HIS LIFE AN'D WORK 



carry 250,000 bushels of wheat in a single load. 

 By this means a ton of wheat is actually carried 

 thirteen miles for one cent. There are to-day 

 small barges on the canals of Holland, large ones 

 on the river Volga, and several thousand steam- 

 ships on the world's main water-ways, all carry- 

 ing burdens of wheat. Enough is now being 

 transported from port to port to give steady 

 work to fully three hundred steamships and 

 summer work to very nearly as many more. 

 There was an exciting contest between the 

 ship and the car in the earlier days of transpor- 

 tation, to see which should carry the largest 

 share of the wheat. About 1869 the car won. 

 In this year, too, the United States was belted 

 with a railway, east to west, which meant the 

 opening up of the first great wheat-empire. 

 Other railways pushed out into the vast prairies 

 of the West, lured by the call of the wheat. 

 They were the pioneers of the world's wheat- 

 railways. Wheat was their chief freight and 

 wheat farmers were their chief passengers. At 

 the outset the grain was shipped in bags. Then 

 some railway genius invented the grain-car, 



