1882.] TOOLS, IMPLEMENTS, ETC. 323 



transportation problem. A farming community had settled west 

 of the Alleghany mountains. They must sell something, because a 

 farming community cannot make all the articles demanded by 

 civilization, and to buy these they must sell something from their 

 farms. There was no crude product, but the grain could be dis- 

 tilled into whiskey, and seven bushels of wheat thus concentrated 

 could be carried on the back of a single horse by the trails to the 

 eastern markets. When a government tax broke up this industry 

 there, it produced a rebellion, the evils of which we need not now 

 discuss. It is the transportation problem only that it is cited for. 

 In Ohio even this means was impracticable, and the efforts of the 

 pioneers to overcome the difficulty by growing silk or other 

 precious products, forms a curious item in the history of the times. 

 It was under such conditions of transportation that Connecticut 

 farms were settled, and the vocation here pursued for nearly 200 

 years. Then scarce crops in any region meant increased prices, 

 and if the season was bad, the farmer found partial compensation 

 in the higher price brought by what he did raise. 



How completely all this is changed. Grain in the "West is pro- 

 duced in enormous quantities; is sold and graded. It is then car- 

 ried in bulk and handled by machinery, and a railroad transports 

 on an average a ton of grain for about what it costs a farmer to haul a 

 bushel. On the great through routes it is less. The average 

 freights on wheat last year (1880) from Chicago to New York by 

 rail, was twenty-six and four-tenths cents per bushel. This year 

 (1881), owing to "cut rates," much has come at prices of from 

 twelve to sixteen cents per bushel. 



As further illustration of the marvelous facilities now provided 

 for transportation of grain this year (1881), much grain has gone 

 from St. Louis, (Mo.,) to Liverpool, (England,) via the Missis- 

 sippi river and New Orleans, at through rates of twenty-six and 

 one-half to twenty-eight cents per bushel, including all charges of 

 freight, handling, and ocean insurance. It has even gone from St. 

 Paul, (Minn.,) to Glasgow, (Scotland,) via New Orleans, for 

 twenty-five cents, exclusive of ocean insurance. I need not 

 further dilate on the means by which this is done; how that steam 

 power is used where man's muscle once was. Ships were once 

 loaded and unloaded by men carrying the grain in and out on 

 their backs. It then took a week or more; now the elevator does 

 it in a few hours. I was reared on a wheat farm in New York 

 State. When I was a boy it took several days to load a canal- 



