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River country, it is no unusual thing to find farmers "skimping" the table at harvesting and threshing time. And many a landlord has found a strike on his hands in the midst of the harvest because of the quantity or the quality of the food he served. But the bonanza farmers-at least the better class of them—are as careful of the food set before the men as they are of the fodder that is put before their horses, and this is as far as agricultural generosity can go. Here is a sample bill of fare served for dinner in August at one of the division dining-halls of a Dakota farm: Corned-beef, boiled potatoes, salt pork, baked beans, stewed turnips, tea and coffee, milk, white sugar-and that is a point that has caused many a strike in the Mississippi Valley-syrup, hot and cold bread, cookies, doughnuts, pickles, two kinds of pie, and cheese. The book-keeper, who issues rations to the cooks from the grocery-room, says that it is a notable fact that the rations for the first week of the harvest are nearly a third more than the amount required to feed not only the same number of men, but the identical men afterward. The book-keeper's theory is that it takes a week to fill the hungry men up. It has been estimated that the cost of feeding a harvest army is thirty cents a day for each man. Upon many farms this means $2.50 a week. But by main taining a good table the farmer has his choice of workmen, and the operators say that no money brings such sure returns as that put upon the tables, and in the bed

rooms

The harvest usually begins about July 20th. This year it was a month late. The sweet-peas in the garden by the superintendents' houses were in the glory of their full bloom, when the men began to come to the bonanza farms. Many a farmer used one hundred extra men. A few farmers used more. The wet weather in July damaged the crops on other fields which usually gave work to harvesters by the score, so that they were employed this year only by the dozen. With the men came the new machinery. Train loads of it went into the valley this year. At Fargo they sell a few thousand dollars less than $3,000,000 worth of machinery annually. The item of machinery each year is almost as large as that of labor. City-folk, who know VOL. XXII.-58

nothing of farming, have much fault to find with farmers, great and small, for leaving expensive machines to stand unsheltered in the fence corners. The Dakota farmers, who buy machinery by the car-load, say that many times it does not pay to take a machine to the shed after a hard season's wear and tear. They say that where one employs much labor, more money is lost in time repairing and tinkering with an old implement than would pay for two new ones. They who have figured it out say that if a man keeps repairing a machine long enough-not counting the lost time of his employees-he will have paid for just five machines and still have an old machine. And in farm machinery breaks are certain to occur. More breaks occur during harvest than in any other season because of the rush and confusion that comes with it. When ten or a dozen machines are eating through a field of wheat in a row, when the men who shock it are working like beavers behind the line of binders, when the hurrah and bustle of this scene is being duplicated three or four places on a farm, something is bound to break. During August the binders on one farm in the bonanza country used up one car-load of twineenough to tie two New England States together and anchor them to Minots Ledge Light out in Boston Bay. In putting all that twine around wheat-sheafs, the wonder is that more levers and screws and bolts and nuts and bars and pivots are not broken than the records at the book-keeper's office show. Yet with all the ruinous waste of cast iron which must inevitably occur every season, it is by the use of machinery, and the careful use of it too, that the profits in wholesale wheatgrowing come. The harvest hand earns from $9 to $12 a week. This he gets all over the nation. But in the small farming country the farmer generally has about half a man more than he needs; yet the farmer cannot economize. He needs a binding machine if he has forty acres of wheat, or if he has a quarter section planted. But the bonanza farmer figures that in a harvest one machine will cut exactly two hundred and fifty acres, and it will take exactly three men to two binders. This ratio will work the men and the machines to their limits. Yet the work is not too wearing on the men, for death from natural causes up

on the big farms seldom occurs. For all this apparent systematizing of work, there is much that depends upon the generalship of the superintendent. A rain in the midst of harvest means a complete change of work. It means that the order must come from the general superintendent to each of the division superintendents, and that the men must either be allowed to loaf, or do such work as the weather will permit about the place. Even in fair weather orders to each division superintendent come from the chief's office the night before for each day's work.

