United State?. Its products are not only those cereals and animals from wliicli 

 our breadstuffs and meats are obtained, but embrace also those textile materials 

 that sustain, not only our own manufacturing industry, but the great cotton 

 manufactures of the world. Hence our manufacturing industry has been cre- 

 ated by, and is dependent on, our agriculture. The capital invested in our manu- 

 factures exceeds two billions of dollars, yielding an annual product not much 

 less in value. This diversified industry has created a commerce of not less 

 proportionate magnitude, which, employed in distribviting these provisions and 

 materials and manufoctures, uses as its means of travel and transportation rail- 

 roads, canals, and river improvements, costing two and a half billions of dollars, 

 and employs a tonnage in value about two hundred and twenty-five millions of 

 dollars. Such are the gigantic operations of American industry, making its na- 

 tional inventory one of the most extraordinary records of progress the world 

 has ever beheld. 



Nor is this all. The wants of Europe have established a great and rapidly 

 increasing dejpendence upon the United States for its agricultural products. 

 This is seen in the magnitude of the exportation of these, even Avhen civil war 

 has closed so many ports, and paralyzed the agriculture of so large a portion of 

 the country. The world leans on us. 



To meet demands of this great magnitude is the mission of American agri- 

 culture. The merchant and the manufacturer, the operative in the factory and 

 the mechanic in the shop, those at home and those abroad — all, as much as the 

 fanner, cannot but feel deeply interested in the monthly report of the progress 

 of an agriculture upon which these classes depend. 



Statistical information is collected slowly, and generally not published until 

 the immediate interest in them has passed away. Thus, for instance, the 

 American Almanac, an annual statistical publication of the highest authority, 

 does not generally bring its statistics nearer than two years of the time of its 

 publication. Even the imports and exports of the United States are not made 

 generally known by the Treasury Department until eighteen months after the 

 close of the fiscal year. In the mean time the vast crops have been sown and 

 harvested and sold, with no reliable information of their amount, save what cer- 

 tain interests obtain through agencies, in which the j)ublic are not regarded as 

 having any concern, nor any right to the information they give. 



This is unjust to the industrial pursuits of our country. Those who produce, 

 and those who consimie, have interests as well as the purchaser who stands be- 

 tween them. A knowledge of the market is essential for all, and this market 

 is governed by supply and demand. 



The relations between agriculture, manufactures, and commerce, demand that 

 something should be done to obtain and publish, at brief intervals during the 

 crop season, reliable information of the amount and condition of these crops. 

 The connexion between the industrial pursuits creates mutual interests. There 

 is no clearer principle of political economy than this, that as the famier is en- 

 riched all other classes prosper. His pursuit, as stated, embraces two-thirds of 

 our population — the great body of consumers of manufactured products — and of 

 these he buys in proportion as his own occupation gives him the means. Hence, 

 the more he consumes the greater is the demand for manufactures. The office 

 of commerce being to interchange the products of agriculture and manufacture 

 between their respective consumers, it, too, prospers in pi'oportion as the fai-mer 

 and operative thrive. Individuals, however, do not regard the common welfare, 

 but are constantly impelled by self-interest to take from it to enrich themselves. 

 Hence commercial speculations are common where general ignorance prevails of 

 the true conditions of supply and demand. Every public interest is injuriously, 

 atfected through this self-aggrandizement. The Wall street speculations in gold, 

 which led Congress to enact the first law ever passed in this counta-y to regu- 

 late discounts, are not the only instances where individual gain disregarded the 

 public good. 



