The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1896-09-17

Farmlng IN the United states has
been subjected to undermining inf1u-
ences which have raised very serious
difficulties in the way of prosperity
The progress of the age has revolu-
tionized the farming industry just as
1t has nearly every other. But this
march of invention and discovery has
been two-edged sword; while it
brings sum total Of gains, 1t often
brings individual suffering The gains
have come to those who understand
the undercurrents of the age and keep
up with the times; the losses to those
who cannot change their fixed habits
OF mind. The most prominent feature
OF this progress of the age as
it has affected American farm
ing is the railway, and the
steamship. The railway is the
slave of man devised to fetch and carry
food from lands of the whole world
where it can be most cheaply grown.
and deliver 1T to the poor in crowded
cities at decreasing prices And it
stands to reason that the man who.
owns poor soil will suffer if railways
bring marvelously rich soils into COM
petition with his land. Indeed, the i'm
mediate result Of tapping the splendid
grain fields of the West by RAILWAYS
was the destruction of Eastern grain
growing And yet the railway, as a
simple fact, has carried traffic so cheap-
~ that its service to the Western
farmer can be measured only by the
entire and thorough ruin of the Ea
grain-grower. The farms of New Eng
land and the Middle States have been
sacrificed on the altar Of modern pro-
gfess, In order that Western FARMING
might exist. The former garden-snots
OF the Susquehanna and the Genessee
Valleys are relatively desolate TODAY.
because cheap and rapid TRANSPORTS flor,
has made possible the eultiVation If
Iar nlgher. grades of soil on the West
erh pra1ries. The medium of exchange
mas no more to do with this great econ
onl1c movement than fish in a stream
mas to do with a vestibule train that
numbers over the bridge above it,
But thls IS not all. This settlement
OF the Western prairie produced hot
feVer OF speculation and expansion In
farming which is now being followed
by the inevitable reaction and weak
ness. Those who have any KNOWLEDGE
OF western farming know the pictures-
que and exciting period when Kansas
and Nebraska farms were regarded &c
prizes; or, when staid farmers in Ohio
Illinois, and even Iowa, sold all their
belongings to join in the wild rush to
the wheat lands of Dakota. There
never was an operation of brokers on
W all street more wildly speculative
than this gambling craze in the farm
Ing industry. In the early eighties
prices of farm land were raised to a.
purely fictitious level. Serious men
undertook heavy obligations in the
height of this speculative fever, and
were fairly carried off their feet
The progress of the age. however
which has opened the rich soil of Dake-
ia and Manitoba to eastern markets.
was not confined to the United States
alone. And just about the time that
credulous lenders on western farm
mortgages discovered that drought and
hot winds might wholly destroy the
crops In some districts of Kansas and
Nebraska; and just as the balloon of
American farm speculation began to
collapse the farmers of foreign coun-
tries, such as Argentina Australia,
Egypt and India, by the aid of the
same cheapened cost of Transportation
through railways and steamships, join
ed in pouring great new supplies of
wheat into the worlds markets A
worldwide movement like this was
wholly unexpected and wholly unap-
preeiated while 1t was going on. 1t
was as If an Esquimaux in his hut on
the northern ice-fee We're going calmly
on in his usual habits of life, uncon-
cious that distant forces had set his
foe for miles about him in motion, and
all was silently drifting southwark on
the currents beneath him. AS one
instance Of this grain movement of
foreign countries, let me give for only
one country, Argentina. the figures of
it's production and expectation of
NH