ilT^&WcvcA 



1 

6 .Sj voL> xix - 



[JULY.] 



Published Monthly. August & Williams, Proprietors 




J. E. WILLIAMS, Editor 



TH E 




DEVOTED TO 



AGRICULTURE, HORTICULTURE, 



I 



AttD TSE 



HOUSEHOLD ARTS. 




PRINTED AT RICHMOND, Va., 
BY MACFARLANE & FERGUSSON 

1859. 




SOUTHERN PLANTER.— ADVERTISING SHEET. 



CONTENTS. 

Guano Cnntroveisy, . - 385 

Sex of Eggs, - - - 387 

Meteorology i« its Connection with Agri- 
culture, - - - 388 
Hair of Children, - - 395 
Adorn, - - * 396 
The First Silk Mill, - - 397 
Less Land and Better Culture, - 398 
The Robin, - - - 399 
Hill-Side Ditching, - - 399 
The Law of Sex, - -400 
A Statistical View of American Agricul- 
ture, - - - 401 
Increase in the Cost of Food, - 413 
The CofTec and Sugar Plantations of Cuba, 416 
Country and City Life, - - 419 
Wearing out Land, - - 421 
Agricultural Science ; Mechanical Tex- 
ture of Soils, - - 422 
Seed Saving, - - - 424 
Enlarging a Farm without Buying Land, 425 
Mental Labor, - - - 425 
Effect of Bones and other Manures on 

Plants, - - - 426 

Relations of Air, Water, and Light, to Ani- 
mal aud Vegetable Life, - 427 
Enterprise and Obstacles, - - 428 
Francis Gillet on Gravel-Wall Houses, - 429 
Mr. Bakers Apples, - - 430 
Investigation of the Sugar-Bearing capa- 
city of the Chinese Sugar-Cane, 430 
The War in Europe, - - 433 
A Manual of Scientific and Practical Agri- 
culture, for the Farm and the School, 434 
Southern Field and Fireside, - 435 
Natural Agriculturist, - - 435 
Acknowledgment, * - 4^5 
Scientific American, - - 435 
Fruit-Trees, Shrubs and Evergreens, - 436 
The Principles that should Guide the Far- 
mer in Breeding Stock, with more 
especial reference to Horses, - 437 
Treatment of Peach Trees- Extirpating 
Thistles from Grass Land - Pitch 
Phenomenon at Sea, 
Reclaiming Clay Soils; Deep Plowing. 

When to do it. 
Rotation and Deep Soii.a Corn Experiment 
Subsoil Plowing, 
A Hole in the Pocket, 
Tb« Blind Boy, Water Mn 



TO ADVEETISERS. 

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panied with the money to insure their insertion* 
AUGUST & WILLIAMS, Proprietors. 

Richmond, February, 1859. 



- 443 

- 444 

, 445 

- 446 

- 447 
• 448 



THE BEST REAPING MACHINE, 

I have in store, and for sale, C. H. McOormick's 
American Reaper and Mower, which is warranted to 
be the best Machine made for cutting Wheat, and will 
be sold with that guarantee. A "sample of the Reaper 
in working order, can be seen at my store, and farmers 
are invited to call and see it. 

Also on hand, Atkins' Self-Raking, and Hursey's 
Reapers, with Threshers, Horse Powers, Wheat Fans, 
and a general assortment of agricultural machinery of 
my own manufacture. 

'Warehouse, No. 14, Main Street, Richmond, Va. 

June 1859—2t H. M. SMITH. 



ALEXANDER GARRETT, 

38 Main Street, RICHMOND. VA. 

General COMMISSION MERCHANT, 

AND DEALER IN 

GEOCEEIES, 

PERUVIAN AND SOMBRERO GUANOS, 
PILASTER, «&c. 

WILLIAM 6. MILLER, 

Who is associated with hiin, devotes his partic- 
ular attention to the sale of 



TH E 




Devoted to Agriculture, Horticulture, and the Household Arts. 



Agriculture is- the nursing 


mother 


of the Arts. 1 Tillage and 
[Xenophon. J the State.- 


Pasturage 
-Sully. 


are the 


two 


breasts 


of 


J. E. 


WILLIAMS, 


Editor. 




AUGUST & WILLIAMS 


Prop' 


RS. 


