the Government, both Federal and State, to
agricultural matters. But practically the whole of this effort has
hitherto been directed toward increasing the production of crops. Our
attention has been concentrated almost exclusively on getting better
farming. In the beginning this was unquestionably the right thing to do.
The farmer must first of all grow good crops in order to support himself
and his family. But when this has been secured, the effort for better
farming should cease to stand alone, and should be accompanied by the
effort for better business and better living on the farm. It is at least
as important that the farmer should get the largest possible return in
money, comfort, and social advantages from the crops he grows, as that
he should get the largest possible return in crops from the land he
farms. Agriculture is not the whole of country life. The great rural
interests are human interests, and good crops are of little value to the
farmer unless they open the door to a good kind of life on the farm."

The Commission on Country Life did work of capital importance. By means
of a widely circulated set of questions the Commission informed itself
upon the status of country life throughout the Nation. Its trip through
the East, South, and West brought it into contact with large numbers of
practical farmers and their wives, secured for the Commissioners a most
valuable body of first-hand information, and laid the foundation for the
remarkable awakening of interest in country life which has since taken
place throughout the Nation.

One of the most illuminating--and incidentally one of the most
interesting and amusing--series of answers sent to the Commission was
from a farmer in Missouri. He stated that he had a wife and 11 living
children, he and his wife being each 52 years old; and that they owned
520 acres of land without any mortgage hanging over their heads. He had
himself done well, and his views as to why many of his neighbors had
done less well are entitled to consideration. These views are expressed
in terse and vigorous English; they cannot always be quoted in full. He
states that the farm homes in his neighborhood are not as good as they
should be because too many of them are encumbered by mortgages; that the
schools do not train boys and girls satisfactorily for life on the farm,
because they allow them to get an idea in their heads that city life is
better, and that to remedy this practical farming