32 LAND AND LABOR. 



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strong desire that I: 7 should go over their road, visit 

 some of the greaj iarms in its neighborhood, and see 

 for myself. H$ spoke enthusiastically of the country, 

 and particularly of the rare opportunities there pre- 

 sented for/the investment of capital in agriculture as 

 a first {ftass financial operation ; and also of the gen- 

 eraly^nd particular attention that great capitalists were 

 /giving to the matter, especially upon the line of that 

 road, and mentioned a large number who had already 

 embarked in the enterprise, and of others who had 

 purchased lands with that object. I desired him to 

 give me a list of some of the names mentioned, to 

 which he at once responded with the following memo- 

 randum: 



"Thompson & Kendall farm, about 7,000 acres. The Rock 

 County farm, near Luverne, Thompson & Warner, 50,000 acres, 

 of which about 6,000 acres are under cultivation. President 

 Drake, of St. Paul and Sioux City Railroad, has numerous farms, 

 with tenants working on shares. General Bishop, manager of 

 railroad, has 3,200 acres under cultivation. George I. Seney, 

 President Metropolitan Bank, New York City, has 2,000 acres 

 under cultivation, near Sheldon, Iowa. A. E. Orr, of David 

 Dows & Co., New York, has a large farm on the line, and 

 Goldsmidt, the great German banker, Frankfort-on-the-Main, 

 has several large farms. President Drake's son, and Horace 

 Thompson's son, are each managing large farms, and every 

 director in the organization has his large farm with tenants 

 cultivating the soil." 



Commissioner Drake also placed in my hands a cir- 

 cular in which he endeavors to prove to the capitalist 

 that investments made in the lands of that road, ;it 

 current prices, and cultivated in wheat and other 

 crops, will pay twenty per cent, upon the whole in- 



