2 
THE WAR GARDEN VICTORIOUS 
labor already engaged in agricultural work, of time de- 
voted to other necessary occupations, and of trans- 
portation facilities which were already inadequate to 
the demands made upon them. 
In March, therefore, some weeks before the United 
States entered the war, he organized for this work 
a commission known as the National War Garden 
Commission. 
What were the causes which led to the world’s lack 
of food and the need of a largely increased production 
by the United States to prevent world starvation? 
When the drums sounded the call to the colors in the 
summer of 1914, three million Frenchmen shouldered 
their rifles and marched away from a large proportion 
of the five million farms of France; and mostly these 
were one-man farms. Russia, a nation almost wholly 
agricultural, mobilized perhaps eight millions of men. 
All the men of fighting age in Belgium were summoned 
to the army. England, possessing only a “ contempt- 
ible little army, ” straightway began a recruiting cam- 
paign which within a few years swelled the ranks of her 
military forces to five millions. Germany called out 
her entire fighting force of military age, an army of 
several millions. Austria, Bulgaria and Turkey like- 
wise mobilized their full fighting forces. Altogether, 
twenty or thirty million men were called away from 
their usual pursuits. The vocation of the majority of 
them was farming. Thus, at one stroke, practically all 
the farms in the embattled nations were swept clear 
of male workers. 
