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THE ATLANTA SEMI-WEEKLY JOURNAL, ATLANTA, GA., TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 25, 1913.
THE SEMI-WEEKLY JOURNAL
ATLANTA, GA., 5 NORTH FORSYTH ST.
Entered at the Atlanta Postoffice as Mail Matter of
the Second Class.
JAMES R. GRAY,
President and Editor.
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Atlanta, Ga.
The Government’s Duty
To Farming interests.
The United States Government spent four hundred
and forty million dollars last year on the war, the
navy and the pension departments; it spent only
about twenty millions in the interest of agriculture.
Such a policy is shortsighted and unjust, neglecting
as it does the nation’s greatest material asset and
the ultimate source of business vigor and public wel
fare. The need of maintaining an adequate na
tional defense can scarcely be overgauged, but the
importance of conserving and increasing the na
tional food supply is more broadly evideftt. “All
enduring conquests,” we are told, “have been made
with the plough.” The . stability and progress of
America depend after all upon the soil, for thence
must come the people’s bread and meat and the mate-
' rials that keep commerce and industry alive. How
essential, then, that tire national government devote
its most earnest thought and effort to the upbuilding
of agricultural interests.
This Idea was urged with peculiar forcefulness
by Senator Hoke Smith In an address last week to
the National Conservation Congress. The very back
bone of our economic existence, he said, is farm prod
ucts. Yet, the Government has given but a compara
tive pittance to the important task of quickening and
increasing this field of production. It has used its
taxing system to foster manufactures, “while the
prices of the products of the farm have been regulated
largely by foreign markets into which our surplus
harvests have gonn.
"Consider two pf our crops alone,” said the
Senator. "The great staple of food both for men
— aiid animals, Is corn. We produce a crop worth
one ’billion, six .hundred millions annually. The
people of, the world are to be clothed by the use
of lint cotton. We produce a crop of this worth
eight hundred and fifty million dollars annually.
And yet the variations in the quantity produced
per acre, even though the acres are naturally of
the same character, demonstrate the fact that
when the highest degree of skill is applied, our
corn crop could easily be doubled and bring to
the country over a billion and a half of foreign
gold annually. Our cotton crop could be pro
duced on one-half the present acreage and leave
the remainder for the cultivation of food prod
ucts.”
The improvement of agricultural methods and the
advancement of rural interests in general concern
not the farmer alone but every sphere of enterprise.
No problem Is of greater moment to the rank and file
of the American people. No subject has a broader or
deeper ground of appeal to Congress. Some method -
must be applied that will bring the country’s food
supply up to the needs of a steadily and rapidly In
creasing population. The national government Is the
only agency strong enough to deal with this condi
tion.
The government has done a vast deal in the way
of agricultural research and experiment through
which a wonderfully rich fund of knowledge has been,
developed; but it has done comparatively little to
place this knowledge directly at the disposal of the
• farmers themselves. The great need of the day Is to
translate this science Into art, to make what Is
known count definitely In things done. To this end,
Senator Hoke Smith urged the importance of co-opera
tive demonstration work “conducted by the State
colleges of agriculture and experiment stations to
gether with the national department of agriculture,
furnishing trained demonstrators In every county of
every State to put into practice, in co-operation with
the farmer, all the scientific truths that have been or
can be discovered.” That is the purpose of a bill in
troduced by him and now before the Senate. This
measure provides annual appropriations by
means of w'hich the demonstration work of the agri
cultural colleges can be extended so as to reach
every farm In the country; it also provides for the
enrichment of the domestic and social side of rural
life. Its great virtue lies in the fact that It opens
the way for the practical application of the knowl
edge acquired through study and experiment.
“There is a widespread and insistent demand,”
says a recent writer on economic problems, "for
something to help the present farmer—the man be
hind the plough. He has paid the larger share of the
tens of millions of dollars that have been expended
during the last fifty years in gathering agricultural
knowledge. This work was undertaken for him pri
marily and through him for the benefit of everybody.
