THE SINGLE TAX AND THE FARMER 131 
This extravagant conclusion is set forth in the hope 
that it may prove a magnet that shall draw present 
attention away from agricultural ground rent, which 
may almost be ignored, and fix it upon the fifty-five 
millions of ground rent in Boston, which the people pay 
yearly for the use of its land; upon the one hundred 
and fifty or two hundred millions of ground rent in 
Greater New York; upon the two or three thousand 
millions of ground rent in the United States; and upon 
the billions of franchise values which in recent years 
have sprung up all around us like gourds in the night. 
Confronted, as we are to-day, by such acute con 
ditions, we ask you to pardon whatever may seem like 
impatience with a theory that has dealt so laboriously 
with the cuticle instead of with the heart of production. 
We seek a proper understanding and economic treat 
ment of this vast river of ground rent, which, like a 
great Mississippi, drains every field of industry, labour 
and capital, wages and interest, in the whole country 
around. Our earnest contention is that to such wise 
treatment we must look for the correction of most that 
is now wrong in the distribution of wealth. Out of 
this vast current of ground rent we would provide for 
all public need.