218 



'JHE IRRIGATION AGE. 



asking themselves: ' How much do we owe 

 these Eastern people anyway?' From 

 their mines, the few people in the West 

 have turned a stream of probably five 

 thousand millions of dollars into the cof- 

 fers of the East during the last forty-six 

 years. When that big stream began to 

 flow the East was so poor that it had no 

 better credit than Egypt. Because of that 

 stream it has become the foremost power 

 in all the world, and in return these East- 

 ern people treat the West as an encum- 

 brance, inhabited by barbarians only lit to 

 be governed by the strong hand of the 

 iederal power, and only tit for the work of 

 the earnest missionary. In contemplating 

 it, Western men reflect that when civiliza- 

 tion goes to seed, and its utmost exertions 

 are turned solely to making more money, 

 it is worse in its effect upon the world than 

 absolute barbarism." 



Fencing It goes without saying that 

 In or Out. if there had been a universal 

 principle by which fencing could be regu- 

 lated, and laws had been based on that 

 principle, an immense expenditure, in the 

 aggregate, would have been saved to the 

 farmers of this country. The point has re- 

 cently been raised and good argument pre- 

 sented why the fencing in of all stock kept 

 by the farmer should be the rule. It does 

 seem an injustice that a man should be per- 

 mitted to let his stock run at large and tres- 

 pass on his neighbors, perhaps unruly an- 

 imals at that, and compel a dozen of them 

 to build fences for their protection and his 

 benefit, when there is no other necessity 

 for such structures. If each farmer fenced 

 such fields as he needed to pasture and 

 that alone, and could be held legally re- 

 sponsible for damage caused by his stock 

 he would certainly see that his fences were 

 kept in order, and that the gates should be 

 kept closed. He would have option as to 

 how much land he would enclose, and 

 would build only as necessary. It would 

 involve no more care than is now necessary, 

 and it would certainly require far less fence 

 than is now in use, for which there is not 

 only a large first cost, but a constant an- 

 nual charge for repairs. 



False The secretary of agriculture 

 Economy, is making a hobby of saving 

 money out of the appropriations for his de- 

 partment. He even ventures to ignore the 



specific acts of Congress, and, when com- 

 pelled to execute the law as it stands, does 

 it with the worst possible grace, and evi- 

 dently with a view to making the seed de- 

 partment odious. Instead of seeking to 

 carry out the law in its true spirit, which 

 would be vastly beneficial to the farmers 

 of the country, he is apparently willing to 

 let his department become of actual dis- 

 repute among the people for whose espe- 

 cial benefit it was created, after a long and 

 earnest struggle on the part of broad-mind- 

 ed and public-spirited men. 



The There are no crops more 



Sugar worthy the attention of our 

 Industry, people than are those adapted 

 to the production of sugar, whether cane, 

 sorghum, beets, corn or the maple tree. 

 European countries have been forced to 

 abandon wheat growing because of the 

 low price, and they are finding it to their 

 advantage to encourage, even by liberal 

 export bounties the culture of the sugar 

 beet. Our market absorbs immense 

 quantities of their sugar and it is a 

 pertinent question which hardly permits 

 more than one answer, can they overcome 

 the disadvantages of worn out land, long 

 shipments, and pay the bounties and still 

 derive a greater benefit from that crop 

 than is possible to our own people with 

 our fresh, strong soils, good transporta- 

 tion facilities and improved implements 

 for the cultivation ? The answer surely 

 must be a negative. 



Good No subject is worthier of sturdy 

 Roads, thought and none of greater 

 practical importance to the farmer than is 

 the improvement of the roads over which 

 he must transport his products. For 

 this he must provide both the vehicle and 

 the motive power. If it costs one dollar 

 a ton to haul over the present soft and 

 badly-kept roadway, there is a saving 

 equivalent to that amount, if the road be 

 put in condition to double the load upon 

 each ton of traffic. A ton of corn to the 

 acre is a fair yield and a saving of forty 

 dollars on a forty-acre field is ten per 

 cent upon four hundred dollars. A road 

 tax for that amount would be startling, 

 wouldn't it? And yet, measured on a 

 business basis, as the banker, merchant, 

 or railroad man would estimate, it would 

 be a good investment. But that would 



