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When the corporate wealth of this country makes war on its wealth pro ducers, the men who labor in field and shop and mine, its organs and mouth pieces may as well not offer any ar gument to the Farmers’ Union; they need not throw up their hands in pre tended astonishment; they need not prate about the country’s good, for the Farmers’ Union will always be found on the side of the laboring classes against the rapacious greed of the speculators, let them be called by any name whatsoever. AMERICAN FARMERS ARE FORM ING UNIONS. (The Union Herald.) The American farmer is about to declare his independence of the spec ulator of Wall street, and the move ment has not been initiated a day too soon. The farmer has worked and wor ried and his profit has been small. The bad crop worries were all for him. He stood the loss alone. The specu lator in life’s necessities can do as well on a bad crop as on a good one.. The droughts, the insect pests, the extortions of the reaper trust and the fertilizer trust were all for the far mer. It makes no difference to the speculator or the produce exchange what farm machinery or fertilizer cost. The farmer worked from daylight until dark one year and the next year, while his life lasted. At the end, ne had little more than at the beginning. On his rare visits to town he had the pleasure of looking at the palaces, yachts, automobiles and private cars built by speculators and middlemen from the products of the farm. We are glad to be able to tell our readers that the farmers have made up their minds to put an end to this system, and that they have gone to work intelligently. There are two great organizations of farmers in the country, both based upon a determination to give to the man who takes life’s necessities from the soil a fair return for his work. Hitherto the farmer alone has had nothing whatever to say about the price to be paid for what he actually produced. Some man in Liverpool, some mill owner in the North, might settle the price that the Southern cotton grower must take per bale of cotton. Some other man, thousands of miles away, could settle the price that the Western farmer should have for his grain. The farmer alone had nothing to say about it. The railroads decided what they should charge him. Banks decided what they should charge for the use of money. Trusts decided on their extortions. Tariff builders de cided what tax the farmer’s wife and daughter should pay on their dresses. But the farmer was forbidden to have any say in fixing the price of his goods. This is the end, the work has been already begun in the farmers’ or ganizations. This newspaper congrat ulates the farmers, and greets them as public benefactors and moving spirits in the great farmers’ organi zations. The farmers of the country are the backbone of the country. They de velop the nation’s real wealth, which is the wealth of the soil. They are entitled to a full share of that wealth and of the national prosperity. By combination, by Insisting on fair prices for their cotton, their wheat and their other crops, and by refusing to sell the non-perishable products ex cept for a fair price, they have already added tens of millions to the annual return from the farms. They will add tens and hundreds of millions more annually as their unions increase in power. The isolated human being, whether ,Aj ifflllh a w Wi 111 ' 'lff;'. F STAND ZDQhg* -V. WV T s£ \' 1 Jr W I Am •V fl \ V i t UAv BY CAPITAL PULL TOGETHER, BOYS! he be farmer or mechanic, is at the mercy of every form of greed and cunning. The farmer has too long plowed, harrowed, sown, reaped, sweated and fretted, to build up bank accounts for others and pay interest on mortgages. We are glad that he has decided, by union, to keep for himself and his family, which means for the people America, that to which they are en titled. BREAK OF DOLLAR A BALE IS NOTED IN NEW ORLEANS. (Birmingham News.) The cotton market broke about a dollar per bale upon receipt of the gov ernment’s condition report. October sold down to 12 cents per pound and December went slightly lower than this. The break in prices lasted but about ten minutes, after which the market worked quickly up to the fig ures quoted before the receipt of the report. The government’s estimate was equal to the best that had been expected in New Orleans and this was taken to account for the momentary break. After the recovery, prices re mained about stationary for a time, with October around 1,220. For the first half of the day October showed an extreme fluctuation of 40 points, having sold up to 1,240 immediately after the opening. EUROPEAN SPINNERS’ COTTON (Charlotte Daily Observer.) Some facts brought out at the re cent International cotton congress of Vienna should possess no small In terest for the South. Last year the