It is to the credit of the better class of farm managers that they do not order work on Sunday. They say Sunday work does not pay from a business stand-point, as the men work so hard during week-days that a rest is necessary to obtain the best results from their labor. The harvest lasts about ten days. It has been estimated that under average conditions it costs the Red River operators forty-five cents an acre to harvest their wheat. This estimate includes labor, and the wear and tear of machinery. The last day of the harvest is the first day of the threshing. It takes a day and a quarter to thresh wheat that it has taken a day to cut. Here again the farmer of many acres has the advantage over the farmer in a smaller way. The farmer who owns a threshing-machine must have the grain upon, at least, 1,300 acres before the machine may be said to be working upon its minimum capacity. Many farmers with one-third of this number of acres in grain are compelled to own threshing-machines. But the bonanza farmer can make one machine do the threshing for all the wheat ordinarily grown upon 2,400 acres. After the wheat-field passes the 2,500-acre point a second machine is needed, and a third machine is required after the field has covered 6,500 acres. Of course one separator in time would thresh all the grain that could grow on 2,500 acres or 6,000 acres or twice that much. But time is an important consideration. For while the single thresher was puffing away a rain might spoil enough grain in one night to buy half a dozen machines. This consideration of the time element is so vital that on most farms the noon hour is shortened, and the cooks come from the dining-halls with jars full of warm food, and the men eat near their work.

During the threshing season about thirty men are employed by the farm managers for each threshing-machine. These thirty men are supposed to thresh between two and three thousand bushels of wheat a day and store it in the elevators. The wheat is not stacked, but stands upright in shocks in the field. These shocks are hauled to the thresher. There the self-feeder takes the wheat. Account is kept of the product from each section on the farm, and when the grain flows from the spout of the thresher into the wheat tanks on wheels, standing ready to take it to the elevator, account is made of the section from which the grain comes. The book-keeper at the elevator enters this account in his book, and when the yield upon any section of the farm begins to decrease—when it is not up to that of other sections-the farmer knows that the soil needs strengthening. The next year the crop on that section is Hungarian grass.

In the meantime the men at the thresher are struggling with the accumulating straw. A little of it is used for fuel to keep the engine running, which furnishes the power for the separator. But most of the straw is dragged away by a large rack. This is called "bucking the straw." On many separators there is a device which chops the straw into bits and literally blows it away from the machine. But occasionally even then the straw-pile becomes awkwardly high, and the separator is moved from it.

From the time wheat-sheaves are tumbled into the wagon, until the flour reaches the cooks no human hand touches it. At the elevator, which is owned by the farmer, an unloosened bolt dumps the threshed grain into the bin, where it remains until a lever pitches it into the cars. Yet every ounce of it is weighed and accounted for, and appears on the books in the main office of the farm where it grew. And while it takes thirty men to thresh the wheat one man at the elevator stores it. It costs about $1.60 an acre to thresh the grain and put it in the elevator. That sum, added to the estimated cost of the other processes in wheat-farming, will make the total cost of growing an acre of grain about $3.75This total will include the cost of labor, seed, and wear and tear of machinery.

But there are other accounts which en

ter into the cost of the cultivation of the wheat aside from those just indicated. The taxes on the land amount to twenty cents an acre. A system of water-works, for fire protection to the sheds and elevators, is maintained. Some large farms own two, others three, large elevators, which must be repaired. The insurance on the wheat in the field and in the bins is another item, which must be added. The loss of horses, and the cost of growing fodder for the stock -which means the cultivation of a hundred acres or so-are not trifling items of expense which must be added to the cost of the wheat crop. Adding these items to the original estimate of $3.75 per acrethe primary cost of growing an acre of wheat-one finds it easy to justify the statement, agreed upon by the successful bonanza farmers, that it costs about $5.70 an acre to operate a wheat farm in the Red River Valley. In terms of bushels the cost is placed at thirty cents a bushel. This may well represent the expense account— the red side of the wheat farmer's ledger. This cost per bushel of wheat is reached upon a basis of a yield of nineteen bushels to the acre. The books of the successful farms which have been kept for the past fifteen or twenty years will authorize this estimate in the long run. Here and there a year has come with a much smaller crop, occasionally a year has brought a yield much larger than the average. The profits upon a farm may not be estimated annually. Often one year's receipts pay for another year's deficits. To calculate the returns upon a given sum invested in farming upon any scale-large or small-one must figure upon a basis of a period of years. During the past seven years, the bonanza farmers have sold their wheat at an average price of fifty-five cents a bushel. Here again the wholesale wheat grower has the advantage of his retail competitor, for the grower of 100,000 bushels can store his product until the best market is made for the grain. The business office of every big wheat farm in the Red River Valley is connected by wire with the markets at Duluth, at Minneapolis, and at Buffalo. After the harvest, quotations from the price schedules of these markets arrive hourly at the farm. The superintendent keeps in the closest touch with his agents in the world's great wheat pits. When the telegraph

