species of millet; and later on they were
introduced to oats and wheat and a variety of others. Rice was of the
very earliest of our cereals, in the extreme east of the old world.
Wherever we find a very ancient civilization we also find that it is
intimately connected with some important cereal, and it has been said
that all you have to do is to study botany--the history of botany--and
you will find the history of human culture; and much there is that
could be said for that.

Fourth, and finally, those who divide human culture according to the
food supply consider that the highest stage is reached through
commerce. Commerce brings to all the great centers of human life the
food essential to their sustenance. It would be absolutely
impossible--obviously so--to have a city like Philadelphia in
existence for a month without constant and ceaseless commerce brought
here the food for its inhabitants. It is quite likely that, were
Philadelphia shut off at once from all connection with the world,
within ten days there would be an absolute famine here--so closely do
we depend upon our commercial supplies for our subsistence. These
supplies are not drawn from any one locality; were we to draw a radius
of five hundred miles around our great city of a million inhabitants,
we should still find that the greater part of our food supply comes
from a wider distance from us than that; and there is no one of us
that will go to his table this evening but will see upon that table
food products drawn from every quarter of the world. Thus it is that
commerce enables man to reach an indefinite degree of consolidation;
and it is through consolidation--through the more and more intimate
relationship, and the closer and closer juxtaposition of man--that his
real benefit and progress may be derived.

These, therefore, are the four stages of culture, as depending upon
food supply: the hunting and fishing stage, the nomadic or pastoral,
the agricultural and the commercial. These have been generally adopted
by English writers, and they are so adopted to-day; and you will
probably find them in many of the text books.

The American writers have, in many instances, followed the principles
laid down and defined most clearly by Mr. Lewis H. Morgan, a
distinguished ethnologist of the last generation. He divides (or
accepted the division and largely defined it) the progress of man into
a series of stages: beginning at the lowest point with savagery; th