hone, the bicycle and the trolley will do much towards
"lessening the isolation of farm life and making it brighter and more
attractive." Many to whom I have spoken on this subject fear that the
linking of the country with the town by these applications of modern
science may, to some extent, operate in a direction the opposite of that
which Mr. Roosevelt anticipates and desires. According to this view, the
more intimate knowledge of the modern city may increase the desire to be
in personal touch with it; the telephone may fail to give through the
ear the satisfaction which is demanded by the eye; among the "more
active and restless young men and women" the rural free delivery may
circulate the dime novel and the trolley make accessible the dime
museum. In the total result the occasional visit may become more and
more frequent, until the duties of country life are first neglected and
then abandoned.

I do not feel competent to decide between these two views, but I offer
one consideration with which I think many rural reformers will agree.
The attempt to bring the advantages of the city within the reach of the
dwellers in the country cannot, of itself, counteract the townward
tendency in so far as it is due to the causes summarised above. However
rapidly, in this respect, the country may be improved, the city is sure
to advance more rapidly and the gap between them to be widened. The new
rural civilisation should aim at trying to develop in the country the
things of the country, the very existence of which seems to have been
forgotten. But, after all, it is the world within us rather than the
world without us that matters in the making of society, and I must give
to the social influence of the cooperative idea what I believe to be its
real importance.

In Ireland, from which so much of my experience is drawn, we have found
a tendency growing among farmers whose combinations are successful, to
gather into one strong local association all those varied objects and
activities which I have described as advocated by the Irish Agricultural
Organisation Society. These local associations are ceasing to have one
special purpose or one object only. They absorb more and more of the
business of the district. One large, well-organised institution is being
substituted for the numerous petty transactions of farmers with
middlemen and small country traders. Gradually the Society becomes the
most important institution in the district, the