. American Agriculturist,' July 12, 19 4 
The Tragedy of Acadia Repeated 
Helping a Hundred Thousand People to Help Themselves 
By HENRY MORGENTHAU 
Ex-Ambassador to Turkey 
F or centuries and centuries people have read 
and listened to many sermons on the contents 
of the five books of Moses and have studied with 
keen interest the story of the Exodus of the 
Jews, their migration from Egypt to Canaan, and have 
deeply sympathized with all their mental and physical 
troubles and tribulations. Most of us have all through 
our lives been conscious of, and have severely con¬ 
demned, the gross impropriety of the conduct of the 
Egyptians. This feeling has been kept alive more 
amongst the Jews than the Christians because the 
Orthodox Jews have so arranged their re¬ 
ligious service that they read through the 
entire five books every year. 
All readers of Longfellow have been deeply 
moved—and frequently to tears—by his 
touching description of the sad plight of 
Evangeline and her companions of Acadia, 
who were violently removed from their homes, 
and carried into different directions. Yet, in 
spite of all the pathos which the poet with his 
magic art has put into their story, how small 
does the misfortune that befell that little 
colony of settlers appear to us in comparison 
with the appalling tragedy that took place 
in Western Asia Minor about a year and a 
half ago! 
It is difficult in the ten minutes allotted to 
me, to give you an adequate description of one 
of the greatest damages done by the World 
War: the complete uprooting and expulsion 
of an entire people from a country which 
they have occupied almost from the dawn of history 
in that section of the world. During the last five cen¬ 
turies, although under the dominance of the Turks and 
subjected to all kinds of tyranny and exactions, the 
Greeks living there had nevertheless been prosperous 
and comparatively happy. Smyrna was practically a 
Greek city. In fact, the Christian element was so 
predominant there that the Turks called the city 
“Infidel Smyrna!” Next to Constantinople it was the 
most important harbor of Turkey. The rug and silk 
factories, the farms, and the majority of the buildings 
were owned by the Greeks who had always, and par¬ 
ticularly after the establishment of the Kingdom of 
Greece, hoped to secure their own freedom from the 
Turkish yoke. In 1919, when under the Treaty of 
Sevre, the mandate was given to Greece, which was 
followed by the entrance of the Greek troops, there was 
great rejoicing among the Greeks of Western Asia 
Minor that at last their fondest hopes of reunion with 
their brethren in the fatherland was to be completed 
and that their dream of redemption was to be realized. 
Their joy was to be short-lived, for in September, 1922, 
the Greek army, which had so confidently invaded the 
hinterland, was beating a hasty retreat which was 
accelerated by the Turks who, again supreme in the 
land, were following them in mad pursuit and finally 
drove them out of the country, and with them the entire 
Greek population. So that instead of freedom, prosper¬ 
ity, and self-government, there came expulsion, death 
and desolation. Instead of a happy, united people, 
there was a distracted mob, shorn of all their posses¬ 
sions, struggling against all kinds of odds for mere 
physical self-preservation! 
Like you and I they loved life, so that when thousands 
of them were huddled into ships that could only hold 
hundreds, when they were compelled to abstain for 
days from any opportunity of sleeping, when the 
food that they received was barely sufficient to keep 
them alive, there was no complaining, they rejoiced 
at having escaped their bloody pursuers. 
When this tremendous mass of people landed in old 
Greece, bedraggled, sick, impoverished, undernourished, 
many of them possessing only the garments on their 
bodies, they had to be taken care of by the Greek 
government and its people. It was a fearful task to put 
upon a people that itself had just been deprived of so 
many of their fine young men and they were com¬ 
pletely bewildered at the terrible catastrophe that had 
befallen them. But th6 Greek Government and its 
people arose to the occasion and never winced at the 
great task that confronted them. They promptly 
arranged all the abandoned barracks around 
Salonica, the warehouses, the churches, the 
schools, the theaters at Athens and all other 
cities, and placed these people therein. They 
communicated with all their Governors and 
demanded how many could be billeted in the 
various districts and cities. They requisi¬ 
tioned over five thousand rooms in Athens 
alone and immediately proceeded with the 
erection of small one and two room houses, 
some of which were frame, others built of mud 
bricks. They utilized all the old army tents, 
so that these people had to remain un¬ 
sheltered but a very short time. Even to-day 
the National Theater of Athens still holds 
1,300 refugees, twenty of the Athens schools are 
still similarly occupied. On their arrival, and 
after months thereafter, the Government 
gave to each person four cents a day to keep 
them alive. When the Government and the 
private Greek charities had almost reached 
the limit of their capacity, they did not ask for assist¬ 
ance but it was volunteered. Dr. Nansen, of the League 
of Nations, made an investigation and when he found 
that here was a condition where 1X million of people 
had been bodily lifted from their moorings and imposed 
upon a country that contained about five million 
people, who themselves were struggling for existence 
and who had bravely attempted the terrific task of 
giving shelter and finding new employment for these 
new comers, he worked out a plan that Greece was to 
supply 1X million acres of land, and that in return the 
League would secure an advance of sufficient money 
to Greece to buy the material for and to build the 
required houses, to supply seeds and animals and 
agricultural implements to the peasants and the neces- 
(Continued on page 23) 
The Hard Road to Farm Success 
A Plow Handle Talk Broadcast from WEAP 
W HILE my experience dates back over a period of 
fifty years either directly or indirectly related to 
the farm and dairy I feel myself less qualified than 
ever before to advise or even suggest any standardized 
methods of administration or procedure that will bring 
success. 
