REPORT OP THE STATISTICIAN. 373 



portatiou declined in consequence, the markets Tvere surfoifced, price?! 

 \^'cre reduced, and farmers wandered what was the matter with the wheat 

 trade; 



The expected has arrived. The prediction has been fulfilled. Wheat 

 was in 18S5 at the lowest figure in England for one hundred and tweuty- 

 ti vc years. Ten years ago the farmers were told, in Department reportvs, 

 that overproduction and low prices were inevitable, unless more promi- 

 nence should be given to other crops. Eighteen years ago, in the sta- 

 tistical report for October, it was said of the Northwest : " Cattle are 

 high in price, horses very high, milk is scarce, and butter sometimes 

 unknown, while straw-stacks are burning, and the wheat at the mercy 

 of speculators and the railroads, and bringing high prices only under 

 the curse of God upon foreign wheat fields, and when foreign nations 

 are in danger of famine, and even then but a moiety of the supply comes 

 from this country." 



How much ? From 1820 to 1860 the average export in wheat and flour 

 was 8,688,012 bushels annually. For eight years after that date, under 

 the stimulus of the premium on gold, the average rose to 36,569,985 

 bushels. Then the deficient European harvests of later years gave ex- 

 cuse for enlarged breadth of our wheat fields, till the exportation reached 

 186,321,214 bushels in 1880-'81, the largest year's shipment, followed in 

 the last four years by a greatly reduced movement, an average reduc- 

 tion of 58,000,000 bushels, and the demoralization of prices, farmers still 

 enlarging the area of wheat, heedless of the warning from Europe. 



The main factor in recent heavy exportation has been a series of par- 

 tial crop failures in Western Europe. When a period of larger yield 

 came, it ushered in an era of reduced importation. There are two pos- 

 sible avenues of relief to our grain-growers : a famine in Europe, or a 

 reduction of acreage. If they wait for the former low prices may con- 

 tinue some years longer. 



The exportation of eight years past, 1,118,288,472 bushels, is nearly 

 the same as for the entire fifty-one preceding years, which equaled 

 1,135,198,673 bushels, and yet, so variable is the demand, that the annual 

 shipments have differed 90,000,000 bushels in two years. The effect of 

 this uncertainty is disastrous to all calculations of price and profit ; it 

 is anomalous, in producing high prices for some of our heaviest crops 

 and low prices for some of the worst yields on record. 



Eight years ago, as a result of careful and repeated investigation and 

 analysis of local distribution, the estimated average consumption was 

 fixed at 4§ bushels per annum. The amount used for seed was also 

 obtained by investigation by counties, and added to the consumption for 

 bread. A third element in the distribution was the quantity exported. 

 These three items made an aggregate only 10,000,000 bushels less than 

 tlio estimate of the year 1877. It is a bold test of the accitracy of these 

 data concerning distribution, as also of the verity of our annual esti- 

 Liates of production, to apply the same methods and ratios to the com- 

 parison of production and distribution of the subsequent years of tlie 

 period. It can scarcely be possible that error, if one exists, either in 

 the rate of consumption, or the annual estimate of production, will fail 

 to discover itself in eight years, if indeed it should not be apparent in a 

 single year. The estimates are made in advance of the distribution, and 

 without any knowledge of what the exportation will be, and by methods 

 entirely disconnected with the facts of distribution. 



The following table shows how the movement of wheat tallies with 

 its assumed production, the food supply being calculated at the above 



