Holt and I made a rough estimate of the land now under cultivation that last year was idle and figured that it amounted to about one hundred and eighty acres. In addition to this there was of course the land that was always farmed to a more or less extent amounting to some two hundred acres more. Out of this last lot there wasn’t an acre that didn’t show improvement over the year before. The new hundred and eighty acres counted for a lot more in value than shows in the mere statement, because it included gardens for nearly everyone in the village and this meant an actual saving in cash for every householder from the moment the produce began to mature. Moulton noted the effect of this when as usual he started to bring in early vegetables from the city market. He had all he could do to get rid of the first lot and after that gave it up. No one wanted city vegetables with the prospect ahead of vegetables of their own. Martin, the local butcher, also noticed the effect in a way he didn’t like. He was the only man in the village who opposed us and he can’t be blamed, for his meat sales began to fall off in June and dropped fifty per cent. during July and August. With green peas to be had for the picking, followed by string beans, new potatoes, green corn, turnips, parsnips, beets, shell beans and what not, most people thought twice before paying him forty cents a pound for rump steak. Personally I’d like to have seen him put out of business, for he was a robber if ever there was one. He had set me to wondering a long while before this why it wasn’t possible for us to raise our own meat. With plenty of corn and hay upon which to feed our cattle, with grazing ground for sheep, with practically everyone able to keep his own pig on ordinary waste I didn’t see any reason why in the end we shouldn’t make use of this opportunity. Our forefathers raised whatever meat they needed and I believed we could do it to-day. This was one of the things I resolved to bring up at one of the fall meetings.