Vol. 


XIX. 




RICHMOND, 


VA., JULY, 


1859. 






No. 


• 



For the Southern Planter. 

Guano Controversy. 
Mr. Editor : 

I am at a loss for a " caption" to this ar- 
ticle, that will designate my subject at pres- 
ent, and still bear some relation to the 
original inquiry, out of which these collat- 
erals have sprung. One would scarcely 
suppose from the points now under discus- 
sion between } T our correspondent " B." and 
myself that the discussion had its begin- 
ning in an inquiry into the " Stimulating 
properties of Guano j" and yet the connec- 
tion is natural, inasmuch as its operation 
for good or evil depends in a great degree 
upon the susceptibilities of vegetables to 
these unwonted effects. And thus we are 
led off into a physiological discussion con- 
cerning the susceptibilities of plants, and 
as susceptibilities imply functions and func- 
tions organs, it brings us directly to the ques- 
tion, Do plants possess an organization anal- 
agous to the nervous system of animals ? 

Says " B.," " I have not asserted that 
there exist an organized nervous system, 
but such susceptibilities as sustain to the 
vegetable, a relation similar to that of a 
nervous system to animals." The mean- 
ing we extract from the foregoing sentence 
is, that plants either possess a nervous appa- 
25 

i 



ratue or some organized structure whose 
functions bear a certain relation to the func- 
tions of a nervous system : for what he 
calls susceptibilities must be the properties 
or functions of some organ from which it 
derives its susceptibilities. 

Now, if he hesitates about calling it a 
nervous system, we must call upon him for 
a name for this new structure in the anat- 
omy and conformation of plants, and then 
to demonstrate its functions and show us 
its relations to this system in animals. 

In the meantime, we will endeavour to 
show that plants do not possess certain func- 
tions or properties that are possessed by all 
animals, in greater or less degree, and that 
arc universally referred by all physiologists 
to an organized system of nerves, viz : sen- 
sation and locomotion. U B." stated in syl- 
logcstic form in a previous communication, 
that as some animals do not possess locomo- 
tion, they, too, must be destitute of nerves; 
but wc deny the fact that there are any an- 
imals totally destitute of either of these 
functions. Wc are ready to admit that they 
are very feeble and of the lowest order, but 
that they are totally absent no physiologist 
has ever asserted. In the higher orders of 
animal existence, both the functions and 
their organs are so palpable as to be read- 
ily demonstrated, and always bearing the 



386 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[July 



relation to cacli other of cause and effect ; 
so that in the oyster and zoophytes, and 
other specimens el' feeble animal existence, 
where the nervous system is too rudimcntal 
to be demonstrated, we have a perfect right 
to infer its existence from the presence of 
its functions. 

Now, what evidence is there that 
plants possess either sensation or locomo- 
tion ? I believe it has never been asserted 
that they have the least pretension to lo- 
comotion, (except by the learned and dis- 
tinguished physiologist from whom " B." 
quotes, and to whom we will refer again j) 
and as locomotion and sensation go hand 
in hand, and always co-exist in the relation 
of cause and effect ; in the absence of the 
one there is no need of the other, and in 
the absence of both there is no need of the 
organization that produces and presides 
over them. Had Nature endowed plants 
with such organs and functions, she, in all 
probability, would have made them to stand 
out in the same bold relief in the one king- 
dom as in the other. In all other respects 
she has constructed plants with their or- 
gans and functions as conspicuous as those 
of the animal kingdom. As animals were 
certainly designed for one purpose and 
vegetables for another, why can we not 
accept these higher attributes of sensation 
and locomotion as the distinguishing char- 
acteristic — the beginning, at least, of a 
separation of the animal from the vegetable 
kingdom. To answer the ends of vegetable 
life, there is no need of such functions or 
such organs, whilst they are indispensable 
to animal existence. Every motion in the 
animal organism proceeds from the nervous, 
apparatus. The phenomena of motion in 
the vegetable, as the circulation of the sap, I 
and the closing of leaves and flowers, de- 
pend on physical and mechanical laws. 
Heat and light are the remote causes of 
motion in vegetables, their growth and de- 
velopment, and also the assimilation of 
their food, being dependent upon external 
circumstances and influences which produce 
motion. There are two sets of circumstan- 
ces necessary to produce any activity in 
vegetables, viz : the presence of matter for 
assimilation and of heat and light j the in- 
crease of the plant being dependent upon 
the presence of material out of which its 
food can be elaborated through the ope- 
ration of these indispensable agents; but 
heat and light are powerless of them- 



selves without the presence of something 
upon which to operate. There is no organ 
in -the plant whose functions they (that is, 
heat and light,) can in the slightest degree 
increase, without the presence of pabulum 
to act upon, and when this pabulum is elab- 
orated, assimilation goes on under the con- 
trol of a " vis vitx," and growth and de- 
velopment are the necessary consequence. 

