22 HOW TO GET A FAKM, 



land so entered at any time before the expiration of the five 

 years, and obtaining a patent therefor from the Government, 

 as in other cases provided by law, on making proof of 

 settlement and cultivation as provided by existing laws 

 granting pre-emption rights. 



Here is land for almost nothing. A quarter sec 

 tion is a hundred and sixty acres. The whole cost 

 of obtaining such a farm is the ten dollars to be 

 paid to the Receiver of the Land-office in which 

 the farm may be located. On payment of this sum 

 he enters into immediate possession, and after re 

 maining five years upon it, he receives a patent 

 from the government, which is equivalent to a deed 

 in fee. 



It may be supposed that this cheap way of getting 

 a farm would occasion an instantaneous rush from 

 East to West, to secure locations on the public do 

 main, as well as an enormous influx of European 

 immigrants. The act did not go into effect until 

 January 1, 1863 ; yet, within four months from that 

 date, notwithstanding the troubled state of the coun 

 try, more than a million of acres were taken up 

 under its provisions, and, by the close of September, 

 this amount was increased to nearly a million and 

 a half. But the great bulk of enterprising and ad 

 venturous Americans have either been drawn into 

 the army or been too much occupied at home by 

 the pressure of business forced upon them by the 

 brisk demand for manufactures, occasioned by the 

 war, to undertake the founding of a new home in 

 the &quot;West. Neither of these classes has been at full 



