SOME SUGGESTIONS FOR CITY PERSONS 141 



Dr. A. D. Hall, formerly Director of the Rothamsted Experiment 

 Station, show the modest point of view to which he arrived as a 

 result of his many years of scientific investigation. 



. . . Agriculture is the oldest and most widespread art the world has known, 

 the application of scientific method to it is very much an affair of the day be- 

 fore yesterday. Nor can we see our way to any radical acceleration of the turn- 

 over of agricultural operations that shall be economical ; the seasons and the 

 vital processes of the living organism are stubborn facts, unshapable as yet 

 by man with all his novel powers. 



The newcomer fails to realize that in every prosperous farming 

 community there are farmers with minds as keen as any industry 

 can command. Manufacturing enterprises are so much under con- 

 trol that the city man comes to have great faith that by the aid of 

 science and business he can do what he wills. The farmer who 

 has spent a lifetime trying to control the stubborn forces of nature 

 is less confident of the powers of man and science. He has never 

 seen two seasons exactly alike. His plans are every day subject to 

 revision by the weather. He may be excused if his plans are not 

 always clear-cut. 



Many public-spirited men of wealth desire to establish farms 

 where, with the aid of college graduates as managers, they can 

 show farmers the results of the application of scientific and busi- 

 ness principles to farming. There are already examples in every 

 county of farms that are demonstrating how best to farm under 

 the circumstances. Furthermore, a demonstration of how to farm 

 with unlimited capital is of little value to the tenant or the small 

 owner whose chief problem is not to know what it would pay to 

 do, but to know what to do with his limited means. The college 

 graduate who wants to demonstrate how to farm can best do it 

 by starting as other farmers start and making his money while 

 he farms. 



The newcomer should at first humbly follow the example of the 

 best farmers. Any attempt to be a model for the farmers nearly 

 always results in amusement for them at the expense of the new- 

 comer. After one has learned how to farm in the region, he may 

 cautiously try new things if he has not by this time learned that 

 they have already been tried and found unprofitable. 



