THE STATE AS FARMER 33 



for the co-operative society has a regulating 

 influence over the whole and guides the 

 destinies of the members to a wise and suc- 

 cessful end. And chiefly is this the case 

 in the reduction of unnecessary transport 

 expense and the elimination of individual 

 salesmanship. 



We have before us another swing of the 

 pendulum towards wheat. The country has 

 always rushed into wheat growing or sheep 

 farming according to its mood. Our history 

 of agriculture tells of little else except the 

 tragic effect of these impulses upon those 

 who tilled the land. Mr. Hall is, apparently, 

 to be asked to devote his great talents to 

 a repetition of this old story. But even he 

 will not succeed in doing the impossible. It 

 is not that land is too obstinate to change 

 its nature or too variable to want always the 

 same crop. The difficulty of rushing violently 

 into wheat, and wheat only, is that land 

 answers best to what we can do best, and a 

 varied scheme, action and reaction, will draw 

 a much more abundant total out of the soil 

 than any doctrinaire effort inspired by fear 

 can ever do. 



