66 



The Condition of the Western Farmer. [344 



figures being $6.41 as against $4.67. The conclusion is 

 that while over two-thirds of the debt has been incurred by 

 residents, and a much larger percentage of residents' land is 

 under mortgage than of non-residents', still the debt per acre 

 which the mortgaged residents have incurred upon their 

 lands is slightly less than the debt similarly incurred by 

 mortgaged non-residents. 



XVII.-DEBT INCURRED BY RESIDENTS AND BY NON- 

 RESIDENTS. 



4. Our next tables deal with the debt of residents still 

 more largely from a personal point of view. They distrib- 

 ute it into divisions according as the borrower was a taker 

 of government land, a purchaser of land from the railroad 

 company, or a purchaser from some other former owner; 

 purchasers of school land are included, for the sake of sim- 

 plicity, under this last division. Table XVIII. shows the 

 number of owners both with mortgaged and with unmort- 

 gaged lands in each of these three classes, and gives the 

 number of acres each class possesses, and the totals of its 

 debts. It also gives the average size of farms, the average 

 debt per man and the average debt per acre for each of 

 these classes. Class "A," composed of those who took 

 their original lands from the government, is divided into 

 two sub-classes according as the farmers have borrowed 

 money on their original homesteads, or still have them free 

 from debt; and those who have their original homes still 

 unencumbered are divided further into those who owe no 



