1420 
The RURAL NEW-YORKER 
The Rural New-Yorker 
THE BUSINESS FARMER'S PAPER 
A National Weekly Journal l'or Country and Suburban Hornet) 
Established 18S0 
l‘nl.l|«hfd ffteklj by the Rural Publishing: Company, 333 West 30(h Slrrrt, >>w Vorb 
Herbert W. CotXlXGWOOD, President ami Editor. 
John J. Diixo.v, Treasurer ami General Manager. 
Wm. F. DiT.r.o!J, Secretary. Mrs. E. T. Koyi.k, Associate Editor. 
SUBSCRIPTION: ONE DOLLAR A YEAR 
To foreign countries In the Universal Postal Union, equal to 3s. GO, or 
8K» marks, or 101$ francs. Remit in money order, express 
order, personal check or bank draft. 
Entered at New York Post Office as Second Class Matter. 
Advertising rates, 75 cents per agate line—7 words. References required for 
advertisers unknown to us , and cash must acconijiany transient orders. 
• “A SQUARE DEAL” 
We indieve that every advertisement in this? paper is backed by a respon¬ 
sible person. We use every possible precaution and admit l tie advertising of 
reliable houses only. But to make doubly sure, we will make good any Joss 
to paid subscribers sustained by trusting any deliberate swindler, irrespon¬ 
sible advertisers or misleading advertisements in our columns, and any 
such swindler will be publicly exposed. We are a(so often called upon 
to adjust differences dt* * mistakes between''our subscribers and honest, 
resjsmsible houses, whether advertisers or not. We willingly use our good 
offices, to this end, but -such eases shot*’ 1 not l>o confused with dishonest 
transactions. W'e protect subscriber, -uinst rogues, but we will not bo 
responsible for file debts of honest bankrupts sanctioned hv the courts. 
Notice, of ,t lie complaint must be sent to lisavit inn one month of (he timo of 
the i ransnetion, and to identify it, you slioiild iiii'iilion Tin: !;i ini. NEW - 
YoRKkit when writing the adveitlser. '• ' ■ 
Home, fiweet Home! 
E want pictures for our Thanksgiving number 
—lots of them. ’I'lic.v should show family or 
farm scenes cliaracterisiic of Hie season, and with 
a silent story of a country home. Suitable pictures 
wiU.be paid for;.those not available will be returned 
promptly. ■ - ' . " 
A S-, time goes on we begin to learn what happened 
in Germany during the’war. For one thing 
the nation, or it large, part of it, was like a big ex¬ 
periment-station in feeding human beings. All sorts 
of ration's were tried out. The hardest problem was 
caused by the shortage of fats. Efforts were made 
to substitute inferior fats, like lard, suet or cotton 
oil, for butter fat. They failed, and it has now 
been demonstrated that butter fat is in a class by 
itself. It supplies not only the fat, but the vitamines) 
needed for growth ami development. J >r. Osborne 
has, been making ibis very clear to our readers, and 
the ; war experience in Germany conlirms his state¬ 
ments. It.is safe to say that no combination of fats 
mixed its a butter substitute can ever exactly take 
the place of pure cream and butter. The use of 
"oleo” increased greatly during the war on .account 
of the higher price of butter. Many who now use 
it have the mistaken idea that it is a full butter 
substitute. It is not, for now we know that butter 
has an important value in addition to the actual fat 
it contains. The vitamines are essential to health, 
and the inferior fat does not contain them. This is 
to be the new and conclusive argument against oleo. 
We now know that butter is in a class by itself. 
T il 10 llope Farm man's remarks about the Lan¬ 
caster, I'a., markets, show something of wlmt 
happens when more or most of the consumer's dollar 
can go straight to the farmers. When the greater 
share of this dollar is distributed among a com¬ 
paratively small class of middlemen it cannot cuter 
circulation in the most useful way. When it goes 
back to the farm a thousand practical uses are sug¬ 
gested for it. Every farm ‘home has urgent needs, 
running from automobiles to zwieback, and a good 
share of any increase in the 35-eent dollar will be 
at once spent to satisfy these desires. This all puts 
the money promptly into circulation through manu¬ 
facturing and transportation and every line of busi¬ 
ness connected with them. No class ol' people in the 
country today have greater need of what manu¬ 
facturers have to sell, and none can make wiser ime 
of the money. The communities around Lancaster 
prove this statement, locally at least. The market, 
which cuts out most of the middlemen, has made 
those farmers the dominant business class and gives 
them great financial strength. The same thing will 
happen to any community whenever the do-cent 
dollar is increased. 