He has the right to expect and demand that the re
sults he delivered to him in a way and in a form
that he Can utilize. He cannot go to college for them;
, they mu§t be taken to him.” That is the aim of the
agricultural extension hill now before the Senate.
It provides a direct and businesslike method of utiliz
ing the fund of agricultural knowledge. Its princi
ples if put into effect in the United States, as they
have already been, in Belgium and Germany and other
'countries of Europe, will add incalculably to the pro
ductive power of our soil, will increase the volume
and variety of our harvests, will lighten the burden
which the present high cost of living imposes on
American workers and homes, will quicken every
channel of Industry and trade and make this nation
In every sense more prosperous and secure.
World-Wide Scarcity of Beef.
The more the beef problem is investigated tne
more evident does it become that the only hope for
lower prices lies In home production of cattle. Prof.
IV. J. Kennedy, of the agricultural extension depart
ment at the State college of Iorva, who has recently
made an exhaustive study of this subject, finds that
in only two countries, France and Argentina, has the
production of beef kept pace with the growth In pop
ulation. There Is thus a world-wide demand, with a
steadily dwindling supply.
In the United States, as Prof Kennedy shows, the
supply of beef cattle decreased sixteen million be
tween 1907 and 1913, while the country’s population
increased ten million. Furthermore, to quote the
Louisville Courier-Journal’s summary of his report:
‘Between 1906 and 1912 our exports of live cattle fell
off about ninety-three per cent and our exports in
fresh beef decreased ninety-seven per cent. Our im
ports of live cattle increased from twenty-six thou
sand head in 1906 to three hundred and twenty-six
thousand in 1912. In December, 1908, the reserve
stock of beef in the coolers of this country amounted
to two hundred and sixty-five million, five hundred
thousand pounds; in 1910 it had diminished to one
hundred and thirty-five million pounds; and in 1912
it was estimated at only thirty-five million pounds.”
In the light of such evidence there is no- occasion
for surprise at the steadily soaring prices of beef;
and when ww reflect that the relative scarcity of beef
is almost worldwide, there is no prospect of cheaper
living, so far as this staple is concerned, unless cattle
raising on our farms is given more attention.
The new tariff law, by placing meat on the free
list, will go far toward ending purely artificial in
creases, that is to say increases imposed by monop
olistic combinations. Free imports of beef will re
store normal competition and to that extent be of
distinctive value. Were it not for the fact that most
other countries are suffering from beef shortage,
just as is the United States, the removal of the tariff
would perhaps well-nigh solve the problem. But, as
Prof. Kennedy observes, “Europe is meat .hungry
and will bid against our country for the surplus
meat of Argentina, Australia and other exporting
countries.”
There is, indeed, but one assurance against a beet
famine in the United States, a time when the price of
steaks and roasts will be beyond the income of the
average family. That assurance is the wonderful
natural resources, especially in the South, for cattle
production. If every American farm raises a few
head of cattle a year, the country will be abundantly
supplied with beef despite the rapid growth in pop
ulation.
In no other section are the opportunities for cat
tle raising so fertile as in the South. We have thou
sands of idle acres, on which great ranches could be
established. But better still, we have an equable
climate and a wealth of native grasses that make
• \
cattle. raising on the small farms easy and inex-
. ••••••- ■ . ,• * V ■.
pensive.
There are cheering indications that Southern
farmers and, particularly Georgia farmers, are awak
ening to their rich opportunity in this regard; to
the extent that they do, they will be more prosperous
and the beef problem of the entire country will be
nearer solution.
To get soaked invest in watered stock.
The South’s Great Need
Of Vital Statistics.
In an address at the recent convention of the
Southern Medical Association, Dr. Cressy L. Wilbur,
chief statistician of the United States census bureau,
declared that the most urgent public need of the
South is accurate vital statistics. The work of san
itation and largely that of all medical science, he
said, Is dependent at every step upon the data which
can be had only through an efficient system for the
registration of births and deaths and related facts.
