Saturday, September 3. 1910. ,
pressed In the arguments we have seen, Is
based on the proposition that town mer
chants will not get the farmer's business If
the farmer can get better and more con
venient service elsewhere, wherefore the town
merchants do not want him to have any bet
ter service.
"While, then, considered thus, this opposl-
tlon Is a selfish and Indefensible thing, we
feel that the town merchants do themselves a
great economic wrong in opposing the pro
posed service. They, would be the very ones
to profit by It Farmers can now buy in town
only by coming Into town in person. With
cheap delivery of parcels by rural carriers,
farmers would telephone or write into town
: for everything they needed. They would not
order from New York or Chicago. They
would order from the local stores,; which -would
give practically as good service. No
people in the world should more heartily en-
dorsa the.parces post than town merchants ,
who do business with the farmers'
There is good hard sense in this, and the oppo
sition of the country store-keepers . is based, not
only on pure selfishness, but on very short
sighted selfishness. The present system is unjust
to the merchant as well as to the farmer. We
have a parcels post treaty witn ningiana, ana ine
result is, that a merchant in London or Liverpool
could send by mall li pounds of merchandise to a
farmer in the Carolinas or Virginia for $1.32. If
a merchant in the farmer's nearest town wanted
to send the farmer this 11 pounds of merchandise,
he would have to pay $1.76 postage and make
four separate packages out of the goods. .
Logical, isn't It? Exceeding creditable to the
men who make our postal laws?-
How long will farmers continue to, elect.. Cpn
1 gressmen who vote to continue such a system?. .
I " What's The News?"
0
Forest Fires in the Northwest.
UT IN THE NORTHWEST forest fires have
been sweepings over thousands of square
miles of territory. Montana, Idaho, Wash
ington, Oregon and California have all suffered;
the loss of life Is estimated at over 200, and the
extent of the damage will never be fully known,
though it must be measured by" millions. After
all the talking that has been done about forest
preservation, and after all the legislation on the
subject, it is now made evident te all that
we have not yet done the most obvious and neces-,
sary thing toward preserving our forests that
Is, to provide adequate means of controlling for
est fires. It will take centuries to repair, so far
jis the forests are concerned," the , damage done .in
these few days, and hundreds of people are home
less and, in many cases, practically bankrupt.
That the loss both of life and of property would
have been much greater except for the heroic
work of the men employed by the Forest Service
can not be doubted. Eighty-six of these brave
men are known to have perished In their efforts
to control the fire, and many-others are yet miss
ing. In an interview, Gifford Pinchot says:
"If even a small fraction of the loss from
the present fires had been expended in addi
. tlonal patrol and preventive equipment,
some, or perhaps nearly all of the loss,, could
have been avoided."
(11) 697
It a great writer and a man of unusual breadth
of vision and wonderful depth of insight He Is
likely to be remembered when most of the names
that now fill the newspapers are forgotten.
-.
Census return? Indicate that the center of popu
lation has moved westward very little, if any.
The larger cities nearly all show heavy gains,
and In some parts of the West the rural districts
an actual decline. The population of' Oklahoma
has Increased 109 per cent In the decade. Rhode
Island, the only other State announced, has made
a gain of 26.6 per cent.
Mr. Roosevelt is on a speaking tour that
will extend throughout the West. He is being
enthusiastically received and his speeches are
generally regarded as a direct bid for the Presi
dential nomination next time. He has agreed
to go to the New York Republican convention and
lead the fight against the "old guard" a little
-ring of corrupt bosses who have long controlled;
the party, and against whom Governor Hughes
has 'waged a hard and partially successful war.
It Is now announced that the germ of -leprosy
has been isolated and grown in cultures. This
means that it will be possible to prepare a serum
like the anti-toxin used against diphtheria and
contrel the disease. That this scourge of the race
that has gone on unchecked through the centuries
should at last be mastered, is one of the great
triumphs of modern science.
Joseph C. Sibley, of Pennsylvania, who spent
$42,000 to secure a nomination to Congress, has
been arrested on the charge of "conspiracy to de-
He lays the blame largely upon those members ybauch the voters.". He is in ill health, a multl-
Some Features of This Issue.
of Congress who have prevented adequate equip
ment of the service, and scores particularly Con
gressman Mondell, Senator Carter, and the noto
rious Heyburn, who has beenthe chief objector
to the forest reserves and whose home town, Wal
lace, Idaho, suffered greatly. The same view of
the matter is taken by Mr. Graves, the present
Forester.
millionaire, is recognized as the representative of
the Standard Oil Company, and has affiliated with
all parties. There will be few to regret his pass
ing. Emperor William, of Germany, made a speecn
last week again asserting that he rules by divine
right. This harking back to the obsolete doc-
While such fires as these are not to be ex-' trines of a hundred years ago Is not likely to
FARM AND GARDEN "Work" for September" ;
"Ten Things to Do This Month"; Septem
ber Work in the Poultry Yard"; talks on
such timely topics as fodder pulling, the seed
ing of bur clover and vetch, sweet potato houses;
the live stock notes of all these timely things
timeliness is the chief characteristics. They are
things that you should be looking after right now.
