charter of Charles II., and ceded the jurisdiction over this part to the United States in 1786, retaining, however, the ownership of the lands, which gave rise to the name "Western Reserve." In 1786, the Ohio Company, composed of Massachusetts people, obtained control of 1,500,000 acres through the agency of Manasseh Cutler. In the next year, the federal Congress passed the famous "Ordinance of 1787" for the gov ernment of the territory northwest of the river Ohio. This ordinance provided for the erection of not more than five nor less than three States, forbade slavery, and provided for the support of education.

STATEHOOD ESTABLISHED.

The territorial legislature was chosen on September 16, 1799, met on the 24th of that month, organized, and was addressed by Governor St. Clair. Jacob Burnet prepared all the "acts that became laws.' W. H. Harrison, Secretary of the Territory, was elected Delegate to Congress by eleven votes out of twenty-one. April 30, 1802, Congress authorized a convention to form a State constitution. The convention met

PRESIDENT WILLIAM HENRY HARRISON.

(Who represented Ohio in the national House and Senate.)

at Chillicothe, November 1, and the State constitution was ratified and signed. The most studious and accurate recorder of the early history of Ohio, Mr. Henry Howe, says of this constitution: "It was never referred to the people for their approbation, but became the fundamental law of the State by the act of the convention alone; and by this act Ohio became one of the States of the Fed

eral Union." We quote the enabling act as passed by Congress :

An Act to enable the people of the eastern division of the territory northwest of the river Ohio to form a constitution and State government, and for the admission of such State into the Union on an equal footing with the original States, and for other purposes.

Section 1. Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That the inhabitants of the eastern division of the territory northwest of the river Ohio be, and they are hereby, authorized to form for themselves

FORT WASHINGTON.

a constitution and State government and to assume such name as they shall deem proper, and the said State, when formed, shall be admitted into the Union upon the same footing with the original States in all respects whatever.

The journal of the United States House of Representatives contains this entry, November 10, 1802:

An engrossed bill to enable the people of the eastern division of the territory northwest of the river Ohio to form a constitution and State government, and for the admission of such State into the Union on an equal footing with the original States, and for other purposes, was read the third time, and the blanks therein filled up:

And, on the question that the same do pass,
Yeas...

It was resolved in the affirmative.{Nays..

47

29

FORT HARMAR, 1788.

June 30, 1802, should be exempt from taxation for five years after sale. The convention accepted the proposition of Congress, with a certain amendment and enlargement, to vest in the State, for the use of schools, section 16 of each township, one-thirty-sixth of the whole, and to give a percentage for making roads,-most just and wise provisions. Congress complied, and the compact was completed satisfactorily.

The di

Missouri River and the high-tipped semi-arid plains of the approach to the Rockies. viding line, influenced here and there by local conditions, follows, in a haphazard way, the one hundredth meridian from the high plains of North Dakota to the level reaches of the Texas Panhandle. For a thousand miles it defines the boundary between moisture and aridity. Beyond it, farming without irrigation is a speculation dependent upon a capricious rainfall. move it westward one mile adds 640,000 acres to the fertile area of the West,-4,000 farms of 160 acres each, capable of supporting a population of 20,000!

To

The problem before the settlers is not so much how to bring more rain as how to get along with what they have. In two ways is this lesson being mastered,-by raising crops that do not require much rainfall, and by conserving the moisture. The first gave the now familiar fields of alfalfa, sorghum, and Kaffir corn; the second is bringing into prominence a new theory of agriculture.

Western lands reached their lowest value in 1896-97. Since that time they have increased by from 50 to 150 per cent. over the entire middle West region, meaning the States between the Missouri River and the Rockies. A quarter of a million people moved out of this section in the half-decade ending with 1894. Now settlers are pushing back into the semi-arid belt then deserted. They are seeking to conquer the conditions of climate and to adapt to them such methods as shall secure better results than in the earlier attempts. One of the most interesting of these is known as "soil culture."

In 1894, a year of widespread drought, a South Dakota farmer, H. W. Campbell, who had been experimenting in tilling his claim, surprised his neighbors by harvesting a crop of potatoes that averaged one hundred and fortytwo bushels an acre on thirty-two acres, while those on adjoining farms were nearly a failure. He gave as his guide in conquering the semiarid conditions a variation from the usual method of tillage. Ordinarily, the farmer turns over the furrow with the plow and cultivates the top only sufficiently to insure the destruction of the

weeds. Mr. Campbell's plan was to plow very deep, and by means of specially constructed implements, pack the bottom of the furrow. The top he kept well cultivated, approaching as closely as possible to making fine dust over the entire field. Even when there were no weeds showing, the cultivation was continued, the object being to form a blanket of fine soil above the seed-bed and so retain to the end of the season a greater portion than usual of the rainfall, somewhat limited in that longitude. The theory was simple and the practice easy. It has gained a wide following, and is becoming one of the accepted principles of the farming of the new West. It means, when carried to perfection, that the natural rain waters will be absorbed readily into the ground, that they will be held there by the packing of the bottom of the furrow slice, and that undue evaporation will be prevented by the stratum of dust above.

