The Story of the Soil | Page 8

of seasons, and the like, these causes
would be discovered and remedied. It is certain that thorough
cultivation would spare half, or more than half, the cost of land, simply
because the same produce would be got from half, or from less than
half, the quantity of land. This proposition is self-evident, and can be
made no plainer by repetitions or illustrations. The cost of land is a
great item, even in new countries, and it constantly grows greater and
greater, in comparison with other items, as the country grows older.'"
Percy paused and said: "If I understand correctly these words of
Lincoln, the land need not become poor. But I do not know why land
becomes poor. I do not know what the soil contains, nor do I know
what corn is made of. We plow the ground and plant the seed and
cultivate and harvest the crop, but I do not know what the corn crop, or
any crop, takes from the soil. I want to learn how to analyze the soil
and crop and to find out, if possible, why soils become poor, in order,
as Lincoln suggests, that the cause may be discovered and remedied."
"It may be that the college professors could teach you in that way," said
the mother, "but you know the farm life is so full of work and so empty
of mental culture."
"I used to think so too," said Percy, "but I fear we have worked too
much with our hands and too little with our minds; that we have done
much work in blindness as to the actual causes that control our crop
yields; and that we have not found the mental culture that may be found
in the farm life. Let me read again. These are Lincolns words:
"'No other human occupation opens so wide a field for the profitable
and agreeable combination of labor with cultivated thought, as
agriculture. I know nothing so pleasant to the mind as the discovery of
anything that is at once new and valuable--nothing that so lightens and
sweetens toil as the hopeful pursuit of such discovery. And how vast
and how varied a field is agriculture for such discovery! The mind,
already trained to thought in the country school, or higher school,
cannot fail to find there an exhaustless source of enjoyment. Every
blade of grass is a study; and to produce two where there was but one is
both a profit and a pleasure. And not grass alone. but soils, seeds, and
seasons--hedges, ditches, and fences--draining, droughts, and
irrigation--plowing, hoeing, and harrowing--reaping, mowing, and

threshing--saving crops, pests of crops, diseases of crops, and what will
prevent or cure them--implements, utensils, and machines, their relative
merits, and how to improve them--hogs, horses, and cattle--sheep,
goats and poultry--trees, shrubs, fruits, plants, and flowers--the
thousand things of which these are specimens--each a world of study
within itself.
"'In all this book learning is available. A capacity and taste for reading
gives access to whatever has already been discovered by others. It is the
key, or one of the keys, to the already solved problems. And not only
so; it gives a relish and facility for successfully pursuing the unsolved
ones. The rudiments of science are available, and highly available.
Some knowledge of botany assists in dealing with the vegetable
world--with all growing crops. Chemistry assists in the analysis of soils,
selection and application of manures, and in numerous other ways. The
mechanical branches of natural philosophy are ready help in almost
everything, but especially in reference to implements and machinery.
"'The thought recurs that education--cultivated thought--can best be
combined with agricultural labor, on the principle of thorough work;
that careless, half-performed, slovenly work makes no place for such
combination; and thorough work, again, renders sufficient the smallest
quantity of ground to each man; and this, again, conforms to what must
occur in a world less inclined to wars and more devoted to the arts of
peace than heretofore. Population must increase rapidly, more rapidly
than in former times, and ere long the most valuable of all arts will be
the art of deriving a comfortable subsistence from the smallest area of
soil. No community whose every member possesses this art, can ever
be the victim of oppression in any of its forms. Such community will be
alike independent of crowned kings, money kings, and land kings.'"

CHAPTER IV
LIFE'S CHOICE

PERCY read these words as though they were his own; and perhaps we
may say they were his own, for, as Emerson says: "Thought is the

property of him who can entertain it."
The mother listened, first with wonder; then with deepened interest,
which changed to admiration for the language and for her son, who
seemed to be filled with the spirit which