rural civilization. It is distinctly a rural civilization,
not merely because of its characteristics, but because it is a triumph of
rural leadership and the product of rural evolution, by fortunate
selection and survival in the country of efficient manhood and womanhood
best adapted to cope with their environment.

Thousands who failed in the country have gone to the cities, where it is
often easier for incompetence to eke out an existence by living on casual
jobs. Thousands of others have found better success in the city because
they were better adapted to urban life. Often the net result of the
migration has been profit for the country community which has held its
best, that is, the country born and bred best adapted to be happy and
successful in the rural environment.

Where you find the new rural civilization well developed, you find a
self-respecting people, prosperous and happy, keeping abreast of the times
in all important human interests, keenly alert to all new developments in
agriculture and often proud of their country heritage. Because of this new
prosperity and self-respect, ridicule of the "countryman" has ceased to be
popular among intelligent people. The title "farmer" has taken on an
utterly new meaning and is becoming a term of respect.

All this marks a return to the former days, before the age of supercilious
cities, when most of the wealth and culture and family pride was in the
open country and the village. To be sure in some sections of America this
frank pride in rural life has never ceased. The real aristocracy of the
South has always been mainly rural. Many of the "first families of
Virginia" still live on the old plantations and maintain a highly
self-respecting life, free from the corrosive envy of city conditions,
often pitying the man whose business requires him to live in the crowded
town, and rejoicing in the freedom and the wholesome joys of country life.
The hospitable country mansions of the South still remind us of the fame
of Westover, Mount Vernon and Monticello as centers of social grace and
leadership; and the most select social groups in Richmond welcome the
country gentlemen and women of refinement from these country homes, not
merely because of the honored family names they bear, but because they
themselves are worthy scions of a continuously worthy rural civilization.
They have never pitied themselves for living in the country. They do not
want to live in the city. They are