THE WAR GARDEN VICTORIOUS 27 



necessary to conserve carefully what already had been 

 produced, and then produce more. Agriculture and 

 horticulture had not generally been taught in the schools ; 

 the old hit-or-miss plan of farming was all too common; 

 the home garden was neglected and the school garden 

 a novelty. To the call both to conservation and to 

 increased production, the American people have re- 

 sponded nobly. How quickly they have changed 

 their attitude, how splendidly they have made good 

 by adapting themselves to the new conditions! When 

 the war garden movement was started, the problem of 

 food production was on the way to be solved." 



Here, then, was the all-impelling, the all-important 

 reason back of the home food production movement. 

 This was the outstanding motive above all others which 

 made the war garden a thing not only to be desired 

 but actually to be demanded. Our allies and the neu- 

 trals, as far as possible, as well as our own people and 

 our army, must be fed : this was the cry from the 

 tower-top, this the call of hungry peoples which had 

 to be answered. Our task was Herculean! 



There was one great difficulty in the road to accom- 

 plishment: the problem of common psychology. It is 

 recorded that when God called Moses to lead his fellows 

 forth from Egypt, Moses replied: "Who am I, that 

 I should go unto Pharoah, and that I should bring 

 forth the children of Israel out of Egypt?" Even so 

 did the average American regard the appeal made to 

 him to raise food and save the world from starvation. 

 The difficulty was that the average American, like the 



