MICHIGAN STATE POMOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 147 



majority of the tillers of the soil, the world over — the sturdy 

 yeomanry of the human race — a:e grain growers. 



THE AVHEAT RAISIXG NATIONS. 



It is a fact that but one commercial nation of the world, — 

 Great Britain,— needs to look abroad for bread for its people. 

 The 40,000,000 people of France ; the 40,000,000 of the now 

 united Germany ; the 40,000,000 of the United States, grow 

 their own breadstuffs, and oftentimes have a surplus to spare. 

 It is a remarkable fact that these three controlling nations, 

 each with about the same population, are the chief grain- 

 growing nations of Christendom. East of these are the val- 

 leys of the Danube, and the plains of Southern Eussia, 

 producing the cereals in all their perfection and in wonderful 

 abundance, so that the ports of the Black Sea have long been 

 held as the unfailing granaries of Europe. It is this world- 

 wide and crushing competition which renders wheat-growing 

 a precarious and unprofitable business. 



THE AVERAGE PRICE OF WHEAT FOR TWENTY YEARS. 



Twenty-one years ago, when I first became acquainted with 

 the heavy timbered lands of wheat-growing Michigan, that 

 grain was selling in her interior towns at 75 cents per bushel ; 

 in 1852 it brought 90 cents ; in 1853, $1.25, and in 1854 it 

 receded to 80 cents; in 1858 it reached a dollar, and in 1861 

 it went to $1.10. During the civil war, prices ruled at higher 

 rates, but it may be truthfully affirmed that the average nor- 

 mal price of wheat for the last twenty years, has not been over 

 one dollar per bushel. This is not a rapid money-making 

 rate, though it affords a slight profit. At that price, if wheat- 

 growing was the only branch of western husbandry, the 

 country would be poverty-stricken. It is for this reason that 

 we should take a deep interest in every project which promises 

 a new industry for western agriculturists. 



THE INCREASING COMPETITION. 



This deadly and oppressive competition is annually increas- 

 ing by the addition of vast territories of arable and richly 



