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trol of moisture, because of our frequent rains. Strange 

 as it may seem, while we suffer if we do not get rains, we 

 should actually be better off, as they are in the arid re- 

 gions of the west, if we did not have any rain during the 

 growing season and had a means of providing water when 

 we wanted it. There is no question that the arid con- 

 ditions of agriculture with water for irrigation permit 

 the most perfect system of cultivation. Such a system 

 is much more efficient and crops are under much better 

 control, if the conditions are handled intelligently, than 

 they are here in the east. The trouble with us is that we 

 cannot maintain this dry mulch. After a rain we plow 

 or cultivate just as soon as we can and we get the surface 

 moderately dry; then another rain comes on, and if we 

 think we can afford it, we cultivate again ; then still an- 

 other rain comes, and we try again to get the surface 

 dry. If you cultivate your soil after a rain just in the 

 right time to catch the moisture in the soil, then if you 

 have a drouth, cultivate by all means, keep cultivating 

 and you will do much toward saving your crop. The 

 Secretary of Agriculture has told of a very disastrous 

 drouth while he was professor of agriculture in Iowa, 

 when he saved his corn crop and got a normal yield by 

 constant cultivation during the dry season, while his 

 neighbors had almost a complete failure. As I told you, 

 it all depends on the skill, the judgment, and the chance 

 which led you to begin operations at the right time. If 

 you knew what was coming you could save your crop 

 during any ordinary period of drouth." 



In view of the fact that it is no new discovery that 

 conditions in the semi-arid regions are radically different 

 from those in the more humid regions, and especially the 

 character of the soil and its adaptability to the best pos- 



