UNITED STATES]
AGRICULTURE
Leicester, prizes were awarded after trial to potato - planting machines, potato-raising machines, and butter-drying machines. In 1897, at Manchester, special awards were made for fruit baskets and milk-testers. In 1898, at Birmingham, a prize of £100 was given for a self-moving vehicle for light loads, £100 and £50 for self-moving vehicles for heavy loads, and £10 for safety feeder to chaff-cutter, in accordance with the Chaff-cutting Machines (Accidents) Act, 1897. In 1899, at Maidstone, special prizes were offered for machines for washing hops with liquid insecticides, cream separators (power and hand), machines for the evaporation of fruit and vegetables, and packages for the carriage of (a) soft fruit (b) hard fruit. In 1900, at York, the competitions were concerned with horse-power cultivators, self-moving steam diggers, milking machines, and sheep-shearing machines (power and hand). In 1901, at Cardiff, competition was invited in portable oil engines, agricultural locomotive oil engines, and small ice-making plant suitable for a dairy. The progress of steam cultivation lias not justified the hopes that were once entertained concerning this method of working implements in the field. It was about the year 1870 that its advantages first came into prominent notice. At that time owing to labour disputes the supply of hands was short and horses were dear. The wet seasons that set in at the end of the ’seventies led to so much hindrance in the work on the land that the aid of steam was further called for, and it seemed probable that there would be a lessened demand for horse power. It was found, however, that the steam work was done with less ■care than had been bestowed upon the horse tillage, and the result was that steam came to be regarded as an auxiliary to horse labour rather than as a substitute for it. In this capacity it is capable of rendering most valuable assistance, for it can be utilized in moving extensive areas of land in a very short time. Accordingly, when a few days occur early in the season favourable to the working of the land, much of it can be got into a forward condition, whilst horses are set free for the lighter operations. The crops can then be sown in due time, which in wet years, and with the usual teams of horses kept on a farm, is not always practicable. Much advantage arises from the steamAvorking of bastard fallows in summer, and after harvest a considerable amount of autumn cultivation can be done by steam power, thus materially lightening the work in the succeeding spring. On farms of moderate size it is usual to hire steam tackle as required, the outlay involved in the purchase of a set being justifiable only in the case of estates or of very big farms Avhere, Avhen not engaged in ploughing, or in cultivating, or in other work upon the land, the steam-engine may be employed in threshing, chaff-cutting, sawing, and many similar operations which require power. The labour question again became acute in 1900, when owing to the scarcity of hands and the high rate of wages, self-binding harvesters were resorted to in England for the ingathering of the corn crops to a greater extent than ever before. For the same reason potatoplanting and potato-lifting machines were also in greater requisition. (w. Fr.) II. The United States. Covering as it does the breadth of the North American continent, with 3,000,000 square miles of land surface, not including Alaska and the islands, of which 700,000,000 acres are in farms and 400,000,000 in actual cultivation, representing every variety of soil and all the climatic life zones of the world, except the extreme boreal and the hottest tropical, the United States affords an important subject of study in respect of agriculture. Its cotton, wheat, and meat are large factors in all markets, and its many other agricultural products are distributed throughout the civilized world. To the student the equipment and methods of agriculture in the United States form as interesting a subject of examination as do its resources and production. In quantity, distribution, and
209
inter-relation of heat and moisture—the chief factors in agricultural production — the United States is greatly blessed. We find in this vast territory all the agricultural belts mapped by the biologist, producing all varieties of cereals, fruits, and breeds of live stock. All kinds of soils, adapted to different crops, are spread out at all altitudes from 8000 feet down to sea-level. The country is equally fortunate in the character of its farming class. There is no peasant class, but the agricultural population is made up of the same people who form the professional and mercantile classes. The negroes, who supply the farm labour in the Southern States, are by nature admirably suited to these pursuits. The inventive skill of the American has had almost as full scope upon the farm as in the shop, with the result that the equipment and methods used are well adapted to the conditions. The story of the ast and varied agriculture of the United States can be most briefly, and, perhaps, best told in the figures of the census and other Govern- Statjstlcs ment reports. Unless some other source is mentioned, the statistics in this article are taken from the eleventh (1890) census (crops of 1889), or the reports of the Department of Agriculture, Avhose annual estimates are based upon the latest figures. As a result of the great supply of available land the number of farms in the United States increased between 1850 and 1890 215 per cent., or from arms 1,450,000 to 4,565,000; their total acreage increased 112 per cent., or from 294,000,000 to 623,000,000 acres; their improved acreage increased 216 per cent., or from 113,000,000 to 358,000,000 acres; and their unimproved acreage 47 per cent., or from 181,000,000 to 266,000,000 acres. The following table (No. I.) exhibits the increases of number of farms, total and improved acreage, by decades :— Table I.—Percentage of Increase of Number and Acreage of Farms by Census Decades.
1850 to 1860 1860 to 1870 1870 to 1880 1880 to 1890
41-1 30-1 507 13-9
Acreage. Total. Improved. 44*3 387 0*1 15-8 31*5 50*7 16-2 25*6
1850 to 1890
215-0
112*3
The United States.
Number of Farms.
216-4
The largest percentage of increase of improved land was 50'7, from 1870 to 1880; the lowest was in the decade 1860 to 1870, the period of the Civil war, and was 15*8. There was a marked slackening in the increase both of the number of farms and of improved land in the last decade, when public lands adapted to agriculture had approached more nearly the point of complete occupation. The chief cause of this wonderful development of agriculture is the large area of cheap public lands AThich has been available for immigrants and natives alike. Up to 1897, 529,000 homestead entries had been made and finally settled for 70,397,000 acres of Government land under the Homestead Act of 20th May 1862, while the number of entries, both final and pending, covered 102,280,000 acres. Between 1875 and 1897 the public and Indian lands sold for cash and under homestead and timber culture laws, as well as those allotted by scrip, granted to the colleges of agriculture and mechanic arts and other institutions, and by military bounty land warrants, and selected by States and railroad corporations, covered 300,000,000 acres. In addition to this, the States and railroad corporations sold a large amount of land to farmers of which we have no accurate record. This vast territory, greater in extent than S. I. — 27
