No. 4.] CATTLE FOODS. 41 



ago. I became possessed of a farm about thirty miles from 

 Cornell. One field, a back field, was poor land, and had 

 been substantially abandoned. When they got tlirough with 

 all their other fields they went up there and did a little work. 

 The meanest kind of grass got in there, and Canada thistles 

 and mullen. My man said, " Wliat am I to do with that old 

 back field ? The field down by the road is good land, I sold 

 it once for fifty dollars an acre ; but what shall I do with that 

 back field?" Said I, "Plough it five times." "Do you 

 know," he says, " that for twenty-five years no man has 

 taken out a load of anything from that field but at a loss ? '* 

 " I know," I said ; " but they did not know how^ to farm." 

 That was pretty strong language, because that was right 

 where I was l)orn. To make a long story short, he did as I 

 told him. He did ])lough it three times, some of it four 

 times, and })ut about twenty dollars' worth of phosphates on 

 twelve and one-half acres. As far as I could see we had done 

 our part, and then we prayed for a crop. I sold the wdieat 

 oft' of that twelve and one-half acres for a dollar a bushel. I 

 was very proud of that, because I was the only man who got 

 that price for wheat that year. Then I got about sixteen 

 dollars a ton for the straw, thirty miles from that farm, and 

 wdien I got that whole thing all cleaned up I had two hun- 

 dred dollars for my share, and out of that I had to take 

 my phosphates. That w^as more clean money than they had 

 got oft' the hundred acres of land for the last five years per 

 year. I say that that was simply taking advantage of a law 

 to which too little attention is paid, and that is, that if we 

 would get plant food out of the soil we must grind the soil. 

 That is the way the Lord made rocks into soil, and you have 

 got to do the same thing with the land which you have. I 

 went out to that field and found that the clover had not 

 cauoht, and of all thino:s in the world it was clover I wanted, 

 ' because I could not go on in that way ; it w^as too expensive 

 to buy commercial fertilizers at forty dollars a ton, any lar^e 

 amount of them, and go on and raise wheat at eighty or 

 ninety cents a bushel. That would not do ; I must bring 

 the clover in to aid. There was no clover there. So I said 

 to the man, " You must replough this field ; there is no other 

 way, and you must plough it right away quick. Before you 



