Year: 1878

ST. Louis, July 9th, 1878.


Come and sit by me, my friend


while we make the trip from Wash


ington to st. Louis. We can chat


pleasantly as we ride, and maybe


dig a good moral out of what we


see on the way. The evening train


from Washington takes US to the


summit of the Alleghanies during


the night, and the first blush of the


morning finds us at the pleasant
city of Altoona. Passing this point
we hurry on through the wild
scenery OF the mountain heights,
round the horseshoe bend, where
the engine threatens to run into the
rear car, plunge through the long
dark tunnel, and then push down
the western declivity, swaying, leap
ing, laundering along at the rate of
forty miles an hour. Past Johns
town with its great iron and steel
works, many of them idle; past
other towns and villages in the
same predicament; past Pittsburgh
the American Birmingham, where
the sun looks through the smoke
cloud like the red eye of a taper or
an ancient tallow dip; down the
panhandle and across the Ohio to
Steubenville, smaller edition of
Pittsburgh in the matter of its Grip
pied industries as well as its smoke
and dust, then out into the hill
country of Eastern Ohio, crossing a
multitude of bridges and passing
through a half dozen tannels, and
then out into the more level coun-
try beyond.


EASTERN OHIO.


The picture all the way from the
Ohio to Columbus is one of marvel
Gus beauty in the leafy month of
June, with that other attribute of
teeming wealth, and all the way
along through the three great States
between Pennsylvania and Missouri
the scenery is charming and rich
with the promise of glorious har-
vest.


"Sweet fields stand dressed in living green.


With rivers of delight"


Golden wheat fields wave in the
breeze, and impatiently wait for the
reaper, while here and there stand
clusters of great pursy stacks rich
with the freshly garnered treasures
of the field, pastures reined with
babbling brooks and specked with
aocks and herds; great meadows of
timothy and clover waiting for the
mower; orchards laden with fruit
and vineyards with the promise of
full vintage; neat farm houses en-
powered in groves; busy towns and
villages all along the way, where
they make everything from a hair
pin to steam engine; green forests
crown the hills and bright streams
coursing through the valleys, while
over all shines the summer sun
with cloud shadows here and there
sailing across the wide landscape.


LABOR SAVING MACHINES.


The crops of grass and small
grain are immense, while the corn
is backward, owing to the cold wet
weather of the last month. Scores
of men are seen riding through |
the corn fields on their sulky Guilt |
vators, and this invention will save
a crop that would otherwise be |
lost or greatly damaged, for want of
power to subdue the weeds in time. |
This machine and others like it
have doubtless done something TO /
increase the labor famine of the
country, by giving one man the
power of five, ten or twenty. But |
let US have the machines neverthe |
less. The country is large enough |
and fruitful enough to sustain 2O0,-
100000 of people. Let US spread |
out and bring into cultivation the
vast empire of rich lands in !
the West. If we finally get too
thick to be fed by the productions
Of the earth, some smart yankee |
will doubtless invent some kind of
nitro-carbo, hydro phosphoric oxy-
genized JohnnY-cake to support life !
at the nominal expense of three
cents a week, Then will come the
and all the world will be |
happy. But what shall we do while |
waiting for the millennium


WORK AND WAGES.


These furnish the true solution
of the great problem of the hour
If the four or five millions of en-
forced idlers were at work, they
would not only supply themselves
and families with the comforts of
lie, but completely extinguish the
spirit of eommunistlc agrarianism,
and add ten or twenty millions
month to the aggregate wealth of
the nation. AS matters now stand
we have auyast surplus Of both farm
and factory products, and a great
army of non producers without the
means to purchase either food or
We are in the strange
and anomalous condition of grow
ing poor because we have too much
to eat What we need is equilib
rum between production and con
This can only be Sc
cured by opening new fields of la
Dor, increasing our possibilities for
domestic and foreign transporta-
tion, thus augmenting both the |
price and demand for our surplus |
products.


DIVERSITY OF OCCUPATION.


rhe above conditions are par
TALLY filed when there is such va
riety in the domestic industries CT
a State or community as to create |
q large home demand for food and |
all kinds of raw material Ohio, |
the State through which we are
passing as l scribble down these
notes, is case in point. Almost
every town Is huge workshop, aud |
the bees in these human hives must |
feed on the honey gathered from the
forests, fields and farms Of the
whole State, This circumstance
lightens the pressure, but can not
wholly meet the demands Of the
present emergency, To answer Che
existing and pressing demand for
work and bread new fields Of en-