FARMING A PRIMARY INDUSTRY 63 



with its bacon, butter, and eggs, and American or Austra- 

 lian farmers send England most of its grain food. 



In America there is an army of over 10,000,000 workers 

 with their families engaged in agriculture. But compared 

 with the number of those engaged in personal service, and 

 in secondary industries, like manufacturing, this vast army 

 is becoming smaller and smaller. This decline has been 

 partly explained in Chapter II. It is caused largely by 

 the progress in the refinements of civilization. Raw mate- 



FARMERS SHIPPING BY BOAT. 



rials are produced on the farm. The market demands 

 finer and finer products from these materials, finer and 

 more attractive clothing, sugar, shoes, and the like. 

 Standards of living are rising. Consequently, an increas- 

 ing number of men are being withdrawn from farm work 

 to those industries that elaborate and refine. 



As was stated in the second chapter, the invention of 

 new machinery will continue to cause men to shift from 

 one or the other of these groups of occupations. The per- 

 fection of the reaper meant fewer men on the land and 

 more in the mill. Labor-saving devices in the mills turn 

 some of the workers back to the land. But however great 



