Report on the American and Canadian Meat Trade. 299 
In the ( Statistician's Report of the Department of Agriculture 
for the year 1875, the area of land under crops is summarised as 
follows : — - 
Acres. 
Indian corn 44,841,371 
Wheat 20,381,512 
Eye 1,359,788 
Oats 11,015,075 
Barley 1,789,902 
Buckwheat 575,530 
Potatoes 1,510,041 
Hay 23,507,964 
Tobacco 559,049 
Cotton 10,803,030 
Total acreage under crops . . 123 , 243 , 262 
Deducting the foregoing total acreage under crops from the 
total area of land in farms, as given bj the Census of 1870, we 
have a surplus in grass of 284,480,102 acres. This is, however, 
at present certainly below the mark, for, in the five years between 
1870 and 1875, a large quantity of land, classed in the former 
year as " land surveyed but not in farms," was taken possession 
of by settlers, and more or less fenced in and cultivated — a 
larger area, in all probability, than the increase in the same 
period of land under crops, great as that was. Compare these 
figures with similar ones relating to Great Britain, and they 
come out in very bold relief. In the year 1870 there were in 
the United States and Territories a grand total of 407,723,364 
acres in farms. In the year 1875 there were in the British 
Islands a grand total of 47,314,000 acres under all kinds of 
crops, and in grass, exclusive of heath and mountain pasture- 
land. Thus, in America, the area of farmed land is already 
more than eight-and-a-half-times as large as the area of farmed 
land in England, Ireland, Scotland, Wales, and the Channel 
Islands, all put together. Indeed, the area of land under Indian 
corn in America — within considerably less than three millions 
of acres — is equal in extent to the whole area under any system 
of cultivation whatever in the British Islands, be it green crops, 
cereals, or grass natural and artificial. And this disparity 
between the extent of farmed land in the two countries (sup- 
posing the extent of farmed land in Great Britain to remain as 
it now is) may, and in due time will, be increased until the 
proportion stands as one to forty ; and this proportion, when 
attained, will leave in the United States over four hundred and 
eighteen millions of acres to be retained as forest or other land 
not devoted to agriculture. 
In order to obtain a clearer idea of — for the next century or 
more — the practically boundless extent of country which the 
