210 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



May 



expected. The prospects for house mechanics 

 are not as encouraging as last year. The de- 

 mand for houses and stores has caused a re- 

 markable activity in building for five years 

 past, and employed a large number of able- 

 bodied men in the erection of the buildings 

 and in preparing the material throughout the 

 country. A check to these branches of indus- 

 try will be felt at once in the rural districts, 

 as any depression in our manufactures will 

 send labor back to the farm for employment. 



The scarcity of farm help during the la-t 

 decade can easily be accounted for when we 

 consider the vast amount of labor that has 

 been accoiuplished ; the number of men re- 

 quired to fight the battles of our country ; to 

 prepare the implements and munitions of war ; 

 to extend and carry on the different branches 

 of our varied industry in a full tide of un- 

 paralled prosperity ; to execute the public 

 improvements, and erect mills, factories and 

 houses at the rapid rate that has been done. 

 Our country will be unlike others, if with the 

 thousands of foreigners weekly landing upon 

 our shores the cities and manufacturing villages 

 can continue many years longer to draw so 

 heavily upon the ifarming population. Manu- 

 factures are comparatively a new enterprise, 

 and they are seeing their palmy days. Soon 

 the resident population around these busy 

 hives of industry will supply all the labor they 

 require. The rush from the farms to the vil- 

 lage and city will be checked, and there will 

 be a superabundance of help in the rural dis- 

 tricts, as there v/as before manufacturing in- 

 terests assumed such gigantic proportions, 

 and as now exist in the old world. 



The fall of gold will affect those who raise 

 only such crops as are exported more than 

 New England farmers who grow other kinds 

 and who do not supply their home markets. 

 All that is raised here is wanted for home 

 consumption, and the price of most articles 

 depends on the supply rather than fluctua- 

 tions at the gold board. The ruling price of 

 vegetables v/as very low last year ; cabbages 

 and some other kinds brought to the producer 

 no more than the average of prices before the 

 war. If market gardeners made wages last 

 season, they need not fear smaller profits this 

 year fi-om any direct infiuences of a decline of 

 j:old. Potatoes are sell'ing at low figures. 

 The retail price now wou<ld not have been con- 

 sidered high ten years ago. They have come 

 down to old rates without much regard to the 

 premium on gold. When the market is full 

 of old potatoes, the new or early crop starts 

 at low rates, and sell slowly. No man can 

 afford to pay fancy prices for early sorts to 

 raise them for table use. Early Rose are 

 now quoted at one dollar and less per bushel 

 in New York. Too many are trying to make 

 money by raising early potatoes. The late 

 crop may pay as well this year. Corn may 

 fall considerably, and still a profit can be 

 made by growing it, even in New England. 



There will undoubtedly be a larger area 

 planted this spring. Flour is selling lower 

 than it was before the war, according to the 

 rate of wages ; that is, mechanics and laborers 

 can earn a barrel quicker now^ than thej' could 

 then. It is ascertained that less winter wheat 

 has been sown than in 1868, thoun;h the pros- 

 pects of a large foreign demand for American 

 grain are unusually good. Barley, oats and 

 rye will pay even at lower rates, if the raiser 

 is near a market and sells the straw at an ad- 

 vani-age. 



Meat has not fallen with gold and the price 

 of grain ; beef sells this winter as high as it 

 did when gold was 2.50. Our neat stock was 

 diminished by the war. That loss is not yet 

 made up. Nearly every State in the Union 

 is laid under contribuiion to supply our mar- 

 kets. The demand for choice pieces of beef 

 increases, and there is every prospect that 

 beef will command good prices for some time 

 to come. Owing to the decrease of sheep at 

 the East, and to a more general use of mutton, 

 we need not fear a material fall in this. Pork 

 sells for about one hundred per cent, more 

 than it did in 1860, while the cost of the ma- 

 terial for producing it has not advanced in 

 the same ratio. This profit, and the tact that 

 swine can be multiplied so rapidly may cause 

 a decline in pork before long. 



Our markets, through the increase of popu- 

 lation, are yearly calling for more and more, 

 and there is little danger of an over supply 

 in any of the staple crops. The prices of all 

 our crops depend more, in fact, on the season 

 than on an inflated currency, or on the re- 

 sumption or no-resumption of specie pay- 

 ment. For the last seven years the products 

 of the dairy have sold remarkably well ; cheese 

 manuf icturers have been surprised at the re- 

 sults of their labors. The high prices of these 

 articles have placed them among the luxuries 

 of many families, and should there be a slight 

 fall the producers will have no cause to com- 

 plain. Eggs and poultry sell quickly, and 

 farmers cannot say that consumers do not pay 

 enough for them. The annual consumption 

 of eggs is truly surprising. A few years ago 

 New England supplied her own markets ; now 

 eggs are brought here from West of the Mis- 

 sissippi ; but commission merchants may bring 

 them from whatever distance they please, 

 still, that which is produced nearest our mar- 

 kets, if carefully prepared, will command the 

 highest price and quickest sale. The demand 

 for well cured hay is increasing faster than 

 our farmers are preparing to sell. Its price 

 appears to be regulated solely by the amount 

 produced and by the price of grain. N. s. t. 



Lawrence, Mass., March 10, 1870. 



— An English writer thinks the American early 

 potatoes will come to an end ere long, for as each 

 new variety is claimed to ripen about ten days 

 earlier than any other, the time between planting 

 and digging will soon be used up. 



