Daily Ohio statesman. [volume] (Columbus, Ohio) 1855-1870, 1867-06-14
from the New York Timesl
Harvest PrOsPects-NOre Cheering
Accounts.

-tenths of all the reports received at
the Agricultural Department during the
past month agree as to the favorable pros
poets for the coming harvest. Never, ac-
cording to the Commissioners summing
up, has there been so general an express
sion of encouragement. From the West
and the South the returns are especially
promising-With the exception of an occa-
sional district in the higher latitudes,
where the winter wheat was exposed to the
sharp and biting frosts of February and
March. Many of the correspondents of the
Department promise wheat crop double
that of last year.
If there is any reliance to be placed upon
these reports-and they are certainly borne
out by the accounts that come to us
through our eXchanges-it can hardly be
possible for the grain spectators to keep
prices from tumbling fast and heavily. They
have been feeling the downward pressure
more or less for the last ten days. But at
the opening of the market this week there
was a strong effort to get the figures up to
the standard of the cold spring months
the northeasterly storms of Saturday and
Sunday being favorable to combinations
against the consumer. Purchasers, more
over, have been holding back since the
recent fall in prices began. and their
being obliged again to come into
market to supply the demands for actual
consumption, has temporarily inspir-
ed holders with the notion of
an advance. This was felt both on Monday
and yesterday; and it need not be wondered
at if the same state of things continues for
few days or perhaps weeks longer. All
depends, or pretty nearly depends, on the
sunshine we get for the next fifteen days.
Consumers may in measure regulate
their purchases by that weather-gauge.-
There is no dispute whatever as to the
large breadth Of ground sown, especially in
the South and Southwest. There can
hardly be a reasonable doubt that south of
the Ohio and the Potomac the danger of a
failure either as to wheat or corn is past
But the full assurance of abundance is yet
wanting.
"How little the price of gold has had to
do with the high quotations for breadstuffs
during the past year may be readily seen
by turning back to market reports of dates
preceding the war and comparing them
with the figures when the war was at its
height, and gold had appreciated 80 and 100
per cent. For the six years, from 1856 to
1861 inclusive, when our paper currency
was at par, the average price of flour at
this season of the year was SIS 33. During
the two first years of the war the average
was scarcely greater-only $3.50, although
in May, 1868, gold had risen to 100. In May,
1864. the quotation for flour was about
$40; but gold had then run up above 200,
and in July was quoted as high as $50.
Thus With the one-dollar greenback rated at
little more than 40 cents in coin, we were ac-
tually paying $3.50 less per barrel for flour
than we have been paying for common
kinds during this Spring, with gold at 1876.
The greater part OF this vast difference
is, of course, only referable to the deficien-
cy of last year'sl harvest and to the late
ness of the present spring, at once delaying
the opening of navigation, and throwing
doubt for the time upon the harvest pros
poets in most of the Middle and Northern
States. SO much of the rise as is not trace
able to either of these causes, is due to the
combinations existing among dealers, and
to the holding back of many of the wealth
ier class OF farmers in expectation of fam
inc prices before midsummer. Some of the
latter have already got bitten far worse
than they bargained for.
In view of all the reports now before the
country, official and unofficial, it does ap-
pear to be safe enough for consumers to
lay in no more than they actually need for
immediate use. The weather must become
suddenly and alarmingly bad-much worse
than we have had tiff the growing crop
does not far exceed in quantity and quality
that of 1896.