This district which may be taken as a sample of many others, had a complete system of waterworks, a continuous pressure being secured by a series of stand-pipes, from three to five hundred feet in height, which forced the water to every point where it was needed. This system also provided water for irrigation purposes as the season seemed to require. This with a complete system of drainage, constituted a method of keeping the most perfect condition for producing the greatest abundance. In addition to this, all the waste products were converted into fertilizer and returned to the soil. These wise, economic, scientific methods and intense cultivation, explain how this small district, sustained a population of 200,000 and yet gave up fully one-half of its lands to boulevards, lawns, parks, driveways and ornamented grounds.
Electricity was the universal motor power, as well as a stimulant to the growth of crops. The soil was pulverized, seeded and rolled by vast machines. The grain was harvested, threshed and placed in sacks by huge combined reapers and threshers, and dried by passing through evaporators on an endless belt which conveyed it to elevators, from which it reached the mills by force of gravity, if that is the right word to apply to the centrifugal force which in this moral world held everything to the surface.
The standard day's labor was but two hours; and yet with the aid of machinery, ten persons harvested a strip of grain one hundred feet wide and thirty miles in length, delivering the same at the elevators in sacks, while another ten prepared the soil and put in another crop. All the other work was carried on in the same labor saving manner, and this two hours of labor was deprived of every feature of drudgery and became only agreeable exercise.
One thing I noticed particularly; domestic animals seemed to be raised more as pets than for use. The only animal diet ordinarily used consisted of eggs, milk, butter and cheese. Sheep and goats were raised for the fleece which was manufactured into the finest fabrics. Fruits and nuts were produced in the greatest abundance and constituted a very large part of the diet of the people.
The district was in fact a stupendous farm and in its original design the prime object had evidently been utility rather than ornament. The work of the landscape gardener had been utilized to the largest extent, but it had not been permitted to encroach upon the useful. The economy in the uniformity in which the lands were laid out, the houses constructed and the work of production carried on, gave to the whole country such an artificial appearance, especially from the airships which we need most generally in our observations, that Captain Ganoe could no longer refrain from commenting upon it. One day as we were soaring above this magnificent farming district, he asked MacNair if the entire inner world had been cut out according to the same pattern.