THE IRRIGATION AGE. 



people of the United States annually con- 

 sume, or that it can absorb a very large 

 percentage of the $1,200,000,000 worth of 

 our annual productions smaller in area 

 than the state of Connecticut and with a 

 population less than that of the city of 

 Brooklyn, it may not be able to meet the 

 somewhat extravagant expectations which 

 enthusiastic people have formed with ref- 

 erence to it." The island is mountain- 

 ous from center to circumference and as 

 the 1,000,000 people who occupy its 3.760 

 square miles of territory have most of 

 the available soil under cultivation, it 

 will not offer many inducements to the 

 homeseeker. Coffee, sugar, and tobacco 

 are the principal exports, and agriculture 

 is carried on in a very primitive manner. 



Of the natives it may truthfully be said 

 "Man wants but little here below.'' for 

 they have no idea of luxury. Mr. Austin 

 says that !> A little rice, a very little flour, 

 a few beans and plenty of bananas, plan- 

 tain, breadfruit and vegetables satisfy 

 their physical necessities, a few yards of 

 cotton cloth for the adults and nothing 

 for the chidren meet their principal re- 

 quirements for clothing, while a few rough 

 boards and a plentiful supply of plantain 

 and palm leaves supply the material for 

 the humble dwellings throughout the in- 

 terior and in many of the villages.'' Ed- 

 ucation is. naturally, not of a very high 

 order. Spanish is the principal language 

 spoken, though the French settlers retain 

 their own language and there are a few 

 English-speaking people in the towns. 

 As a compliment to the "change of owner- 

 ship" one of the two daily newspapers 

 published in Ponce prints one page 'in 

 English. It is mostly extracts from our 

 constitution and biographical sketches of 

 our great men. 



Porto Rico will offer attractions to Am- 

 ericans who are seeking a health resort 

 or who desire a pleasurable winter resort, 

 and with Cuba and Hawaii will help fur- 

 nish a great share of our tropical imports 

 and enable us to expend our money among 

 our own possessions. 



Another Sept. 2 marked the passing 

 Pioneer away of another Mormon pio- 

 Gone. neer Wilford Woodruff, pres- 



ident of the Mormon church. He was 91 

 years of age and had been a Mormon 



for sixty-five years, being one of the orig- 

 inal 147 pioneers who reached Salt Lake 

 Valley in 1847. He was beloved by all his 

 people and the many thousands who at- 

 tended his funeral services proved the es- 

 teem in which he was held. It is thought 

 that Lorenzo Snow will succeed him as 

 president of the church. It is a curious 

 fact that New England, the home of Puri- 

 tanism, furnised to Mormonism three of 

 its four leaders, Joseph Smith and Brig- 

 ham Young were from Connecticut, while 

 Woodruff was born in Vermont. 



The Czar's peace manifesto 



The Czar's ^as occasioned much comment. 

 Manifesto. ., ., ., , , . 



While the press as a whole is 

 inclined to regard it as something that 

 should be hailed by all humane persons as 

 'one of those flashings of light out of 

 darkness which renew faith in God and 

 man and the beneficient increasing pur- 

 pose which runs through the ages,'' there 

 is here and there a cynical editor who 

 thinks that the czar's desire for peace is 

 something after this fashion: 



Russia I will build a great battleship. 



England I will build two. 



Russia I will build four great battle- 

 ships. 



England I will build eight. 



Russia. Let us have peace. 



The fact that British imports 

 Our Foreign into the United states have 



fallen off greatly in the past 

 year while American exports to Great 

 Britain have greatly increased has been 

 announced from time to time during the 

 year, but the full year's figures, just pre- 

 sented by the Treasury Bureau of Statis- 

 tics, brings to the surface some interesting 

 details not heretofore published. These 

 show that while the exports from the 

 United States to the United Kingdom 

 have incr eased 1 12 percent, the imports 

 from the United Kingdom have fallen off 

 35 per cent. The exports from the United 

 States to the United Kingdom during the 

 past year were in round numbers five 

 times as much as the imports from the 

 United Kingdom, the figures of the Bureau 

 of Satistics being: Imports from the 

 United Kingdom, $109,138,365; Exports 

 to the United Kingdom $540,860.152. 



The most decided decrease of imports 

 from the United Kingdom to this country 



