The Laurens advertiser. (Laurens, S.C.) 1885-1973, 1893-11-21
AT THE LAMPS END.
The Farmers who Own Productive
Land Will Have Everything Their
Own Way I'm the Future.

Atf
Own Way I'm the Future.
II the population of our cities and
towns grows during the next fifteen
years at its rate for the past fifteen
years the consumption Of food products
will overtake production. The farm
ers who produce food crops will then
be OH top. The home market will pnr-
chase all they have to sell at good
prices. The cotton planter, too, will
probably find that the growth Of popu-
lation and the increased demand for
his staple will bring him better prices.
With such prospects fifteen years
vey the farming situation as it is at
present. The arabic soils Of the
United States are nearly all occupied,
and the agricultural development OF
the past forty years will be an impossi-
bility I'm the future. Literally speak
ing, we have come to the lands end.
1t will be said that the countries Of
Europe support q much larger popula-
ton to the square mile than we do, and
that We can employ scientific methods
and increase the productive capacity of
our lands. This may be true, of some
localities, but it does not apply to all.
For instance, it was recently shown in
a statistical article In The New York
Sun that under the intensive system Of
culture the yield per acre Of corn, cot
ton, wheat and other crops was dimin-
ishirg. instead of increasing in Louisi-
ms From this it would seem that
the intensive system does not suit per-
haps q large extent of u southern
territory.
Now, that we have reached the
lands end, what IRE we doing with our
cultivated area? a writer in the
Mo- 10, nnl1r ,tn,nkto, ~ Ah@ nD,l,s~.1
Of the Carolina foot hills. The soil in
that region is washing down the slopes.
There is no sod to bind it, and as the
burrows generally run downward the
land is badly quilted and impoverished
beyond redemption. When O field is
worn out the owner cuts down O por-
ton of the forest and proceeds to wear
out more land. Some plantations that
produced q bale to the acre fifteen
years ago are o h~opelessly sterile,
and the valleys + becoming useless
because the beds of the streams are
filled up and a flood comes with every
rain. The writer here quoted says
"If the destroyed forests had been
left standing and properly cared
for, their value would now be inestim-
able. A North Carolina farmer, who
worked forty years in destroying the
timber of q tract of 1900 acres that he
came into possession of, with the re-
suit of remaining at the end almost rs
poor DIS when he began. stated that II
he had left the wood all standing, the
black walnut and yellow poplar alone
would now be worth as much as all the
crops it ever produced. Professor
Sargent pronOunces this southern
Allegheny d%eciduous forest not only
the most beautiful in this country and
tho rinhaef in cnoaino h,f ono IF fho
most valuable in the world. The land
is rich up to the very crest of the
ridges in many places, and it is this
richness that chiefly gives the forest
it's luXuriance. This richness of soil
gives the greatest temptation to inn
p%rovident cutting; the more so since
the people of the region are poor,
standing in need of all the money they
can get. AS, however, the country is
permanently impoverished by their
short-sighted and ignorant policy, it
may DO seen that this section furnishes
n of the best fields for the dissemina-
In the Mississippi valley. in the
northwest and on the Pacific slope the
same disastrous policy is followed.
The forests are wastefully destroyed
and an area equal to hat of several
states has been ruined for farming pur-
poses. Garden md Forest estimates
that it will take a rest of a thousand
years to restore the productive capa-
city of this vast territory.
So, when consumption catches up
with production, it will be found that
the latter canno be stimulated to keep
pace with the former. We shall be
driven to the necessity of importing
common staples, and our homes farm
ers who have the good fortune to own
productive land will have it all their
wv way. 1tpir" r7stcp the further
waste Of F. united area OF farming
lapa Tanu a we get a more abundant
yield cut of the territory now under
cultivation? This is a big question,
and it grows more pressing every year
Atlanta Constitution.