the country, and the incentive of cooperative endeavor is
the key to the new success in every rural interest and organization.

V. Effect of the New Order on Rural Institutions.

For several decades we have been seriously troubled by the decay of rural
institutions. The strain upon them resulting from rural depletion has been
very serious. First of all the country schools began to deteriorate and
thousands of them doubtless have been closed. With the decay of the
village, the village store, that social center and fountain of all wisdom,
has lost prestige and most of its trade. The trolley and the mail order
houses have made it unnecessary. With the coming of the rural delivery
route, even the village post-office has lost all social importance. With
the advent of farm machinery and fewer farm hands, many of the jolly
social functions of the past, such as husking bees, barn raisings,
spelling bees and lyceums, have ceased to be; while the rural churches in
all depleted sections have suffered sadly and in hundreds of cases have
succumbed.

In some scattered communities, away from the beaten paths, this social
decay has resulted in de-socializing the neighborhood. Feuds, grudges,
gross immoralities have followed and the people have relapsed into
practical heathenism. But in many places _social readjustment has come_,
with a new efficiency in rural institutions. Centralized schools have
brought a new largeness of vision in place of the little district
knowledge shop. The great advantages of the rural free delivery have
certainly outweighed the loss of the social prestige of the post-office,
just as the trolley is more valuable than the village store. Many of the
old time social functions were worth while, but new institutions like the
Grange and the farmers' clubs, institutes and cooperative organizations
are better fitted to the modern age and are contributing largely to the
new rural civilization, while the village church and the church in the
open country are discovering new opportunities for service, broader
community usefulness and a great social mission.

The new rural civilization is bringing a new prosperity into the great
business of farming. It is bringing new and permanent satisfactions and
comforts into country homes. It has greatly diminished the vexed problem
of rural isolation, with its many new ways of communication. It has to a
remarkable degree eliminated drudgery, through the use of wonderful
machiner