10 RESOURCES OF SOUTHERN ALABAMA. 



an increased concentration in some places along the coast on 

 account of fisheries and commerce. When deposits of valu- 

 able minerals were opened up people flocked to them, and the 

 invention of innumerable kinds of labor-saving machinery 

 has caused the development of many large manufacturing 

 centers, which import food and clothing materials from all 

 over the country in exchange for factory products. The 

 discovery of mineral fertilizers in various parts of the world 

 since the middle of the last century has made agriculture 

 profitable on many soils in the South once thought hope- 

 lessly sterile, and thus profoundly affected the distribution 

 of population (incidentally placing "the South in the saddle" 

 in national politics in recent years) ; and the development 

 of dry-farming and irrigation has had a similar effect in the 

 arid regions of the West. 



After each new discovery or invention has had time to 

 take effect the advantages of different parts of the earth 

 are pretty nicely balanced ; otherwise the population of the 

 less favored regions would be perpetually discontented, and 

 trying to migrate to the more favored regions. But as a 

 matter of fact there are multitudes of successful and con- 

 tented people in practically every county in the United 

 States, who would rather live in that particular spot than 

 anywhere else. Where natural resources are few the popu- 

 lation is usually sparse, but the very fact that the most 

 fertile regions are thickly settled interferes with the fullest 

 enjoyment of life and development of resourcefulness by 

 the inhabitants thereof, and makes competition more in- 

 tense. City dwellers have to live under all sorts of restraints 

 to avoid conflict with their neighbors, have to take more pre- 

 cautions against epidemics, and have to pay more rent and 

 taxes than the country people. However, many persons have 

 long been accustomed to that sort of life and would be lone- 

 some and dissatisfied in a thinly settled region, and of 

 course there are some at the other extreme and all grada- 

 tions between. Almost every one has read ^Esop's fable 

 about the city mouse and country mouse who exchanged 

 visits and were each glad to get back home again, and heard 

 of the pioneer settler who felt crowded when somebody else 

 located within five miles of him, and thought it was time to 

 pull up and move farther west. 



There is now no longer any geographical frontier of 

 settlement in the United States, where any one so inclined 



