hope to "make" sufficient, before another crisis comes on. Because all producers act in like manner, each one trying to outflank the other, another catastrophe is invited. It responds to the call and approaches with accelerated strides and with more damaging effects than any of its predecessors.

These crises very much quicken the absorption of the smaller fortunes by the large ones, for the capitalist with large resources is the only one capable in the long run of withstanding this rough treatment of outraged Nature. The smaller capitalists the crises swallow up like veritable mælstroms.

These mælstroms: the crises, then, are the direct production of Private Enterprise.

Again, we saw how the workingmen were driven out of their employment as producers, how the small employers were pushed out of their business by this cut-throat competition. In nine cases out of ten they have only one refuge left: that of squeezing themselves in between producers and con-umers as shopkeepers, saloonkeepers, peddlers, agents," boarding-and lodging-house-keepers; that is, of becoming parasites.

It may seem hard to speak thus of persons who by no means lead an enviable existence, who honestly try to make some sort of a living, whose life often is a tread-mill of drudgery and, if different from that of the workingman's, is only dif ferent in this, that while the latter struggles for the necessities of today, the former struggle for the threatened necessities of

tomorrow.

They are, nevertheless, parasites, unnecessary workers. Going along our streets you observe one small store, one boardinghouse crowding another, one saloon, and often several, in one block: you will have all kinds of men and women tha ust their small stock into your face; in your house you will be annoyed by all kinds of peddlers and agents, socalled.

All these people live. Somebody must earn their living for them.

In the first place, they live by enhancing the price of o visions and all other goods twice and three times what the pro ducers get. The difference between their prices and whole

sale prices makes just the difference between healtliful plenty and half satisfied hunger for the poor. It is a great mistake to suppose that competition always. or necessarily, lowers prices. It often has just the contrary effect. Probably two-thirds of existing small shopkeepers can not make a decent living without extravagant profits. Or, if the prices can not be enhanced, then

In the second place, they live by depreciating the quality of their goods and by short weights and measures. Adulteration of provisions and merchandize is notoriously carried on in every branch of trade that will permit of it; has indeed become a social institution, against which no law can make any headway. A representative of a leading spice house lately said: "We sell to the trade more adulterated goods than pure. We cannot help it. We simply sell the retailer what he wants. It would ruin the trade to prohibit adulteration." Competition in drugs is now so hot, dealers, in order to live, are compelled to adulterate, to weaken and to substitute. It has gone so far, that manufacturers of mineral pulp," now boldly importune respectable millers and grocers to mix rock-dust with their flour and sugar,

The laboring class, more than any other, is the natural prey of these parasites. Remember, that the laborer's ware, his labor, is never paid for till it has been used; that he must give his employer credit, always for a week, often for two weeks or a month; that he will have to wait for his compensation, even while the values he has created have been long since converted into cash in his employer's hands. It is a necessary consequence, that he, on his part, must ask credit from his shopkeeper. Ile becomes the prey, bound hand and foot, of that shopkeeper. He dare not murmur at the price charged, dares not be over particular as to weight or quality. He is pretty much in the same fix as the fly in the spider's web.

Thus the portion of the industrial cake allotted to labor is further considerably curtailed, and all on account of Private "Enterprise;" for it, also, is exclusively responsible for these parasites.

Let us pass over to our farmers. They, as yet the majority of our working population, are still the great conservative force, the brake, so to speak, on the wheel of progress. Is it likely that they will continue to be? We shall see.

Our farmers were half a generation ago considered and are still considered the most independent and prosperous class of the community.

True, the prosperity of the western farmer, especially, was and is not of a character to excite the envy of anybody. His whole life, and more particularly that of his wife, was one of toil. He had to break our lands and clear our forests. His family had to subject themselves to all kinds of privations for a lifetime of dreary years. The social life of the farmers' wives was a mockery of our civilization; their sisters struggling in the cities had, at least, the comfort of suffering in company. To the family of the farmer sugar, tea and coffee were, for a series of years, luxuries, especially when droughts and grasshoppers destroyed the fruits of his toil, generally as severe as that of his horse. And his reward? That of vegetating and "raising" a family, as we so expressively term it; yes→ and of being the owner of his farm.

