36 The Condition of the Western Farmer. [314 



which the sandy soil or the roughness of the land was a 

 drawback, or in which it seemed that without irrigation 

 success in agriculture would be very doubtful. This indi- 

 cates another reason why the number of settlers in the 

 township should so greatly increase at this time, the immi- 

 grants often turning back from the frontier and preferring 

 to purchase railroad lands in tried parts of the state near 

 the means of transportation, rather than to take from the 

 government free land the value of which was very uncer- 

 tain. We must here remember the fact, indicated in another 

 plac^, that the settler who took government land really 

 needed almost the same amount of capital in order to bring 

 his*" claim " well under cultivation as was required by the 

 purchaser of railroad land on long time. In 1878 the crops 

 throughout the state were very good, but hail caused almost 

 total destruction of grain over at least half of Harrison 

 township ; and here we can observe the effect of unfavorable 

 local conditions; for the number of newcomers in '79 was 

 not at all affected by the losses of the previous year,> being 

 in fact greater than in any other year since 1872; but the 

 number of removals was affected, being in 1879 much 

 greater than the average. The temporary cessation of im- 

 migration during 1 88 1 must be laid to the severe drouth of 

 1880 and the consequent crop failure. During the next five 

 or six years crops were heavy and prices were good, and in 

 connection with this we notice the steady increase in the 

 number of resident owners. The decrease in the number of 

 such owners in late years must partly be attributed to the 

 removal of prosperous farmers and partly to the removal 

 of those who had met with failure just in what propor- 

 tion will better be seen at a later stage of this paper when 

 we have more data before our consideration. 



Table II. 1 contains the number of purchases or entries, 

 and of sales of lands in the township during the various 



*Jn. this table, for the sake of simplicity, purchasers of school 

 lands are included under the third subhead. 