* 
I T is now nearly a month since the Administration 
started its great; campaign to reduce the high 
cost of living. There have been ample funds for 
doing the work and a tremendous power.of pub¬ 
licity has been employed. It is time to ask fairly 
what has been accomplished. A quantity of army 
food has been sold. Personally, we think this food 
might better have been held until colder weather, 
instead of being dumped into the market just when 
farmers are at their harvest. Without discussing 
that—now what single practical result Inis been 
worked out ? What: necessity of food or clothing lias 
been reduced in price? We have made a careful 
canvass among hundreds of consumers, and have not 
found one who can give* figures to show that the cost 
of living lias been reduced to them. < >n the other 
* i 
hand, there can be no doubt that, all this wild talk 
and the sale of army food has been used to cut down 
the prices on what farmers have to sell. This is 
particularly true in produce, which passes through 
the hands of commission men or handlers. There 
has been a deliberate and partly successful effort to 
cut down the price paid the unorganized farmer and 
extract even greater profits for the organized han¬ 
dlers. This is a cold analysis of the situation, and 
it has worked wherever middlemen bold consumer 
and producer wide apart. 
T HE Kansas Agricultural College semis out the 
following: 
Menhaden is a fish too oily and bony for human beings 
to eat, and for a long time nobody on the Atlantic 
coast, where it is caught, knew what to do with it. In 
the last, few years, however, it has been made into lish 
meal, and has been used in the East and South for hog 
feeding. It. is superior to tankage. Mr. Imel says, as it 
contains a large proportion of protein and also of easily 
assimilable bone ash. Bonemeal is not generally avail¬ 
able in the Middle West now, hut probably soon will he 
at a price lower than that of tankage. 
Think what that means—the Atlantic Ocean feed¬ 
ing the Missouri Valley! The menhaden are caught 
off the const of New England or Long Island. The 
oil is extracted and the rest of the fish dried and 
crushed and sent to Kansas or beyond to feed bogs. 
These hogs make ham and bacon, which is sent back 
(•) New York, Boston or Portland to feed the people. 
The wastes from Ibis feeding flow out into the ocean, 
and there feed more menhaden, which in turn pro¬ 
duce more lish meal to feed more hogs to produce 
more meat. Thus the eternal round of Nature goes 
on with nothing lost, and as society develops man 
learns more and more about utilizing it. 
* 
Is there anything in the present political situation 
of ftfate or Nation to lend courage or hope to agri¬ 
culture? 
HAT is what we asked on page 1349, but thus 
far no one Inis attempted any answer. We re¬ 
pent the question! Surely if there is anything in 
sight someone must be able to point it out. That 
article on page 1349 has met with a line response. 
It expresses the ideas of working farmers. The big 
question is whether they will work out the idea when 
they get a chance:. One man says that most of us 
lind it easier to sag amen than to act the part of a 
man. Wayne County, N. Y., gives us a good test this 
year and we all await the answer. 
♦ # 
T HE Legislature of Ontax-io, Canada, passed a 
law designed to help rural communities provide 
community halls. This law gives financial help to 
any country neighborhood which will erect a hall for 
community meetings. The province gives 25 per 
cent of the cost, with a limit of $2,000. Each hall 
must have in connection with it at least three acres 
of land, suitable for picnics, sports, etc., and plans 
b»r the building must be approved. The argument is 
that every community must have a place where all 
are free to gather. This may well be separate from 
church, school, Grange, or any other institution. 
The simple fact of getting together in such a place 
•where all are free to feel at home will be one of the 
greatest things for any community. 
* 
T HAT'S a good one the Pastoral Parson gives us 
this week about the young minister. This 
young man was sure he could have hold the young 
fellows in his church since he had studied psyvhot- 
ogg six gears! That's good—exactly typical of the 
way some of our laboratory-educated people regard 
their mission of teaching plain, working folks. The 
study of psychology is good and well worth while. 
It is the science of mind, and mind is ever the mas¬ 
ter <ff matter. But mind can never influence matter 
unless there is some connecting link between the two, 
and this link must be put down by the student into 
material things so as to take root there. The stu¬ 
dent of psychology and the worker struggling for 
mental and moral help will be like ships that pass 
in the night unless the student can anchor his “sci¬ 
ence of mind” to plain common sense and human 
sympathy. 
