74 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. [Pub. Doc. 



tially, asking, "What is the meaning of this thing you talk 

 about, proteinef What is the meaning of this, what is the 

 meaning of that?" My friends, the intelligent farmer to-day 

 is not doing the farming of the United States. The great 

 mass of all the corn that is raised is raised mechanically, of 

 all the wheat, of all the pork, and of all the dairy products. 

 So that I say that we are keeping two cows to do the work 

 of one. That is a loss. 1 want to see just half the number 

 of cows in the United States that there are to-day. I want to 

 sec them rigidly cut down. I want to see a three-hundred- 

 pound cow in the place of a one-hundred-and-fifty-pound 

 cow. That leaves me the opportunity of keeping one cow 

 instead of two. Intelligence will enable me to make that 

 gain ; the lack of it is costing me what I have already. 



Mr. Lyxde. I do not believe it is ignorance. I believe 

 that this body of men is composed mostly of practical farmers. 

 I do not believe that it is because of the ignorance of farmers 

 that everything is in the depressed condition that it is now. 

 I will say at once there is nothing that I regret so much as 

 that I did not at an early age receive a thorough education 

 in all that appertains to my calling, — in geology, chemistry 

 and botany. Farmers are not all ignorant. I live in Worces- 

 ter County, and most of the farmers in Worcester County 

 take an agricultural paper. I myself have had the enlighten- 

 ment of "Hoard's Dairyman," and take it to-day. The one 

 great reason, — there is more than one, — but the one great 

 reason of the depressed condition of agriculture to-day is 

 overproduction. Mark that ! It is no use for us to get up 

 into the air ; let us come right down to hard-pan, and stand 

 on the earth. I saw in a paper last week, — I don't know 

 but it was in "Hoard's Dairyman," I think it was, — the 

 statement made by a writer that one reason for the depressed 

 condition of farming is that farmers, instead of keeping a 

 dairy of twenty cows that will make on an average three 

 hundred pounds of butter each, should keep fifteen cows that 

 will make four hundred pounds each; and he says, "How 

 much better that would be!" Well, Mr. Chairman, how 

 much better it would be to keep one cow that will make 

 six thousand pounds rather than fifteen that will make four 

 hundred pounds! The one is jus! :ts practical as the other. 

 Is not that true ? 



