ortant, as the new commuters will
make a demand for it, and cheap autos will largely fill the gap; it
will improve rapidly.

If possible it should have a lake or a fair stream on it for
irrigation and small water power; the soil should be examined by
experts, to see that it is suitable for trucking and market
gardening.

The object should be to make a sort of vacant lot gardening plan on
a grand scale. Heretofore the trouble has been that we have been
unable to get land where there was any assurance that we could have
it again the second year, and that the limited amount of land makes
it impossible to give the men as much as they ought to have. They do
not need much land, because a man working at intensive culture with
only the rough plowing done for him cannot take good care of much
more than one acre of land. He will probably make as much money out
of one acre of land as he will out of two. Those who are willing to
work should be given one acre of land, with the assurance that they
can have it as long as they work it faithfully and comply with the
simple rules which we have found so effective in the Vacant Lot
Gardening work,--which are practically, that a man should attend to
business and not annoy his neighbors. No contract or lease should be
given the men, or indeed the women, for both work such gardens, as
they have been doing for the past twenty years in several large
cities, making at least a living upon the land and often a very
large return.

There must be a competent superintendent, for everything depends
upon him, who would show the men what land they should use, what
they should put in, instruct them how to do it, and market their
products cooperatively. Experience in Philadelphia, and in some
score of other cities where they have established Vacant Lot
Gardens, shows that about ten per cent annually of the people prefer
to work for others, and consequently take places in the country
after they have learned to do market gardening. Some others, being
dissatisfied with so little land, and wanting to own their own
place, go off and buy land or lease it for themselves. This makes a
constant drain from the gardens, leaving openings for others who
will learn in time their trade; it is possible to make in this way a
steady drain out of the cities to the country, and what is better
still, an automatic drain.

The land must be so near to a center of population that it may be
possible to take a gang of men dow