OF AGRICULTURE. 155 



tion of an agricultural exhibition, "the State's 

 fair," in some small town of Iowa, with its 

 70,000 farmers camping with their families in 

 tents during the fair's week, studying, learning, 

 buying, and selling, and enjoying life. You see 

 a national fete, and you feel that you deal with 

 a nation in which agriculture is in respect. Or 

 read the publications of the scores of experimental 

 stations, whose reports are distributed broadcast 

 over the country, and are read by the farmers and 

 discussed at countless " farmers' meetings." 

 Consult the " Transactions " and " Bulletins " 

 of the countless agricultural societies, not royal 

 but popular ; study the grand enterprises for 

 irrigation ; and you will feel that American 

 agriculture is a real force, imbued with life, which 

 no longer fears mammoth farms, and needs not 

 to cry like a child for protection. 



" Intensive " agriculture and gardening are 

 already by this time as much a feature of the 

 treatment of the soil in America as they are in 

 Belgium. As far back as the year 1880, nine 

 States, among which were Georgia, Virginia and 

 the two Carolinas, bought 5,750,000 worth of 

 artificial manure ; and we are told that by this 

 time the use of artificial manure has immensely 

 spread towards the West. In Iowa, where 

 mammoth farms used to exist twenty years 

 ago, sown grass is already in use, and it is highly 



