The Savannah morning news. (Savannah, Ga.) 1900-current, 1903-05-24

also interested in line of steamers.
so that they can furnish their own
shipping. The wheat is sent to Eng
land and sold for what it will bring
1t acts as a damper-a wet blanket
on the entire market. The voyage
around the Horn is four months long,
and by the time the first cargoes are
reaching port the late are leaving, so
that it is all afloat at the same time.
The buyer in Europe knows what is
afioat. Thus, the manner in which the
crop is handled breakes the market
down more than twice the same
amount from Atlantic ports. There
the buyer must send over and place
his order in advance of shipment
With the Pacific Coast grain it must
sell for what it will bring. The ship
cannot be delayed and the grain cam
not be stored in sacks.
I'VE can never get away from the
practical proposition that we are in
competition with every wheat raiser
in every countryside peasants on the
steppes of Russia, the ryots of India,
and the Argentine farmers, most of
whom went into Italy. We are in
competition with them on an even
whiffle tree. We always will be so
long as we have to sell outside of our
own country; and that our own coun-
try will ever consume our entire pro-
duct no intelligent man will believe at
least for half a century.
"Our farmers can do nothing in the
way of getting market. l can do
very little. The price of transporta-
ton has come down, but the price of
wheat from year to year is just about
the difference in this rate 1t has made
wheat cheaper for the other fellow.
He is not compelled to take your
urhpat He ran take wheat from r.
gentine or anywhere else. We must
find new customers by enlarging our
commercial relations, by expanding
our markets. The country has always
expanded and always will. If 1t is to
go on and increase, we must have
some place, some people, where We
can get rid of the stuff we raise.
Suppose the trade with these Ash
attic peoples to amount to 1 cent per
capita for each day in the year. that
would amount with China alone to $4,
100000 a day-nearly $1,000 100000
year. We could not begin to furnish ii
to them. We have not the surplus.
''Fhe European nations have the
Mediterranean Sea and two oceans to
cross in reaching these peoples. We
have to cross but one ocean. II might
do us some good if we had any ships
to use ii. OF the carrying trade going
fourth of per cent. Yet We cali our
selves a commercial nation and are
ambitious to be a maritime nation.
Farmers care nothing about the
size of ship, but they do care about
it's carrying their products to some
new people who will use them. I am
building ships for this purpose, be-
cause 1 see an opportunity to make a
reasonable return on my investment.
The reason we can compete with other
nations is because we have greater ia
cilities in using human intelligence,
while the other nations supply human
energy. Fifty or sixty years ago we
had more than our share of the worlds
carrying trade. To-day the cheapest
transportation in the world is on the
Great Lakes. 1t now astonishes Eu-
rope, but the end is not yet.
IF we can carry grain at these rates
from the Pacific coast to China and
Japan we would not ship one bushel of
wheat from the Pacific coast to Ell-
rope. And with a chance to bring ev-
cry car back loaded with Pacific coast
lumber, we would carry millions and
millions of bushels from Minnesota and
the Dakotas. Empty cars one way
mean double mileage. 1t would not
only help farmers of the Northwestern
States by taking the Pacific coast
wheat out of competition, but 1t would
carry away their own crop at times.
Either know absolutely nothing or 1
know absolutely that these farmers
would be greatly benefited. The en-
tire wheat crop of the Northwest last
year might have gone to the Pacific
coast, If there had been ships to take
1t when 1t got there"