40 The Tariff and the Farmer. 



the region as is capable of raising surplus crops lias been 

 covered with a network of railways, giving ever-increas- 

 ing facilities in the number and speed of trains, and aug- 

 mented benefits in the form of greatly reduced freight 

 charges. The result has been a rapid settlement of the 

 countrv. That now covered bv the fourteen states of the 

 great Northwest, from Kansas to Washington, had an 

 aggregate population of less than two millions in 1870; 

 in 1890 they had more than seven millions ; m 1900 nearly 

 nine millions." 



''The settlement of the agricultural land of the North- 

 west has brought about a greatly augmented production 

 of food, a shifting of the centre of food production, and a 

 new competition in food markets. Accompanying and 

 promoting these results has been a prodigious increase 

 in the efficiencv and the use of asTicultural machinerv." 



Most of the above description of the changes that took 

 place from 1870 to 1900 on land relates to only fourteen 

 states. Mr. Stanwood does not here refer to the great 

 changes that took place in many others of what old- 

 fashioned folks still call western states, those east of the 

 Mississippi Eiver, or to the southern states. Concerning 

 the latter, now included in the two general divisions of 

 south Atlantic and south central states, it used to be 

 said that it was mainly devoted to the raising of cotton. 

 Now, not only has the highest quantity of cotton raised 

 before the war been doubled, but, besides, agricultural 

 produce, consisting of corn, wheat, oats, hay and forage, 

 meat, vegetables, tobacco, orchard and forest products, 

 etc., are raised to the value of $984,000,000, a sum some- 

 thing less than three times the value of cotton produced 

 in 1899. 



In regard to facilities for producing crops and trans- 



