Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1917-06-03
BY JAMES B. MORROW.

BY JAMES b. MORROW.
ESlHE twelve brave and crafty
agents sent by Moses into
Canaan have been called spies.
They were also, as a matter
Of fact. trade scouts. Their re-
ports back to the Israelites were mostly
oral. but they pisualized their discover
les by means of fruits, notably bunch
of grapes that reached from a staff
borne on the shoulders of two men to
the ground. Some grapes" it might
be slangily remarked.
Trade has been scouting ever since.
Many times the scouts have brought
on wars between nations fighting with
spears, battle-axes and guns. And Teu-
tonic historians, dealing with the year
1914. may even write that trade scouts
were blamabIe in part for the first war
carried on with flying machines and
submarines.
Scouting in faraway countries has be-
come one of the peaceful pursuits of
this government. CaIebs and Joshuas,
Shammuas and Shaphats, are busy in
all parts of the earth. They are bring
ing seed wheat from Russia and cotton
seed from Egypt. They are studying
precious and guarded processes. At this
moment modern representatives of the
tribes of ISsachar, Benjamin and Joseph,
bearing credentials from Washington,
are searching South America, from
Venezuela to Patagonia. The business
eye of this country is now hopefully
looking to and beyond the Amazon and
the Rio de la Plata
A new era has arrived. The home
market. in time of peace, is not enough.
Production in some lines, when demand
is not stimulated by war. has passed
consumption. Many things are for sale
even coal and lumber, although the
conservationists declare that future
generations OF Americans will want for
both. But the man on the spot with u
mine or a forest is not worrying about
his great-srandchiIdren.
There was a time when the home
market strained tie mills and factories.
Before that. back il colonial days.
George Washington traded tobacco for
English cloth. furniture and farm i'm
Elements. Even the clergymen of Vir-
ginia we're paid for preaching and pas
toralizing in that narcotfcal plant.
which they. In turn, exchanged for
Bibles and SUPPLIES made abroad.
The day came, however, when the daily
domestic market could be fully supplied
at home Likewise. the day came and is
here now, when the American market was
vouring of any in the world. No market,
since Adam made food and clothing
necessary, has ever equaled 1t in the
profit gained or in the quality and the
quantity demanded.
The natural home market is larger than
II ever was: Besides. it is growing. One
hundred million men. women and chill
dren, the most luxurious. as a mass, the
sun ever shone upon, live between the two
oceans. They eat better food. wear bet
ter clothing and live in better houses than
the world has ever known before. Take
the item OF bread-white bread not black
bread, sour and sodden-as an illustra-
ton Every inhahitant of the United
States eats five bushels of wheat wear
The consumption. therefore. is 100000
bushels day. including sunday.
In other words, the bread eaten in
twenty-four hours by the American peo-
pie requires the wheat grown in field
a field would be 143 square miles, which
is considerably more than the area of the
District Of Columbia Hauled to the rail-
roads in farm wagons, the wheat cone
days supply would load 916 cars
Hundreds of cotton and wooden mills
are making clothing. Millions OF dollars
Scores OF publishing houses are printing
books Potteries blaze under their patron
age There was never anything anywhere
so prodigious and prodigal as the pur-
chasing power of the American people
no. by classes, but collectively
Meat and wheat when the world is nor
NAL. still goes to other lands. Experts in
Washington, however, believe that food
exports will sooner or later entirely cease
Exports Of manufactured products, of
machinery, cotton goods. iron and STEEL
they arc sure. will increase. Inded, they
must increase IL all the factories, mills
and furnaces are to be operated up to
their capacity and wage-earners kept at
work. So scouts are travelling and hunt
ing all over the globe for opportunities
10 expand American trade
These men are directed in their la
bors by the bureau of foreign and do
nestle commerce. A group of them are
now In South America. where they are
learning how the countries in that part
of the world are buying their agricul-
turaa machinery. their paper and print
ers supplies, their electrical materials,
their boots and shoes, their cotton