freight, you will fare nearly as well.  Railroads control agricultural development.  Sparsely settled regions always practice extensive cultivation, raising light crops on big farms, because only such crops can be grown as can be raised on large areas by machinery, and are not perishable.  Staples like corn, wheat, pork, and beef are transported at low prices for long distances by the railroads.  This forces the settlers in newly opened portions of the country to sell in a market created by the railroads, in competition with what is produced within the areas of intensive cultivation, that is, with access to adjacent markets.

So we find the bonanza wheat farms of California, the Dakotas, and the Canadian Northwest, the pampas of the Argentine, the Steppes of Russia, and the Indian uplands devoted to wheat raising; in the United States corn belt, fields of from five to twenty thousand acres are still not uncommon.  Conversely, intensive cultivation is most advanced in China, where a dense population forced the people long ago to bring into use every foot of tillable soil that is left open to them.

Near the towns of the United States a few market gardeners supply such vegetables as the people do not raise for themselves.  The states along the Atlantic seaboard have all the facilities for successful intensive cultivation—­a dense population and idle, cultivable land.  In choosing a location, the home crofter should well consider his experience, and try to enter a community where he can engage in analogous pursuits.  Dairy regions never have enough men who understand cattle and horses; fruit-growing districts always need experienced pickers; market garden regions need men who understand rotating crops and making hotbeds, transplanting, etc.

If you have a little money, you can probably do best by buying and draining some swamp land, which is the most productive of all, as it contains the washings of the upland for centuries.  Swamp land can usually be cleared and drained for from thirty to forty dollars per acre.  It can be bought very cheap and when ready to cultivate will have increased many times in value.

The next best is the “abandoned” or worn-out farm.  Proper methods of cultivation will bring it back to more than its original fertility.  The Eastern states from Maine to Virginia abound with them at from five to twenty-five dollars per acre.  In many cases the buildings are worth more than the whole price asked.

The nearest land easily available in the East is in the state of New York.  The writer believes it is true that “there are twenty thousand farms for sale in this state, and nearly, all at such low prices and upon such favorable terms as to make them available for any one desiring to engage in agriculture or have a farm home.  The soil of these farms is not exhausted, but on the contrary is, with proper cultivation, very productive.  Nearly all have good buildings and fences, are supplied with good water and plenty of wood for farm purposes, and in nearly all cases have apple and other fruit trees upon them.” (List of Farms, occupied and unoccupied, for sale in New York State.  Bureau of Information and Statistics, Bulletin, State of New York, Department of Agriculture.)