But his ownership is even now. frequently, one in name only. The capitalist has got hold of him also. Very many of the western farms are covered with mortgages, which their nominal owners have no hope of ever raising. This fact is so well known, that the N. Y. " Times” some time ago advised the farmers to prepare themselves for their fate. What fate? That of be coming tenant-farmers like their brethren of Great Britain.

It is, especially, since the commencement of the last decade that they are falling victims to Private Enterprise."

There is in the Atlantic Monthly" for Janury 1880 a most instructive article.* entitled "Bouanza Farms," containing many startling facts, which in the near future cannot but have an important bearing on the condition of our farmers. These "Bonanza Farms are vast cultivated tracts of land in Min* Embodied in a book called “Land and Labor," published by Scribner and Sons. Mr. Moody of Boston is the author.

nesota, Dakota, Texas, Kansas and California. each containing thousands of acres of land owned by presidents and directors of railways, by bankers in St. Paul and New York, London and Frankfort-on-the-Main. They are conducted on purely "business."—that is, capitalist principles. On these farms there are no families, no women, no children, no homes. There is no need for them. But there is plenty of Labor" in the neighborhood. There is such an abundance of unemployed men, that the managers of the farms can hire all the labor they want for $16,00 a month, during the busy seasons with thirteen hours of daily labor, and for $8.00 a month during the balance of the year.

This fact alone would render it absolutely out of the question for the surrounding small farmers to compete with the bonanzas. For the former have to support a family, and to feed, clothe and shelter, and altogether provide for the same number of persons throughout the whole year, while the latter only need to hire about one-fourth the number of persons, in proportion to the work to be done, and that for less than one-fourth of the year. But the small farmer has other and greater odds still to contend with: the discrimination practised by other large corporations. Thus, the bonanzas obtain special rates from the railroad companies: f. i. they are charged for the transportation of their produce rates. fifty per cent below those which the other farmers are obliged to pay; they buy their machinery and farming implements of the manufacturers and dealers at a discount of 33 1-3 per cent. from the published rates. We ought, therefore, not to wonder, when we are told, that the surrounding small farmers are hop lessly in debt, while the owners of these bonanza farms -the aforesaid bankers and railroad-presidents-are amassing colossal fortunes; that they even with wheat at only 70 cts. a bushel realize twenty per cent. the first year on their capital and the second year-fifty-five per cent.

The article concludes with the remark: "We are taking immense strides in placing our country in the position of Great Britain, and even worse." So it seems. For there the farms are practically homesteads, while the bonanza farms have noth

ing suggesting homes, except a building for the bachelor su perintendent and the boarding house for the "hands." There is no doubt that these bonanzas will in the near future increase greatly in number. Thus our publie lands, which were intended for happy homes are in a fair way becoming no better than penal colonies, and of being robbed of their rich soil for the benefit of capitalist pockets. What will then become of our farmer-" proprietors but farmertenants? If they are already running behindhand now, how much time will it take for the bonanza farmers to put an end to their proprietorship, by means of Private "Enterprise?" Especially if our export to Europe, on account of good harvest there. should happen to cease. Bear in mind, that our country already now produces far more food than our population could possibly consume, and yet thousands of acres are yearly added to the area under cultivation.

Yes, the time will come, when our farmers will learn, that Socialism is the only refuge alike for them and the other working classes, and their eyes may be opened to the advantage of the Cooperative Commonwealth. The great dairy farms in New York State and elsewhere may also contribute their quota to this lesson.

Thus even our farmers, as yet the most splendid yeomanry the world has ever seen. are becoming the victims of Private Enterprise to fully the same extent as our workingman and small employer.

But our big capitalists have a still more powerful sledgehammer than that of Competition ready at hand, to wit: Combination.

These gentlemen know practical dialectics. They know, that, though Competition and Combination are opposites, they yet may come to mean the same thing-to them. They have already found that while Competition is a very excellent weapon to use against their weaker rivals, Combination pays far better in relation to their peers. It is evident, that it is combination they mainly rely upon for their future aggraudizement. Combination consists in one or several capitalists or corpora