♦ 
E VEN now we have occasional letters from wom¬ 
en who say they are trying to prevent the rati¬ 
fication of the suffrage amendment. They say that 
the people have never had a chance to express them¬ 
selves on the subject. These women may quite prop¬ 
erly be called “poor losers!” Of all the 19 amend¬ 
ments to the United States Constitution, it seems to 
us that the one calling for suffrage has been most 
thoroughly discussed. For the last half century this 
question has been in the public mind, and has been 
more freely debated than any other question except 
slavery and prohibition. How could it he possible to 
elect a Congress which would vote almost unani¬ 
mously for suffrage and President who supports the 
amendment unless the people understood it clearly? 
September 27, 1910 
It seems to us that our “anti” friends are somewhat 
like the old-timer who continued to vote for Andrew 
Jackson even after he died! When the amendment 
first passed Congress we said that New England and 
the Gulf States might unite and oppose it. Since 
then Massachusetts and Texas have both ratified! 
Alabama has refused to ratify, but it now seems 
likely that the necessary number of States will he 
secured during 1920. In New York State the ballot 
has, we think, been of help to women. We hear of 
repeated incidents which show that women are re¬ 
ceiving greater consideration and larger opport unities 
because they now have the power to vote. If now, 
after this experience with the ballot, the question 
were once more submitted to a referendum, we be¬ 
lieve New York would vote two to one in favor of 
woman suffrage. We do not believe there is a single 
State in the union where women are now permitted 
to vote which would go back to the old system. We 
are, therefore, quite unable to understand the point 
of view of the "antis” who are still working against 
the amendment. 
>)< 
A MONG the old-fashinned practices now coming 
back is that of making dairy butter. Many 
private families or gardeners or fruit growers are 
keeping one or two good cows. These cows are fed 
mostly on farm and garden wastes with grain. The 
rush to sell whole milk crowded the churn off many 
a dairy farm, and in other ways the old practice of 
making good butter has become almost a lost art. 
Now that the turu has come we have, many questions 
about butter-making. There are so many that we 
have arranged for a series of articles which will 
cover the ground. They ;ire for you. If you do not 
find in them just what you want it is your privilege 
to come up and call for more. 
* 
1 ADMIRE and enjoy The R. N.-Y., but speaking of 
most dailies, I am inclined to think that if editors knew 
what they were talking about, they would do less talk¬ 
ing, and that the world would be less restless accord¬ 
ingly. R, 
E feel that a large share of the trouble in the 
world is caused by the gyrations of the bone¬ 
less tongue around the contents of a hollow head. 
That is most certainly true of the ordinary printed 
remarks about farming. The foolish talk poured 
out by most of the city daily papers has caused more 
injury and trouble to agriculture than any other 
agency. It seems to us that the average editor 
tries to spread his mental wings over the entire 
earth—like the hen that tried to hatch out the crate 
of eggs. Few men seem capable of clearly under¬ 
standing more than a dozen large problems. Far 
better stick to them, and help put them over. But 
there are men who would go insane if they could 
not talk. 
* 
S INCE we printed the note about a law to compel 
dealers and manufacturers to state the propor¬ 
tion of shoddy in their "all wool” goods .we have 
received several comments from manufacturers. 
They argue that shoddy (which they say is picked 
over old wooleu garments) is necessary as a part of 
clothing. Without it, they say, the world could not 
be clothed properly. For the sake of argument, sup¬ 
pose we grant that. Is it any reason why the manu¬ 
facturer should not state how much shoddy goes 
into his cloth? Under our food laws it has been 
necessary to compel manufacturers to state what 
goes into flour, breakfast food, etc., or label their 
substitutes distinctly. Is there any fair reason why 
woolen cloth should not .come under the same re¬ 
quirement? Such cloth i< a necessity—next to food 
and fuel. Granting the necessity of using shoddy, 
is there any sound reason against the proposed law? 
There are several good arguments in favor of it! 
Brevities 
We have had best success in starting a lawn iu the 
Fall. 
Some of those folks who are so prone to go to the law 
with every little matter might well try the experiment 
of taking some of them to ihe Lord. 
There’s one kind of paint makes you look like a 
saint—rub some of it on for awhile. So come up and 
drag out your vanity hag and paint up your face with 
a smile. 
During 19ls Hong Kong, China, imported $3,584,851 
worth of Amerienn condensed milk. Both the Chinese 
and Japanese will demand more and more dairy prod¬ 
ucts, and most of them must come from this country. 
The Lane scheme for spending millions to water the 
deserts and drain the swamps to provide work and land 
for the soldiers seems to have met a set back in Con¬ 
gress. At present the chances are that it will not come 
no this year. It has come to he a sectional issue chiefly. 
The far Western States and some of the Southern States 
favor it, while the East is generally opposed. The new 
hind is not now needed for production, while the labor 
which would be spent iu this scheme is needed, both on 
the farms and for road building. 
