The Editor's Outlook. 



a "CVERY plaot that the farmer, 

 theVeople. gardener and fruit grower 



cultivates is subject to the attacks 

 of one or more of these parasitic foes. The grape 

 alone has more than fifty of these pests, and it is a 

 wonder that we are able to grow this choice fruit at 

 all ! More than two hundred and fifty species live 

 upon the apple, and it is very probable that fully 

 one-third of these are positively injurious." It 

 seems strange that we have never known until with- 

 in the present generation how many are the enemies 

 of the agriculturist. We have attributed our fail- 

 ures to Providence and the weather, or if we could 

 find no better reason we have laid them to the moon. 

 Now we are finding out that obscure failure is due 

 to some definite and individual agency, and that 

 agency is oftenest a fungus or an insect ; and we 

 are looking so sharply for these insidious foes that 

 we are discovering the causes of failures in which 

 they have no share. We sometimes think that the 

 greatest good which this increasing knowledge of 

 fungi can bring is the sharpening of our wits. It is 

 certainly a great educator, even to the man who 

 knows nothing about fungi ; he is led to look rather 

 than to guess. 



"Despite the fact that these microscopic foes 

 have destroyed our crops for years, causing annual 

 losses of millions of dollars, no intelligent attempt 

 worthy of note was made to investigate them until 

 within the past ten years. Five years ago practi- 

 cally nothing had been done in this country toward 

 checking their ravages; in fact, it is only during 

 the past three years that anything like a systematic 

 effort in this direction has been put forth." It is 

 stimulating to live in this new era of inquiry. We 

 are picturing to ourselves the time when the greatest 

 perplexities of the farmer will be overcome, and 

 most of us even hope to live until that time. Cer- 

 tainly every year marks great progress. No doubt 

 this uncompleted year has itself seen greater progress 

 than has been made in some entire centuries. But 

 we must not expect too much. To-day a scientist 

 discovers a new enemy, and to-morrow the world is 

 demanding a remedy for it ; and if perchance the 

 remedy is not forthcoming, demand warms into 

 complaint and impatience. We know that there is 

 more than one experimenter who hesitates to an- 

 nounce a discovery unless he can announce its 

 "practical" bearings or utilities at the same time. 



The public seems to say that it is better not to find 

 an enemy than to find him and not dispatch him 

 forthwith. All this is a direct and positive hindrance 

 to investigation. The truth must be discovered be- 

 fore it can be applied. 



We should not be impatient if we cannot find 

 remedies for all our ills. Progress is rapid, per- 

 haps rapid enough. It is better to feel our way in 

 a measure, for thereby we avoid costly mistakes. 

 We are making the acquaintance of our friends and 

 foes, and the more we learn of them the more com- 

 pletely can we control them. The farmer and hor- 

 ticulturist must get themselves into line with this 

 new work. Most of them are not yet able to com- 

 prehend it fully. We expect that results will come 

 as fast as people are ready to apply them. The in- 

 vestigators are now far ahead of the practicers. 

 The majority of fruit growers are still asking how 

 to kill the codlin moth ! 



* * 



ABANDONED 

 EAR MS. 



T 



HERE IS much talk of the en- 

 feebled condition of agricul- 

 ture, and the abandoned farms of 

 parts of New England are cited as proof of it. There 

 is no doubt much farm land in Massachusetts, New 

 Hampshire and Vermont which is no longer tilled. 

 It has been given over to pasture ranges and second 

 growth forest. But so far from forecasting a gen- 

 eral decline or enfeeblement of agriculture, we are 

 confident that this abandonment is the strongest 

 proof of advancement. It indicates that farmers 

 are outgrowing the traditions of their fathers, and 

 are beginning to adapt their business to their con- 

 ditions. The greater part of the abandoned farms 

 are not fit for tillage, and we rejoice that their oc- 

 cupants have discovered the fact. 



We had almost said that these lands ought never 

 to have been tilled, for this is a common statement ; 

 but the rugged New England farms have bred a 

 hardy and determined race of farmers which could 

 hardly have arisen on the softer soils of the west. 

 Having bred the men, they have accomplished a 

 mission, and they are now entering upon their true 

 and proper sphere — that of timber lands and graz- 

 ing ranges. The more tillable and richer lands of 

 the central and western states must forever supply 

 the greater part of the gross crops, and the abandon- 

 ment of eastern hills is but a realization of this fact. 

 Farming must be adapted to regions. 



