DEVELOPMENT OF FARMER'S ECONOMIC PROBLEM 21 



was just the kind to succeed in a new country where commerce 

 could not be counted upon to supply such stores of goods as 

 the wants of men demand. 



The second class of English farmers had been in the habit of 

 producing primarily for the market, and depending upon the 

 market for the supplies of clothing, luxuries, etc., which it was 

 their desire to consume. They had passed on to that stage in the 

 evolution of industrial society where the commercial side of 

 their agriculture dominated, and without a market they could 

 not well survive. Having before our minds these two classes 

 of English farmers, let us next take a glance at the country 

 which they were to occupy. 



The new country provided new crops, such as maize, potatoes, 

 and tobacco, the culture of which could be learned from the 

 Indians. The climate of the eastern coast of America is very 

 different from that of England, and much colder in winter than 

 the settlers may have expected to find in a latitude so much south 

 of their mother country. The Atlantic coast presents two very 

 different areas: tidewater Virginia, with her mild climate, 

 rich soil, and slow-flowing rivers which were well suited for 

 becoming the arteries of commerce ; and New England, with 

 her more severe climate, her poorer soil and rough surface 

 traversed by swift-flowing streams which did not lend them- 

 selves readily to the purposes of transportation. 



Both of these classes of English farmers came to America. 

 The first class, the self-sufficing farmers, got along well in New 

 England. They learned to grow maize and potatoes. They 

 found plenty of fish in the streams. Their old habits of build- 

 ing houses for themselves, manufacturing their own clothing, 

 and producing and preparing for winter's use abundant sup- 

 plies of food, made them the natural inhabitants of the isolated 

 New England of that time. 



But the commercial farmers were not so successful in the 

 North as were their less pretentious fellow countrymen. They 

 sought diligently for some agricultural product which could be 

 transported to London with profit; for it was from London 

 that they could draw the comforts and luxuries which they had 



