"Wheat is the most sustaining food grain of the great Caucasian race, which includes the peoples of Europe, United States, British America, the white inhabitants of South Africa, Australasia, parts of South America, and the white population of the European colonies."
He then points out how rapidly the consumers of wheat have increased, yet failing to attribute this increase in part to the rapid reduction in the cost. He says:
"In 1871 the bread-eaters of the world numbered 371,000,000; in 1881, 416,000,000; in 1891, 472,600,000; and at the present time they number 516,500,000. The augmentation of the world's bread-eating population in a geometrical ratio is evidenced by the fact that the yearly aggregates grow progressively larger.... To supply 516,500,000 bread-eaters, if each bread-eating unit is to have his usual ration, will require a total of 2,324,000,000 bushels for seed and food. According to the best authorities, the total supplies from the 1897-'98 harvest are 1,921,000,000."
It will be observed that while the English average consumption is said to be six bushels, the average employed in this computation is four and a half bushels per head. He then remarks upon the large harvests for seven years, saying:
"Bread-eaters have almost eaten up the reserves of wheat, and the 1897 harvest being under average, the conditions become serious.... It is clear we are confronted with a colossal problem that must tax the wits of the wisest. Up to recent years the growth of wheat has kept pace with demands. As wheat-eaters increased, the acreage under wheat expanded. We forget that the wheat-growing area is of strictly limited extent, and that a few million acres regularly absorbed soon amount to a formidable number. The present position being so gloomy, let us consider future prospects."
He then deals successively with the United States, Russia, Canada, and other countries. In regard to the United States he remarks:
"Practically there remains no uncultivated prairie land in the United States suitable for wheat-growing. The virgin land has been rapidly absorbed, until at present there is no land left for wheat without reducing the area for maize, hay, and other necessary crops. It is almost certain that within a generation the ever-increasing population of the United States will consume all the wheat grown within its borders, and will be driven to import, and, like ourselves, will scramble for a lion's share of the wheat crop of the world."
It is difficult for a citizen of the United States who has given any attention to the potential of our land to conceive of such views being held by an Englishman of highest scientific intelligence. When I was in England last summer I had a long interview with the editor of one of the papers of widest influence in all Great Britain. I then remarked that there were forces in action in the United States in three or four different directions which would profoundly change all the conditions of British industry, and render the English-speaking people of the United Kingdom and the United States more and more interdependent. It is seldom that one finds more than an occasional half a column in any great English paper devoted to the subject of our economic relations and to the development either of the American iron industry, of its agriculture, or of the cotton production and manufacture. Yet, in all these branches of industry, profound changes of world-wide importance, and yet of greater importance to the people of Great Britain, are now in progress. I may venture to say that this address of Sir William Crookes marks even a more profound ignorance of the forces in action in this country than even I had ever comprehended. Sir William Crookes next submits the following computation:
"The rate of consumption for seed and food by the whole world of bread-eaters was 4.15 bushels per unit per annum for the eight years ending 1878, and at the present time is 4.5 bushels.... Should all the wheat-growing countries add to their area to the utmost capacity, on the most careful calculation the yield would give us only an addition of some 100,000,000 acres, supplying at the average world yield of 12.7 bushels to the acre, 1,270,000,000 bushels, just enough to supply the increase of population among bread-eaters till the year 1931. At the present time there exists a deficit in the wheat area of thirty-one thousand square miles.... When provision shall have been made if possible to feed 230,000,000 units likely to be added to the bread-eating populations by 1931, by the complete occupancy of the arable areas of the temperate zone now partially occupied, where can be grown the additional 330,000,000 bushels of wheat required ten years later by a hungry world? If bread fails—not only us, but all the bread-eaters of the world—what are we to do? We are born wheat-eaters. Other races, vastly superior to us in numbers, but differing widely in material and intellectual progress, are eaters of Indian corn, rice, millet, and other grains; but none of these grains have the food value, the concentrated health-sustaining power of wheat, and it is on this account that the accumulated experience of civilized mankind has set wheat apart as the fit and proper food for the development of muscle and brains."