Ashtabula weekly telegraph. [volume] (Ashtabula, Ohio) 1853-1873, 1873-11-08


plcnishing.
We have been boasiing aud acting as
if we could supply the world with bread
stulfs; and so we have done almost, and
can do, if the iron horse is permitted to
draw our wheSt and corn TO the sea-
board without too great charge, and
eat up the crop before il reaches the
consumer. But we must remember that
for every bushel Of wheat that crosses
the ocean, nothing comes back which
goes on to the land again even if we
do not pay our debts, national or indi-
vldual, with IT, Silks, satins, aud broad
cloths, which we receive in return, NAV
dress our sons and daughters in the
goodly array ] see before me, but they
do not dress the. land, and the effect has
been that the wheat producing sections
of our country recede westward, cat
ing up new lands day by day, in turn
to be given up, until iuiml ing the aka
line plains, the Rocky moutains, and
the Sieras, we are bringing the food for
the population of Eastern cities from the
western slope of the Pacific, raised in
the rich fields of California, by labor
drawn from the mines, the only other
source of production from which to pay
our debts abroad; and after these shall
be exhausted, neither the '.Star of En-
pire" nor the production Of food can
| further "wcstward take its wav." Lt
me give yuu an illustration of the man
her in which we have used up another
natural product necessary to the health
and comfort of man, which we dealt
with ~ if bnundless, and indeed it seem
ed to be, and incN haustible. az indeed il
was not.
How have we destroyed our pine for
ests, extending in Il belt between the
two oceans, and of the width of ten de-
grees of latitude above aud below the
lakes! Within two generations we have
so deva,ted our forests, sending lum-
Der all over the woIrd, besides using it
recklessly and eytrlvagantly for Our
selves, that we are now depending up
on the Dominion of Canada for the
same means of building and furnishing
our houses with the same material that
our fathers used in building theirs, uu-
less we qnintHple the price, and in adj
dition content ourselves with using a
much inferior quality.
all from our lands year by year, and re-
turned nothing. Crop his succeeded
crop, until in many cases the farms are
abandoned for the purpose of tillage,
because the production III Il few years
does not more than pay tic increased
price of labor and material expended.
Thus you will see the double drain up
OH the country; first that the produce
is sent abroad and sold to pay the inter-
est on debt which has not aided and
does not aid production; secondly, if
any thing else is brought back it is moth
ing that protiteth the land. We are
literally, therefore, in this regard, burning
the candle at both ends, and it becomes
a problem of the deepest moment to the
statesman and agriculturalist how far
this can go on and not sap the nation S
wealth. Nay, not only this, but there
is but very little returned to the land
from that which we use at home. Sent
into cities and town, and there consum-
ed, that which might be saved from it
is lost, by our was efulness and washed
by the great sewers into the rivers and
harbors, choking them with filth, and
endangering the health of their people,
by throwing that away which, il
brought again upon the land, would be
rich productiveness and untold wealth.
There can be no more instructive exam
ample of our recklessncss as agricultu-
rst than the wastfulness Of the very
means we have of euriching our lands
We boast of oTr cultivation and ad-
vancement in knowledge and the arts of
agriculture, and We speak with scornful
contempt of the -barbarouS Chi
nese; yet they utilize every atom of
matter which may enrich the soil, aud
are thus enabled to produce more of the
mean Of sustaining life and feeding a
people from Il rod of land than we ob.
tain from an acre. But this drain upon
our resources by the payment of our
debt abroad, from which we get no re-
} turn, is not the only evil of our system
of Indebtedness. The Investment of
money at interest simply, and not
using it III manufacture, agriculture, or
otherwise in aid of the production or
preparation of the comforts and neces-
saries of life, raises up and supports, OF
necessity, Il class of fnon-producers which
living upon incomes, the principal OF
which does not aid in production, makes
them the very drones of society, eating
out substance which they do not IN
any degree bring into being. There is
not so expensive Il class in community
as those who merely live upon incomes
derived from the investments of money
from non-productive purposes. "Ihey
toll not neither do they spin; but the ILL
lies of the valley are not arrayed like
one of these"
The entire address is very able and inter
csling, aud we should he Il ID to republish il
were it not for lack of room,
IMPORTANT CHANGE.-A special Indianap.
oils dispatch 10 the Cincinnati Gazette says
y party of Atlantic & Great Western
Railroad managers, including J. f.
Devereux, General Manager of the con.
solidated lines, and a number of Eng
lish stockholders i'll the road, passed
through on their way to st. Louis. 1t
is stated that they go to take possession
of the indianapolis & St. Louis Railroad
and the great freight route between st.
Louis and indianapolis. The road was
owned jointly by the indianapolis and
Pittsburg, Ft. Wayne d Chicago rail