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the remaining 50 or 60 per cent is fixed by the price we get for the 

 remainder. 



I know nothing in all the realm of trade and commerce so illogical 

 as that the wheat grower in India who works for 10 cents a day should 

 fix the price of a sack of flour in Sacramento. Yes; there is one ex- 

 ception, and that is, that he should fix the price in Duluth or Omaha 

 or Chicago, where the farmer has a home market in America, for 80 per 

 cent. He had better dump the 20 per cent in the river or the lake, or, 

 what is better, feed it to swine, or, what perhaps is still better, not raise 

 the 20 per cent surplus, than to have an Indian on the Ganges fix the 

 price for four fifths of his crop. Suppose the Eastern farmer should 

 resolve to raise 20 per cent less wheat, or refuse to export any more 

 wheat at Liverpool prices, less the cost of getting it there. What would 

 happen? The farmer could name the price of his wheat for the home 

 market. 



Suppose the Pacific Coast farmer should resolve to raise only enough 

 wheat for the home market, or should feed his surplus. Is it not plain 

 that his wheat, like his hay and other products having no export value, 

 would bring his own price, subject only to home competition? Would it 

 not be better to sell 50 per cent of his wheat at a fair profit than 100 

 per cent at no profit? Why do not our farmers learn wisdom from the 

 manufacturer? Is it not as illogical and absurd to let Liverpool make 

 our home price for wheat as to make our home price for a plow, or an 

 engine, or a harvester, or a suit of clothes? 



Suppose we fruit growers should exploit foreign markets for our green 

 and dried fruits, and should succeed in selling 10 per cent of our product 

 abroad, are we then to let the foreign market make the price in our 

 home market for the remaining 90 per cent? We had better never go 

 abroad with fruit than submit to such a rule. 



I am a profound believer in the value of the American market for 

 American products. 



I cannot see, and never could see, why we have a different law in force 

 as to the home price for wheat from almost every other export product. 

 We export many articles. Our trade abroad used to exceed our imports 

 In value. After 1896 I hope they will again. But where would we be 

 as a wealth-producing nation if our domestic trade of all commodities 

 were regulated by our export trade in the like commodities? The 

 whole philosophy of protective legislation is grounded on the idea of 

 securing the best home market attainable. But this protection would 

 avail us nothing if we could not have a better home market than foreign 

 market. 



Perhaps no agricultural problem at this moment is demanding greater 

 attention than that we are discussing. It has heretofore been rather - 

 sacrilegious to suggest other uses for wheat than for human food. Indeed, 

 its value has precluded such necessity. We have become accustomed to 

 see corn used for fuel, but to make hog feed of wheat shocked the ordi- 

 nary bucolic mind. But to this base use our wheat has come at last. 



I find in the " Rural Press" for October 27th, an extract from a recent 

 report of the Kansas State Board of Agriculture, in which it is shown 

 that in 1893 that State fed about 16 per cent of its entire wheat crop to 

 stock, and in 1894 it will be 30 per cent, or 8,500,000 bushels. ' Over four 

 hundred practical farmers reported on the subject, and from fifty differ- 

 ent counties. The result is interesting and instructive. Compared with 



