ions are the rent in its original
form. The rent of wheat land is wheat, that of cotton land is cotton,
that of mill sites is manufactured goods, etc. That money is used in
payments made to landlords changes nothing that is essential. To say
that such contributions to the supply of particular commodities are
not an element in determining the prices of them, would be as
unreasonable as to make the same assertion concerning other parts of
the supply. Quite as logically might it be asserted that other
components in the supply do not affect prices--that the amount of
wheat which is attributable to harvesting machinery or the amount of
calico which is imputable to looms has no influence in the market
values of these articles.

_Why the Produce due to Good Land prevents Prices from greatly
Rising._--If the use of good wheat land were merely discontinued, the
supply of wheat would of course be not only lessened, but reduced
almost to nothing, and a famine price would at once result. If, now,
an attempt were made to make good the shortage of the supply of this
cereal by tilling lands which are now at the margin of cultivation, it
would at once appear that not enough of such land exists to enable us
to accomplish the purpose, and it would be necessary to push the
margin outward and till poorer and poorer soils, at a greatly
enlarging cost. We should grub out worse thickets, drain worse swamps,
terrace more discouraging hillsides, irrigate more remote and barren
deserts, etc. All this would mean a greater cost of production of
wheat and a higher price for it in the market.

It would also mean another thing. The extending of the margin of
cultivation which makes it include poorer grades of land causes that
part of the area now tilled which does not command any rent to yield
one. After the margin should have been greatly extended and finally
located in a region where getting anything out of the soil would
require a struggle, it would appear that all of the lands newly
annexed to the cultivated area except the last and poorest would
command a rent. All but those on the new margin would add a definite
quota to the supply of wheat, and this contribution would be their
rent. Entering into the supply, it would of course count in the
adjustment of price.

_What can reasonably be conceded concerning Rent and Price._--There is
another possible meaning of the phrase "Rent is not an element in
price"; and, whether it was clearly in the m