Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 31.djvu/800

780 —The price of meats, according to the statistics of English markets, exhibits no material decline, comparing the average prices of 1867-'77 and of 1878-'85. But during the years 1885 and 1886 the decline was very considerable, and extended also to most other animal products. The percentage of fall in the carcass prices of different kinds and quantities of meat in London, as given by the London "Economist" of November 27, 1885, was, in comparison with the prices for 1879, as follows: For inferior beef, 43 per cent; prime beef, 18 per cent; prime mutton, 13 per cent; large pork, 22 per cent; middling mutton, 27 per cent.

The immediate cause of this decline was undoubtedly the new sources of supply of live animals and fresh meats that have been opened up to Europe, and especially to Great Britain, from other than European countries: the value of the imports into Great Britain from North America of live animals having increased from $1,085,000 in 1876 to $22,980,000 in 1885; of fresh meat from 81,950,000 to $11,820,000; and of fresh meat from Australia and the River Plate (transported through refrigeration) from $890,000 in 1882 to $5,850,000 in 1885; a total increase of from $3,025,000 in 1870 to $40,650,000 in 1885. The ability of the three countries named to increase their exports of meat during such a brief period to such an enormous extent, constitutes of itself a demonstration of increased product and of the diminished price that is the invariable accompaniment of a surplus seeking a market. The decline in the average export price of salt beef in the United States was from 8·2 cents per pound in 1884 to 6 cents in 1886 (26 per cent); of salt pork from 8·2 cents to 5·9 cents

him so little that a single good crop or two pays for it outright. Then he puts into it labor of his own, and of men hired, which he could not otherwise utilize at all, and the cost of which he can not compute, and thus adds year after year to its value. The farmer who runs into debt can tell what his land costs him yearly, but they are not the majority. Host farmers get a living out of the land for themselves and families, to begin with, and make some improvements besides, and meanwhile are gaining more without any effort, than by all their labor. For, while the farmer is raising four or five crops, a settled State or county grows up about him. Towns and cities start from the ground. Railroads and manufacturing establishments come to enhance the value of his land. In a few years, the ground that he bought for $1.25 to $5 per acre comes to be worth in market price $10, $20, or $30 per acre. Land settled by men who are yet in their prime averages in value over $20 per acre for the entire State of Iowa, or $13 for the entire State of Minnesota, or $10 for the entire States of Kansas and Nebraska. That means for the owners of only a small farm a yearly saving which not many wage-earners are able to accomplish, and in all the more successful selections of land the increase in value and the consequent return for labor are far greater."Just as long as this occupation of new land and development of new territory are possible in this country, the most scientific calculation of the cost of growing wheat will have as much to do with its continued production or with its average price as it has to do with the height of mountains in the moon. Wheat-growing will continue, and the yield in this country will greatly exceed the demand, and an enormous surplus will be annually offered for sale, at prices with which British farmers can not easily compete, where the cost of growing wheat averages 'about $40 per acre.'"