am personally acquainted with the officers of this company and they reside on and operate large farms.

Near my home city, about a year ago the farmers formed a stock company and started a creamery. In six months and two weeks they made 136,915 pounds of butter, which sold for $25,000.00. They estimate they have saved about $3,000.00 in that time to their patrons. This is a small creamery and just commencing business. Such instances might be multiplied almost indefinitely.

Do I advise these ventures? In the case of creameries, telephone lines, etc., yes, but, except in certain localities, I would most emphatically say no, as to engaging in the mercantile business. I think that most of our merchants are satisfied with reasonable profits; if they are not, we need not patronize them. Every man to his own business. Let each tub stand on its own bottom, but remember that in union there is strength; united we stand, divided we fall.

DISCUSSION.

Capt. Arnold-We have 7,000,000 of farmers in the United States. How are we going to control the prices of farm products when we cannot get the farmers to co-operate? Suppose we should get 1,000,000 of these 7,000,000 to co-operate and to agree not to sell our products below a minimum price, an equitable price, will that oneseventh control the price of commodities?

Mr. McGilvra-I think they will to a certain extent.

Capt. Arnold-You are aware that if we stop the trains of cars from going into Chicago one week, there would be a great deal of suffering there.

Mr. McGilvra Yes, that is our stronghold, but we do not want to stop them, that is where we want to go.

Capt. Arnold-Won't you get like some other institutions, wanting more than the product is worth?

Mr. McGilvra-I think not. If we did, we would lose in the end.

prices

Capt. Arnold - You mean would be so high that it would cut off the demand?

Mr. McGilvra-No, sir. Why, bless your heart, what is the use of asking. such a question as that? We have to

have the product right in our control. We produce it and the price we get is the price of our labor, our wages.

Capt. Arnold - You do not understand me. In the United States and in the world, we have never produced more than is necessary for consumption. Now, the idea is to hold these products until the demand comes up to the supply. Now, if that is true, the only question is whether the farmers have brains enough to hold these products until they can at least get what it costs to produce them. We fix the price on our products, but it certainly is wrong to undertake to fix the price on anybody else's products, and if they have a right to fix the price on their product, we have the right to fix the price of ours, you say. Now, is that practical?

Mr. McGilvra-Yes, it is practical.

Capt. Arnold We have attempted heretofore to fix the price upon the other fellow's product, all kinds of other fellows' products, and we have no business to do that. We have trusts and all these things, and we get excited about it; we are talking about railroads now, getting crazy about them, when they are the greatest benefactors we have and 45 per cent. of them have proved failures, have gone into the hands of receivers. Now, we will take care of our own stuff and let them go.

A Member-I would like to suggest as a common sense proposition that in all cases where a law of nature will operate, it is injudicious to bring in artificial efforts or legislation, and those laws of nature will produce equity in all cases. Now, it occurs to me that if we undertake to fix prices for the farmer's products, we will interfere, not only with the interests of the great public, and there has come to be recognized everywhere the absolute solidarity of human interests, the interests of all mankind; we will not only interfere with that principle, but we will interfere with the interests of the farmers themselves, for consider this: It is a very easy proposition to fix what we may call an equitable price upon our corn, oats, such articles as are not perishable, and are capable of being held, but how are you going to fix a price and prevent the shipping and the sale and demand for eggs, for instance?

They must be sold, as must all perishable products, the dairyman's milk must be sold, and you bring in this element of interference with the operation of the natural law, which is the occasion of the great bulk of human ills.

Mr. Hotchkiss-What are cold storage establishments doing? Can't they keep the eggs?

The Member-You are a strawberry man. What will you do with your strawberries when they are ripe?

Mr. Liebau-Eat them.

Mr. Hotchiss-I am a strawberry man, and if my strawberries are properly canned they will keep all right.

Capt. Arnold-There are certain products that are perishable and you cannot hold them, we have to grant that, but there are plenty-grain, tobacco, cotton and various articlesthat can be kept an indefinite period. I will not sell my tobacco until I can get what I think it is worth. I can hold it four years and double my money. I will keep it at least till I get what it cost to raise it, and every producer should do the same thing, and the time will come when he will receive an equitable price. I don't sell my pork until I think I have pretty near the top of the market; sometimes I make a mistake.

