Philippine Islands (exports) 102,000 tons. Most of the cane sugar was raw, and did not bring so high a price as beet sugar, which was mostly refined. The average price of the cane sugar may be taken at three cents per pound. The total value of the crop was therefore $51,542,400. The area planted to flax for the production of flaxseed in 1902 in the United States was 3,739,700 acres. The quantity of seed produced was 29,284,880 bushels, and the value of the crop was $30,814,661. In this valuation no account is made of the value of the flax fibers. The area in hemp in the census year was reported as 16,042 acres, yielding 11,750,630 pounds of fiber valued at $546,338. The area in vegetables, excluding potatoes, in the census year was 2,814, 139 acres, producing a crop valued at $143,782.534. The total area devoted to the production of peas in the census year was 968,371 acres, yielding 9,440, 269 bushels valued at $7,909,074. The total area devoted to the cultivation of peanuts was 516,658 acres, producing 11,964,959 bushels valued at $7,271,230. The area devoted to the cultivation of castor beans was 25,738 acres, producing 143,388 bushels valued at $134,084. The total area planted to hops in the census year was 55,613 acres, producing 49,209,704 pounds valued at $4,084,929. The area devoted to the cultivation of broom corn in the census year was 178,584 acres, producing 90,947,370 pounds and valued at $3.588,414. THE FRUIT CROPS The total value of the fruit crops of all kinds in the United States in the census year was $131,423,517. Of this amount $83,751,840 was the value of The total area in fruit trees in the United States is 6,230,745 acres. The total area in small fruits is 304,029 acres, and the total value of the small fruits produced $25,030,877. The number of olive trees in the United States in the census year was 1,540, 155, and the number of pounds produced was 5,053,637. The number of nut trees in the United States in the census year cultivated on farms was 1,649,072. THE NUMBER OF FARMS The total area under irrigation in the census year in the United States was 7,263,273 acres, and the value of the irrigated crops was $84,433.438. The total area of the United States, including Alaska, Porto Rico, and the Hawaiian Islands, is 3,613,217 square miles, equivalent to 19,768,604,880 acres. The number of farms in the United States in the census year was 5,739,657. The average number of acres in each farm was 146.6. The total acreage of the farms in the United States was 841,201,546. The value of the farm property in the United States in the census year was $20,514,001,838. The value of the farming implements and machinery was $761,261,550. The value of the live stock on the farms was $3,078,050,041. The total value of the farms of the United States in the census year was The total number of farm animals was 191,937,394, and the total value of the farm animals was $3,102,515,540. The total value of the agricultural and horticultural crops of the United States for 1902, as estimated by the Statistician of the Department of Agriculture, is $3.500,000,000, not including live stock, the annual value of which is estimated at $1,000,000,000, making the total value of the agricultural products of the United States for 1902 $4,500,000,000. The total value of the agricultural exports of the United States for the year ending June 30, 1901, was $943,811,020, amounting to 64.62 per cent of the total exports of all kinds from this country. Some of the principal items included in the above are as follows: Milch cows. 16,557,373 2,728,088 17.105,227 44,659,206 63,964,876 | 46,922.624 197,753,327 516,711,914 824,054,902 168,315,750 364,973,688 Other cattle. Sheep.... Swine.. "bacon and hams exported $37,566,980 1,933,000 238,465 60,341,804 WILL OUR FOOD SUPPLY KEEP PACE WITH OUR ENORMOUSLY INCREAS ING POPULATION? The foregoing data will show, in a general way, the vast agricultural resources of the United States. It is seen that we are not only able to feed our own people, but millions of people in other countries. There is one question which constantly presents itself to the mind of the political economist, namely, Is the rate of increase in population to be diminished, or, if continued, will the food supply be exhausted in the near or remote future? In looking for answers to these questions, political economists must consult scientific agriculture. In the application of the principles of agriculture to science is found the only safe response. It is certain that under the fostering care of this country and with wise and well-directed engineering, many millions of acres of rich land can be procured for agricultural purposes through irrigation. Science teaches us in many other ways the methods of making the farm, to a certain extent, independent of the variations in rainfall. The true principles of conserving moisture for the purpose of crop production, and of utilizing to the best advantage the excess of precipitation, are now well known and are daily taught to our people. Scientific forestry is increasing the number of trees and bringing large areas into tree culture which before were only featureless plains. What the effect of tree planting will be upon the climate is not known with cer tainty, but the general impression is that A Field of Silverskin Onions on Bloomsdale Farm, Philadelphia the more abundant the growth of trees, the more readily is moisture preserved for agricultural purposes while the intensity and extent of floods is diminished. The true principles of fertilization are annually increasing the average product of the older farm lands of the community. The principles of cattle feeding are introducing important economies into the utilization of farm products. We have no reason to think that the average wheat crop, for instance, in the United States would not increase in the amount grown per acre An increase of a single bushel per acre will give, in round numbers, an increase of sixty million bushels to the crop. The scientific farmer can readily double and treble his crop, and so, without increasing the acreage, supply double or treble the amount of wheat. The same principle is true of other crops. The future soil fertility will increase, not diminish. The average output of each acre will grow. While the capac-. ity of the mouth to consume remains constant through all centuries, the ca pacity of the hands to furnish food is ' constantly increasing. We need not fear, therefore, a period of world starvation due to the exhaustion of the food-producing capacity of the soil. If universal hunger does come, it will not be from this cause. It may be-I would not deny it-that the final fate of man on earth is starvation or freezing, but the remote future at which such calamities can occur makes their event for practical purposes infinitely removed. We are now feeding, within the boundaries of the United States, eighty million people. When in a hundred years from now we are feeding two hundred million people, the quantity of food per head will be no less abundant than at present. In those days now so near at hand agriculture will be more a science and more an art. The fields will all be gardens, and the forests: sources of income without destruction. The life of man will be full of amenities which are now denied the tiller of the soil, and the true aristocracy of the earth will be composed of those in direct touch with earth herself. W BIG THINGS BY CHARLES F. HOLDER HETHER rightly or not, the West has earned a reputation for big things-big fishes, big fruit, big trees; and so many really big things come from this section of the country that possibly some of the inhabitants fall naturally into the habit of telling big stories and painting as they rise. There are, however, certain peculiar conditions that hold on the Pacific slope that justify the story-teller. The West has the largest trees in the great Sequoias which rear their lofty heads two or three hundred feet in air. * It possesses the giant redwoods, which possibly rank next in size and usefulness, great forests extending all along the fog-laden country of northern California. In Alaska we find the highest mountains in America, and the largest and most numerous glaciers, beginning with Muir and Malaspina, the latter the most remarkable glacier in the world. The stroller through the markets of San Francisco will find the western representative of the New York weak-fish-a huge creature ranging from eighty to one hundred pounds—and will be told * Reprinted from the Scientific American Supplement by courtesy of Munn & Co. |