166 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



Mr. Taft. How'much is the cost of labor and fertilizer? 



Mr. Graves. The cost would be from one hundred and 

 twenty-five to one hundred and fifty dollars. 



Mr. Taft. And the balance would be profit ? 



Mr. Graves. The balance would be profit, of course. 

 This would be calculated upon a yield of eighteen or nine- 

 teen hundred pounds per acre, and I have just heard of a 

 man who raises twenty-six hundred pounds to the acre. 



Mr. Slade. To what extent do you ask for protection? 



Mr. Graves. Sufficient to keep Sumatra tobacco out of 

 the market. 



Mr. Sedgwick. If the farmers need protection on tobacco, 

 they also need it on other crops. I raise potatoes for sale. 

 Last year I could have sold my potatoes in New York City, 

 from $1.25 to $1.50 per bushel if it had not been for the impor- 

 tation of potatoes, the result of which was that I had to sell 

 my crop for 90 cents a bushel. I was in a produce house last 

 week in New York, when a customer came in and said, "What 

 is the price of beans per bushel?" The dealer said, " Amer- 

 ican beans are worth $2.75, but we have got some very fine 

 German beans here for $2.50." German cabbages were im- 

 ported into New York last winter by the ship-load, and sold 

 for less than our crop which we put on the market. I no- 

 ticed by a paper last week that one hundred and twenty pack- 

 ages of butter had been shipped from Liverpool to Chicago, 

 because it could be bought for a less price than American 

 butter. Now I say, if fiirmers want protection (and they 

 ought to have protection, because they sell their products 

 in the lowest market in the world, and pay the highest 

 price for everything they buy) — if they want protection, 

 they must ask protection for other crops as well as for 

 tobacco. 



Mr. Paul. I would like to ask Mr. Graves one question. 

 I understood him to say that the cost of raising an acre of 

 tobacco, when the gross sales amounted to seven hundred 

 dollars an acre, was one hundred and twenty-five dollars for 

 fertilizer, and one hundred dollars for labor. He says now, 

 if I understand him, that at the present time, the cost of ferti- 

 lizer and labor amounts to one hundred and twenty-five or 

 one hundred and fifty dollars. I would like to inquire if 



