150 Singing Valleys 



left a memorable picture of what he calls "one of the triumphs 

 of this great American staple production." 



I witnessed on Thursday (Jan. 28) a procession of 20 or 30 carts, 

 the forward one being drawn by 6 white horses and decorated 

 with flags, up Broadway to the grunting of martial music, each 

 cart loaded with 4 or 5 enormous dead hogs. The whole number 

 was 106 hogs, weighing 40,262 Ibs., an average of 380 Ibs. 



These overgrown animals were raised by 5 farmers of Burlington 

 County, N.J. and sold to a pork butcher here. They were nearly 

 uniform in size, with short, duck legs, like Grant Thorburn's; little 

 twinkling eyes peeping out between two mountains of fat, like 

 pins upon a pin-cushion; and hams as round as a full moon and 

 luscious as a turtle's calipash. 



There was Indian corn written in legible characters upon their 

 jolly features, and shining out of their swelling sides; dead though 

 they were. They had, out of benevolence to mankind, laid down 

 their characters as swine to assume that of pork. Every spare-rib 

 and every link of sausage, as well as the more important parts of 

 these children of Ham, will sing the praises of Indian Corn. 



We have seen how the lure of new and ever richer cornlands 

 drew farmers into Illinois, Indiana, across Kentucky to Mis- 

 souri, and up into Iowa. Where they planted corn, they raised 

 hogs. And where the corn flourished, hogs were healthy, fat 

 and prolific. 



The British might deride American bacon and the corn 

 which made it fat. Americans retorted that they liked it that 

 way. They wanted their rashers crisp, not flabby. And they 

 wanted lard for their frying pans and for the crust that covered 

 their pies. Americans wanted pie; lots of pie, and often. The 

 corn and hog belt supplied them with the wherewithal. 



And where the corn grew and hogs grew fat, the railroads 

 came. As a matter of record corn was, and still is, the largest 

 crop in every state of the Union. Most of it was, still is, fed to 

 livestock on the farms where our corn is grown. But the live- 

 stock had to be carried to the packers. Rail kings, smoking long 

 Havanas in their offices in New York, spoke reverently of 



