1914. 
THE RURAI> NEW-YORKER 
47 
“ TWO BLADES OF GRASS.” 
However desirable increased production on farms may 
appear to be from the consumers’ standpoint it does not 
follow that such increased production would result in 
any increase in the cash income per farm or per capita 
of farm population, or that prices paid by consumers 
would be any lower. * * * When as the result of 
such organization and improved methods the price of 
farm products can be maintained at a higher level with¬ 
out increasing the cost to consumers, farmers will be 
justified in increasing the output of their farms with a 
fair prospect of realizing a reasonable profit on their 
investment of time, labor and money, which in the ag¬ 
gregate is enormous. 
Look who's here! What heretic is this who pulls 
one blade of grass out of the pleasant dream of the 
‘‘authorities”? It must be some “disgruntled old 
grouch,” or some 35-eent-dollar crank. No, gentle¬ 
men ; guess again. It is Hon. David Houston, TJ. S. 
Secretary of Agriculture! That is what he says, and 
he proves his words by facts and figures. He says 
the total value of farm products for 1913 was $9,756,- 
000.000. The net farm income, as he figures it. is 
$4,074,027,499. In 1912 the total crops were consider- 
ably larger than this year, yet prices were better, 
and the farmers received about $500,000,000 more for 
this year’s smaller crops! 
Had the total production in 1913 equalled or exceeded 
the 1912 production it seems probable that the cash in¬ 
come per farm would not have been greater, and might 
have been less, than in 1912; but it is extremely doubt¬ 
ful whether the cost to the consumer would have been 
any less because retail prices are promptly raised on a 
prospect of underproduction, but are very slow to de¬ 
cline if there is overproduction. 
True as gospel, and everyone knows it—including 
those who still talk “two blades of grass.” It has 
been proved again and again here in New York City. 
Be the crop large or small, prices for such staples as 
bread, potatoes, milk and groceries rarely vary from 
year to year. There have been seasons when farmers 
in the interior received 20 cents a bushel for pota¬ 
toes. In other years these same farmers received 
90 cents or even more, yet housekeepers know they 
paid practically the same for a peck of potatoes each 
year. As we see, the farm price for crops this year 
is figured at about $4,000,000,000. The final con¬ 
sumer paid at least $13,000,000,000 for this crop be¬ 
fore it reached his mouth or body. The best thing 
the present Administration has done thus far is to 
recognize the truth of the 35-cent dollar and the folly 
of the “two blades of grass” theory. 
“I THROW THEM RIGHT INTO THE 
WASTE BASKET.” 
The speaker was an educated man—a teacher and 
clear student. He is a good speaker, capable of 
making a convincing address before an audience of 
thinking or fairly educated people. This man re¬ 
ferred to the letters or questions from the class 
which he calls “cranks.” This means people who 
get away from the conventional things and ask 
questions which get far below the polite falsehoods 
or fashionable ideas of life. Sometimes the “crank” 
comes with what seems from our present knowledge 
a wild and impossible theory. In meeting such 
people mentally our friend would get rid of them 
in the easiest way, and devote his energies to those 
who came nearer his own lines of thought. 
“/ throiv them right into the waste-basket.” 
This time it was an agricultural editor. He re¬ 
ferred to the same classes of people, and also to 
the people who ask what he calls simple questions, 
or things which he has answered time after time. 
Usually, however, he referred to the man who puts 
up an unpleasant truth which cannot be answered 
without kicking over some timeworn prejudice or 
habit. This man pointed to several leading farm 
papers which refuse to answer questions by mail, 
and intimate that they do not want suggestions 
from readers. 
We told both these men that they are wrong— 
that is, if they ever expect really to grow mentally, 
or in sympathy or instinct. A man may think he 
is growing rapidly if he is able to keep a little 
ahead of men of his own class and capacity. Fox- 
example, a farmers’ institute speaker may go about 
year after year, meeting the same small audiences 
of selected people. He may bring this small pro¬ 
portion of selected farmers a fresh message, and 
still 'be unable to answer the arguments of the 
“cranks” or the uninformed farmers. It is strange 
that such men cannot see that the mental struggle 
required to make their learning clear to the dull or 
uninformed will do them far more good than ac¬ 
quiring fresh knowledge which they cannot make 
soluble! Do they not see that “throwing it into the 
waste-basket” is a confession that they cannot an¬ 
swer the “crank,” or put their learning into the 
plain language of homely people? We think that 
herein lies one great trouble with our agricultural 
education. We are making it too much of a class 
privilege for the naturally bright and strong. The 
best way to spread it is to learn how to answer the 
“cranky” and explain to the dull. 
