192 LAND AND LABOR. 



ing complete financial returns from the States in 

 rebellion, this table presents a graphic diagram a 

 perfect picture of the effect upon general business 

 caused by the employment or nonemployment of the 

 masses. So would a similar table of the period be- 

 tween 1837 and 1857, with the Mexican war in the 

 middle, if it could be obtained, though less grand in 

 its proportions. And so will any period of general 

 employment of the masses, from whatever cause, or in 

 whatever country, sandwiched between two periods 

 of great idleness. There is an economic law govern- 

 ing these matters as inflexible as the law that governs 

 the siderial system. 



This table also shows the extraordinary increase of 

 traders middlemen, between the producers and con- 

 sumers immediately after the close of the war, and 

 which has continued to the present time, caused by 

 large numbers being forced out of the abnormal in- 

 dustries of the war into idleness, and the necessity of 

 finding something to do, as stated in the chapter on 

 " The Economic Effects of the War of the Rebellion." 

 In 1866 the number of traders is shown to be 160,303, 

 being 1 to every 222 inhabitants, or every 37 of our 

 voting population. In 1867 the number had risen to 

 205,000, being 1 to every 177 inhabitants, or every 29 

 voters. In 1870 it was 427,292, being 1 trader to 

 every 89 inhabitants, or every 15 voters ; in 1878 they 

 had increased to 674,741, being 1 to every 72 inhabi- 

 tants, or every 12 voters ; and in 1882 the number of 

 traders, reckoning each trading company or house as 

 one trader, had reached to 852,256, being 1 to every 

 61 inhabitants, or 1 to every 10 voters. 



