70 ILLINOIS DAIRYMEN'S ASSOCIATION. 



yet, on high-priced lands, it is not usually profitable to keep a cow for no 

 other purpose than to rear a calf. The system of collecting the cream for 

 manufacture at a central factory, leaving the sweet skimmed milk for use on 

 the farm, has many advantages for regions in which beef making is an im- 

 portant factor in farm work. I believe this or some like system will extend 

 itself through the central belt of the state more readily than has the ordinary 

 factory system. It is not probable there will be any rapid increase in cheese 

 manufacture outside of what is known as " the dairy belt " of the state. 



In any such connection as this my thought goies to the fact that we are 

 seeing striking chauges in the agricultural situation in our state and country. 

 Illinois is ceasing to be a new state ; is becoming one of the old states. We 

 are now, comparatively, a state thickly peopled and with high priced lands. 

 Competition is greatly increased. At least one half of the wheat and corn 

 crops of the country grow west of the Mississippi river. The cheap and fer- 

 tile lands of the farther west attract immigration in vastly greater degree 

 than did our own in recent years. The rate of advance in the price of good 

 farm lands in Illinois is becoming slow. Farmers must rely more and more 

 on the profits from their farm work, and less and less on the rise in the value 

 of their lands ; and we must remember there is very, very little profit from 

 " average " farming. One must produce more or better or at less cost than do 

 his neighbors if his profits are to be large. It is to be less easy to make 

 even moderate success in farming in the future than it has been in the past. 

 There is to be more rather than less need for intelligence, energy and good 

 management in farming. 



Dairying stands in the front rank in its adaptations to these changed con- 

 ditions. It enables us to get a large money return per acre ; to concentrate 

 much labor on a moderate area. It is noteworthy that there is increasing 

 attention paid to combining good dairy and good beef making qualities in 

 cows. A chief claim to public favor in behalf of each of several breeds of 

 cows is their fitness for this double purpose. The dairy farmer may be, often 

 is, a breeder of choice cattle, thus combining two profitable, most interesting 

 branches of business. In the central belt of the state many farmers may 

 profitably be dairy and beef making farmers. To more economical methods 

 we must look for increased profits, and it is easily possible, by the uniting of 

 butter making and cattle rearing, to more economically rear calves than has 

 been the custom by general farmers. 



It needs repeating that, in unusual degree, skill and intelligence are 

 needed. It is fortunate that dairy farming, more clearly than most other 

 lines of farming, tends to develop energy, careful observation, intelligence 

 and correct business practice. Some years since I was much impressed with 

 the hearty tribute privately paid by Governor Seymour, of New York, hon- 

 ored deservedly for his oft-shown interest in agricultural progress, to the 

 great improvement consequent on the introduction of associated dairying in 

 Central New York. There is room enough for further improvement; but it 

 is not idle flattery to say that the dairy farmers of Illinois are among the 

 very first in intelligence, education, energy and thrift. 



There are difficulties in the way of future prosperity. The competition 

 from the dairy manufacturing regions of the further west is serious. These 

 states have some advantages over Illinois, as Illinois has some over more 

 eastern states. But this competition can be met. 



