2/8 OUR DOMESTIC BIRDS 



necessary. But it is not a question of numbers ; it is a question 

 of conditions. The number depends more or less upon whether 

 the middleman at any stage finds it more advantageous to deal 

 with one next to him in the general series or to pass one or 

 more and deal with another farther away. In the United States 

 prices of eggs are finally determined by the demand and supply 

 in the large cities of the East ; the prices at other points are 

 usually the prices in these cities, minus the cost of transpor- 

 tation and handling. In periods of scarcity, however, there is 

 a tendency to uniformity of prices in all large cities. 



The movements of poultry to market are made in much the 

 same way as the movement of eggs. As a rule the same people 

 handle both. 



How the demand for poultry products stimulates production. 

 In the preceding sections it was assumed, for the purpose of 

 showing clearly the relation of the middleman to both the pro- 

 ducer and the consumer, that the movement of these articles 

 from the country producer to the city buyer came about as the 

 result of the existence of a surplus in farming districts. As a matter 

 of fact the movement is produced by the demand in localities 

 which do not produce their own supplies. One effect of the 

 increase of population in cities is to cause farmers near the 

 cities to grow more poultry and sometimes to establish special 

 poultry farms. But as grain and labor cost more near the cities, 

 the poultry and eggs produced near them must be sold at high 

 prices. If the city people were dependent upon these local 

 supplies, only the rich could afford them. 



As this is true of all perishable food articles, as well as of 

 poultry products, the growth of cities was restricted as long as 

 there was no means of bringing provisions quickly from places 

 where they could be produced at low cost. When steam railroads 

 were built, this restriction on the growth of cities was partly 

 removed. Many cities then began to grow very fast, and the 

 demands of their population for cheap food led city dealers in 



