38 THE FUTURE OF OUR AGRICULTURE. 



hopelessly barren material that it used to be considered, but 

 may be turned into something of a gold mine. This same 

 process also led to an enormous extension of the practice 

 of what may be termed " industrial " farming, or rather 

 farming for industrial purposes, that is, pressing industries 

 into the service of Agriculture, such as beetroot-sugar 

 making, potato distilling, syrup and starch making from 

 potatoes and so on. These industries, by their very multi- 

 plication, lost their " profiteering " character. There were 

 no more great fortunes to be made out of them by favoured 

 individuals in advance of the rest. But they became all 

 the more valuable an asset to Agriculture as a national 

 interest. For they meant, after the extraction of the 

 money value from the produce, in the shape of an industrial 

 product, the supply of the land, through well-fed animals, 

 with a mass of valuable manure. And the scientific dis- 

 section, analysing and starting on the new lines spoken of, 

 furthermore did much to intensify that valuable feature 

 of " diversification," as Secretaries Wilson and Houston 

 of the United States Department of Agriculture have com- 

 mendingly called it, which now forms such a striking and 

 laudable feature in German Agriculture. The Germans 

 were routineers when we were specialists. They are now 

 specialists where — with some brilliant exceptions — we are 

 the routineers. This is one of the most notable char- 

 acteristics of German Agriculture, altogether at variance 

 with our recommended cast-iron idea of " wheat, wheat, 

 wheat ! " The object pursued was to find out what produce 

 would, in every particular district, and in that district, if 

 possible, on every particular field, thrive best and yield 

 the best money results. The farmer was " out " for money- 

 making. Should an emergency occur — as it occurred in 

 1914 — the field which had borne tobacco, or sugarbeet, or 

 chicory, or teazle, would produce wheat, all the better for 

 not having been worn out with it before. However, until the 

 emergency came, money was to remain the determining 

 factor. That practice has benefited not districts of small 

 husbandry only. But for them it has proved a true godsend. 

 Another feature markedly differentiating German Agri- 



