NINTH ANNUAL YEAR BOOK— PART XII 729 
for pulling up stream is harder than to drift, but powers grow with 
exercise and we should be willing to aid in working out our own salva- 
tion. If it is right thinking that will shape future destiny of farm life, 
let parents and teacher co-operate to put the farm boys in line for doing 
things in the right way and let parents keep the pace. Let every pro- 
gressive farmer and every teacher interested in the advancement of agri- 
culture do a little missionary work along this line, and since a "little 
leaven leaveneth the whole lump" w^e see in the near future consolidated 
schools with agriculture and domestic science taught as regular branches, 
and the country scholar placed on a fair footing with the town scholar. 
Meanwhile let us not despise small beginnings, and if the country school 
teacher can aid arousing the boys' ambition, help him to see that there 
is something more in farming besides hard work, start him in the way 
of reading, thinking, investigating, until he acquires the habit, she will 
have builded better than she knew. 
DRAINAGE. 
FEANK FORBES, KORTHWOOD, lOW^V. 
(Before Worth County Farmers' Institute.) 
It is both profitable and interesting to study the peculiar effect of 
water upon soil, and upon vegetable life in the soil, but the scope of this 
paper will not admit much discussion of that subject. It must be enough 
to say that plants can not feed on the soil unless water is frequently 
supplied; neither can the plants valuable in Iowa farming feed upon the 
soil unless the water is promptly removed. This problem of getting the 
water to the soil, and then getting it away, must be constantly in mind 
when studying drainage in any of its phases. 
In some countries the soil is supplied with water by irrigation, in 
w-hich case the amount supplied, the time applied, and place at which it 
is applied are easily regulated, but in this country the water is supplied 
by rain, which comes unbidden and uncontrolled, and although one of the 
greatest of blessings it often becomes a source of great injury. It has 
been truly said that it falls on the just and the unjust alike, but after it 
falls, no rule of fairness is observed, and it may bless one man and injure 
his neighbor. 
It serves its purpose where it falls, and there is no place where it can 
be said that more rain falls than is needed, but where the rain fall from 
one place is allowed to accumulate at another, or where it is not allowed 
to flow away, it becomes at once a source of injury. So i..e bare question 
is, how shall we remove the water after it has served its purpose without 
damage to other soil? No method has yet been discovered that is prac- 
tical except to allow it to flow by force of the laws of nature. But if 
allowed to Mow on or near the surface it injures the soil along its path, 
while if allowed to flow a reasonable depth below the surface no harm 
is done, and the effect is even beneficial to the soil above its road. 
So we may say that the first requisite is to get the w^ater down to a 
safe depth below the surface. If the water is allowed to stay on the soil 
