INTRODUCTION. 



SECTION I. MEANS OF PROMOTING AGRICULTURAL 

 LIFE IN AMERICA. 



By KENYON L. BUTTERFIELD, 



President of the Massachusetts Agricultural College and member of 

 Ex-President Roosevelt's Country Life Commission. 



Farming a Subject of Study. In our study of the 

 means of promoting agriculture and country life in 

 America, we are first of all obliged to take into account 

 the wonderful progress which agricultural science has 

 made during recent years. The United States De- 

 partment of Agriculture and the State Experiment Sta- 

 tions are constantly placing at our disposal new truths 

 which can be successfully worked over into the actual 

 practice of the farm. A new generation of young 

 farmers is being trained for successful agricultural 

 practice in ways far different from those which their 

 fathers used, and in a much more thorough manner. 

 Farming is no longer a matter of experience only 

 it has become a subject of study. 



A Farmer Must Be an Educated Man. The very 

 fact that there is so much that is new to learn about 

 agriculture, and that farm practice must be worked 

 over in the light of this new knowledge, makes it im- 

 portant that everything possible be done to give a wide 

 distribution to what we already know about the science 

 of agriculture. As in every other industrial occupa- 

 tion in modern life, the farmer must make a profit. 

 It is not fair to say that in thus encouraging farmers 

 to make more money, we are devoting ourselves sim- 

 ply to greater material gain, although there is a pos- 

 sible danger that this may be the result. As a 

 matter of fact, the education of a good farmer under 



Xlll 