We are

all speculators, more or less, and why not use a little more sense and hold our products until we get at least what it costs to produce them. If you have 1,000 pounds of tobacco, or 1,000 pounds of cotton, or 1,000 bushels of wheat, can't you borrow money and hold it? Why not? Why should not the farmer speculate to the extent of holding his goods until he gets an equitable price? Isn't it better to have the money distributed about the community rather than to have all the money right in the hands of a single individual in New Orleans or Chicago?

Mr. Hill-I am a little interested in this strawberry business, and I am trying to figure out if we can up one crop, what we are going to do when we have two crops on hand?

Mr. Linse-We farmers have been kicking a good deal about trusts. Doesn't this look as if we were trying to form another trust right now?

Mr. McGilvra-No, sir, we are not

trying to form any trust at all. A trust, as I understand it, attempts to make a corner and to hold complete control.

Mr. Scribner-It is a difference without a distinction.

Mr. McGilvra-We do not ask exorbitant prices. We want even prices for our products throughout the year. You never know when to sell. You stand and study the thing a long time before you are willing to sell, because you are in hopes the prices will be a little better in the future. If we put our product onto the market as it is demanded, I think we can hold prices just about level.

This gentleman over here says the Almighty regulates these things, and I do believe that the Almighty regulates these things to this extent, that we do not produce a surplus of anything. If so, what is done with that portion in excess of annual consumption? There is occasionally a local surplus, but if all were properly fed and clothed no portion need be wasted or go begging a market at unrenumerative prices.

Supt. McKerrow-I guess we are like the dog that gets hold of the big end of the bone, this subject is so big we cannot get our mouths around it. Farmers' organizations are good things where they are carried on in such a manner that all farmers may meet upon a level plane and they are still better where your business men come in and all take an interest in the general education that takes place. I think we ought to have started at the other end, and ask, What can the local organization do in the way of education? Part of it was outlined in this paper. We can meet together and discuss the business problems in this immediate vicinity. Second, the advantage of getting accurate crop reports, and I do not know of any better than the one devised by this organization if it becomes a large organization representing all districts of the country. The last consideration to my mind is this one of controlling the prices, or rather, not controlling prices, because I doubt if the farmers will ever practically control prices, but the matter of finding some system by which farmers can have a little show, at

.east, in deciding what these prices may be by determining, first, the cost of production, and the different qualities of goods. I am in favor of this farm organization, or any other farm organization that is as broad as this is, and for that reason Mr. McGilvra, as a representative of that organization, has been given the privilege of speaking here. As he says, this organization seems to be drawing the thinking farmers into it very rapidly. I have talked with a good many of these,

and I find that most of these farmers have the correct idea of beginning their education at the bottom; getting together locally, educating themselves there, and then when they are educated up to the standard, if there is any hope of having a say in the formation of prices, they are educated up to the right point to consider that. I think Mr. McGilvra's paper started at the wrong end, and the audience took it up the same way.

Adjourned to 7:30 p. m.

It certainly would be a great pleasure to talk to such an audience as this upon any subject, but I consider myself particularly fortunate in having a subject in which you are all interested. Every man, woman and child here is interested in a home of some kind and most of us are working, economizing and planning-either for the home which we already have, or for the one which we hope the happy future will bring. We all know that it takes a woman to make a home, that the American girl of today is the home-builder of tomorrow. It doesn't make much difference how successful a woman is in other walks of life-she may be a splendid teacher, business woman or lawyer, but if she does not know how to make a home, she does not really seem to be quite a success-as

woman.

a

Now, taking this for granted, does it not seem a pity that the training and education, both at home and in school, instead of fitting the girl for that work which she is almost certain to have to

do when she becomes a woman; instead of inclining her interests, ambitions and plans toward that future work, that future home, nearly all of it tends away from the home and out into the busy, overcrowded marts of man. It is true, and pity 'tis, 'tis true, that a girl can go through the common school, the high school, and the university and in all those years scarcely hear mentioned the three most important periods of her life her womanhood, wifehood and motherhood. She studies literature, languages and mathematics and philosophy, but she learns scarcely anything about the care of her own body and absolutely nothing about the care of her own home.