This truth cannot be Iterated too srongly or too
often. Without vital statistics, it is impossible to
determine the results of campaigns against disease
or to know just where and how-to proceed in combat
ing them. Many States, Georgia among them, ap
propriate money for anti-tuberculosis work and yet
provide no means for ascertaining whether the death
rate from this malady is ’ decllnti^; or increasing.
This is but one among scores of instances in which
public health movements are left without the light
and guidance which, vital statistics alone can give.
The effective resistance and conquest of diseases,
particularly those like typhoid, malaria and others
which demand public attention, all for complete and
definite information as to their extent and source.
The South has been distinctly negligent in this
Important duty. The welfare of Its business, Its
homes and Its people should impel every State to
establish a competent bureau for the registration of
vital statistics. North Carolina and Kentucky have
met their responsibility in this regard, but the ma
jority of Southern States are without the protection
so essential to their progress and safety in matters of
health. It is to he hoped that the Legislature of
Georgia will not fail at Its next session to enact the
vital statistics bill which was Introduced last sum
mer but which In the eleventh-hour crush was carried
The tramp has one advantage over an automobile
—you can’t puncture his tire.
Federal Aid for Good Roads.
Senator Hoke Smith’s bill providing federal aid
for the construction and maintenance of public high
ways comes at a time when the thought of Congress
is ripe for such a proposal. Within the past few
years many measures of this kind have been intro
duced and one of them, the Shackelford bill, passed
/the House by a significant majority at the last ses
sion of Congress hut was defeated in the Senate.
Circumstances now seem peculiarly favorable for
the enactment of legislation of this kind.
For one thing, public interest the nation over has
awakened to the importance and the urgent necessi
ty of good roads as a means to agricultural and
commercial progress. The problems and burdens en
tailed by poor roads are not limited to any one sec
tion bf the country; they are nation-wide. The bene
fits that would accrue from an interstate system of
good roads would extend to every part of the Union
and to the people as a whole.
This/ issue, therefore, is clearly one of ted era j
concern and it is the manifest duty of the federal
government to lend definite aid and supervision to
the great task of highway improvement. Senator
Smith’s hill Is said to be free from the objections
which have been made to previous measures of this
character and at the same time to assure generous
encouragement and assistance to the individual
States that are actively interested in the good roads
cause.
The Duty of the Courts.
In the structure of government which society has
reared for its security and well being no principle is
higher or more vital than that represented by the
courts. The integrity of a State and the peace and
f.eedom of its people depend ..pon upright, unswerv
ing enforcement of the law. However'much may be
done by philanthrophy and science for the prevention
of crime, there still remains a dire need for the certain
punishment of crime whenever it lifts its head
against a community or an individual. It Is to the
courts that the people look for this protection and
if the courts fail in their duty, the law itself is
brought Into disrepute and confidence in all the in
stitutions of government is dangerously shaken.
There are wholesome indications that American
thought has awakened to -he importance of this
principle. In every part of the nation and notably
among the members of the bar itself there is a
growing insistence that legal machinery be freed
from those technicalities which serve no necessary
or rightful purpose hut merely tend to delay or de
feat the ends of justice. There is also on the pub
lic’s part a more earnest demand that the spirit of
the law be given a clear path and that no offender
whose guilt is proved be suffered to escape. This
Is an evidence of social progress and of the develop
ment of a keener social conscience
Gratifying as these tendencies may be, however,
they should not be confused with that brute passion
for sheer revenge which would transform our courts
from tribunals of deliberate justice to instruments
in the hands of mob excitement. Firm and even
enforcement of the law necessarily implies methods
that are orderly and that are above any suspicion
of influence from the heat or clamor of a crowd. If
It is important that the guilty pay their due pen
alty, it is even' more important that the innocent
should not be sacrificed.
