The commercial. (Union City, Tenn.) 190?-193?, 1914-12-25
Food and Fighting.

Food and Fighting.
The popular imagination sees the
pillow and hoe abandoned when the rifle
is picked up and every farm transformed
into scene Of trampIed desolation.
But Prof. Carver, Of Harvard, who is
adviser in agricultural economies in the
United States Department Of Agricul-
ture, disagrees with the popular view,
expressing the opinion that the war now
| in progress will be determined by sue
cessiul slaughter, and not by starvation.
He sees no reason for believing that
any OF the belligerent countries will for
get the relative importance Of food,
men, arms aud ammunitiop. And
only country ovorrun by az enemy
and fighting with its back to the wall
will fail to keep agriculture going upon
scale sufficient III meet the ciyii and
military demand for sustenance.
There is difference, DR.. Carver
points out, between sastenance and the
food required ia times Of peace and
plenty by the popular standard Of living,
| A square meal is luxury Food is q
necessity. Nations need moi be well
dined in order to keep up military
strength and spirit. They need only
be we'll nourished. Tie normal con-
sumption Of food is much larger than
the consumption necessary to support
life and sustain strength.
DR.. Carver's article, in the American
Review Of Reviews, is illustrated by a
potato map, cattle map and other
maps showing the relative production
ID the various sections OF Europe. The
ordinary military campaign does not
destroy agriculture, explains this au-
Ethority. Unless there is deliberate
effort, upon large scale, to destroy
means OF sustenance in an invaded
cousttry, battle or a march 9f troops
through the country does local damage
only, like hailstorm. Its effect is
striking and is miscalled devastating,
.butths section affected is small in COM
patiscu With the agricultural area OF the
country in which the military operations
occar.
Laberbs plentiful in Europe, where
women OF the peasant class are accus-
toned to field labor, and men under or
over military age or otherwise disquali-
fed will be plentiful. Factories pro-
ducing luxuries and even relative neces-
stiles will close and assidious devotion
to agriculture to produce the basic
necessities will be concomitant Of
recruiting, ammunition making, the
manufacture Of guns and other normal
activities OF war. Even a shortage Of
horses may be measurably overcomeby
extraordinarily strenuous human labor,
and DR.. Carver holds out 20 hope that
iack ii food anywhere vii! shorten
the fighting. Agriculture will not only
be prosecuted as usual, with only tenn
porary and scattered interruptions to
diminish slightly the aggregate produce
tons OF Europe's fertile fields, but it
win also be adapted to the production
Of the greatest amount OF necessary
food that ran be grown upon the acre.
Great Britain, OF course, could be
starved II she did not retain supremacy
at sea, but it is perhaps true that Ger
many, Austria, and certainly Russia,
can produce the necessities and fight at
the same time long while. DR..
Carver's expectation that Waterloo
rather than famine will end the war
is that Of thoughtful student Of agri-
culture whose head is not turned by the
popular picture Of complete desertion
of the fields at the first call u the
hattlefialds. Louisville Courier-Journal.