Transition Remedies 49 



alleviating agricultural isolation and failure. 

 The good-roads people have been sure that 

 the lack of traversable highways is the cause 

 of the so-called agricultural decline. Lately, 

 various kinds of extension work have been 

 strongly in the public mind. We are just now 

 in the era of soil surveys and other soil studies. 

 We are beginning to talk in a new way about 

 the old and yet unknown subject of farm man- 

 agement. We are talking freely of social ques- 

 tions, without knowing just what they are. 



'^Every one of these epochs has placed us on 

 a higher plane, and yet we have never heard 

 more about agricultural decline than within the 

 past ten and twenty years, notwithstanding that 

 this is the very time when the agricultural col- 

 leges and experiment stations and govern- 

 mental departments have been expanding 

 knowledge and extending their influence. The 

 fact is, that all these agencies relieve first the 

 good farmers. They aid those who reach out 

 for new knowledge and for better things. The 

 man who is strongly disadvantaged by natural 

 location or other circumstances, is the last to 

 D 