In animals, on the contrary, we recognize 
a distinct power residing in a nervous sys- 
tem capable of renewing itself, at every in- 
stant of life — a power peculiar to them- 
selves — self-generating, depending upon none 
of those external influences to which vege- 
tables are subject as the source of their 
motion, a mere operation of the will being 
sufficient to develop it and to produce the 
motion which is indispensable to the vital 
process. Joy or anger excites it, and dis- 
turbs its equilibrium. The action of " mere 
stimulants" produces the intensest activity, 
without any increase or development what- 
ever. * 

Says " B.," " The gentleman will scarce- 
ly deny that when the vital forces or actions 
of plants are exalted or quickened, that the 
circulation of the nutritious juices in the 
plant are at the same time accelera- 
ted." In reply to which we say that " B." 
but makes the common mistake of putting 
the cart before the horse, or mistaking the 
effect for the cause. The acceleration of 
the nutritious juices, consequent upon an 
abundant supply ; that is elaborated under 
the influence of heat and light, is what 
exhausts and quickens the vital forces or 
actions. 

" B." informs me "I am mistaken in sup- 
posing alcohol innoxious to plants, and that 
I will be convinced of the mistake by pour- 
ing strong brandy on a delicate plant." I 
am rather opposed to wasting the material 
by such an experiment. Could he have 
been so indiscreet as to put his to such a vile 
purpose ? If he will inform me how I can 
persuade his little nervous membranes to 
u . imbibe a mouth-full," I would consent to 
spare as much : but I can't stand this 
pouring on, as I would not only waste my 
brandy, but burn my plant, though not 
quite so effectually as by using a strong 
acid, or fire, the effect of each and all such 
agents being to destroy the structure par- 
tially or wholly according to the degree of 
concentration by a chemical action. If I 
could direct a little " spirits and water" in- 



1859.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



387 



tcrnally to its susceptibilities, I would sac- 
rifice a little of the u over-joyful" to see ;; 
drunken plant. He also informs me that 
brandy is not a "mere stimulant" to animals, 
though it be the type of the class of " mere 
stimulants," from which I infer, he means, 
that while plants arc susceptible to the ac- 
tion of u more stimulants," animals are 
not. How is it with hope, and joy, and 
anger ? Are they fattening also ? Rut I 
hate to give up the brandy ; and I know 
that u B." has the good taste to like it, 
too, — for lie says that u it is destruction to 
rose bushes, but as fattening as Cod-liver to 
man," which we in all our admiration must 
doubt ; and we will hazard our opinion 
that, if "B." will go it on brandy alone 
for one month his " fair, round belly 
and good caponed loin" will vanish into 
the lean and lank Cassius form. 

Again he asks, * How does the gentle- 
man know that all the positive phenomena 
of such action (stimulant) are found in 
connection with such a known system of 
nerves." Because I have never known the 
application of any stimulant to anything 
without nerves to produce phenomena in 
accordance with the functions of a nervous 
apparatus, and the manifestations of the 
functions of a nervous apparatus are what 
I call " the positive phenomena." 

