30 LAND AND LABOR. 



produce as much food as could be raised by the 

 naked muscle and tools of a score of our fathers. 

 There is now no known limit to the power of its pro- 

 duction. In consumption there is no corresponding 

 increase. Our fathers required, obtained, and used as 

 many ounces of food per day as we do. It might 

 have been different in kind and quality nothing 

 more. 



Not long ago the farm found constant employment 

 for all its sons, and also for many of the children of 

 the city. But now it furnishes work for but a very 

 small portion of its own children, and that for a few 

 weeks or months at most in the year, and for the re- 

 mainder of the twelve months employment must be 

 had in the cities and towns, or not at all. Here we 

 find the true reason for stagnation in the population 

 of the older agricultural sections, and abnormal growth 

 and crowding of the cities. 



The use of machinery in general manufactures, and 

 especially of textiles, has had an equally potent effect 

 upon the daughters of the farm, in compelling them, 

 also, to seek employment in the manufacturing towns 

 and cities, because there was no longer work to be 

 found under the old roof tree, as will be here shown. 



The great revolution that has been effected in our 

 industrial and social conditions, by the use of machin- 

 ery and labor saving processes in general production, 

 to the exclusion, in great part, of manual labor, may, 

 perhaps, be best seen by the changes that have been 

 wrought within a few years in all that relates to our 

 farming interests. For which see next chapter, on 

 the " Bonanza Farms." 



