Hillsdale Whig standard. (Hillsdale, Mich.) 1846-1851, 1851-02-25
The Great Grain Market of the World.

But three years since we were assured thai
Europe was 10 afford us a market for almost
countless millions OF bushels of wheat anC
corn. "lf the energy OF our own people.
said the then Secretary of the Treasury, "csr
add Sal 1892, 1892 TO the export and supply o.
our breadstuffs aud provisions in single ear
what could they not adj to such products il
they eoloy free of duty the markets Of the
worIdf' An increase of domestic exports
similar 10 that which had then taken place il
consequence of the famine in Ireland. might
give il was supposed, in the year lS49 an a.
mount Of not less than three hundred ana
t,oenty-nine millions Of dollars; and yet we
have now reached the year 1851, and are ex-
porting less cotton, less food, less tobacco
than we did before lhat time. That we have
less food To export is certainly most fortunate
for our farmers, Tor there exists no market a.
broad, here is it likely to exist. We have
now before US The London Mark Lane En-
press of last month, by which it appears that
the average prices of wheat throughout the
kingdom range from thirty tour to forty shit
lings per quarter Of five hundred and forty
pounds, or from ninety cents to a dollar per
6ushel. Now admitting hat the antclpa-
lions OF the late Secretary had been realized,
and that we had now this large quantity Of
food to send abroad, at what price would it
sell! Would II command in the market OF
Britain, even thirty shillings per quarter. or
sevonly-fiye cents per bushel, leaving for the
farmer even fifty cents here! IL certainly
would not. His anticIpalions have not been
realized, s1d we have less to sell, and there
fore prices are maintained and this is regar-
ded by him, we doubt not, as evidence of the
soundness OF the theory on which was based
his alteration Of the tariff of 1916. So IS il
with all the English economists. Their
predictions are never realized, yet they are
never dlsheartened. British free trade must
be right, however wrong they themselves
may be. We are now importing enormous
quantities of food, in the form of iron, and
we can export scarcely any to pay FOR It, asd
this is supposed tn be the process by which
the iarmer is to secure high prices for his
products and obtain his iron cheaply. ln
Ohio, says one of our exchange papers, 'one
Thousand two hundred square miles ale un-
de Ilsid with iron. A region explored 10 lS,-
80 would furnish iron sixty one miles long
aud six miles wide; square would yield
100000 tons of pig iron; so that this DIS
trcr would contain 1000. .OOO, 900 tons, which
would last 300 years-as long distance
certainly as any man looks ahead. The
States of Kentucky. Tennessee, Indiana, IL
liuOis. Maryland, and Virginia possesses in
exhaust5le quantities Of iron ore
And yet Ohio, Indiana, and illinois, which
have only food TO sell. are rendering them
selves daily more and more dependent for
iron upon distant county. in which wheat
sells at from ninety cents to dollar per bush
ell and in which iron will again sell for ten
pounds per ton when the remainder Of our
furnaces shall be blown ou,, as they are daily
diminishing the competition for the purchase
oi their products, and loT the sale of iron,
the result OF which must inevitably be, aud
tina; ere lsng. cheap food and dear iron.
Republic.