Professor Parsons says “the total _national_ land-grants alone have aggregated 215,000,000 acres”—(15,000,000 acres higher than the estimate by Professors Cleveland and Powell). “It could be said of more than one railroad company as was said by an English capitalist who inspected ... the properties of the Illinois Central, ‘This is not a railway company; it is a land company.’”[158] It is interesting (and instructive) to note that the charter of the _Northern_ Pacific Railway with its 47,000,000 acre land gift, with astoundingly liberal amendments to the U. P. charter, was granted July 2, 1864, _precisely at a time_ when the nation’s attention was again riveted to two specially terrible campaigns which absorbed the nation wholly in the war: Grant and Lee, with immense armies, were fighting bitterly, and Sherman with 98,000 men and Johnston with 45,000 men had been fighting fiercely and almost continuously from June 10 to July 2, 1864. As stated above, the Northern Pacific got 47,000,000 acres of land.[159] The three railways, says Professor Parsons in substance,[160] the Union Pacific, the Central Pacific and the Northern Pacific, _cost_ somewhat less than $132,000,000, and were _capitalized_ at more than $383,000,000—that is to say, about $250,000,000 (_two-thirds_ of the capitalization) was fictitious,—a fraud, a lie, _commercial patriotism_. While at wining and dining tables in closely guarded private parlors in the best hotels in Washington this unmatchable plundering was cunningly arranged (“to develop the country, of course”) working class men and boys, half starved and weary, were obediently slaughtering themselves at the word of command—for 43 cents a day, in depreciated paper money forced upon them by pirate patriots. While the nation is blinded with tears and the common men’s blood gushes from their torn veins, the “business” man, with pious patriotism talking grandly of the “glorious flag,” cunningly sneaks to the nation’s store-house, a blushless burglar; he climbs aboard the ship of state, a conscienceless pirate.[161] FIFTH ILLUSTRATION: “FREEING CUBA”—“REMEMBERING THE MAINE.” So you were—or wished to be—in the Spanish-American War? Well, I wish to explain why the capitalists excited some young men—carefully excited them—and then sent them to Cuba in 1898. There were very strong reasons for their doing so. (1) American capitalists already had investments in Cuban industries, and they knew that if the United States took charge of Cuba, their investments would be more secure, would thus increase in value—and thus yield more profits. (2) American capitalists wanted Spanish capitalists crowded out in order to give still more opportunity to American capitalists to extend their American capitalism in Cuba—and thus make more profits.