THE CALL OF THE LAND 



and saving up the extra supply of water, you 

 have in most seasons the moisture needed for 

 your crops during the entire summer. This 

 conservation of moisture by means of care- 

 ful and thorough cultivation is an art which 

 we have hardly begun. We must press it 

 until the soil shall yield its utmost, even in 

 the dry seasons. 



The quality of cattle and hogs is improv- 

 ing. It is as cheap to keep a first-class brute 

 as to keep a second or third-class brute, and 

 pays better. The meanest kind of a steer has 

 a stomach that enables it to take in vast feed 

 without laying on flesh. It is the mark of 

 a good animal not to do that. Best keep 

 good animals. It makes you poor to keep 

 the poorer. Why do so many farmers retain 

 such scurvy types of cattle, hogs and horses 

 when it would be so much more profitable 

 to keep good stock? 



The old Biblical question, "Sir, didst not 

 thou sow good seed in thy field?" interest- 

 ingly shows that the importance of honest 

 seeding was recognized ages ago. Do not 

 buy seconds in grass seed or in seed corn. 



128 