ticker indicates the arrival of a good price, the farm's agent—a commission merchant at some city board of trade-is instructed to sell. Ten days are allowed for delivery. That ten days represents a season of worry for the buyer. The farmer has his "nights devoid of ease "before he sells. Nothing could better illustrate the thoroughness with which commerce covers the farmer than the presence of the "ticker" on the farm. A rainfall in India or a hot wind in South America is felt upon the Dakota farm in a few hours. The nerves of trade thrill around the globe, and the wages of the harvester in the Red River Valley are fixed by conditions in the fields in Russia, or in Argentina, or in India. The distance between the fields has been lost. The world's wheatcrop might as well lie in one great field, for the scattered acres are wired together in the markets, and those markets are brought to the farmer's door. Indeed, it is whispered about in North Dakota that where the unsuccessful farmer is found, often more paint is worn from the chair by the "ticker" than from the threshing-machine in the fields. The owner of one of the largest farms in the world is about to lose it because he was not content to sell his own million bushels of wheat, but he had to buy and sell the product of mythical fields that hover in the air over the world's great wheat-pits. This man has but few imitators. Most of the bonanza.farmers are content to let their operations in wheat end when the railroad company backs its cars upon the "siding" by the farm elevator, and a lever heaves the wheat into the car.

Much of the best wheat goes to Duluth, although the Minneapolis millers have all the first-grade grain they can handle. From Duluth it goes by water to its destination. There is a terrible story in vogue in the wheat-fields, that when this flinty wheat arrives at a certain lake port town many hundred miles east of the western prairie, it is deftly mixed with soft southern wheat and then it is reshipped to Liverpool as "No. 1 hard Dakota wheat." This, however, is probably a folk-tale, and is important only if true.

Accepting the cost of operating a bonanza wheat-farm at $5.70 an acre, and accepting the average selling price of the wheat at fifty-five cents a bushel on an av

erage yield of nineteen bushels to the acre, one finds that the product of an acre is $10.45. This would seem to leave a net profit to the capitalist who maintains the field of about $4.75 an acre. From this gross sum there must be subtractions. The matter of interest must be considered. The returns from the year's business do not come in until the farm has been operated practically a year. It is not uncommon to hold the product for six months or a year after it has been harvested, waiting for a profitable market. Eighteen months is about the time that may be said to elapse between the first ploughing and the return of the cash for the crop. Eight per cent. is not an exorbitant rate for money in North Dakota. This eight per cent. should be charged for the operation expenses of the farm-that is upon $5.70 for each acre. The interest, therefore, on the operating expenses would be forty-five cents per acre. The final subtraction from this gross profit must be made in the form of interest on the capital invested in the farm. Accepting the estimated value of the land, improvements, and machinery to be $30 per acre, and conceding that for a sound investment six per cent. would be a fair interest return to capital, one comes to the real profit, which is not such an exorbitant profit after all. Subtracting from $4.75, the gross profits, forty-five cents the interest on the operating expenses, and $1.80 the interest on the capital invested, the real profits dwindle to $2.50, or less than eight per cent. profit on the capital invested in land, improvements, and all operating expenses. Figuring the items of interest with

the profits

making the result a gross profit - the rate of profit is about doubled.

