74 ILLINOIS STATE DAIRYMEN’S ASSOCIATION. 
From Ireland, and Persia, and China, and now from 
Russia, has the cry come, give us food or we die. 
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To meet this great want of the nations of the old 
world, the people of this country have laid their broad acres 
under contribution, and with such results that our railroads 
and canals and steamships fairly groan under the burdens 
which have been thrust upon them, while our graneries and 
warehouses are full of the golden grain. 
Living, as we do, in the midst of such abundance, we 
can hardly realize that famine has been more destructive to 
human life, than the most sanguinary wars that have de¬ 
luged the world with blood. 
So long as it continues to be the policy of the govern¬ 
ments of Europe to keep all the vigorous young men in the 
• army, leaving only the infirm, and the crippled, and the 
aged men, and the women to cultivate the soil, it will be the 
mission of the people of these United States to feed a 
hungry world. 
But it is not the question of food in general, but a 
special kind of food that is to engage our attention. 
Let us turn then to the consideration of the value and 
importance of milk as an article of food. 
It will doubtless be conceded by all that milk is a very 
convenient article to have in the family ; that it is very use¬ 
ful in the culinary department, and that it is almost indis- 
pensible as seasoning for tea and coffee. 
How few people in this land that is literally “ flowing 
with milk” have ever given any considerable attention, or 
thought, to the intrinsic value of milk as an article of food. 
How many here present are prepared to give credence 
to the statement that a gallon of milk will furnish an 
amount of nutrition equal to two and three-quarter pounds 
of boneless beef, or that twenty millions of steers of the 
average weight of fourteen hundred pounds gross, will 
not furnish an amount of nutritive food greater than that 
contained in the annual milk product of the United States, 
and yet such are the facts. 
