of it, as they would in an experiment station. We fed first 

 with alfalfa meal mixed with corn meal and gluten feed, then alternated 

 with wheat bran mixed with corn meal and gluten feed, then back to the 

 alfalfa meal mixture, and we have just gotten to where it is hard for 

 us to tell which brings the best results, a ton of alfalfa meal or a ton of 

 wheat bran. If I were called upon to decide today, I would say I don't 

 know which would bring me the best results. But we found out this, 

 when we feed alfalfa meal we do not have to feed oil meal as a con- 

 ditioner. 