" B." quotes from a u learned and dis- 
tinguished physiologist in vegetables" the 
following remarkable enunciation of facts ; 
but however learned and distinguished his 
authority may be, he must excuse us for 
asking for the proof. An " ipse dixit," 
is one mode of imparting knowledge and a 
quod erat demonstrandum" is another. 
And where propositions are new and start- 
ling, we of little faith require the latter : 

" Two properties direct the action of 
their small number of functions j a latent 
and faint sensibility, in virtue of wnich, 
each vessel, every part of the plant is affect- 
ed in its own way by the fluids with 
which it is in contact, — a contactility as 
little apparent, though the results prove L- 
refragibly its existence; a contactility 
in virtue of which the vessels sensible to 
the impression of liquids close or dilate 
themselves to effect their transmission or 
elaboration. The organs allotted to repro- 
duction animate, for a moment, this exhi- 
bition ; more sensible, more irritable, they 
are visibly in action j the stamina, or male 
organs bow themselves over the female 



organs, tiie pistil shakes on the stigma the 
fertilizing dust, then straightens, retires 
from it, and dies with the flower, which is 
succeeded by the seed or fruit." 

So you perceive the learned and distin- 
guished physiologist has not only discover- 
ed " a latent and faint sensibility," but also 
the highest attributes of animal life, con- 
sciousness and volition. We can but think 
that the learned gentleman left the province 
of philosophical research for that of fancy. 

M B." refers, very properly, the agency 
of heat, in producing such sublime phe- 
nomena in the mineral kingdom, to its ex- 
pansive powers ; but supposes it possesses 
another and distinct power when applied to 
the vegetable and animal kingdoms. He 
says, ** the potency here excited is an ex- 
alting, quickening, life-giving energy." So 
it is; but how does «it do it? We appre- 
hend, (if he will permit the expression,) 
by the agency of the same expansive 
power elaborating the elements of nutri- 
tion out of pre-existing compounds, and 
when these elements are brought within 
reach of the assimilating power of vege- 
tables, they produce " an exalting, quick- 
ening, life-giving energy." 

Heat has but one force and one power, 
and that is manifested alike upon all Oodles 
and all matter. It is a great disengaging 
force tending to separate particles of mat- 
ter, and its antagonistic force is " affinity." 
Yet it is frequently employed to aid the 
power of affinity, by presenting matter in 
a more eligible condition. 

We acknowledge the receipt of the 
" autograph," and must confess to no little 
anxiety to meet in person the individual 
(on many accounts) that owns so remarka- 
ble a cognomen, and am not surprized that 
he hesitates to give it to the public. For, 
were it " Scroggins," it would not be less 
euphoneous than the veritable " auto- 
graph." 

W. A. BRADFORD. 

Clarke Co., June 8th, 1859. 

«»•»■> 

Sex of Eggs. 

A correspondent of an English paper af- 
firms that he learned whilst in France, 
among the best poultry breeders, that the 
long narrow eggs were set aside as male eggs, 
or those that would produce male chickens if 
hatched out, and that the round dumpy ones 
would produce female chickens. 



388 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[July 



Meteorology in its Connection with Ag- 
riculture. 

An Abridgement of an Article written anil 
published in the Patent Office Report of 
1855. 

BY JOSEPH HENRY, SECRETARY OF THE 
SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION. 

All the changes on the surface of the 
earth, and all the movements of the hea- 
venly bodies, are the immediate results of 
natural forces, acting in accordance with 
established and invariable laws ; and it is 
only by that precise knowledge of these 
laws, which is properly denominated science, 
that man is enabled to defend himself 
against the adverse operations of Nature, 
or to direct her innate powers in accordance 
with his will. At first sight, it might ap- 
pear that meteorology was an exception to 
this general proposition, and that the 
changes of the weather, and the peculiari- 
ties of climate, in different portions of the 
earth's surface, were of all things the most 
uncertain, and farthest removed from the 
dominion of law; but scientific investiga- 
tion establishes the fact, that no phenome- 
non is the result of accident, nor even of 
fitful volition. The modern science of sta- 
tistics* has revealed a permanency and an 
order in the occurrence of events depend- 
ing on conditions in which nothing of this 
kind could have been supposed. Even 
those occurrences which seem to be left to 
the free will, the passion, or the greater or 
less intelligence of men, are under the con- 
trol of laws, fixed, immutable and eternal. 
No one knows the day nor hour of his own 
death, and nothing is more entirely uncer- 
tain than, in a given case of expected birth, 
whether a boy or a girl shall be born ; but 
the number out of a million of men living 
together, in one country, who shall die in 
ten, twenty, forty or sixty years, and the 
number of boys and girls who shall be born 
in a million of births, may be predicted 
from statistical data with almost unerring- 
precision. * * * All events are gov- 
erned by a Supreme Intelligence, who 
knows no change, and, under the same con- 
ditions, the same results are invariably pro- 
duced. If the conditions, however, are per- 
manently varied, a corresponding change in 
the results will be observed. * * * It is this 
regularity which is observed in phenomena, 
when studied in groups of large numbers, 
which enables us to arrive at reliable and 



