No. 4.] MILK TROBLEM. 23 



State fair in New England a few years ago, I improved an 

 opportunity which came to me to ask one hundred farmers, 

 who visited the exhibit of which I was in charge, the question, 

 " Are you interested in agriculture ? " Of these hundred 

 men, a half dozen replied that they were interested in agri- 

 culture, and gave me the impression that they were glad of 

 it. A few more said they had a " little land," '' did more or 

 less at it," " were more or less interested," etc., but by far 

 the great majority hung their head a little to one side or to 

 the other, and as if pleading guilty to some disgraceful act 

 of which they might have been accused, replied that they 

 were " only farmers." 



Seen or unseen, recognized or unrecognized, there is 

 usually a cause for every condition. For years l^ew England 

 farmers as a class have, regardless of their degree of financial 

 prosperity, persistently condemned their business, and di- 

 rectly or indirectly they have influenced and interested their 

 children in leaving the farm for the city, or in leaving the east 

 for the west. Generation after generation of boys have lis- 

 tened to such arguments and have left the farms of ISTew 

 England, and the losses which 'New England agriculture has 

 suffered as a result can never be fully realized or measured. 

 Their going has forced farming values to a lower level than 

 land of equal producing power is valued in any other section 

 of the United States ; and as a practical proof of this asser- 

 tion, we have only to refer to the fact that nowhere in this 

 country to-day are such bargains in desirable farming lands 

 to be found as right here in ISTew England and close to l^ew 

 England markets. Because they have never been taught to 

 appreciate farm life with its opportunities and advantages, 

 farm boys and girls of New England have in too many in- 

 stances become city consumers of milk rather than milk pro- 

 ducers, and the time is close at hand when they must be 

 brought face to face with the plain truth, and learn that they 

 cannot go on forever with their present plan of taking from 

 15 to 20 cents in food value in every quart of milk from the 

 farms of New England, and only giving in return from one- 

 half to two-thirds of its real value. 



