FOOD AND LAND TENURE. 577 



of leguminous plants, dissociating the nitrogen of the atmosphere and 

 converting it through the plant to the renovation of the soil, coupled 

 with artificial sources, give assurance of adequate supply of that 

 necessary element, while discoveries in science promise yet greater 

 abundance in the conversion of the secondary products of gas plants to 

 fertilizers. 



The last element which is necessary, potash, of course exists in 

 great abundance throughout many sections of the country, but the 

 solubility of potash capable of being assimilated by plants and the 

 cost of deriving it from its original source in the rocks, have rendered 

 the country for the time being largely dependent on the Stassfurt 

 Mines of Saxony, where the existence of a pan underlying the salt in 

 which the potash has accumulated, has rendered that place the source 

 of this necessary element in fertilizers at the lowest cost. It is, how- 

 ever, hardly to be doubted that in the great range of alkali soils and 

 deserts extending from British Columbia around the circle far into 

 Texas, deposits of potash will soon be discovered which can be worked. 

 Permanent potash springs are very numerous, and in the arid country 

 it may be assumed that while the potash may have leached down to a 

 moderate distance, it has not been carried away. A strong company, 

 with abundant capital, under competent engineers, has lately been 

 organized for following the surface indications of potash by boring at 

 many points. 



In a broad and general way it may be safely affirmed that the 

 great farming States of the Mississippi Valley which have been named, 

 will produce this year within a fraction of all the wheat now required 

 for the consumption of the people of the United States, and that by 

 improvement in the methods of agriculture their product will keep 

 even with the increase of population without calling for more land. 

 Outside this area are vast sections from which the quantity of wheat 

 now available for export may be derived. In these sections the in- 

 tensive system has not yet taken the place of the former methods of 

 cultivation. It may be safely affirmed that Montana, Washington, 

 Oregon, California and other sections of the Korthwest and of the 

 Pacific coast, can produce all the wheat that Europe can possibly pay 

 for during the present generation. It is only a question of price. Our 

 crop now being marketed officially estimated at 704,000,000 is probably 

 750,000,000 bushels or about 95,000,000 quarters. The prevailing 

 drought did not come until the winter wheat was harvested and the 

 spring wheat fairly secure ; it will reduce the com or maize crop. At a 

 dollar a bushel or at thirty-two shillings per quarter in Mark Lane, 

 we could add 20,000,000 quarters in a year or two if we had the farm 

 laborers to do the work not yet done by machinery. 



VOL. LIX. — 40 



