294 SOILS 



from the farms in bushel baskets, in baled bundles, in 

 cotton sacks by the pound, by the bushel, by the ton. 

 Go into the South into the land blessed in every way 

 beyond measure. You find impoverished soils; you see 

 worn-out fields, gullied and wrinkled and cast aside. The 

 fat of the land was gathered up and shipped away in 

 cotton, in tobacco, in corn, and none was returned to take 

 its place. The humus was used up and burned by one- 

 horse plows and shallow working tools and the land was 

 bereft of its powers of high production. 



Go into any of the older portions of the country go 

 even into the West, into the newest settlements. You 

 find depleted soils, lands robbed of fertility, farms render- 

 ing their owners a bare existence. Why is this all so 

 true? Because the soil robber in every instance had been 

 present, and because of a compact with the fool the fer- 

 tility has been taken away and the lands reduced to the 

 lowest point of production. 



But the brighter side of the picture is coming into 

 view; we see the soil robber and the fool far in the dis- 

 tance, disappearing; we see the intelligent tiller of the 

 soil in the foreground, already at work with vim and 

 courage and determination, adding humus to the soil and 

 restoring life to the land. And so every earnest husband- 

 man can take courage, for the land is not lost to the wise 

 farmer either East or West, or North or South. For 

 brains mixed with the soil and applied to intelligent 

 culture will restore the land and save the nation. 



Diversify your crops: have many to support you. It 

 matters not what your line of farming your specialty 

 may be, you must have the help of many crops. Is it 

 wheat? You need clover and grasses for humus and 

 nitrogen. Is it corn? You need animals to consume it 

 that the manure may be returned to the land ; you need 



