DRY-FARMING 



an old map of the United States, of just 

 forty years ago, and you will see that vast 

 region marked "The Great American 

 Desert" which stretched from the Mis- 

 souri to the Rockies. What has hap- 

 pened? In the space of a single 

 generation, a vast army of settlers has 

 invaded this region and six transconti- 

 nental railroads^ bring food and the 

 daily paper to the farmer's door. Next 

 turning to the British Empire we note 

 that great desert region of Australia so 

 quaintly called the "Never-Never-Coun- 

 try" on the fringe of which farmers even 

 now are settling. Lastly, coming to 

 South Africa, we can mark out the 

 Kalahari Desert, or, as it is termed in the 



1 On the 10th of last May forty years had elapsed 

 since the rails of the Union Pacific moving westward met 

 the rails of the Central Pacific moving eastward at Prom- 

 ontory Point, near Ogden, Utah, and the first transconti- 

 nental railway was finished. To-day the United States 

 possesses 230,000 miles of railroads, or forty-seven per 

 cent, of the railway system of the whole world. 



4 



