SIXTH ANNUAL YEAR BOOK — PART VIII. 613 



matter summer or winter. It is either too heavy or not finished enough, 

 and a person is reminded of the man who sits down at the dinner tahle 

 with no taste — nothing is good enough. And so the market; when 

 glutted the buyers are independent, because there is a flood of cattle to 

 riclv from. 



Here are problems which confront the farmer and stockraiser, and 

 must be solved before long. This state of alTairs cannot last long else 

 the feeders go bankrupt, which has been the case with hundreds in the 

 last three years. After hard work and slavery for a whole year with feed- 

 ing from 300 to 500 head of steers, from $5,000 to $8,000 have been lost, 

 and it did not only get the new beginner as a dule is called green, no; it 

 got the best of them as well. 



But as everything has its time, so I look for a change. I have notic- 

 ed this in my time, that no matter what the business is, if legitimate it 

 will have its inning some day. It is very gratifying to the farmer to 

 notice that some of our best agricultural papers have taken the stand 

 for the farmer's interest and insist on having some legislation which 

 heretofore has been neglected or ignored by our law-makers, who have 

 rather given attention to the millionaires' interest in the eastern states, 

 than to the men by whom they were elected in our agricultural states. 

 But no wonder. The western granger was easily bought some years ago, 

 when our politicians preached all over this country for protection against 

 pauper labor, telling the farmer that if the wheels and spindles were 

 kept turning in the United States so the working classes had plenty of 

 money to buy witli, our products would all save 5 per cent be consumed 

 at home. This of course would be to the farmer's interest as he would 

 get a big price for all he raised, but we must steer clear from pauper 

 labor, which the old countries had, said these politicians. Now this 

 song of protection was very sweet to the farmer's ear, but it was soon 

 learned that it did not work as dees the golden rule, both ways, no; it 

 worked only one way. The men who could talk iron, steel, coal lumber 

 and even oil were strictly in it, but the fellow who had kept hold of the 

 plow and filled his graneries was told one morning on his way to mar- 

 ket that everything had dropped in price at the Liverpool market, by 

 which of course our markets were all governed. This was a surprise to 

 the granger, because he had voted to protect himself from pauper labor. 

 Now he had maneged and raised his produce in a high-priced wage coun- 

 try and had to place his produce right alongside the pauper laborer's 

 goods; and lo. the poor fellow had nothing to say, but was told if that 

 did not suit he could take his stuff and go; so all there was left for him 

 to think about was this: I am cheated. 



These are the conditions with the American farmer to day in a large 

 measure. His interest has been neglected or ignored. The railroad 

 rates as everything else are fixed at a paying basis to which he has noth- 

 ing to say. But the old saying still goes: "It is a long lane which has 

 no turn." 



