This land, however, is in small and isolated tracts of from 20 to 40 acres, little of it suited for agricultural purposes and no tract large enough for cattle grazing purposes. Lands in Nebraska subject to homestead entry may as well be dismissed from the mind.

      For a distance of 175 miles west of the Missouri river Nebraska is very thickly populated and land is correspondingly valuable. This department takes it for granted that you are not interested in the highly improved and valuable farm lands of eastern Nebraska; and that you are interested in the unimproved and therefore less valuable lands in other sections of the state.

      There is a notion all too prevalent in many sections of the country that northwestern Nebraska is a dreary waste of sandhills. At the risk of being prolix the Bureau of Publicity will explain the facts.

      On a map of Nebraska scaling approximately 20 miles to the inch lay your full hand, with the lower edge of the palm in the upper left hand corner and the index finger pointing towards the extreme southeastern corner. Let the thumb stand out from the palm about 90 degrees. Your hand will then cover what is commonly known as the "sandhill section." In this so called "sandhill section" is found the greatest area of cattle grazing land within the state, and it is this section which enables Nebraska to rank fourth in beef production among the states. Scattered all through these sandy hills are small valleys that produce wonderful crops of alfalfa and wild hay, and when cultivated produce good crops of corn and potatoes, and even wheat. But these

Silica Deposits near Arnold, Nebr.

Beet Sugar Factory at Gering, Nebr.

little valleys are really better for grazing and hay purposes than for cultivation in agricultural crops. However, stretching far into what is commonly known as the "sandhills" are hundreds of thousands of acres of land that to date have been devoted to grazing and hay purposes, but which are capable of producing corn, wheat, oats, rye, barley, alfalfa, potatoes, sugar beets, melons and small fruits in abundance - equal, in fact, to the high priced lands in the eastern part of the state. Such land maybe found in Valley, Garfield, Wheeler, Holt, Rock and Brown counties in north-central Nebraska, and in Keith, Perkins, Deuel, Garden, Morrill, Kimball, Cheyenne, Banner, Box Butte. Sheridan, Sioux and Dawes counties in the western and northwestern section, Scottsbluff, Morrill, Garden, Keith and Lincoln counties in the west end, in addition to offering great opportunities for "dry land farming," offer exceptional opportunities for irrigation farming. The entire North Platte Valley is rapidly becoming one vast irrigated garden spot. Land not yet under irrigation, but which will be in good time, may be purchased at from $20 to $35 per acre, with a small payment down and the balance on long time. In many instances the land may be purchased with a very small initial payment to insure good faith, and the balance paid from an annual share of the crops produced. Wherever the land is now without irrigation, but will come under one of the government irrigation projects, the perpetual water right will cost $60 per acre, but the government allows twenty years in which to pay it,

without interest on the deferred payments. The irrigated lands in the North Platte Valley are producing record-breaking crops of wheat, alfalfa, oats and sugar beets. The Great Western Sugar Co. has sugar mills at Scottsbluff, Gering and Bayard, with a total capacity of 4,000 tons of beets per day. The returns netted by beet raisers are highly satisfactory, averaging right around $65 an acre. But of course you can not cultivate as many acres of beets as you can of corn. Right now the federal government is constructing a huge irrigation canal in eastern Wyoming and western Nebraska that will irrigate about 200,000 acres in Nebraska, all on the south side of the North Platte river and in the counties of Scottsbluff and Morrill. Land that will be under this ditch may be purchased now for from $35 to $50 an acre. With the water right assured from the government the land will eventually represent an investment of from $95 to $110 an acre. Irrigated land not one bit better and in that same neighborhood is not for sale at $150 to $250 an acre.

     "Dry land farming" is the rule in the extreme western part of Nebraska. it is scarcely worth while to undertake to cultivate this land as land is cultivated in Illinois, Indiana, Ohio or Kentucky. The rainfall is adequate as far as mere inches per annum is concerned; the trouble is that it does not always come at the right time for those who depend upon seasonable rains. Moisture in plenty is deposited during the falls and winters, and the dry land farmer needs only to conserve it. Conservation of the moisture is secured by proper methods of tilling. By keeping the surface covered with a "dust mulch" the moisture is attracted to the rootlets of the growing crops but is not allowed to escape into the open air and pass off by evaporation. A simple experiment will show how the method works out in practice. Take a cube of loaf sugar and pyramid upon its top a bit of pulverized or confectioner's sugar. Then dip the lower end of the cube in a saucer into which a few drops of ink have been placed. The ink will rise rapidly in the cube, but will stop when it reaches the pyramid. The cube represents the subsoil containing the moisture accumulated during the fall and spring; the confectioner's sugar represents the "mulch" that prevents it from escaping into the air and holds it around the rootlets of the growing crops. This method of farming in western Nebraska is no longer experimental. It is a magnificent success. Hundreds of western Nebraska farmers raised a wheat crop in 1917 that more than paid for the land on which the wheat was raised, and this, too, in a year when the wheat crops of Nebraska, Kansas and the Dakotas were less than 20 per cent of the ten-year average.

      While not the equal of eastern Nebraska in corn production, profitable crops of corn are produced in western Nebraska by the "dry farming" process. Alfalfa flourishes wonderfully in the valley sections, and is now being profitably grown on the tablelands where it was thought ten years ago to be impossible to secure a stand.

      The dairying possibilities of the counties named above are almost without limit. A natural grass country, with an abundance of pure water, and with good railroad facilities, the cream industry is growing by leaps and bounds. With an abundance of grass, and with land that will produce abundantly of the crops best fitted for putting into silos, this so called "sandhill region" is