THE STORY OF THE NONPARTISAN LEAGUE 



The usage of these two devices was like this : 



When the farmer drove his wagon of wheat 

 upon the scales to have it weighed, the 

 plugged weight deprived him of about seventy- 

 five pounds of the true weight of his cargo. 

 After the wheat, being thus fraudulently 

 weighed, had been shifted from the farmer's 

 wagon to the elevator, the empty \vagon was 

 driven upon the scales to be weighed, that its 

 weight might be deducted from the gross 

 weight of wagon and wheat. Then the scale 

 weight on the upper beam would be pushed 

 beyond zero, with the result that about 

 twenty-five pounds would be added to the 

 apparent weight of the wagon and deducted 

 from the total amount of the wheat. 



By this arrangement the farmer was cheated 

 of amounts varying from fifty -five pounds on 

 every one thousand pounds to one hundred 

 and thirty-five pounds in ten thousand. 



Not only was this definitely proved, but 

 Mr. McCirath was able to make up, in one 

 instance, a bill of $3, .'391 against one elevator 

 for wheat it had secured in this way from 

 certain fanners. 



It appeared, therefore, only too likely that 

 the estimate of the farmers of five hundred 

 thousand bushels of mysteriously disappearing 

 wheat every year was far under the real figures. 



In the view of the victims the chance to 

 escape from these practices was bound up in 



