The aegis & intelligencer. [volume] (Bel Air, Md.) 1864-1923, 1895-01-25
THE OUTLOOK FOR THE FARMER.

THE OUTLOOK FOR TIE FARMER.
The farmers prospect for the year
1895 is not at this time particularly
bright. The prices of all the products
of the farm seem to be Mt the lowest
possible ebb, and there is but little
hope for any marked improvement in
the near future. The price of any
commodity must necessarily be gov
erned by the demand for it and the
quantity in the market. That is pre-
cisely where the farmers trouble
comes in-The supply of his products
exceeds the demand.
The condition of the people of the
United States is that they occupy a
vast domain which, compared with
the older nations of the earth, is but
sparsely settled. Land here is abund-
ant, and it naturally follows that the
people depend in a great measure on
the products of the soil for their pros
perity. In times past this source of
incoming revenue was master of the
situation. Cotton was liking" and
wheat, corn and hay We're potentates
scarcely less powerful.
But this state of affairs has some
what changed and our agricultural
monarchs have lost many of their sub
jects. 1t is natural that when people
have to buy things they should en-
deavor to do so at the lowest possible
price. Beyond all comparison our
best customer for the surplus products
of our farms has been Great Britain.
With a population two-thirds as large
as our own she has only one-thirtieth
of our area, excluding Alaska. Her
inhabitants number about four hun
dred to the square mile, while ours
number about twenty. With her
concentrated population Great Brit
ain can not raise her own bread and
meat and, owing to her climate, she
can not raise any cotton at all to sup
ply her thousands of looms and spind-
les. Formerly, this country supplied
the British almost exclusively with
these articles but, unfortunately for
US, we no longer monopolize the mar
ket. Russia, India, Canada, Austria
liza and Argentina are becoming for
midable rivals of ours for the control
of this valuable trade.
The British statesmen are we'll up
on the subject of political economy
and they have made giant efforts to
open commerce with the other coun-
tries of the world, where they can
not only sell their own manufactures
to a better advantage than they can
here, but where they can also do
better in buying what they need
They have gained control of the Suez
canal. giving them a shorter route to
India and Australia, and they
have advanced millions of dollars to
the Canadians to enable them to ex-
tend their railroads into their rich
agricultural districts so that they can
supply the mother country with cheap
food.
Unfortunately for us, also. the price
of our grain is fixed by the merchants
of Liverpool. Last year the crops on
the other side of the Atlantic were
fairly good and the demand for our
grain is much less than usual
Whether or not this state of affairs
will continue this year is. impossible
now to predict, for it depends entirely
upon the weather.
But there are also some things in
our own country which have contrib
uted to the stagnation in the grain
market. Like nearly everything else
the raising of grain has to a consider
able extent been monopolized by the
moneyed men of the country. With
our improved machinery and the ad-
vantages afforded by the fertile and
easily titled plains of the West these
men of capital can easily crush out the
small farmers of the East and trans
port their grain thousand miles and
sell it on the seaboard cheaper than
the eastern man can possibly put it in
his barn. The same monopoly, due
to the same natural causes, exists in
the beef and pork market.
This much is easy to recite and may
be stated by anyone who will put his
pen to paper, but when we undertake
to prescribe remedy for the farmers
trouble we encounter difficult pro-
blem. Many great and wise men and
some not soigreat nor SO wise are work
ing omit but, so far, with little success.
There are few things, however, which
appear to be imperatively necessary.
The eastern farmer must limit his
operations, as far as possible, to the
production of things which do not
bring him into competition with the
wheat growers and stock raisers of the
prairies. He must economic in his
expenditures, notably in his purchases
of commercial fertilizer. He must
study his business, keep up with it
and post himself on the best methods
pointed out by the experience of sue
cessful men and modern science. By
doing this he will still be able to make
a living and, possibly, a little money.