1 use the figures of a baker who bakes at wholesale, but sells bread at the least charge. These figures prove that the poor of New York are served with better bread at much less price than are the poor of Boston.

Wheat assumed to be raised near Glyndon in Dakota: 5,625 bushels to one man's work ; 1,125 retained for seed or for domestic consumption.

Totat charge to N. Y.

$3,150 Price of 4,500 bushels wheat at 70c., delivered at the railroad. 1,215 Cost of railway service 4,500 bushels wheat 200 to 300 miles, 1,000 barrels flour 1,400 miles.

225 Profit on the railway service.

500 Milling 1,000 bushels flour.

450 Barrels for 1,000 barrels flour.

1,750 Labor, fuel, yeast, etc., used in making 275,000 pounds of

bread.

500 Cost of selling the bread.

210 Incidentals.

$8,000 Cost of 275,000 pounds of bread in New York; or, 7 men feed 1,000 for I year with bread.

If the labor of those who provide fuel and other materials for the railway and for the baker be added, the number might be raised to 10 men to 1,000 barrels of flour converted into bread.

At the risk of repetition let me again give other examples of the saving of labor which has resulted from the application of adequate capital and skilled labor. The year's work of 1 person is as follows: I in a cotton mill spins and weaves cotton cloth for 250 persons; 1 in a woollen mill, woollen cloth for 300 persons; 1 in a coal mine, iron mine, or iron furnace serves 200 pounds iron each to 500 persons; 1 in a men's boot factory makes 2 pairs a year of boots or shoes for 800 persons; 1 in a women's boot or shoe factory makes 3 pairs a year for 1,000 persons; 1 in a shirt factory sews 2,400 excellent shirts, or more of lower quality, or 4 a year for 600 to 800 persons.

The poor sewing women are only those who sew in a poor way by hand. Skilful sewers in the shirt factory earn more than $10 per week. How much labor the materials used may represent is not included in these computations. In the case of the bread the wheat is traced from the beginning to the end. It may be admitted

that this is an extreme case, and that the average production of wheat, except on these great bonanza farms, so-called, represents a much greater amount of labor. I have only presented the extreme of the present because it may become only the average of the future, but that part of the cost of the bread which constitutes the railway service leaves little margin to be gained until some new invention is applied by which the cost may be reduced. The profit of the railway on each pound of bread is of a cent. It will puzzle legislators to cheapen this service; they may make it more costly.

The statement that the wheat from which 1,000 barrels of flour may be made, which represents the yearly ration of 1,000 persons, can be raised as the equivalent of one man's labor for one year, may be questioned. It seemed almost incredible to the writer until he had proved it by incontestible evidence of many competent witnesses. A fair average equivalent for one day's work of one man on a Dakota farm is 12 bushels of wheat in an ordinary season. On a well managed and thoroughly equipped farm in a season in which the crop is 20 bushels to the acre, the average for one day's work of one man has proved to be 181 bushels. This season, when the crop is expected to be 25 bushels per acre, it will be over 20 bushels per man per day. That is to say, the average per man per day is very nearly the product of one acre, whatever that may be according to the season. If we multiply the middle statement of 18 bushels per man per day by 300 working days, we have 5,625 bushels of wheat as the equiva lent of the continuous work of one man for one year; but of course about three men will be employed for only part of a year, or during the wheat-growing and harvesting season. After the wheat farm has been fully equipped with adequate machinery and brought into good condition, the crop can be planted, made harvested, and moved to the elevator at a cost ranging from $6.00 to $10.00 per acre, according to relative conditions; it is claimed that on the best farms most completely equipped the whole cost can be covered at $5.00 per acre. It may be said that this cannot

There

last, but such a hasty conclusion may not be warranted. are as yet, no signs of exhaustion; the soil of this section appears to be of a peculiar kind. The frost strikes deep into the ground, and long before it is out below, the surface is dry, warm, and ready for the seed; after that the moisture from the melting frost keeps coming up laden with elements of fertility. How long this will continue who can tell? But even if it may only last a few years, then after that the division of the land into smaller farms will bring in fertilizers and other methods of economic cultivation. In the meantime what is the area available? The area of Dakota only is 150,000 square miles, of which but a mere fraction is yet under the plow, and north of it is the almost unlimited area of wheat land in Manitoba. Is it not apparent that wheat may go even below thirty-four shillings per quarter in Mark Lane before the supply of wheat from Dakota would cease to meet the demand, except the demand of our own country should stop the export tide? With our present railway and steamship service, even at paying or profitable rates of traffic, our farmers can unquestionably contest the markets of Europe with India and Russia, down to less than thirty-four shillings a quarter in Mark Lane, if they cannot do better at home. The English quarter of wheat by which prices are quoted is 480 pounds, or 8 bushels of 60 pounds each -thirty-four shillings per quarter will yield a little over one dollar per bushel in London, at which we can readily continue the traffic, but of course at a greatly reduced profit to the farmer. The India railways, for which å very large appropriation is about to be made, will doubtless render the competition in India a little sharper, but it will be observed that the system adopted has been planned mainly with reference to the distribution of food in India itself, for the purpose of preventing the recurrence of famine. It will therefore increase the consumption of food in India, and may diminish the export of grain to England instead of increasing it.

JULY, 1884.