Markets and soils are so 
varied that personal ingenuity, 
judgment and adapt¬ 
ability must govern. 
It is rare to find two 
farms adjoining, or 
even one single farm, 
that does not contain 
within its area a 
variety of soils and 
subsoils. The? clay 
portions demanding 
drainage and the ad¬ 
dition in some form of 
organic matter and 
perhaps lime, the loams calling for fertilizers 
and humus and maybe lime and all of them 
a maximum of cultivation. 
The technique of soil management can be 
studied and general principles worked out by 
experimenters and student minded farmers 
but their application must be the business of 
an artist who has the point of view of an 
executive and the ability to combine these 
principles and methods as an artist com¬ 
bines colors. One may plow loam in a rain 
storm but clay only afterwards and so it is 
with countless practices that call for wise application. 
The rural sections are dotted with misfit farmers who 
fail themselves and bring competition to others through 
over production at a loss and of inferior quality. In 
some cases education will give these men a helpful 
understanding and a safer outlook but unless farmer 
and student minded, education will be wasted fragrance 
on a desert air. Fortunate it is indeed that we are 
surrounded by a varied industrial life with its almost 
By H. E. COOK 
human machinery under the direct supervision of a 
trained foreman and an administrative genius at its 
head, where these misfits can find employment at a 
living wage. 
The rural people should have an interest in the 
manufacturing city second only to their own farm and 
community. Only the misguided and ignorant or the 
out and out demagogue will play these great and vital 
interests against each other. These problems are for the 
diplomat and humanitarian and not the law giver. 
City folks may be quicker to grasp the situation than 
we of the farm and sometimes they hasten in a patroniz¬ 
ing fashion to teach us social and business methods 
thereby arousing our vocational dignity. 
It is important instead that each one of these great 
classes, producers and consumers, should study to 
understand and respect the viewpoint of the other and 
not to judge each the other from their own view point. 
We shall not, in my opinion, ever reach a period of 
skillful production and thorough organization which 
will guarantee universal farm prosperity. No more 
disastrous event could happen. Indifference and slack 
procedure would become universal and the most radical 
socialism would be tame in comparison. 
Hard persistant mental and physical effort 
in the past has been the only road to success 
and none other can take its place. We say 
much these days against the individualism of 
the farmer. God forbid that any government 
action or organized movement shall make us 
weaker or less pronounced individuals, giving 
unscrupulous leadership of whatever name or 
location a chance to absorb our substance. 
I am frightened at the urgency of our 
leadership for direct government support and 
the willingness of superficial politicians to 
espouse their cause. Not only must these 
things fail in the end but they with other class 
demands will eventually undermine the 
foundation of our government. 
Class legislation is minority rule and 
minority . rule is not synonymous with a 
democratic form of government. 
If these class demands continue I shall 
think that farmers are being over organized 
and that our leadership has run away with 
itself and actual conservatives rural opinion 
has lost its representation. 
The type of farming followed must necessarily depend 
upon adaptability and location and then it won’t make 
much difference. 
Probably 100 men will succeed on a small farm to 
one on a larger farm, partly because there is no cash 
paid labor involved or if any the percentage becomes a 
negligible one in comparison to the whole, the family, 
and partly because the wife becomes a much more 
(Continued on page 20. 
No Universal Prosperity 
I N Dean Cook’s ptowhandle and radio talk given on this page, he has 
emphasized two thoughts that we wish could be shouted from the 
housetops, and particularly into the ears of the politicians and the 
demagogues who are constantly preaching that the royal road to success 
on the farm is by way of fool lawc and uneconomic schemes. 
Mr. Cook, says: “ We shall not, in my opinion, ever reach a 
period of skillful production and thorough organization which 
will guarantee universal farm prosperity. No more disastrous 
event could happen. . . . Hard, persistent mental and physical 
effort in the past has been the only road to success and none 
other can take its place.” 
And the other thought he wen emphasizes when he says: “The rural 
people should have an interest in the manufacturing city second only 
to their own farm and community. Only the misguided and ignorant 
or the out and out demagogue will play these great and vital interests 
against each other. ... It is important instead that each one of 
these great classes, producers and consumers, should study to under¬ 
stand and respect the viewpoint of the other and not to judge each the 
other from their own viewpoint.”—T he EDITORS. 
