The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1916-03-08

Greece. 6oO,oO0; Holland, I'll, 900
 Switzerland, 485.oOo; Sweden; 1,0oO,-
 900; Denmark, 995, 1000; United StateS
 126, ,44o,00O; Mexico, 100000; Argen-
 tina, 24,00O.000: Chile 2,00O,OO0; Uru-
 quay, 100000; Peru 60o,0O0; Persia,
 100000. Total 1s9,181, 900 quar-
 ters.
 Central Powers: Germany 20,000,-
 900; Austria, 7,5OO,0oo; Hungary.
 IS, s,959,000; Crotia and SIavonia, r.
 500, ,000; Bosnia and Hersgovina, 50o,-
 oOO;' Bulgaria, 5,7S5. .0o0; Serbia, l.
 5O0,000; Belgium, 100000. Total
 56,739, ,0OO quarters.
 There are of course other factories
 operating in this war game which
 affect the foregoing stocks of the va is practically sealed up, and while it can supply her own army ana peo-
 pie, it cannot get out through the Oar danel1es, or westward across the Aus
 o-German lines, or northward
 through the ice ports and the German
 Baltic fleet. Belgium's stock, also,
 while controlled by the German occu-
 pants of the country, is by arrange
 ment used for internal needs. So that these and some other small grain producing countries are out of the worlds fluctuations of grain the food-weapon of warfare.
 The recent government purchases in Australia and Argentina are refer red to in an official statement, which
 says the British and French govern
 ments purchased 100000 tons of wheat from Australia, the share of the
 British being 5O,000 tons.
 The Argentina purchase, the state
 ment says, was 250,000 tons by the
 British government: At the prevail ing rate this would be about $16,- 00O,000 for the Australian and $20,- 100000 for the Argentina suppnes. Details of the Rumanian purchase are given in letters from Bucharest stating that Sir George Barclay, the British minister, Signed the purchase contract, which the British legation i announced was made in behalf of the government. The purchase covered 1 8O,000 car loads at 128 pounds per l carload, or total of ten million ster- ling, $5O,000,0o0.
 Aside from it's effect on the Ameri- can exchange rate, this gathering in
 Of huge stocks of grain appear to be one of the modern methods of War fare. as a reserve food defense for the armies and population, and as an other means of wearing down the enemy by shortening his food resour- ces. This has been urged in the past notably by MT. Yarburgh, M. F., who claimed that wheat reserve was es- sentia1 as a first line of defense for an insular country like England, n- able to be cut off from the food sup plies on which it is absolutely depen- dent The British navy has of course been the encircIing protection against this possibility. And yet it appears
 to be accepted as a wise precaution
 that great wheat reserve should be built up as against any eventual ity, just as much gold reserve. The wheat reserve of London has been running very low of late, being only one-third what it was year ago, and there is about the same fall ing off at the fifteen great ports of
 the country. So that this new policy lsof government wheat purchase is go- I ing into operation, with the double purpose of gradually building up a
 great defensive wheat reserve, and in cidentally no doubt keeping down the rate of American exchange.