Roads and Posts 77 



smaller centers, who are afraid that persons 

 will buy goods through the mails. It is humil- 

 iating that great public service should be 

 obliged to wait on such opposition as this. 



As nearly as I can estimate from such data 

 as I have been able to collect, not one farmer 

 in three reads an agricultural book, an agricul- 

 tural bulletin, or an agricultural newspaper. It 

 is all well enough that the farmer thinks in 

 terms of experience rather than in terms of 

 books ; but a sound reading-habit is essential 

 to his progress and his success. Reading-clubs, 

 of one kind or another, are likely to become a 

 strong force. It is not improbable that the 

 agricultural press will find itself exercising a 

 new cooperative relation with the reader. I 

 look on the reading-center as one of the dis- 

 tributive agencies. 



We should not forget that distributive agen- 

 cies should be developed coordinately with 

 the centralizing agencies, otherwise we make 

 no permanent progress. It is not by any means 

 sufficient that we have merely good roads and 

 autocar routes and many trolley lines and a 