College Courses One-Sided.

While in St. Louis, at the World's Fair, I spent much of my time in the educational building, and was particularly interested, naturally, in the work of the women's colleges. In looking over the catalogues, photographs, statistics and other exhibits from the

higher women's colleges, such as Vassar, Wellesley, Smith and Bryn Mawr, I was painfully surprised to note how invariably the curriculum avoided anything which might in any way assist its students in their future work as home builders, wives and mothers. While the course contained years and years of Latin and Greek, Higher Mathematics and Exact Sciences, there would be out of the entire years of work possibly 15 to 30 hours devoted to Physiology and Hygiene, while the home and its care was conspicuous by its absence. This fact might be explainable and excusable if we could prove that these girls, after leaving college, lived a life and occupied positions in which the things which the colleges do teach would likely be of service to them, but as a rule the young women teach a few years, one to five at the most, many of them never teach at all, and the great majority marry and fill that most important position for all women-the homemakers of the nation. Home-making is going to be their life work-now, what have they learned in school that will help them in planning that home, furnishing it, caring for it, choosing the food which is to provide strength and keep up the health of the family, arrange the ventilation and sanitation of their homes, so that the dreadful Scourge of typhoid, tuberculosis, etc., shall find no foothold in their homes. How gladly many a one of these young women, proficient in dead languages and higher mathematics, would exchange all her expensive culture for a little knowledge of home nursing, hygiene and sanitary arrangements.

Such a change in the curriculum of our schools, both public and private, would not necessarily result, either, in lowering the standard of culture and refinement in our homes. In fact, I think it would be more likely to raise it. The present education seems to have a tendency to develop a false value of show and pretense, so many women

over estimate the importance of showy furniture and clothing, of fancy foods and elaborate entertaining, and strain every nerve to outdo their neighbors. I have traveled a great deal in Canada, Alaska, Europe, and in our own country from coast to coast, I have been in a great many homes, both of the rich and the poor, and I have come more and more, as the years go by, to respect the people who dare to live plainly, who live to suit themselves and their own incomes, and do not worry much over what the rest of the world thinks about it; who build and furnish their houses for comfort and not for show, who dress as seems to them most suitable and becoming, who furnish their tables with plain, wholesome, nourishing foods most carefully prepared, and thus have time and money to spend on books, magazines, music and even on travel. It seems to me it could not help but be more beneficial for our girls and our future citizens if our schools taught the coming home-maker some things which would help her in her life's work, show her how they can be made interesting and fascinating, too, instead of being meré drudgery, which home work is so apt to become to those who do not know how to do it in the easiest, pleasantest and most successful way. When I say that girls are naturally interested in home work, I know the truth of my statement, for I have taught this work to hundreds, almost thousands of them, and it has been a rare experience to find a girl who did not take up the work with enthusiasm, when properly presented.

My firm belief is that we make or mar our own future and it seems such a pity to start these girls on their none too easy path through life so handicapped. Experience is such an expensive and wearisome teacher; why not make our girls' future easier, our homes happier, and our children healthier by educating for life instead of away from all practical life and work?

But I am to talk a little while tonight with the boys. The older ones may listen. and the girls may too-I hope they will-but it is to the boys, the boys on the land and those away from the land, whose attention I especially wish to have the short time I am to occupy.

As a rule, the average American boy, it seems to me, thinks too little of the importance of owning a piece of land and of knowing how to handle it. He has not as yet come to appreciate what it may sometime mean to him to have

hoped to make himself in the trade and professional world his first great achievement should be the possession of at least a small piece of land, and the knowledge of how to make a living for himself and for those who must look to him for a living, out of it.

A Critical Time in Land History.

Land has so long been almost free in this country, and when a man failed at everything else he could so easily go onto a piece of land somewhere and make his bread, we have come to not