There are things on a farm that you can postpone
and things that you can not, and the good farmer
is the one who is ready to do the things of the lat-
pected in the South, they make clear the egregious
folly of any State in which the forests are of eco
nomic importance neglecting to take steps to pre
vent forest fires. Only one or two States in our
territory have made any provision at all for the
control and prevention of forest fires, and in every
one of them the annual loss . from such fires
amounts to hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Surely, it is time for us to realize the "penny
wise and pound foolish" nature of such, a course.
Other Happenings of the Week.
GENERAL INTEREST was taken in the Geor
gia primaries where Hoke Smith won out
by a small majority over Governor Brown
who defeated him two years ago. Mr. Smith rep
resents the "progressive" element of the Demo
cratic Party while Gdvernor Brown was the can
didate of the "conservatives." A hard fight was
strengthen his position with the masses In a coun
try where only an unfair voting system prevents
the Socialists gaining control of the government.
; ' " ' ' - , -
Returns from the South Carolina primary in
dicate that the second race for Governor will be
between C. C. Featherstone, prohibitionist, and
S. L. Blease, local optionlst. C. A. Smith is nomi
nated for Lieutenant-Governor, and J. F. Lyon" for
Attorney-General. All the present Congressmen
are probably re-nominated.
-
Over in Spain, and to a less degree in Por
tugal, the old war-between - Church and State
goes on. Premier Canalejas has brought forward
a bill placing other churches on practically the
same footing as the Roman Catholic, and the
Clericals are fighting It furiously. The outcome
is yet uncertain.
:
Mr. Flora L. Dot'ger, of New Jersey, who died
ter class at the right time.
You will want to read, too, Mrs. Hollowell's
story of how she was converted to the hookworm
theory; Professor Barrow's account of South Car
olina crops and weather i the short talks from
fflrmoro In "All 1 J i. - T71 . II,. 1xUa
w aiuuuu uie rttim , mo w n th rTnnnraHr Hnnffrfissmpn who camfl
the boys who are fattening pigs, and Dr.Butler's to the relief of Speaker Cannon last year when recently, left an estate estimated at $1,000,000
article on tick eradication. ' - the fight was on over the House rules. All of to Tuskegee Institute, of which Booker T. Wash-
Then on the Hnmo nirHfi tia thfir rt soma them were re-nominated, however, except Living- ington Is the head.
ton ana Howard, tne leaders oi jne delegation in
rank and length of, service. These' two men seem
ed to be generally blamed for the defection of
their colleagues, and the results indicate that Can
nonism Is not much more popular in the South
than it seems to be in the North and West.
suggestions of things to do for your schools, and
the story of a North Carolina school that has in it
a. message to farm women and farm men, too, r
in every Southern neighborhood. There is no
nobler work than the '. upbuilding of our rural
schools. Let each onev of us this year do all In
his or her power to make them a success, andf
thus to help the children of the South to better
things than we have known. . , - '
Justice Moody of the United States Supreme
Court, on "account of prolonged 111 health, an
nounces that he will retire in November.
Ex-Senator Wilkinson Callof Florida, is dead.
Next week remember, will be our "Young
The new Senator from Florida, ex-Governor
N. P. Broward, began life as cook on a tug-boat. Folks' Special"; and September 24 our "Good
He is 50 years, old, and one of the best posted Roads Special." For this' we want 100 short
- '". "men in the South on the vital subject of drainage, reports from our readers as to what they, their
- Jettembei', you have no right - to trouble us Senator Taliaferro, whom Broward succeeds, rep- districts, their townships, their counties, have
with any complaint about your dealings with any resents the old machine type of 'politician with done in .the making of better roads. Five prizes
advertiser unless you say when making the pur- corporation alliances, and it Is significant that In of $1 each will be given for the five best reports,
cnase, "I am buying from you as a guaranteed Florida as every else in America, the people are Make them short, 200 to 500 words, and get them
advertiser In The Progressive Farmer and Ga- turning from leaders of this kind and giving sup- to us as soon as possible, September 15 at the
zette, ' or at least, "I saw your ad. in The'Progres-"' port to , men whose reliance is in constructive latest. V
wye uarmer and Gazette." We canvnot under- , plans rather than in political shrewdness. -Sen--take
to settle any controversies that may, develop ator Broward will, doubtless, do much to get Con- ,
unless you do this. We put ourselves to great, gress to do its part in the work of draining South-
Tuuie an expense to see that every subscriber era lands. He Is a good speaker and a man of.
A Thought for the Week.
gets absolutely honest treatment from every ad- commanding presence.
'trruser, out you must live up to your part of
outadvertising guarantee if you expect us to live
UP f our part It will take only a few seconds
T j!? you wrlte Nan3r advertiser to say,
I saY your ad. in The Progressive Farmer and
Gazette," and even if an advertiser were inclined
to be cfcreless, this would make him give you more
careful lattention. ' He then knows that if he does
not 'givelyou satifiXactlon, h may hear from" us. s
The death of William James, for many years
Professor of Psychology at Harvard University,
removes one of the really great men of our time.
"He made science as interesting as a novel," was
a comment on his writings, and their influence on
thinking men and women all over the country is
J? A PROPERLY organized rural neighborhood
could be developed that higher kind of at
traction which is suggested by the very word
"neighborhood." Once get the farmers and their
families all working together at something that
concerns them all, and we have the beginning of
a more stable and a more social community than
Is likely to exist amid the constant change and
not easily over-estimated. It lsvnot too much to bustle of the large towns. Sir Horace Plunkett,
6ay that he was our foremost scientist; and with in "The Rural Life Problem.'