324
��AMERICAN ANTHROPOLOGIST
��[n. s. v i, 1899
��i
�� ��consumed and furniture is produced, and the furniture is con- sumed in the production of welfare, which is the entelechy.
The planter purchases a field on which he raises cotton ; the time of the field, that is, its power of producing for a year, or, in other terms, the interest of the purchase money for the field for a year, is consumed in the production of a crop. The labor on the field is also consumed, and the field of cotton is produced. Then the cotton from the plant is picked, and the field of cotton is consumed by the picking of the cotton bolls ; the cotton now becomes the material for another process. Overlooking minor operations, it becomes material for the spinner, who makes a product of yarn ; the cotton and the labor employed are con- sumed by the man who makes a product of cloth. Then the tailor consumes it as cloth, together with an amount of labor necessary to make it into clothing ; then the clothing is consumed by the wearer, when it reaches its entelechy. Thus land, by a series of human processes through intelligent labor, produces wel- fare through a series of changes in which labor is consumed.
In the course of production from one kind to another and from one form to another, the domain of nature and art is ran- sacked for the purpose — air, water, land, plants, and animals are utilized and a multitude of persons are employed.
In the consideration of production we must contemplate the natural material found in air, in sea, in land, in plants, and in animals. The air is ambient over all the surface of the earth as a hollow sphere of gas. The sea has its gulfs, bays, and straits, with its auxiliaries in springs, lakes, and rivers, while the lower portion of the air is laden with moisture which is partially gathered into clouds and precipitated on the earth in rain when favorable conditions prevail. Thus the water is a sphere of liquid which in- tervenes between air and land. The sea with its auxiliaries yields its materials and the air yields its materials. Plants are scattered over all the surface of the land not covered with liquid water, and over a part of the surface of the land which is covered with
��-1 r ,
it*
P. ' 1. u
�� �
