in nations. England and Germany are dependent on other countries
for a considerable part of their food supplies and raw materials, while
certain agricultural countries depend on them for manufactured goods.

The point which must ever be borne in mind in considering the relation
of rural and urban communities is their interdependence; that the
development both of modern industrial centers and of modern agriculture
and the higher standards of living on American farms, have been due to
an exchange of commodities and services which was mutually
advantageous. Without the growth of markets our farms would still be
self-sufficing, but they would lack the many comforts and cultural
advantages which they now enjoy, and this rise in the farmer's standard
of living has stimulated further growth of industry and so made better
markets.

These considerations are particularly pertinent at the present time of
agricultural and business depression. The present position of American
agriculture, and its lack of buying power in our markets, has been
largely due to the fact that Europe has heretofore furnished an open
market for our surplus agricultural products. To-day Europe is unable to
purchase this surplus. The cause seems to be chiefly an economic
paralysis resulting from the political interference by the tariff walls
of newly-created states with the established economic relations of
agricultural areas and manufacturing centers, and an unwillingness of
the farmer to do business with a currency so debased that its value is
highly problematical. So we see the great city of Vienna,[26] once one
of the gayest and most brilliant capitals of Europe, now reduced to
destitution, and the cities not only of Russia but of Germany being
forced to revert to the ancient system of barter in order to secure
adequate food.

The ultimate dependence of all cities upon the farms and mines is to-day
exemplified in Europe with such appalling tragedy, that even the smug
isolation of the American farmer and the American business man is broken
down, not only by human sympathy but by the necessity of a better
adjustment of their own economic system to the world crisis from which
they are unable to escape.

This shift of control from the city to the country has been powerfully
portrayed by Norman Angell:

"Moreover, the problem (of feeding Great Britain) is
affected by what is perhaps the most important economic
change in the world since