372 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



was impossible to keep out men who were farmers only to the extent 

 of a garden or back yard. In those days lawyers, doctors, merchants, 

 discovered in themselves a marvelous interest in agricultui-al pursuits, 

 and joined the Grange. As a Granger remarked, they were interested 

 in agriculture as the hawk is interested in the sparrow. Two Granges 

 were organized in New York city ; one, the " Manhattan," on Broad- 

 way, with a membership of forty-five wholesale dealers, sewing-machine 

 manufacturers, etc., representing a capital of as many millions ; the 

 other, the '* Knickerbocker," one of whose first official acts was to pre- 

 sent the National Grange with a handsome copy of the Scriptures — a 

 gift causing some embarrassment. A similar one was organized in 

 Boston, which made great trouble before it could be expelled ; and 

 one was found in Jersey City, with a general of the army as its mas- 

 ter, a stone-mason as secretary, and the owner of a grain-elevator as 

 chaplain. But discordant elements were not all from other professions. 

 Thousands of farmers had been carried in by the enthusiasm of the 

 movement, with no idea of the nature and aims of the order. Some ex- 

 pected to make a political party; others, to smash the railroads ; almost 

 all hoped to find in co-operation a panacea for poverty. There was 

 great lack of discipline, but no discipline could have harmonized such 

 a body. The first outbreak was in the direction of democracy. Lay 

 members were eligible to but four of the seven degrees, and this was 

 denounced as aristocratic; opposed to the spirit of democratic institu- 

 tions. Along with this came the cry that the National Grange was 

 growing too rich. In vain it made liberal donations of seeds and pro- 

 visions to sufferers by grasshoppers and floods, and spent large sums 

 in distributing crop-reports among the order. The clamor continued 

 till the faint-hearted in the Charleston session in 1875 carried a meas- 

 ure to distribute $55,000 to the subordinate Granges — about 82.50 

 to each ! Prominent Grangers have maintained that the causes of 

 Grange decay are to be found in this and the other measures of the 

 same session curtailing the power of the National Grange. The true 

 cause has been seen to lie deeper, in the failure of business enterprises. 

 These measures had some influence, however. They were the begin- 

 nings of endless tinkering with the constitution, and the cause of quar- 

 rels innumerable. Among other quarrels was one with the Grange of 

 Canada, over the question of jurisdiction. Soon afterward came the first 

 open break in the ranks. An Illinois Grange voted to disband, alleg- 

 ing pecuniary reasons and the autocratic rule of the National Grange. 

 Many still had dreams that the order was to spread over the world, 

 but the co-operative leaven had begun to work, and there was soon 

 no mistaking the tendency to decay. At the annual meeting in 187G, 

 four thousand Granges were reported delinquent. Salaries were at 

 once reduced — the master's from $3,000 to $1,200, and the secretary's 

 from $2,500 to $2,000. It was vainly attempted to stem the tide by 

 issuing an official organ, the "Grange Record." In 1879 the master's 



