484 , HISTORY OF THE GRANGE MOVEMENT; OR, 



single car-load of flour and bacon. Only twenty-three 

 or twenty-four car-loads of provisions were shipped in 

 this way last Spring, for the reason that these transac- 

 tions are all between members of the Order, and the 

 Grange had not at that time become much of an institu- 

 tion in the Southern States. There are now in the 

 South 597 Granges, outside of Missouri, and it is ex- 

 pected that the number will be increased to at least 

 1000 by Spring. By that time it is also hoped that 

 the Grangers of this State will have established a 

 number of packing-houses and perhaps a few mills, so 

 that they will be able to ship provisions directly to 

 Southern consumers without their passing through the 

 hands of any middle-men. There is no doubt that a 

 large business of this kind will be done next year. 



" Cooperative buying and selling by the Granges is 

 as yet but an experiment, but the facts which I have 

 set forth in this letter, all of which I have gathered 

 from official sources, show it to be a very promising 

 one. Of course there. have been, and will be, difficul- 

 ties to overcome. The farmers are often timid ; a 

 sudden decline in the market causing them to lose 

 money on a single shipment of grain sometimes alarms 

 them, and they are prone to go back to the old grain- 

 buyers, forgetting, perhaps, that their gains on other 

 shipments compensate many times for the loss on one. 

 Dishonest men may secure appointments as agents and 

 swindle them, and a hundred other things may occur 

 to retard the success of the system. But the leaders 

 of it, most of whom have been life-long disciples of Mr. 

 Greeley, believe that the principle is right, and that 

 the Grange organization furnishes the machinery by 

 which it can be put into practical operation. 



