2 THE WAR GARDEN VICTORIOUS 



labor already engaged in agricultural work, of time de- 

 voted to other necessary occupations, and of trans- 

 portation facilities which were already inadequate to 

 the demands made upon them. 



In March, therefore, some weeks before the United 

 States entered the war, he organized for this work 

 a commission known as the National War Garden 

 Commission. 



What were the causes which led to the world's lack 

 of food and the need of a largely increased production 

 by the United States to prevent world starvation? 



When the drums sounded the call to the colors in the 

 summer of 1914, three million Frenchmen shouldered 

 their rifles and marched away from a large proportion 

 of the five million farms of France; and mostly these 

 were one-man farms. Russia, a nation almost wholly 

 agricultural, mobilized perhaps eight millions of men. 

 All the men of fighting age in Belgium were summoned 

 to the army. England, possessing only a " contempt- 

 ible little army, " straightway began a recruiting cam- 

 paign which within a few years swelled the ranks of her 

 military forces to five millions. Germany called out 

 her entire fighting force of military age, an army of 

 several millions. Austria, Bulgaria and Turkey like- 

 wise mobilized their full fighting forces. Altogether, 

 twenty or thirty million men were called away from 

 their usual pursuits. The vocation of the majority of 

 them was farming. Thus, at one stroke, practically all 

 the farms in the embattled nations were swept clear 

 of male workers. 



