INDIANA CANE GROWERS. 459 



as well as of Europe. In our recent visit among the sugar makers of the lower 

 coast of Louisiana, we took occasion to inquire as to the desirableness of the busi- 

 ness, and was assured that it was indeed very fascinating — that a sugar maker was ' 

 never known to sell out his plantation ; and th«n our informant facetiously re- 

 marked, " The sheriff always saves him that trouble." We were then assured that 

 not one planter on the coast was doing a paying business, and that many of them 

 were irretrievably ruined. It is therefore obvious that the depression felt in the 

 Northern cane industry is also shared in by the South, as well as Germany and 

 France, including the sugar-producing island with which we have commerce. 



For the benefit of protectionists, I quote from the Sugar Bowl of January 3, 

 1885: 



"The population of Kansas, in 1883, was 1,028,729, and her proportional sugar 

 tax would be two and three-quarter millions of dollars, but by growing her own 

 cane she was enabled to save all but the fraction of a million, putting the round 

 two millions into the pockets of her farmers. About 50,000 acres of sorghum was 

 grown for syrup, yielding over four and a half million gallons, or about four gal- 

 lons to each inhabitant of the State. 



" The prospect for profitable sugar making is so good that a refinery was built 

 last year that cost $125,000, and which gave employment during the busy season to 

 one hundred and sixty men and fifty teams. The company last year grew 1,500 

 acres of cane, with an average yield of from ten to twelve tons per acre. The price 

 paid for unstripped cane delivered at the factory was $1.75 per ton, and farmers re- 

 gard the price so remunerative that it is expected that the amount furnished may 

 soon be enough, so that the company will go out of the cultivation." 



This is a favorable showing for Kansas, and yet it now turns out that all the 

 large sugar factories in the State of Kansas have failed to pay the expense of work- 

 ing, to say nothing of dividends on capital invested. At a rough estimate, the 

 whole amount thus invested will not exceed half a million of dollai's, while the an- 

 nual saving is estimated at two millions ! 



It appears that at a recent meeting of the " Hawaiian Commercial and Sugar 

 Company," held at San Francisco, that company, representing ten millions of dol- 

 lars, is also embarrassed. To make some much needed repairs, its President bor- 

 rowed a million dollars, which the stockholders refused to indorse. This, with a 

 sudden drop from $120 a ton to $87 a ton for sugar, is assigned as a reason for the 

 embarrassment. These examples and figures are introduced here to show that the 

 sugar and syrup business is also under a cloud in other places besides with us. 



Wheat has for some time past been sell.ing at a ruinous figure. The bottom 

 seems to have fallen out of wool, and all of us can well remember times when pork 

 was sold at a loss. What, then ; shall we strike wheat from the list of farm pro- 

 ducts, abandon sheep and wool, and neglect our swine? You-negative the propo- 

 sition at once. And the same will hold good with reference to our sweetening, 

 which is not only a luxury, but has grown in the estimation of our people to be a 

 positive necessity. And in reference to overproduction of this staple, what other 

 infallible means of knowing how far to go had we, except by actual trial? Pre- 

 vious estimates, founded upon arithmetical calculations, all failed to give the neces- 

 Bary warning, and with one common consent we all entered the "overflow" and 



