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Show SOIL IS BEING IMPOVERISHED Secretary of Agriculture Wilson Sounds a Note of Warning to Farmers of Middle West. New York. Causes that tend to Increase In-crease tho high cost of living and tho proper conservation of tho soil as tho remedy for the lncreaso wero subject matters of an address on Wednesday by Secretary of Agriculture James Wilson, before the Now York produce exchange. "We cannot afford to bo buying food from foreign countries," he snld, "and wo must seo to It that our western farms produce enough, not only for homo consumption, but also to soil abroad, and square up the balance of trade." "Tho cost of living calls for a careful care-ful Inquiry Into tho causes that have oporated to bring about condltlons'now to us ns a people. We havo had great abundance of food and prices that were lower than most other countries with which we compete In commerce and manufacturing. Compensation for skill and labor has been comparatively comparative-ly high In our country, but Increased cost of living has been an absorbing factor that cannot be adjusted at present to tho satisfaction of those concerned. "Tho major part of our people in tho cast are being fed from tho Mississippi Mis-sissippi valley, and the states of the south draw much from the same source. I am well satisfled that the soils of that valley are being subjected subject-ed gradually to tho same unwise treatment treat-ment that so seriously destroyed the soils east of tho Allegheny south of the Ohio." |