Plenty In New Egypt

PLENTY IN NEW EGYPT.

Extraordinary Yield of Corn In Southern Illinois.

RICHES OF RECLAIMED LAND.

One Hundred Thousand Acres Produce Seventy-five Hundred Thousand Bushels -- Joy Follows Discouragement Along the Kaskaskia Levee.

Two hundred million bushels is the estimated corn yield for the state of Illinois for this year, and "Egypt," that part of the state extending from a line drawn from east to west touching Centralia down to Cairo, will produce not less than one-third of the yield, says the Chicago Record. The American and Santa Fe bottoms, consisting of about 100,000 acres, extending along the Kaskaskia river, are but a mass of ripening grain, for the relentless September sun, which is withering everything else within its range, is putting a golden touch upon the huge ears of corn that protrude from every side of the heavy stalks. The 100,000 acres in these two great fields will yield an average of 75 bushels to the acre, making a total of 7,500,000 bushels.

Of the two fields the Santa Fe is perhaps the more impressive. With the exception of the Air Line railroad, which extends through the entire length of the bottom, not a single dividing line mars the beauty of the field. The road's grade is an average of 10 or 12 feet in height, that the tracks may always be above the water of an accidental overflow, and the corn tassels wave almost upon a level with the passing car windows, while from either side the fields of ripening maize stretch away as far as the eye of the traveler may reach.

Eight years ago where the fields of ripening grain now wave and rustle in the winds was an uncultivated swamp, rank with the growth of vegetation produced by the annual overflow of the Kaskaskia river, which usually lasted from four to ten weeks. When the waters lowered and the greater portion of the land had drained, large flat basins remained filled, forming shallow lakes overgrown with buttonwoods and yonkey pins, ideal breeding places for wild ducks, brant and woodcock. Here the mosquito thrived in great numbers, and the squirrel and raccoon laid away their winter's store always undisturbed. By autumn the sun would dry the shallow lakes. The deeper basins would dwindle to little pools of dirty black water, and the fish left there by the spring rise would die in countless numbers, while the black buzzard and the blue heron feasted upon the filthy mess. A terrible nauseating stenen permeated the atmosphere, while malaria in its worst form lurked in every direction.

The thousands of acres of land were fertile but useless. The section just north of the two bottoms became thickly settled, and the continued summer droughts damaged the growing crops to such an extent that the farmers began looking for available ground that would carry the crops through the season without rain. The Santa Fe and American bottoms offered the opportunities. A sum of $75,000 was subscribed, and a company formed exclusively of farmers was organized to construct a levee along the Kaskaskia river to stop the annual overflows, that the bottom lands might be converted into farms. Two years were required to build the levee, which extends from a point near Carlyle, in Clinton county, to a point directly opposite Okawville, in Washington county, a distance of about 18 miles.

The first rise of the river after the completion of the levee was the highest for a number of years. The farmers had been preparing the ground, clearing it of brush and timber and grubbing the stumps. All were eager to test the new soil, but when the water had reached the highest mark, just when the danger seemed to have passed, then the levee broke. The whole bottoms were again flooded, and to put in crops that year was out of the question, but by the time the spring crops were sown on the uplands and the lowlands had again become dry more money had been subscribed and the levee was being reconstructed along its entire length. The bottoms were reclaimed and the levee held. Clearing has progressed rapidly until today the timber is scant and nowhere is there a finer cornfield than that of the Santa Fe bottom.

In March, 1898, the levee broke for the second time. The rise was an extraordinary one, and the embankment could not withstand the heavy sweep of the current. The entire bottom was flooded, and part of the corn crop was not planted until the latter part of June. But what a production came from these fields! Three days after the break a mass meeting was held at Bartelso, a little German village of one church, one store and one saloon, and $8,000 was obtained to repair the break and strengthen the entire dike.

The yield of corn alone in these reclaimed lands during the first three years more than repaid the farmers for their labor and their outlay of money. In the history of southern Illinois no such yield as the one produced this year is recorded. Corn cribs are numerous along the Air line, yet not an hour passes that the sound of the hammer does not echo through the thin timber along the Kaskaskia, disturbing the few remaining squirrels who are just beginning to lay away their winter's store. Many cribs are needed to hold this year's crop, and the farmers are not slow to supply them. Another month and the new cribs will be bursting with the yellow grain.