And now, having sketched the growth of Kansas during the past quarter of a century, it is proper to ask, what of the future? I answer with confidence, that Kansas is yet in the dawn of her development, and that the growth, prosperity and triumphs of the next decade will surpass any we have yet known. Less than one-fifth of the area of the State has been broken by the plow—ten million of fifty-two million acres. Multiply the present development by five, and you can perhaps form some idea of the Kansas of the year 1900. The light of the morning is still shining upon our prairie slopes. The year just closed witnessed the first actual, permanent settlements in the counties along our western frontier—not settlement by wandering stockmen or occasional frontiersmen, but by practical, home-building farmers and business men. The line of organized counties now extends four hundred miles, from the Missouri river to the Colorado line. The scientists, I know, are still discussing climatic changes, and questioning whether the western third of Kansas is fit for general farming. But the homesteader in Cheyenne or Hamilton counties entertains no doubt about this question. He has no weather-gauge or barometer, but he sees the buffalo grass vanishing and the blue-joint sending its long roots deep into the soil; he sees the trees growing on the high divides; he watches the corn he has planted springing up, and waving its green guidons of prosperity in the wind; he sees the clouds gathering and drifting, and he hears the rain pattering on his roof—and he knows all he cares to know about climatic changes. He is going to stay.
A PROPHECY FULFILLED.
On the 7th of May, 1856, a great American, learned, sagacious, and confident in his faith that right and justice would at last prevail, said, in a speech delivered in the City of New York:
“In the year of our Lord 1900, there will be two million people in Kansas, with cities like Providence and Worcester—perhaps like Chicago and Cincinnati. She will have more miles of railroad than Maryland, Virginia and both the Carolinas can now boast. Her land will be worth twenty dollars an acre, and her total wealth will be five hundred millions of money. Six hundred thousand children will learn in her schools. What schools, newspapers, libraries, meeting-houses! Yes, what families of educated, happy and religious men and women! There will be a song of Freedom all around the Slave States, and in them Slavery itself will die.”
Read in the light of the present, these eloquent words of Theodore Parker seem touched with prophetic fire. The ideal Kansas he saw, looking through the mists of the future, is the real Kansas of to-day. The marvelous growth, the splendid prosperity, the potent intellectual and moral energies, and the happy and contented life he predicted, are all around us. At the threshold of the year A. D. 1886, fifteen years before the limit of his prophecy, Kansas has cities like Providence and Worcester; has more than double the railway mileage Maryland, Virginia, and both the Carolinas could then boast; has land worth, not twenty, but fifty and a hundred dollars an acre; has wealth far exceeding five hundred million dollars; has schools, newspapers, libraries and churches rivaling those of New England; and has 1,300,000 happy, prosperous and intelligent people.
The prophecy has been fulfilled, but the end is not yet. The foundations of the State, like those of its Capitol, have just been completed. The stately building, crowned with its splendid dome, is yet to be reared. Smiling and opulent fields, busy and prosperous cities and towns, are still attracting the intelligent, the enterprising and the ambitious of every State and country. The limits that bound the progress and development of Kansas cannot now be gauged or guessed. We have land, homes, work and plenty for millions more; and for another quarter of a century, at least, our State will continue to grow. For we are yet at the threshold and in the dawn of it all. We are just beginning to realize what a great people can accomplish, whom “love of country moveth, example teacheth, company comforteth, emulation quickeneth, and glory exalteth.”
OUR DUTY TO THE UNION SOLDIER.
Address at the opening of “Blue Post” Fair, North Topeka, February 15th, 1886.
Comrades of the Grand Army: In coming before you this evening, I do not come with any expectation that I can say anything to interest or instruct you. But when Comrade Arnold called on me, last Friday, he supplemented his invitation with a statement that my acceptance would promote the object for which this fair is held, and thus aid Blue Post of the Grand Army of the Republic in securing a fund for the relief of destitute and disabled soldiers. I could not resist such an appeal. I am willing at all times to do what lies in my power for such a cause, and so, busy as I am just now, I came to your festival to bid you Godspeed in your noble work, and to give such assistance as I can in promoting it.
It is sometimes asked why so many soldiers of the late war need help in the battle of life, and why appeals in behalf of the survivors of the Rebellion are growing more frequent as the years go by? Tens of thousands of soldiers, it is said, are on the pension rolls of the Government; the Nation has provided comfortable and pleasant homes for thousands who are disabled and destitute; and why should the generosity of the people be so frequently appealed to?