THE WAR GARDEN VICTORIOUS 5 



This fact, however, was not patent immediately. 

 At least it was glimpsed only by those of keen pene- 

 tration. In every country there were some accumulated 

 stores. These served to delay the approach of actual 

 hunger. Then came the year, 1916, which was, agri- 

 culturally, the most disastrous year the world has 

 known, in recent times. Crops failed everywhere. Eu- 

 ropean production decreased terribly. Our own fell 

 off by hundreds of millions of bushels. What was left 

 of accumulated surpluses was eaten up. The great 

 drain on our food resources wiped out our surpluses 

 also, for, in effect at least, we had pooled our food 

 resources with our fellows in Europe. Thus both 

 Europe and America found themselves living a hand- 

 to-mouth existence. 



It was barely an existence, at that — at least for our 

 allies in Europe. So terrible had the food shortage 

 there become that the daily rations had been cut to the 

 minimum that would sustain life and strength. The 

 peasant population of continental Europe, which means 

 a large part of the people, lives principally upon wheat 

 in one form or another. In France bread is literally 

 the staff of life, normally constituting 52 per cent, of 

 the Frenchman's food. Yet the French bread ration 

 was successively lowered until at one time it reached 

 seven ounces a day per capita. In Italy, the sale of 

 macaroni was entirely prohibited in certain districts, 

 and the bread ration was cut to eight ounces a day. 

 Hard-working laborers were allowed fifteen ounces. 

 In both of these countries even the bread ration of the 