It sometimes happens, and probably always will,
that innocent men are convicted of crime even with the
utmost care on the part of the courts. Such verdicts
sometimes will be found. Under these conditions,
there is even a greater responsibility upon the courts
than when guilty men are acquitted to see to it that
final justice is done. The acquittal of a guilty man
is a mistake and a misfortune but the punishment
of an innocent man, where innocence appears reason
ably certain is a judicial calamity; and the punish
ment of an Innocent man is doubly deplorable because
it is inflicted upon a helpless victim.
The responsibility of our courts in this regard is
inexpressibly solemn. Their duty to the law whose
high ministers they are and to society which has
established them as its great protectors demands
that they vouchsafe to everyone who comes before
them a trial that is Impartial and dispassionate.
Thus only can justice, which is the end of govern
ment and the one foundation on which "human rights
and progress can endure, be preserved. Thus only
can the courts measure up to the sacred principle to
which they are dedicated.
A SUCCESSFUL WOMAN
BY D3. FEANK CRAKE
(Copyright. 19X3, by .Frank Crane.)
It is easier for a young man to make love to a
girl than to make living for Iter.
The Currency Bill in the Open.
Now comes the cheering announcement that the
banking and currency bill which has lain so long
in the doldrums of a hopelessly divided committee
is to be reported to the Senate without further
quibble or delay. A course for definite, contractive
action on this important measure will thus be open
ed; and there is little doubt that the basic reforms
for which the administration stands will soon be
wrought into law.
The two factions of the committee, one headed
by Chairman Owen and the other by Senator Hitch
cock and five Republicans, have agreed to submit
the entire issue to the Senate as a whole for deter
mination, each faction presenting a brief statement
of its proposed amendments together with the bill
as it originally came from the House. While It is
to he regretted that Senator Hitchcock’s unreason
ing defection from Democratic ranks prevented a
favorable report from the majority of the committee,
it is none the less gratifying that the bill is at
length to be put; upon its merits in open debate.
The situation in the Senate will be far simpler
than in the committee. The great majority of Sen
ate Democrats are In cordial sympathy with the
principles of the banking and currency measure,
though they may differ in respect to certain details;
and there is reason to believe that at the decisive
moment support will come from open-minded Repub
licans. The administration’s strength is as assured
In this issue as it was in the tariff fight, and even
more so. The backward forces that deadlocked the
committee cannot long survive the forward move
ment that will now spring into being.
The country welcomes this prospect of a speedy
settlement of the banking and currency question.
Business will take new courage and press forward
with new energy when the matter is settled. The
people look to the Senate for prompt action; they
should not and, we believe, will not be disappointed.
There is a woman of my acquaintance who Is a
success. She is not rich, not gifted in. the’jusual arts
that gain notoriety, not young and peachy, not cele-
' i
brated. *•-
She is in quite moderate circumstances, and lives
with her husband in a flat in a neighborhood that is
not “select.” She has no children.
She is past fifty, and glad of it.
Why is she successful?
Because she is cheerful, and because She cheers
everybody around her.
And she is cheerful because she is the one woman
out of, say, fifty I know who has succeeded in per
fectly ADJUSTING herself to her surroundings.
The secret of the art of life is ADJUSTMENT, and
whoever can accomplish that is entitled to be called
successful. And to this title no other pegson has a
right. /
No human being is able to secure an entirely Ideal
environment. No woman ever lived who fhad a per
fect husband, perfect children, a perfect home, perfect
clothes, a perfect income, and, perfect friends. Those
who complain because they lack in any oqpe of these
respects are foolish, and know nothing of how to take
hold of life.
This woman is content with the husband she has,
sh loves him for precisely what he is, and does not
want to make him over. To have tinkered, him and
changed him to suit her fancy of what a husband
ought to be was, of course, impossible, though many a
silly woman wrecks her happiness -t that task. She
has done the better thing: She has ADJUSTED herself
to the man as he is. ,
Homekeeping is her lot. * So she has ADJUSTED
herself to it. She has learned to love it. Her home
is beautiful within, restful, 4 tasteful, altogether de
lightful.
