The Devils Lake world and inter-ocean. (Devils Lake, N.D.) 1915-1920, 1916-10-12

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debut if you do get your money this
season, the interest begins right away,
you know.
About three months later a citifed
chap steps off the train, takes a bus
to the hotel and after registering and
getting a lot of mail, he inquiries for
Bill Davis, the secretary of you local
National Farm Loan Association, and
introduced himself with a letter Of
credentials as the Federal Land Bank.
appraiser the "carpetbagger," as
Bill calls him.
Next day he gets a livery team and
driver and starts to visit your ten
farms. He can't inspect over two
farms a day for they are scattered all
over two townships and so it takes
him nearly a week to get all around
yaur. ten, and you: can see how it is
going to take a long time for the car
petbaggers to appraise all the farms
to be mortaged in America.
This chap makes a lot of notes in
his book and asks you all a lot IF
questions about what you raised each
year for the last five years, and.how
much stock you keep-not double liza
bility stock but real f~our-footed crit
ters-and a string Of fool questions
about rotation and fertilizer and deep
blowing just as if he knew how to
farm better than you did. He doesn't
tell you what he is going to appraisc
your farm at, and that's all you want
to know from him. Why, he wouldn't
know a Poland China hen from a
Plymouth dairy size and if he tried to
plow, like as not he'd 60 backwards.
So you ten farmers wink and laugh
behind his back, until the smart car
petbagger shakes hands and departs.
Ten days more 60 by, and then the
secretary gets another letter from the
Federal Land Banker, who says he
regrets that the appraiser was obliged
to report that all your appraisals were
thirty per cent too high and that Tom
Edgley's and your own were forty per
cent too high. It would be necessary,
therefore to refuse loans to any of the
ten members without a re-appraisal
by the committee of the Farm Loan
Association within the maximum lin
it set by the banks appraiser-that
ca%rpetbagger, you know. It does not
soothe you to be informed by Squire
Brown that you have to pay the cost
of having that carpetbagger appraise
your farms.
You hold a meeting and "cuss" that
c~arpetbagger, but that doesn't get you
your loan, so, by a majority vote, you
instruct your appraisal committee to
try again. About this time Tom Edg- !
ely gets mad. He's a hair-trigger
sort Of a fellow, and he pulls out Of
the Farm Loan Association and gets
his loan through: Squire Brown, but
the rest of you decide to go ahead.
Then the banker writes you that
nine farmers cannot form a Farm
Loan Association-there must be ten
or more. You can't persuade Tom
Edgley to come back, for Squire
Brown already has his signed appli-
cation, and that binds him. There
don't seem to be any other farmers
who want to borrow except Widow
Nelson and she wants only $500 and
that won't make up your total of $780,
600.
So it is all off for several weeks, but
just about Christmas another neigh
Dor turns up for a loan of $4,000 to
enable him to buy the farm next TO
his, and after another delayed trip by
the carpetbagger, his appraisal is O.
KID and you Farm Loan Association
is ready to go ahead. All ~appraisals
are satisfactory to the bank, now,
though some Of you feel insulted by
the value they put on your land.
Now surely you expect your loan to
go through, so you will get your cash
before spring plowing-in fact, you
look for it in a few days, for the ap-
p~raisals are accepted. But on Wash
ington's birthday, the secretary gets
a note from the banker that the Fed
leral examiner of titles had discovered
that Sam Sticks great grandfather
had given a mortgage on this farm
which had not been paid when he died.
The administrator of the great grand
fathers estate made a division of all
the property and this farm fell to
Sans grandfather subject to the
mortgage. Later the grand father
paid the mortgage but never put the
satisfaction Of mortgage on record
and there is no proof that he really
paid it. Some years afterwards the
administrator was closing up his af-
fairs with the great grand fathers es-
tate, and, knowing that the mortgage
had been Maid. in the general sett1inC