Over the semi-arid region, where the rainfall is only about twelve inches a year, little or no moisture falls after the middle of June until autumn. Then it is that the corn withers, the wheat shrivels, and the fruit trees lose their strength. But it is noticed that if a quantity of coarse sand be scattered over a bit of soil, no

WHITE ELM TREE, WESTERN KANSAS. (Growth, from 4 feet to 10 feet in one year.)

matter how dry the summer, there will always be beneath it moist earth. So it was argued that if the bottom of the plowed surface could be packed to retain the spring rains, and the top of the field could by frequent harrowing be kept in a sandlike state of fineness, the full value of the rainfall might be utilized. The flood of muddy waters that formerly rushed away toward the sea after every rain ceases, for the rains have gone into the ground where they fell. It is a new condition, and one that appeals to the farmer with great force.

In 1895, Mr. Campbell operated under contract with a leading railroad at five points in South Dakota. The next year he managed five farms in North Dakota, and four in western Nebraska, eastern Colorado, and northwest Kansas. The following season he had charge of forty-three farms, on four different railroads, in five States. Too much was done by proxy that year, and the results were less satisfactory than the smaller undertakings. Since then, he has been conducting an experimental farm in northwest Kansas, where some remarkable results have been secured. Another farm in western Nebraska is to be under his charge.

Now for the results. Mr. Campbell says of his success in producing crops by this conservation of the natural rainfall: "On a farm twelve miles east of the Colorado line and eighteen miles south of Nebraska, in western Kansas, in 1896, two hundred young trees were set on a narrow, high divide fully one hundred and seventy-five feet above the Republican Valley, which is near by. All made a fair growth that year, but in 1897 a remarkable advance was noted. One plum tree had nine limbs, the shortest measuring 4 feet 8 inches, the longest 6 feet 1 inch, all entirely of the 1897 growth. In October of the second year, we bored down 16 feet 2 inches with a sampling auger and found moist earth all the way. We could make balls of it by pressing it in the hands. On adjoining fields, this could not be done, dust flying from each augerful. Potatoes were grown in 1899, when no rain fell in western Kansas from October, 1898, to June 17, 1899, that averaged 80 bushels an acre. At Lisbon, N. Dak., the first year's corn was 42 bushels; the second, 82 bushels; the third, 93 bushels."

The work begins with the fall plowing, which is deep, and with a sub-surface packing. Several harrowings are given to improve the seed-bed and make the soil receptive of the rainfall. Harrowing after every rain keeps the dust blanket above the plant until there is too large a growth for the work. Then the cultivator finishes the work. The work is simple," says Mr. Campbell, "but it must be done thoroughly, at the right time, and in the proper manner. It is not only necessary that the farmer know how, but he must know why; then he will see how unwise he has been."

The objection of the average settlers is that

the time and expense are more than they can afford; that the average farmer cannot follow an experimental farm's methods profitably. It is probable these will attempt only a modified form of the system, but few there be who cannot thus improve their methods with profit.

Ex-Chancellor Snow, of the Kansas State University, one of the West's best authorities, says of the weather in 1902:

It is a fact to be emphasized that the average annual rainfall in eastern Kansas has now passed 36 inches, notwithstanding the great deficiency of 1901, There is no doubt that the rainfall of Kansas is slowly increasing, while the wind-velocity is slowly decreasing,-two points of great importance to the welfare of the State.

This is one of the conditions upon which the semi-arid West bases its hope for the future. The lands are being taken for homesteads at an unprecedented rate and the sod broken. Last year, more claims were entered than in any year in the history of the nation, not excluding the period of the great migration of the early eighties. The people do not go in "prairie schooners," but on the railroads; they are taking with them a fair understanding of conditions that must be encountered.

The semi-arid belt has unquestionably been pushed back many miles by the discovery of crops adapted to a climate that is short on rainfall; if the new system of agriculture proves as practicable as its enthusiastic followers are certain it will, there will be another realm added to the wheat, corn, and fruit growing region of the West. It will admirably supplement the vast irrigation fund that is to be given for the redemption of untilled lands by the provisions of the recently adopted federal legislation.