Her income is at a certain figure. To that figure
she has ADJUSTED all her desires. She lives Just
as contentedly as if the figure were ten times as great.
She said to me the other day: “I wish you would
write something to persuade woman to love the com
mon things, the everyday things. $ou ask me why I
am so contented. It is because I love everything I
see constantly about me. I Jove that chair, that table,
that desk, those pictures, 'curtains, and rugs. They
are all friends of mine.
“Every piece of glass or china on my table means
something to me. There is not an article in this
apartment that does not please me when I look at it.
“I love my friends. I love my day’s duties. I love
the way we live.
“When an ythought of unlove presents itself to me,
I put it away, just as if it were unclean. I will not
give room to dislikes.”
This woman is a point of sunshine in a cloudy
world. If the Lord were angry with the city, as He
was wroth against Sodom, and should look about to
see if there were at least three souls worth while,
for whose sake He might spare the town from His
consuming fire, this woman would be one of the sav
ing sort. For she is a radiating center of helpfulness.
She boosts all spirits.
Any Woman can be successful, as this woman Is, if
she will*'learn the art of ADJUSTMENT. For better
than a billion dollars it is to be adjusted. Better than
having everything just as you’d like it, is to like
things just as they come to you.
Huerta’s message to congress, although read in
person, was not so impressive a proceeding as other
messages we have heard of.
j The jVonder of a Salmon Run
The world's greatest salmon runs are to be found
along the shores of the North Pacific ocean, in the
states of Washington, Oregon and California, the prov
ince of British Columbia and Alaska, on the American
side and Siberia and Japan on the Asiatic side. So far,
however, but few salmon have been canned on the
Asiatic side.
To one who has never witnessed these annual runs
It is almost an impossibility to convey an adequate im
pression of the countless numbers of fish that swim
in from the sea in the late spring and summer, all im
bued with the same desire—to gain suitable grounds
in the upper reaches ‘of the rivers, some of which are
from 1,600 to 2,500 miles in length, where they may
perpetuate the species. No obstacle appear? to be too
great to be surmounted in this feverish rush. Jump
ing falls, shooting rapids, dodging nets, bears, birds,
mink, otter and other enemies, fighting with other
males, whom the near approaching of the breeding sea
son renders especially savage—all these are taken as
a matter of course. And yet one sometimes wonders
if the heroic struggle is worthily repaid, for the mo
ment of victory is also the moment of death, as, sad
to relate, these valiant voyagers can breed but once
and then must die, their wasted bodies, which have re
ceived no nourishment since leaving salt water, be
coming the prey of any prowling bear or carrion bird
who may chance upon them. Why these fish. should
all die after spawning still remains one of the great
unsolved mysteries of the scientific world.—From “The
Salmon Fisheries of the Pacific,” in the December Wide
World Magazine.
Marriage sometimes opens the eyes of blind people.
More things come to those who do not wait for
them.
It takes the better half to see the worst side of a
man.
A rolling stone gathers.no moss, but it’s a smooth
one just the same.
Only the man who has more dollars than sense
can afford to be sarcastic.
Green is a popular color at present, but no girl
should be green with envy. \
He’s an unusual man who doesn’t love himself any
mere than he loves his neighbor., /
It’s just like a woman to begin figuring on how
she will celebrate her silver wedding before she has
been married two weeks.
The man who is governed by his conscience sel
dom needs the advice of a lawyer.
i
Ship Early for Christmas
Don’t rest content with early Christmas shopping.
Bp wiser still and do your Christmas shipping be
times.
The approaching Yuletide promises to he a sedson
of extraordinary strain upon the country’s transpor
tation facilities. Santa Claus has seldom been so
prosperous as he is this year and he is going to give
full vent to his g’enerous nature. He will remember
the children afar as well as those at home, the grown
up -hildren as well as the tots. It will be an un
usually hard task to deliver the hundreds of thou
sands of Christmas boxes and packages.