COMMISSION MEN AND TREE LEGISLATION. 
There are two things that I believe the farmers of 
New York may reasonably seek to have enacted into 
laws during the coming session of the Legislature. 
Pick up the loose ends of the commission mer¬ 
chants’ bill. The things needed to perfect this law 
should be immediately discussed in detail, not in gen¬ 
eral terms. I may say that one of the untouched 
evils of the business is the ease with which the com¬ 
mission man may become a dealer, either as whole¬ 
saler 1 , jobber or retailer, in the same kind of goods 
as he is selling on commission. If a legal way can 
be found, I believe it would be a good and just thing 
to forbid every commission man being a dealer in 
the same kind of things as he sells on commission. 
Another wrong that ought to be corrected is that 
refinement of means for taxing the farmer’s dollar— 
the middleman between the commission man and the 
retailer. Time was when the commission man sold 
direct to the retailer, making his commission cai’ry 
the goods into the l-etailers’ hands dii-ect and guaran- 
teeing the account. Now he often saves himself much 
of this trouble and cost by passing the goods through 
a wholesaler or jobber. The worst of this is that the 
latter is unrestrained; being a “buyer,” he may sell 
the goods for what he chooses. So it falls out that 
the farmer, instead of paying 10 per cent for getting 
his products into the retailer’s hands, as he supposes 
to be the case, is very often, I fear, paying 25 per 
cent or more. I am well aware that there is a proper 
place for the wholesaler in the produce business, but 
that place is not in taking over the real duties of the 
commission man, and for which the commission man 
is paid. For one thing, I believe the commission 
chax-ged the farmer should be, when his products are 
sold to a wholesaler or jobbei-, but one-half the 
amount charged when the sale is made direct to a 
retailer. It is to the great mutual interest of the 
consumers and the producers that the horde of peo¬ 
ple who stand between them be as few and as modest 
as may be, and any reasonable proposition to that 
end well backed is sure to find friendly consideration 
in the Legislature. 
We must demand a good nursery tree bill, and 
stick to it till we get it, and get it right. The Vert 
bill as amended through the influence of the legis¬ 
lative committee of the New York State Fruit Grow¬ 
ers’ Association, with the full approval of Mr. Vert, 
was a good bill. The bill was materially modified iu 
favor of the nurserymen as it progressed through 
the Assembly, the bill failing in the Senate, mainly 
through lack of time. It is significant of the strength 
of our position that we could get so good a bill 
through the Assembly the first year, even admitting 
that it had some serious defects. Mi-. Vert was true 
to us and a good fighter. The fundamental principle 
of this bill is that the farmer has the right to de¬ 
mand that he invariably be informed whex-e the trees 
were grown and by whom. The nurserymen reluct¬ 
antly conceded this, but minimized its effect by pro- 
viding that the farmer shall be given the informa¬ 
tion when the trees are shipped—at a time when the 
farmer has his ground and his mind ready for them, 
and would do little else then than accept and plant 
them, wherever they came from. 
I believe it to be a reasonable proposition, and 
moreover an attainable one, that every nursery tree 
label shall give on one side the name of the variety 
and on the other side the name of the grower, or for 
whom grown, and the place where grown. We don’t 
want a “list” giving the information, prepared in the 
office of the shipper and sent to the farmer at the 
time of the shipment. We want labels—real labels, 
inseparably a part of the variety label—labels put 
on where the tx-ee is grown, and we want these labels 
on every nursery tree sold in the State of New York, 
w herever grown. Then we want to know this at the 
time of purchase, or not less than two months befoi-e 
delivery, because it is not a safe assumption that the 
trees are coming from the nursery ‘selling them. 
And we want some penalties that will count, and 
count hard, for delivering trees not ti-ue to name. 
Kindei-hook, N. Y. datus c. smith. 
As a general proposition we think there has never 
been iu 20 years a more promising outlook for Eastern 
farmers to push some line of live stock. Year after 
year the supply of meat in proportion to population 
grows less and less. The future seems to offer the 
surest thing in the way of a market for all kinds of 
meat. In the past many of our farmers became dis¬ 
couraged because there was no competition in Inly¬ 
ing. The “Meat Trust” monopolized the trade and 
drove out the small buyer and slaughterer. We think 
this objection will be, partly at least, overcome. The 
development of parcel post will mean an immense 
direct trade in poultry, pork and smaller cuts of veal, 
mutton and beef. Then we think the Government 
will finally step in with Federal slaughter houses, 
where live stock may be slaughtered and dressed at 
a fair price. These things may come slowly, but they 
will sxxrely come, and they will give our fax-mers a 
chance to obtain more than 35 cents of the dollar. 
