The Austin weekly statesman. (Austin, Tex.) 1883-1898, 1886-08-26
EDITORIAL COMMENTS
B1ooM1NeroN DAILY LEADER.

The more the oleOmargarine bill is con-
sidered the more obvious it is that 1t was
a necessary measure. A study of statis-
tics leads to this conclusion. In 1880
there were 4,00S,907 farms in the United
States, an increase of 507 in the previ-
Gus decade. To-day there are at least
100000 farms in this country. These
farms produce one thousand million
pounds of butter every year and about
one-third that amount of cheese. The
manufacture of oleomargarine depreciat-
ed the value of both these products. A
depreciation of one cent pound meant
loss to the farmers of $10,000,O00 a
year, and the loss has actually been many
times that amount. Dairying is usually
conducted upon small scale. There are
very few large farms entirely devoted to
it. Every farmer has few cows, and ex-
poets to make little more butter than he
needs for family use, and there is no agri-
cultural product in which such large
proportion of the farmers are directly in
terested. Upon the ground that the
greatest good to the greatest number is
the main thing to be considered in legis-
lation, it is doubtful if any other law
passed by congress in recent times has
been more judicious or necess airy.
THE REPUBLICAN STANDARD.
The discovery of new method of max
ing barbed fences, which substitutes
strip for wire, and makes it much faster
and cheaper than the wire is now made, is
an announcement which we hope may
prove true. The barbed wire monopoly
has had the field long enough to make
some new and improved arrangement
welcome one, and the invention referred
to, which is said to be the work of a
Pittsburg, Pa, mechanic, named Charles
Rogers, will prove profitable one and
most timely rival to the old concern.
X X
Notwithstanding the adverse reports of
government engineers and others who
h We investigated into the status OF Il .
Panama canal enterprise, the new
bonds are being taken in France rapidly,
one hundred and fifty thousand new sub
scribers having applied for the last issue.
So long as such a state of feeling exists
as this seems to indicate, it is useless to
predict what will be the outcome of the
enterprise. If it fails the end will be only
the more disastrous, and if it succeeds it
| III Will only udNO SlOduOI AOou
to carry. But no matter how heavily
loaded, success after all the encourage
ment which has been brought upon the en-
terprise, will be an immense thing for the
company and the browning glory of De
Lessep's life. 1t has been hard to be-
lieve that a man who has done so much
that was really worthy and almost heroic,
is now playing the charlatan and swindler.
TIMES DEMOCRAT.
The work of harvesting the Louisiana
rice crop of 1886 has now fairly COM
menced, and will be continued until, prob
. ably, about the LIST of October. The be-
, ginning of the harvest has this year set in
under far more suspicious circumstances
( than it was attended by in 1885. In that
year one of the most unsatisfactory reap
ing seasons ever known in the state visited
/ the rice producing section, reduced the
! Weld much below what it would have been
! with an average fair season, and greatly
= injured the quality of the grain. This
t year the rice planters have, so far, been
favored by dry weather. If it continues
I the entire crop will be saved, the quality
S of the staple preserved, and the cost OF
e gathering it largely reduced from the
n figures of last years harvesting expense
p AS far as can be learned by planters
f many of whom have been interviewed,
i from correspondents in the rice region
!, and from the press in the southern par
: ishes of the state, the area planted in
a the lowland cereal is less this year than it
! was last. 1t is only within the province
D of idle conjecture to figure now on the
| 81 &c fhn mir
r crop for 1885, it is sufficient to
say that prospects are favorable for a
good yield. Last year it reached the I'M
= expected figure of little more than a
million barrels of rough rice. We say
unexpected" because it was roughly esti-
mated at the close of the harvest, that at
least 100000 barrels of rice had been lost
by the rains of August, and the floods and
storms of September. The large acreage
of last years crop was due to the fact
that many of the lately overlooked sugar
fields were devoted to the production of
this staple, and that large number of
limited sugar planters abandoned the
sugar industry to become grain raisers.
This season considerable proportion of
the crevasse-f flooded lands has been re-
turned to cane and the dissatisfied sugar
: planters, who most of them preserved a
stock of seed cane, somewhat extended
the culture of the saccharine plant.
With the commencement of the rice
harvests, the work of harvesting the three
great Louisiana staples-rice, sugar and
cotton-begins, and capital turns south
ward in its annual autumnal flow. Ere
the rice reaping is over, cotton picking
will commence, and just about the time
that the rice crop is gathered and CLEANED
sugar rolling is started. Thus our labor
s ing population is enabled to enjoy six
3 months of well paid labor.
ST. LOUIS GLoBE-DEMoCRAT.
Our correspondent in South Caroline
calls attention to the remarkable fact that
the $1,000 white voters of that state are
+ represented by six congressman, while the
$4,000 colored voters of the state have
, only one member to speak and vote fol-
a them. SO long as such condition OF
, things exists in mockery of the princi
q pies of free and just government, it is
idle to say that the mission of the repub
: lican party is completed
We appeal to the democrats of Missouri
in convention assembled to give us full
q fair and frank expression in behalf Of
n civil service reform. They can surely g
l. as far on this subject as their nationa