A Christmas gift that is not received until long
' days or perhaps weeks after the holiday is gone loses
much of its spirit and charm; It is certainly a dis
appointment to the sender, if not to the recipient.
The custom of shopping early for Christmas has
proved a great economy of time and nerves. Early
Christmas shipping is just as important aDd will yield
equally fortunate results.
Editorials in Brief
The City of Mexico is one of the most beautiful
places in the world. About it lie some of the most
splendid opportunities for development on earth. The
mountains are rich in minerals, the lands in agri
cultural possibilities. There are ample ports, conven
iently situated. Mexico, a land with everything, has
become a land with nothing but lawlessness, poverty,
slothfulness and lack of ambition. Democracy has
not proved a failure, hut the people into whose hands
it was committed have failed. The elimination of
Huerta will he merely the beginning in a process of
morals and industrial education that will require de
cades for satisfactory results.—Philadelphia Public
Ledger.
Harvard University Is dispuieted to find that Japs
and Hindoos speak better English than native Amer
ican students. The reason is said to be that these
Orientals acqdire the language by the study of
classics like Milton and Coleridge, while American
hoys amass their Vocabularies from'baseball reports
and street-corner dialogues. If this is true the case
lodks rather hopelessL—Portland Oregonian.
RURAL CREDITS
X.—THE FRENCH SYSTEM.
B* FREDERIC J. HASKIN.
The French system of co-operative rural credits 1*
younger than those of Germany and Italy, having been
Inaugurated by the enactment of the French profes
sional syndicate law of 1884. But it was not until ten
ye&s later that the movement came into its own and
began to develop rapidly. In 1894 a law was enacted
creating local mutual agricultural credit banks, and
this brought about the conditions necessary for the
spread of co-operative credit throughout republic.
In another five years so many local oanas had been
organized £hat it was found necessary to create a sort
of clearing house ft/r them. The result was the re
gional bank act, giving state aid to the movement, and
linking all the banks together into one great organiza
tion.
• • •
In creating the regional banks the French govern
ment placed at their disposal the income derived from
the concession rights of the Bank of France. In con
sideration of the fights which that institution enjoys,
it must advance to the state, without interest, a loan
of $8,000,000, and must make an annual payment upon
the basis of the amount of business done. This pay
ment varies l>om year to year,, sometimes going as
high as $1,000,000 and sometimes as low as $600,000.
• « •
The local banks of the 'French system are associa
tions made up of the members of agricultural syndi
cates, or buying and selling societies. They itiust do
purely a local business, their share capital being made
up of small shares ranging between four dollars and
eight dpllars each. The shareholders have no right to
any dividend, but are allowed 4 per cent interest upon
their investments. Each bank may determine for Itself
whether it will pay interest on its deposits, and each is
allowed much latitude in determining the extent of the
liability of its .shareholders. Some fix the liability up
to the amount of the stock, others doubling it, and
still others making it unlimited so far as the manage
ment is concerned, or even extending this unlimited lia
bility to all the members. The present tendency is to
ward the unlimited liability idea, making every member
of a bank responsible for all of its debts.
• • •
rj.
The local French rural bank generally is managed
by a small council of merribers. When it is organized
it must subscribe to a certain number of shares of the
regional bank of the province or department. It can
then take advantage of the regional bank's credit facil
ities, the regional bank discounting its loans and mak
ing advances for working capital.
• • •
When a member of a local bank wishes to borrow
money he goes to the bank ;„nd signs a bfll; if this
passes muster the local bank indorses it and transmits
it to the, regional bank. This bank, in turn, discounts
the bill and immediately forwards the cash, less the
discount. In a recent yea* the regional banks dis
counted $16,000,000 in bills in this way. The regional
bank charges 8 per cent interest on such discounted
bills, and the local bank charges 4 per cent. The mar- v
gin suffices to meet the expenses and to create a re
serve fund for the local bank. The size of the loans
made to members varies, but a limit is nearly always
fixed which is far on the safe side of the danger line.
