THE STORY OF TIIE NOXPARTISAN LEAGUE 



seven of them. But abandoned with this 

 difference, that on each the bank had fore- 

 closed its mortgage and the fertile untilled 

 soil now lay there waiting for a new occupant, 

 a new mortgage, and a new struggle against 

 overwhelming odds. 



Overwhelming odds? How can they be 

 in a country so manifestly and wonderfully 

 enriched with every advantage? 



And here we come upon a series of facts 

 that most of us do not know or habitually 

 ignore, and yet facts that if we stop to think 

 of we shall be of one mind about, for they are 

 of overshadowing importance to us and all 

 our affairs. 



Farming ought to be the best business in 

 the world. Truly, as the statesmen said, it 

 is the most useful, serviceable, necessary. 

 By means of it the race lives. All other con- 

 cerns lead back, soon or late, to the plow and 

 the hands that guide it. 



Fanning in the United States, of all farm- 

 ing, ought to be the most profitable, for no 

 other nation has such farming resources, with 

 such consuming millions so close at hand. 



Farming in the Middle Northwest ought 

 to be the best of American farming, because 

 this endowment there is at its best. 



Yet farming, useful, serviceable, necessary, 

 and all thai, is not a good business. Farm- 

 ing in the United States does riot reflect the 



