746 
Tlie Future of Agricultural Gomiietition. 
The year 1870 was before tlie days of agricultural statistics 
for India. In 1879 the area of the wheat crop in that country 
was 25,812,407 acres, and in 1890 it was 24,938,100 acres, 
showing a reduction of 874,307 acres. This, with probable 
decreases in some European coiintries for which there are no 
statistics, and in Egypt, may be set against increases in the 
Argentine llepublic and probable increases in the Danubian 
countries, Asia Minor, and Persia. It is possible that there 
has been an increase in Eussia since 1883-7 ; but there are no 
figures for later years. Spain had 7,311,892 acres in 1857, but 
probably has a smaller area under wheat now. Egypt, in 
1871, had 1,103,124 acres ; but as her exports to Europe have 
fallen off greatly in recent years, it is to be assumed that the 
acreage has been reduced. I am indebted to Major Craigie for 
the Austrian and Hungarian figures for 1890, and the Italian 
figures for 1891 ; but he informs me that those for other 
countries which I lack are not to be obtained. It is probable 
that in estimating the Canadian area for 1890 for other pro- 
vinces besides Ontario and Manitoba (the figures for which are 
official) too little has been allowed for the decline of wheat- 
growing in Quebec and the Maritime Provinces. In British 
Columbia, however, there has presumably been an increase. 
It will be seen that the increase in the wheat area of the 
principal producing countries outside Europe during the decade 
ending with 1880 was enormous, while that of European 
countries was small. But when we come to compare the 
figures for the next decade, we find that wheat-growing has 
made but a slight proportionate increase, while the population 
of all these countries together has increased by tens of millions. 
What was the cause of this remarkable change ? Unquestion- 
ably it was the excessive competition in wheat jjroduction, which 
affected growers in new countries as well as in old ones. 
In 1882 the farm price of wheat in the United States fell to 
88'4 cents a bushel, and the wheat area declined in the following 
year. But in 1883 the farm price was 91 cents, and the acre- 
age increased in 1884 to 39,475,885 acres, the greatest area 
ever grown. The excess over the previous maximum of nearly 
38,000,000 acres, grown in 1880, was, however, in great measure 
attributable to the exceptional mildness of the winter 1883-4, 
which allowed of all the wheat sown being harvested, and so 
coming into the statistical record ; whereas, in most years, a 
million or two of acres of wheat are winter-killed, or otherwise 
destroyed, and ploughed up. But in 1884 the farm price fell to 
05 cents a bushel, and the wheat area of 1885 was 34,189,240 
acres, partly owing to the fall in price, and partly through 
