New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1917-06-10

their loyalty.
But that evening as the group of in
spirationistS sat in the comfortable office
of President Todd's car one of them
asked him how he expected to get the
labor for the farms of Aroostook. He
replied that he had already made the
first move toward the solution of that
problem. He had again called upon the
Governor of the state for cooperation
cooperation in the form of proclama-
ton to the justices of the peace through
out the entire state in regard to SEN
fences for tramps. For one of the most
prolific summer crops of Maine is
tramps-the yield runs over 1900 in an
average year.
This year the tramp who comes into
limbo in Maine may be given his choice
of two paths-go to jail for six months,
with hard labor there, without cOmpen-
sation; or go into the fields and work IN
the open for three months, with gener-
Gus compensation. Senator Hale-the
very efficient new Senator from the Pine
Tree State, who went into the trenches
cf Verdun between his election last No
vember and his induction into office in
April in order that he might vote the
more intelligently on the war problems
that were bound to come before the
present Congress-has made the sug-
gestion that inasmuch as we will have TO
feed the Allies in any event, we bring
the German prisoners which they are
holding-and feeding-over here and
put them to work upon our farms. 1t is
certainty that the ships upon which
they were being transported would not
be sunk. And it is an equal certainty
that our overburdened allies in Europe
would be glad to be rid OF their big job
of feeding and guarding and housing
thousands of prisoners.
Already the Committee on Public
Safety of Aroostook County. acting
through the main committee down at the
Capitol in Augusta, has asked the Fed
eral government to send up to the new
wheat lands of Northern Maine a part
if not all of the interned German sailor
prisoners whom it was planned to send
to a leased golf club near Asheville,
N. Ca project which has aroused no
deep feelings of Joy in Ashevile. There
is a great experiment farm Of the Uni
versity of Maine up in the Aroostook
country which is admirably adapted
both for the guarding and the employ
ment of these prisoners. And if they
cannot be secured it is possible that con-
victs from the state prison at Thomas
ton may yet be sent to the experiment
farm. One thing is sure. Percy r.
Todd is going to keep his promise to the
farmers he induced to plant wheat
even if he has to induce Governor Milli-
ken to start form of draft to get the
labor. Maine is not going to fail at the
eleventh hour to do her full patriotic
duty in her new wheat fields.
Simpkins is right and so is Bliffkins,
and as for that matter, so is grumbling,
growing old Jones, too. Each of them,
all of us, are buying the new Liberty
Loan bonds. Each of us wants to help.
The puzzle is to find the place where our
help is needed. Todd was fortunate in
finding the place-and the place was
doubly fortunate that man of resource
and energy and persistence found it.
Aroostook has long since won its place
in the sun as potato patch. Who knows
but that because Of our entry into the
Great War and the supreme emergency
it was called upon to face it may yet
rival the fields Of the Dakotas, the val
leys Of Washington or the exquisite San
Joaquin Valley Of California? 1t is hard
to estimate definitely the full possibili-
ties Of a county the size of Massachu-
sets, as yet with less than ii per
cent of its rich farming soil developed.
Twenty years ago Aroostook seemed