46 HOW TO GET A FARM, 



only the inexhaustible quantity of land now freely 

 open to all who choose to occupy it, but refer to its 

 variety of character as adapted to suit the diversi 

 fied wishes of the many who seek to acquire farms. 

 The farmer can be accommodated with woodland or 

 prairie, the lumberman or mechanic with densely 

 wooded forest, the miller or manufacturer with 

 mill-sites, the miner with either silver, gold, or 

 coal. 



The quantity is without limit, and the uses to 

 which it may be profitably applied are so numerous 

 that the most fastidious applicant may be supplied 

 with what he wishes. Millions of families may thus 

 obtain farms before the quantity now open for se 

 lection can be appropriated. It will require cen 

 turies to fill it up. Hence those either here or 

 abroad, who learn for the first time that farms may 

 be had on the simple condition of living on them 

 for five years, may entertain no fear that a sudden 

 absorption will deprive them of the opportunity of 

 obtaining one. It is the monopolists and specula 

 tors who are repudiated, not the actual settler. 



How this national liberality is to affect the value 

 of land generally, may be inferred from what has 

 followed the abolition of serfdom in Russia. That 

 great measure threw open millions of acres to the 

 occupancy and ownership of a people who had here 

 tofore only tilled them for the benefit of a master. 

 The privilege of obtaining land, even by paying for 

 it, revolutioned the feelings and industry of the en 

 tire mass. Emancipation was completely triumphant 

 in every respect. All the forebodings of the re- 



