778 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



open which the Canadian Pacific railroad was mainly constructed ; 

 from Algeria and Northern Africa, which, once the granaries of the 

 Roman world, are now, for the first time for centuries, contributing 

 something to the world's surplus of cereals ; and from the South 

 American states of the Argentine Republic and Chili, where extraor- 

 dinary railroad construction is rapidly drawing an extraordinary Euro- 

 pean immigration to the finest of wheat-lands, which so recently as 

 1880 were practically inaccessible. Great, also, as is the present wheat 

 product of the United States, Mr. Atkinson has shown that all the 

 land at present in actual use in that whole country for growing maize 

 or Indian corn, wheat, hay, oats, and cotton is only 272,000 square 

 miles, out of 1,500,000 miles of arable land embraced in its present 

 national domain ; and, also, that the present entire wheat-crop of the 

 United States could be grown on wheat-land of the best quality select- 

 ed from that part of the area of the State of Texas by which that 

 single State exceeds the present area of the German Empire. 



In short, it would seem as if the world in general, for the first 

 time in its history, had now good and sufficient reasons for feeling free 

 from all apprehensions of a scarcity or dearness of bread. But while 

 this is certainly a matter for congratulation, are there not, on the other 

 hand, reasons for apprehension of serious disturbances to the material 

 interests of that large part of the world's population engaged in agri- 

 culture, from the continued abundant production and decline in the 

 price of their products ? 



The effect of the extensive fall in prices of agricultural products 

 during the last decade has, as already pointed out, been most disastrous 

 to the agricultural interests and population of Europe. It has reduced 

 farming in England and Germany to the lowest stage of vitality, and 

 has had less but similar effects in France, Italy, and Belgium. It has 

 almost bankrupted the sugar-producing interests in the West Indies 

 and the Dutch East Indies, and threatens the continuance of productive 

 industries, and even of civilization, in these countries.* In 1880, 44 



had almost doubled. Notwithstanding these remarkable results, the traffic which has 

 been developed on the railways of India is less, in proportion to the population, than that 

 of any country in the world. This is especially the case in reference to goods-traffic, 

 which only represents some 0*05 of a ton per head of the population, as compared with 

 three tons per head in Canada, and over seven tons per capita in the United Kingdom. 

 But the goods-traffic of India is likely to develop very rapidly in the future, and espe- 

 cially in agricultural produce, of which only about 4,000,000 tons are now annually 

 transported, as compared with 76,000,000 tons in the United States for less than a 

 fourth of the population." BradstrecC s (N. Y.) Journal. 



* " In consequence of the low prices of sugar in Europe and America, owners of plan- 

 tations and their lessees have speculated to such an extent that they have placed them- 

 selves on the brink of an abyss, and it is feared that this will totally stop the production 

 of sugar in Java. This event would be in every way a great catastrophe. ' It would at 

 once throw half a million of Javanese laborers out of employment, who would increase 

 the already enormous number of Malay pirates." Journal des Fabricants de Sucre, Oc- 

 tober, 1886. 



