Norwich bulletin., 1920-07-16

that the American people dearly loved to be humbugged It looks as if the big snowman had some foundation for his cynicism
 There's no use denying that, when a a big man does big thing in a big way, the man and the result and the method are more Or less interesting. But it is open to question: whether imitation of him by smaller men on smaller jobs is al ways desirable. It is open to graver question whether the attempt to set forth big mans big work as the proper ideal for all men, everywhere to follow after
 is quite judicious.
 When Milton wrote Paradise Lost the highest price any publisher would pay him for it was f5-$25. It was the life work of one of the wisest men and great est poets the world has ever known, We have since then, heard of modern writ CTS who have been paid $100,000 for a single cheap novel. Does that make the trash more admirable than the epic? Or really worth more, in any true sense of worth?
 The Atlantic ocean is considerably big ger than the cold spring in your back pasture. But if you were afioat on a sprag-swept raft in mid-Atlantie. parched with thirst, you'd gladly swap the whole of the seven seas for one good swig from that spring. It wouldn't be the size of the drink that would appeal to you so much as the quality of the water. The craze for bigness, merely because it is big, is a sign and symptom of de- generacy. What should count is not bulk but value. That is what does count with wholly sane and level-headed men. We're in real danger of disaster when any great number of us swear off our devotion to good work in order to enlist under the banner of big work.
 Some years ago, I happened to fall short of onions for my fall deliveries. l take special pains with that crop SOW the finest grained and sweetest variety and get my seed from the best strains. In all my years of gardening I have new CT had a complaint from single custo- mer as to the quality of my onions But, this particular year, 1 ran short of the
 demand, A neighbor had a big crop of tremendously big onions. They certainly looked grand, both while growing and after pulling To fill out my calls, 1 bought few bushels from him, and de- livered them to my customers. They were bigger onions than mine and his crop was measured by the hundreds of bushels where mine was by tens.
 And I had complaints, that winter from every one of the customers who got those substituted onions, They were rank; they sprouted early; they didn't keep, etc. You see, this plunger neighboI had gone in for quantity, where my rule is to strike for quality. Without any design to deceive but thoughtlessly I'll admit, had simply delivered the on | ions without any explanation that they were another mans raising. I shall not ! .1-- 1sr,A,I k sure Later, I heard that this same grower had to throw away over a thous i and bushels, during the winter,' because he couldn't sell them They went off at first, like hot cakes. But the quality wasn't there. They didn't hold up tc the test.
 | What is true of onions in this on, special case, is true of a great many other things. I know of one farmer whs l is getting a dollar pound for all thu | butter he can make, right now, when thu
 most of us have to be content with abou i half that price. One reason-probabl!
 the controlling reason, is that he doesn'
 try to make it by the ton, out of any olC
 cream in any old way. He coddles hi l COWS as if they were prize babies; h, gold; he makes his butter with as fin i icky care as if his life depended on it perfectio. If by chance some of it turn
 out below his ideal, he turns it into soap
 grease rather than sell it. And. there
 fore, he gets price which enables hin
 ao make a profit, even on a fancy herd
 kept in fancy barn and fed fanc!
 foods.
 Again, you see, it's quality that count
 rather than quantity. He hasn't a bil
 herd, and candidly admits doubt o 1 his own ability to make as good a pro duct and get as high price if he shoul'
 branch out and try to do big things il
 the butter line. He prefers to do a per