world’s production for mill con sumption was nearly 20,000,000 bales, of which the United States supplied two-thirds, grown within an area of 700,000 square miles. Nearly 40 per cent of this American cotton now comes from west of the Mississippi, and four States lying along the Gulf, on both sides of the big river, grow OR per cent. A failure of half the yield in this territory would probably WATSON’S WEEKLY JEFFERSONIAN. silence one-third of the world’s spin dles. From the European spinner’s standpoint, therefore, this smallness of climatic area presents a danger to be avoided only by pushing cultiva tion in other parts of the world. In this view, colonial cultivation is pri marily a matter of insurance, and all the European spinners present at Vienna agreed that it must be pro moted in every possible manner. Doubtless a recollection of the great suffering experienced in Lancashire when the American Civil war cut off cotton contributed to the unanimity and resoluteness of this determination. It is not hoped to compete with the South seriously, at least not for many years to come, but only to break the present monopoly. We can see very little ground for even this modest hope. At no time has the Southern cotton grower’s future looked so bright as it does today, after a gen eration of more or less unsuccessful attempts to bring every available re gion of the earth into competition with him. A REASONABLE REQUEST. (Dublin Courier-Dispatch.) “The Farmers’ Union of this state, through a committee appointed for the purpose, has requested that the cur riculum’ that has been prepared for the district agricultural colleges be so modified that it will be possible for students over eighteen years of age to take an elective course—that is, to choose their studies,” says the Sa vahnah News. “The point at Issue is this. Many young men over eighteen years of age will not be able to attend college more than one or, at most, two years. What they want is knowledge of agriculture, and of that subject they want all they can get. The curricu lum is planned upon a four years’ course, and agricultural studies are mixed in with academic studies. For students who propose to take the en tire course, the curriculum may be sat isfactory, but for the young men who can spare but one or two years it isn’t quite what is wanted. The request is a reasonable one and. should be granted without hesitation. In fact, it is a question if the curriculum doesn’t provide for too few agricul tural studies and too many studies of an altogether different kind. We called attention to this matter some time ago, and it seems that the views then expressed are finding approval among the farmers.” Os course the News is right about this. There are high schools all over the state, but agricultural schools are few and far between. What is needed is a school in each district that teaches scientific agriculture, and if the schools now being estab lished by the state do not make agri culture the chief study they will prove to be as big a farce as the course of agriculture that has been taught for years at the state university. UP AGAINST IT. In Luther Burbank’s garden Is scarce a setting sun, With level light upon the sea, But finds some wonder done— Some little weed becomes a plant Os flower and of fruit, Some mighty cactus bearing food That once was destitute. In Luther Burbank’s garden The violets and blues, The iris and forget-me-not, Are given other hues — The humble flowers of the field In new effulgence bloom, And things which never fragrance had Are laden with perfume. The plain tomato is a plant Os gorgeous growth and buds, And simple old potato vines Bear other things than spuds— The once despised are highly prized, The barren made to bear, And any sort of little bush Will grow a peach or pear. But Luther Burbank’s garden Is up against it still, With all the wizard’s genius and His superhuman skill — Tho great he is and wonderful, He has his Shibboleth, For even Luther’s onions leave Offense on Luther’s breath. -Post-Dispatch. THE SANDS O’ DEE. ”0 Mary, go and call the cattle home, And call the cattle home, And call the cattle home, Across the sands o’ Dee!” The western wind was wild and dank wi’ foam, And all alone went she. The creeping tide came up along the sand, And o’er and o’er the sand, And round and round the sand, As far as eye could see; The blinding mist came down and hid the land: And never home came she. ”0, is it weeds, or fish, or floating hair — A tress o’ golden hair, O’ drowned maiden’s hair— Above the nets at sea? Was never salmon yet that shone so fair, Among the stakes on Dee.” They rowed her in across the rolling foam — The cruel, crawling foam, The cruel, hungry foam— To her grave beside the sea! But still the boatmen hear her call the cattle home Across the sands o’ Dee. —CHARLES KINGSLEY. PAGE SEVEN