Thus the balance-sheet stands with the successful operators. Upon scores and scores of farms this balance is written in red ink. It represents assessments-not profits. The value of the wheat in the territory tributary to Fargo, N. D.-where the big farms are found-was estimated at $25,000,000 this year. The nearly $3,000,000 worth of machinery sold at Fargo this year does not include the machinery left over from last year's purchase. It is new machinery. Probably if one could know the amount of capital invested in bonanza farming in the valley of the Red River of the North, the profit in this $25,000,000 worth of wheat would shrink far below the profits which accrue to the few successful farmers in the valley. And if one were to include in his estimate of profit and loss the possibility of a soil giving out in half a score of years, after a generation of wheat-growing, the balancesheet, even for the best-paying farms might need changing. Perhaps every business is conducted under some such dread possibility. The wheat farmer of to-day in the rich Red River Valley does not seem to be disturbed by thoughts about the failure of the soil. With him sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof, and so long as crops continue fair he does not borrow trouble. He is much more interested in the shortage of the wheat crop abroad, and in the steady rise in the price of wheat than he is in the future failure of a soil which for twenty years has shown no "shadow of turning."

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AN EXPERIMENT IN REALITY

BY WALTER A. WYCKOFF

IV-A FARM-HAND

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WILKESBARRE, PA., Saturday, 19th September, 1891. HAVE a wide sweep of country to cover from the House" in the Highlands above the Hudson, where I served as a porter, and received with my wages a reference to the effect that my work was done " "faithfully and well," to the coal regions of Pennsylvania in the valley of the Susquehanna.

My spirits rise at every recollection of the journey. For days I walked through the crisp autumn air, breathing its tingling freshness, and barely sensible of fatigue.

The way led me over the rich farm lands of Orange County, and across the Delaware, and through the lonely wilderness of the Pennsylvania border, until I emerged upon the hills above the Susquehanna, and caught sight of the splendid valley, with its native beauty hideously marred by the blackened trails of forest fires and the monstrous heaps of colm, that mark the mouths of the coal-pits.

So far work has not failed me, unless I mark as an exception the single case when I began a search, and brought it abruptly to an end by descending suddenly upon a camping party of friends.

Quietly and mysteriously, I fancy, to the other servants, I appeared among them at the House," and with as little notice I tried to steal away. Instead of going to the kitchen at five o'clock on that Wednesday morning for scrubbing water, I took to the road with my pack, and left behind me the " House," awakening to life in the servants' quarters.

I had been a gang-laborer and a hotel porter, and now I wondered what my next rôle was to be. But the feeling was simply a genial curiosity, and was free from the timid shrinking with which I set out from

the minister's home in Wilton, and my lodgings at Highland Falls. Then it was under the spur of self-compulsion that I launched afresh upon this fortuitous life. With strong animal instinct I clung to any haven where shelter and food were secure. Now I warmly welcomed a freer courage born of experience. Not too sure of newly gained powers, but like a boy learning to swim, I fancied that I felt the strength of some confidence in the novel element. Light-hearted in spite of my pack, which gained weight with every step, I walked briskly along the country roads, charmed with everything I saw, and feeling sure that my wages would see me through to another job. Was it a real acquisition, and had I learned to catch the strange pleasure of this fugitive life? Or did the difference lie in the bracing cool of the morning, and the beauty of the open country, and the sense of freedom after long restraint, and, most subtly of all, in that little hoarded balance in my purse?

It was nightfall when I entered Middletown, and too late to look for work. With my eye upon the rows of cottages which line the street, by which I entered the town, I soon found a boarding-house for workmen. A bed could be had for twenty cents. At a bakery near by, I got a loaf of bread and a quart of milk for a dime, and was thus supplied with a supper and breakfast.

Twelve hours of unbroken sleep fell to me that night, and in the cool of a threatening morning I set out to find work. The scaffolding about a brick building in process of erection drew my attention, and I applied for a job as a hod-carrier, but found no demand there for further unskilled labor. The boss in charge refused me, with some show of petulance, as though annoyed by repeated appeals. He was not

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