THE INFLUENCE OF CROPS UPON BUSINESS 23 



can be rendered, it would appear that in the past variations in the 

 wheat crop have probably been the most significant for general 

 business. That crop has often been worth less than half of the 

 value of the corn crop, and changes in its amount have probably 

 not affected the country's general income and consumption as 

 much ; but it has been much more closely connected with the 

 transportation interests of the country, and it has exerted a more 

 variable and more immediate influence upon the general trade 

 balance. The cotton crop has frequently been more valuable, and 

 has entered in far greater proportions into our foreign trade ; but 

 the cotton product does not affect American transportation inter- 

 ests to a similar extent, and the value of our cotton exports has 

 remained comparatively steady, whatever has been their amount. 

 Of the several American crops, then, we may tentatively conclude 

 that that of wheat is most closely related to business at large, and 

 that the fluctuations in its output are the most widely felt. This 

 by no means implies that the wheat crop has always been the 

 dominant factor in determining the measure of prosperity in trade. 

 Numerous other influences, as we have already seen, have played 

 from time to time the leading rdle, and there have been occasional 

 years, as in 1 884-1 885, when a season of profound depression in 

 business accompanied and followed a record-breaking output of 

 wheat, or as in 1 900-1 901, when a period of great buoyancy and 

 commercial advance ensued upon a deficient crop of wheat. The 

 supposition which we have made with regard to wheat is only one 

 of general tendency, liable, as is every influence in this world, to 

 be overbalanced by counteracting factors. 



Granting that wheat has exceeded the other agricultural prod- 

 ucts in the past as a trade-influencing factor, its continued su- 

 premacy in the future is still open to question. Conditions are 

 continually changing, and within the past two or three years there 

 have not been lacking indications of the diminishing, importance 

 of the wheat crop as a factor in our trade balance. Our wheat 

 exports declined so rapidly in 1904 and 1905 that for the time 

 being we appeared no longer in the ranks of important wheat 

 exporters. The total wheat exports during the fiscal year 1904- 

 1905 were the smallest in our history sirK:e 1872. Whether this 



