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obstructions in their way, they remove them. If usurpers attempt to destroy their national unity, they crush them according to due forms of law. When enemies become peni tent and harmless, the sovereign people are magnanimous. This is what we mean by a strong government. When all citizens, in time of danger, are soldiers and patriots by instinct, and the government is invested with full power to command them at discretion, and the reign of God over the career and destiny of the Republic is the most sacred faith of the people, we may well adopt the words at the beginning of this chapter: "A true democracy has at last established itself, that not only develops an intenser centralization than despotism ever boasted, but that develops and also vindicates it by a completer freedom than could ever before be permit ted."

On the fourth day of July, 1776, the grandest fact in history was the Declaration of American Independence. Less than a hundred years have passed; and the exclamation, " I am an American citizen," has become the proudest claim and surest guaranty possible to a human being.

CHAPTER IV.

DEVELOPMENT OF INTERNAL RESOURCES.

"The more a man is versed in business, the more he finds the hand of Providence everywhere." - CHATHAM.

THE field to be surveyed in this chapter is very large. The facts condensed from a great variety of sources are of the greatest importance to the American people, and fundamental to our argument. The materials are ample for a volume; but those which properly belong to this historical discussion may be brought within the compass of a few pages.

It is not material from which census of American products we gather our figures. The decade now passing, and ending with 1870, will furnish many startling facts, showing the growth of the country during the great war of emancipation, which will increase the scope of the argument, bringing out the plans and acts of God in the great American system. We have, however, now before us more than we are likely to comprehend or appreciate.

PRODUCTS OF THE SOIL.

The soil is the first grand source of American wealth. Farming is the most natural and most important occupation of large numbers of our people. The census of 1860 shows, that, out of 8,217,000, more than 3,000,000 were engaged in this department of industry. The proportion exceeds one-third of all heads of families and others laboring for themselves. In the year above named, there were improved

lands, 116,110,720 acres; lands enclosed, but not improved, 244,101,818 acres; outside lands, a large proportion tillable, 1,466,969,862 acres.

The farms of the Republic in 1850 were estimated at $3,271,575,000; in 1860, $6,645,045,000,- an increase of a hundred and three per cent in ten years.

It cannot be claimed that agriculture has reached any thing like perfection in the United States. The farms are so large, so many productions are so nearly spontaneous, and the lands, with even negligent cultivation, produce so abundantly, and withal the price of labor is so high, that the people generally lack the stimulus felt in England to make the most of every foot of ground. Enough progress, it is true, has been made in agricultural chemistry, and the use of fertilizers, to show that American lands respond to the various modes of scientific farming as generously as the most highly-cultivated lands of Europe, and to show that the capabilities of the soil are practically without limits. But our productions, notwithstanding our negligence in cultivation, and waste in harvesting, are actually enormous. The following tables show the produce of 1860:

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It ought to be stated that the most rapid increase of products from the soil is in our great North-west. Take a few facts in illustration of this unparalleled growth. Grain and flour were shipped from Milwaukie, Wis., as follows:

Bushels.

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Year.

1841

1845

1850

1852

1855

1860

1862

4,000 143,260

820,033

1,772,753

3,758,900

9,995,000

18,712,380

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"The production of grain in the North-western States of America is estimated to have increased from 218,463,583 bushels in 1840 to 642,120,366 bushels in 1860. The eight food-producing States west of the Lakes embrace an area of 262,549,000 acres, of which only 52,000,000 acres were under cultivation in 1860. Having regard to the rapid progress of cultivation, and the immense extent of territory remaining to be tilled, I think it is not to be questioned that there is ample room and scope for increased production; in fact, I look upon the exportation of grain from these States as only to be limited by want of facilities for transportation."

California, so recently considered valuable only for its extensive gold-fields, now raises large quantities of grain in excess of the wants of her population. "In 1861, the export of wheat from San Francisco amounted to 2,379,617 bushels, valued at $2,550,820; and the export of flour to 186,455 barrels, valued at $1,001,894. In 1863, California is estimated to have produced 11,664,000 bushels of wheat, and 5,293,000 bushels of barley."

In 1866, large numbers on the Atlantic slope received their bread for months from the vast and splendid ranches of California, where an average of forty bushels of wheat to the acre is not at all unusual. In cereals, vegetables, and fruit, the productions of this State are unrivalled, and almost incredible.

California is one of the greatest grazing countries in the world. Its foot-hills and mountains are covered with wild oats, which furnish a very rich food for cattle, horses, and sheep. On the coast, and far back into the interior, the various grains and grasses cure on the stalk; and the cattle grow fat on them during the long drought of the summer. The cattle-ranches take in thousands of acres each, on the mountains, of such land as would be of no value in the East; while the vast old Spanish ranches, leagues in extent,

* Resources and Prospects of America, by Sir Morton Peto, pp. 56-58.

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