• • 1
The security which the bank requires for a loan va
ries with the circumstances und with the policy of the
bank itself. Sometimes one security is accepted and
sometimes two are required. The man who cannot or
prefers not to get an indorser, may deposit collateral
in lieu thereof. The period of the loan varies, accord
ing to the nature of the undertaking, from three months ■
to a year. Many banks require renewals every ninety
days, and some of them demand a small installment v
on the principal with each renewal. At least three-
fourths of the profits of each bank must go to the re
serve fund until that amounts to half the paid-up share
capital. The balance may be divided among the mem
bers in proportion to the amount of interest paid on
loans.
i • • m
The regional banks receive, through the government,
from the Bank of France, loans without interest, four J
times their paid-up capital, for a period of five years, '
subject to renewal. For example, a regional bank is
made up of ter} local banks, each of which subscribes
$2,000 to its share capital, so that the stock of thy Re
gional bank amounts to $20,000. This gives it tjfe
right to a non-interest bearing loan of $80,000 from
the Bank of France, under the concession terms ©f
that institution.
• • •
A special committee, nominated by the minister or
agriculture, distributed the funds coming from the
Bank of France to the regional banks. AH profits in ex
cess of an annual dividend of 6 per cent goes to their
reserve fund and is used eventually to repaying their
loans from the Bank of France. In addition to their
primary work of serving the local co-operative banka,
the regional banks are authorized by law to make loans
to co-operative producing and selling societies, and to
Individual farmers for acquiring and improving small
holdings. These activities are financed by the Bank of
France for them.
• . •
Another source of-cheap money for the French fann
er is the Credit Fonder, a financial institutional or
ganized in France in 1852*' incorporating, in the main,
the best principles of the German land mortgage banks.
It enjoys rights under the French laws that are pos
sessed by no other institution. It is a centralized in*,
stitution rather than a decentralized system, yet it ha*
produced splendid results in financing French farmers
and other landholders. The government has a meas
urable control over it through the appointment of its
principle officers. The confidence it has been able to in
spire has made it the financial agent in bringing bor
rowed and lender together in one-third of the land
mortgage business of the French republic.
• • *
The bonds of the Credit Fonder are payable to
bearer, and the claim of a third party to them cannot
be made except upon the allegation of loss or theft.
The Credit Fonder may receive deposits up to $20,000.-
000, one-fourth to be kept in the treasury and the re
mainder to be invested in gilt-edged securities, prefera
bly government bonds. While its activities are espe
cially in the direction of exploiting long-term mort
gage business, it also does a short-term credit busi
ness of large proportions. On long-term loans the pe
riod is from ten to seventy-five years. The annuities
are small, and permit the borrower to wipe out the
principal without feeling it; consequently the system
of amortization has become very popular in France.
• • •
To illustrate the difference between our system and
that of the Credit Fonder, suppose an American farm
er and a French farmer each borrow $1,000 for ten
years. The average interest rate in the United States
is 7 per cent, so the American farmer would have to
\pay out Sl.'TOO to wipe out his debt and the accumu
lated interest. The French farmer pays it all back on
the annuity plan, which calls for the repayment of
$124.09 a year, or $1,240.90 in all, a saving of nearly
$500. On a thirty-year loan the American farmer
would have to pay out $3,100 to wipe out interest arid
principal, while the French farmer would accomplish
it by the payment of $1,789.32. In other words, the
French farmer, paying 5.96 per cent for his loan, would
find it charged off the books at the expiration of thir
ty years, while the American farmer, paying 7 per
cent for his, would.-still have the whole principal to
meet at that time. On a fifty-year loan in the Credit
Foncier, an annuity of 4.88 per cent wipes off both
principal and interest by the time of its expiration.
Life is one Indian summer forecast after another.
Any girl can make a name for herself^-lf she
can induce some man to face the parson with her.
No. trouble for Huerta to call an extra session
of congress. He simply elects a new one.
A man never realizes how much sense one girl has
who jilts him until another gets busy and marries
him.