54 Agriculture and Its Needs 



decided are best adapted of any in the world 

 to the needs of Japan. Why did they not 

 take American hens? Doubtless because 

 they found that all chickens look much 

 alike to most Americans. The proof of our 

 indifference to domestic chickens is cum- 

 ulative. Yet our State has $15,000,000 in- 

 vested in poultry, and there is as much 

 difference in the individuality, and the pro- 

 ductivity, and the respectability, and the 

 value, of hens, as there is in horses, or cattle, 

 or sheep, or swine, or people. This is an 

 ideal State for first-class chickens and 

 plenty of them, and why should we permit 

 ourselves to be the seventh state in the 

 Union when it comes to such attractive 

 and money-making creatures of the farm ? 

 We smile about it, but other peoples make 

 them the subject of governmental care. 

 Then there are the other large matters of 

 small fruits, and vegetables, and flowers, 



