EDITORIAL. 407 



and future, or the relation of agricultural colleges to agricultural 

 progress. 



The fact is we are nearing the close of a period of the vastest and 

 most rapid expansion of agriculture over a continent which history 

 has or probably will record. Up to the present time we have had a 

 surplus of fertile unoccupied lands on our hands which we have been 

 only too glad to give away to any people who would undertake their 

 cultivation on any terms. One result of this was the wholesale de- 

 pression of the agricultural industry until the profits were so small 

 that the wonder is that so many intelligent people were willing to 

 remain on the soil. There was absolutel}^ no incentive to keep up 

 fertility. Land was the cheapest thing we had. The whole effort 

 was to extend acreage, and by means of labor-saving machinery and 

 otherwise to produce crops as cheaply as possible and skim the cream 

 of virgin soils with the utmost rapidity. "VVlien one region was some- 

 what worn out the agricultural people moved on to another. Or if 

 they did not do this they sought a cheap fertilizer to help make their 

 crops. Xo body of experts and no amount of funds for the promo- 

 tion of agriculture could have aroused any effective sentiment in 

 favor of intensive methods and careful treatment of soil. 



The colleges and stations were inevitably driven to spend their 

 main energies in finding crops to grow on new land, cheap fertilizers, 

 ]neans of repressing insects and diseases, cheap rations for animals, 

 protection of farmers against fraud in the purchase of fertilizers and 

 feeding stuffs, methods of conducting such industries as dair3dng so 

 that the farmer's family would be relieved of their burden, and other 

 things suited to an era of expansion and cheap lands. The measure 

 of their success should be looked for in these directions. They were 

 so busy doing these things that they might have been excused if they 

 had done nothing else. We believe that history will conclude that 

 their achievements in those lines were both relatively and absolutely 

 very great. At any rate the determination of their success does not 

 rest on so narrow a basis as their relation to the deterioration of the 

 country's soils. 



But they were not content with this. They have led the way in 

 pointing out the inevitable results of the rapid and wasteful expan- 

 sion of our agriculture, have showed the evil effects of the lack of 

 rotation of crops, and have been among the foremost agencies in 

 arousing and organizing jjublic sentiment in favor of more rational 

 farming. By reason of their studies of soils, fertilizers, crops, and 

 animal production the colleges are now in a position to show the 

 farmer, as the price of his land and his products advance and new 

 lands are no longer available, how to adapt his methods to the new 

 conditions; and when population flows back over the old lands, as it 