permanent laws in regard to meteorology, 
and to predict, with certainty, the average 
temperature of a given place for a series of 
decades of years, and which furnishes the 
basis, in accordance with the principles of 
assurance, of a knowledge of what species 
of plant or animal may be profitably raised in 
a given locality. * * * We need but to unite 
the results of observations with those of ex- 
periments in the laboratory, and mathemati- 
cal deductions from astronomical arid other 
data, to enable us, not only to refer the pe- 
riodic changes to established laws, but also 
to trace to their source, various perturbing 
influences which produce the variations 
from the mean, and thus arrive, at least, at 
an approximate explanation of the meteo- 
rological phenomena which are constantly 
presented to us. 

No truth is more important in regard to 
the material well-being of man, and none 
requires to be inore frequently enforced 
upon the public mind, than that the im- 
provement and perfection of art depend 
upon the advance of science. Although 
many processes have been discovered by 
accident, and practised from age to age, 
without a knowledge of the principles on 
which they depend, yet, as a general rule, 
such processes are imperfect, and remain, 
like Chinese art, for centuries unchanged 
or unimproved. They are generally waste- 
ful in labor and material, and involve opera- 
tions which are not merely unessential, but 
actually detrimental. The dependence of 
the improvement of agriculture upon the 
advance of general science, and its intimate 
connexion with meteorology in particular, 
must be evident, when we reflect that it is 
the art of applying the forces of Nature to 
increase and improve those portions of her 
productions which are essential to the ne- 
cessity and comfort of the human race. 

Mbdern science has established, by a wide 
and careful induction, the fact that plants 
and animals principally consist of solidified 
air, the only portions of an earthy charac- 
ter which enter into their composition, being 
the ashes that remain after combustion. 
All the other parts were originally in the 
atmosphere, were absorbed from the mass of 
air during the growth of the plant or ani- 
mal, and are given back again to the same . 
fountain from which they were drawn, in 
the decay of the vegetable, and in the 
breathing and death of the animal. 

The air consists of oxygen, nitrogen, car- 



1859.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER 



389 



bonic acid, the vapor of water, (races of 
ammonia, and of nitric acid. A young 
plant, placed in the free atmosphere, and 
exposed to the light of the sun, gradually 
increases in size and weight, and receives 
carbon constantly from the corbonio acid of 
the air, which is decomposed, and evolves 
the liberated oxygen. The power by which 
this decomposition is produced is now known 
to be due to the solar ray, which consists of 
a peculiar impulse, or vibration, propagated 
from the distant sun, through a medium 
filling all space. 

It is a principle of nature, that power is 
always absorbed in producing a change in 
matter. This change may be permanent, 
or it may be of such a character, as to re- 
produce the power which was expended in 
effecting it. * * * For example, the effect of 
the impulse from the sun is to decompose the 
carbonic acid which surrounds the leaf of 
the plant, or, in other words, to overcome 
the natural attraction between the carbon 
and the oxygen of which the acid is com- 
posed ; and, in this effort, the motions of 
the atoms of the etherial medium are them- 
selves stopped. The power, however, in 
this case, is not permanently neutralised ; 
for, when the plant is consumed, either by 
rapid combustion or by slow decay ; that is, 
when the carbon and the oxygen are again 
suffered to rush into union, to form carbonic 
acid — the same amount of power is evolved 
in the form of light, heat, or nervous force, 
which was absorbed in the original compo- 
sition. If the plant, moreover, be con- 
sumed in the animal, the same power is ex- 
pended in building up the organization, in 
producing locomotion and the incessant ac- 
tion of the heart, and the other involuntary 
movements necessary to the vital process. 