Live stock, too, will help take care of our farms 
and give a more profitable winter work. We believe 
this development of meat-making on our Eastei-n 
fai-ms will give opportunity once more to many of 
the smaller dairy farms—now dismissing their cows 
because the cost of producing sanitai-y milk is too 
high. One thing is sure, however, the futxire live 
stock business has no place for the “scrub.” The 
pure blood or the high grade will be the only ani¬ 
mal that can pay for its board. In the past farming 
has actually been able to carry a lot of boarders and 
l’obbers. It cannot do so in the fxxtxxre. 
* 
“Go West, young man /” That was the slogan which 
Horace Greeley took up shortly after the Civil War. 
Without qixestion this advice so persistently repeated 
did mxiclx to feed the sti-eam of hximanity which ran 
down the hills away from our Eastern fax-ms. In 
those days the argument was a strong one. The 
Eastern soils had been cultivated for a centxxry and 
were losing their power to produce. The modern 
system of using chemicals had not been worked out, 
and the depleted Eastern farms were in dii-ect com¬ 
petition with the new and rich soil of the West. In 
those days a young man could go West and obtain 
for almost nothing a new farm, the soil of which 
was nearly as rich as the leached manure in the 
old barnyard at home. As one of the young men 
who took Gx-eeley’s advice, the writer knows the 
power of this old argument, and something of the 
historical effect of this desertion of the Eastei-n 
farms. Now, however, the time has come to put 
Greeley's advice on the sex-ap heap of agi-icultui-al 
history. 
“Stay East, young man! Stag where you are!” 
That may be called the “up-to-date” argxxment. 
The West has no more cheap land to give you. The 
only low-priced land now left for you is far away in 
some lonely place, where you will be at the mercy of 
a long string of middlemen, who must finger what 
you i-aise. The hope for the futixi-e fai-mer is not so 
much in raising enormous crops as in direct trade— 
getting closer to his market. The strip of land 150 
miles wide along the upper Atlantic is destined to 
provide the best markets in this coxxnti-y and to con¬ 
tain the most profitable fai-ms. Here is to be found 
the future land of opportunity for the sale of farm 
pi-oducts of high grade. And so we say in this newer 
time, “ Stay East, young man! Stay East!” 
Government Crop Reports. 
According to the U. S. Department of Agriculture the 
value of home-grown crops for 1913 was as follows: 
Com.$1,692,000,000 
Cotton . 798,000.000 
Hay . 797,000.000 
« heat . 610.000.000 
Oats . 440.000.000 
Potatoes . 228.000.000 
Tobacco . 112.000.000 
Barley ... 96,000.000 
Sweet Potatoes. 43.000.000 
Sugar Beets. 34.000.000 
Cane Sugar. 26.000.000 
Hye. 26,000.000 
giee . 22 , 000,000 
Flaxseed . 21 . 000.000 
Hops .. 15,000.000 
Buckwheat . 10.000.000 
Dairy Products. S14.000.000 
Eggs and Fowls. 57S.000.000 
Wool. 51,000,000 
The value of all agricultural exports in the fiscal vear 
ending June 30 was $1,123,021,469. 
Lyle’s Wheat Estimate. 
The estiniated distribution of the domestic supply 
July 1, 1913, to July 1, 1914, is as follows, in bushels: 
Farmers’ hands, July 1 , 1913 . 35,515.000 
Visibie supply, July 1, 1913. 30.103.000 
Crop 1913.763.3SO.OOO 
s «Pply .S29,058.000 
Disappearance six months ended December 31, 1913: 
Exports (December estimated). 95,000 000 
Seed, winter wheat. 42,000.000 
heed, screenings losses, etc. 15 000 000 
Consumption .23L5(KUH)0 
Total disappearance.3S9,500.000 
Remainder January 1 , 1914.439.558.000 
Disappearance six months ending June 30, 1914: 
Seed, spring wheat. 22 500 000 
Consumption .. 237.500'.000 
heed, screenings’ losses, etc. 8,000.000 
Total.26S,000.000 
Remainder .171,55S,000 
The remainder must supply the exports for six months 
and what will be in farmers’ hands and the visible sup¬ 
ply on July i, 1914. Th e figures suggest we have about 
100 . 000.000 bushels available for export in the coming 
six months that must be sold iu competition with Rus* 
sia, Danubian districts, Canada, Argentina and Aus¬ 
tralia. 
