Capital And Labor On The Big Farms Of Dakota

We spent an evening in tho comfortahle home of one of the upcrintcndents, and heard him txplaio tho systom of bonkkeeping. Kvery man is engaged by coniract, for h certain time, to do ertainwork for oertun Wagv. He rcceives liis monoy on pre -enting t ihu caahier a time eliouk ocrtifyiim :itiHunt and nature f luí la bor. The avorago prii-e paid to hands is fl1? n inontti ainl boaid. In luirvest they git Üi" day. A record ia kept by tho Hircman ut' i .lic aiuount ol' whcal mrnnl out by eacli tlnv-licr, liy tlio drivii ot' cach wriiT'Mi of' the ainouiit ofwlical loadcd by liiuj. and by the reeeivi t at ihe clevator ol tho auiount of wluat brottlit in by cacli Itam. All the Tartu machinery and the provisious aio bciuht at tir.st handa lor wholesale priors. AJuIcxaml honM are bou'ht in St. IjOuíh. U'lieat Ls BOt tacked or atored, but shippoi) to nurket aa raiudly as iwssible. líTciy tliing in ropulutcd by ao exact system, and thi.' i.- wht oialce.s the fiirms a suwusí. W YmJ _JL Urains and energy in the man who controla them nnd in tho.se wliom lic choosen as bis suburdinate oflicers - this is the secret oi the enormoua profits which have been we on the Palrymplc farms. The cost of raising the firnt erop is about $1 1 an acre; each sul-o(]ueiit cro]) eost.s $H. The average yicld for thil year was about pineteen bushels to the acre. Thi.-. oould be sold at Fargo on Ootober lst, for 80 cents a busliol. A brief caleulation willgiveyou $4.20 per acre profit on the new land, nnd $7.120 for all the rest ; or, say, $130,000 gain on oue erop. These figures 1 believe to be too fiiiKill, rather than too largo. But does this largc farm ing pay for the country? It absorba erent tracts of land, and kceps out smaller farmers. Itontploys trunps, wbo vauish when the harvest is over, inslead of increasing the permanent populación. It exhausta the land. The cultivation ia very shallow. Thcre is no rotation of erop. Kvery thing is taken trom the eround ; nothing is rrturncd to it. Kven Che straw is burned. The result of this is that the average erop froui any givon acre grows smaller every year, and it issimply a question of time under the present system how long it will take to exhaust the land. ..______