e, of president and senator; the farmer must be esteemed as the
direct medium of blessing through whom God manifests his goodness to
the nation. We have been accustomed to such phenomenal crops that it
almost goes without saying that the past year has been phenomenal in
its agricultural productions. Indeed there has been a wealth in the
soil, a wealth in the mines, a wealth in the seas, which awakens
astonishment and admiration in the minds of those beyond the deep--for
it is a statistical fact that our agricultural products for the year
just closing is not less than three and a half thousand millions of
dollars in valuation. How difficult to appreciate the fact! One
thousand seven hundred million bushels of corn, valued at five hundred
and eighty millions of dollars; four hundred and fifty million bushels
of wheat, valued at three hundred and fifty-five millions of dollars;
six and a half million bales of cotton, estimated in valuation at two
hundred and fifty millions of dollars. And including all the other
agricultural products, the statistician of the Government estimates
the value at three and a half thousand millions of dollars. And this
is but a repetition of other years. No! It exceeds other years! It is
a great fact that one and a half millions of square miles of
cultivated land in this country now subject to the plow could feed a
thousand millions of persons, and then we could have five thousand
millions of bushels of grain for exportation.

In ten years, from 1870 to 1880, we produced over seven hundred
millions of dollars of precious metals, and the last year the
valuation is estimated at seventy-five millions in gold and silver;
and rising above these colossal and phenomenal figures, our great
manufacturing people during the past year have produced not less than
five thousand millions of dollars in valuation. The mind staggers in
the presence of these tremendous facts.

Then our national wealth is as phenomenal as are the annual products
of soil, and mine, and skill, and commerce. In 1880 our national
wealth was estimated at forty-four thousand millions of dollars,
which would buy all Russia, Turkey, Italy, South Africa, and South
America--possessions inhabited by not less than one hundred and
seventy-seven millions of people. This enormous national wealth
exceeds the wealth of Great Britain by two hundred and seventy-six
millions of dollars. England's wealth is the growth of centuries,
while our wealth,