Plants are, therefore, the recipients of 
the power of the sun-beam. They transfer 
this power to the animal, and the animal 
again returns it to celestial space, whence it 
emanated. Properly to so direct this power 
of the sun-beam, that no part of it may run 
to waste, or be unproductive of economical 
results, it is essential that we know some- 1 
thing of its nature; and the lifetime cfj 
labor of many individuals, supported at ( 
public expense, would be w T ell expended in ' 
exclusive devotion to this one subject. The 
researches which have been made, in regard 
to it, have developed the fact, that the im- 
pulses from the sun are of, at least, four dif- 
ferent characters, namely, the lighting im- 



pulse, the heating impulse, the chemical 
impulse, and the phosphorogenic impulse; 
and it has further been ascertained that, 
though each of these impulses may produce 
an effect on the plant, the decomposition of 
the carbonic acid is mainly due to the chem- 
ical action. A scries of experiments is re- 
quired to determine the various conditions 
uriuYr which these impulses from the sun 
may be turned to the greatest amount of 
economical use, and what modifications they 
may demand, in order to the growth of pe- 
culiar plants. The fact has not yet been 
clearly ascertained, whether some of these 
emanations cannot be excluded with benefi- 
cial result, or, in other words, whether they 
do not produce an antagonistic effect, and 
what relative proportions of them are ab- 
sorbed by the atmosphere, or reflected from 
our planet, without reaching the earth, by 
the floating clouds of the air. To deter- 
mine these, requires a series of elaborate 
experiments ancf accurate observations. We 
have said that the chemical vibration is that 
which principally decomposes the earbonic 
acid, in the growth of the plant; but we 
know that the heating impulse is an auxili- 
ary to this, and that heat and moisture are 
essential elements in the growth of vegeta- 
tion. The small amount of knowledge we 
already possess of the character of the em- 
anations from the sun, has been turned to 
admirable account in horticulture. In this 
branch of husbandry, we seek, even more 
than in agriculture, to modify the processes 
of nature; to cultivate the plants of the 
torrid zone amid the chilling winds of the 
northern temperate zone; and to render the 
climate of sterile portions of the earth con- 
genial to the luxurious productions of more 
iavored regions. We seek to produce arti- 
ficial atmospheres, and to so temper the im- 
pulses from the sun, that the effects of va- 
riations in latitude, and the rigor of the 
climate, may be obviated. 

From all that has been said, therefore, it 
will be evident, that the hopes of the future, 
in regard to agriculture, principally rest 
upon the advance of abstract science — not 
upon the mere accumulation of facts, of 
which the connexion and dependence are un- 
known, but upon a definite conception of the 
general principles of which these facts are 
the result. All the phenomena of the at- 
mosphere should be studied and traced to 
the laws on which they depend. The labor 
bestowed upon investigations of this kind is 



390 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[July 



not as, the narrow-sighted advocate of im- 
mediate utilitarian results would affirm, 
without practical importance ; on the con- 
trary, it is the basis of the highest improve- 
ment of which the art of agriculture is sus- 
ceptible. On every acre of ground, a defi- 
nite amount of solar force is projected, 
which may, under proper conditions, be em- 
ployed in developing organization ; and €he 
great object of the husbandman is,to so ar- 
range the conditions, that the least amount 
possible of this may be lost in uneconomi- 
cal results. Independent, however, of the 
practical value of a knowledge of the prin- 
ciples on which the art of agriculture de- 
pends, the mind of the farmer should be 
cultivated, as well as his fields, and, after 
the study of God's moral revelation, what 
is better fitted to improve the intellect than 
the investigation of the mode by which He 
produces the changes in the material uni- 
verse. 

The climate and productiveness of a 
country are determined, first by its latitude, 
or its distance on either side of the equator; 
second, by the configuration of the surface, 
as to elevation and depression ; third, by its 
position, whether in the interior of a conti- 
nent, or in proximity to the ocean ; fourth, 
by the direction and velocity of the prevail- 
ing winds; fifth, by the nature of the soil; 
and, lastly, the cultivation to which it has 
been subjected. 

First, in regard to latitude : The produc- 
tive power of a soil, other things being the 
same, depends on two circumstances, solar 
radiation and moisture; and these increase 
as we approach the equator. 

If the kind of food were a matter of in- 
difference, the same extent of ground which 
supports one person at the latitude of 60° 
would support twenty-five at the equator ; 
but the food necessary to the support of per- 
sons in different latitudes varies with re- 
spect to quality, as well as to quantity, and 
the other conditions mentioned, with regard 
to climate, should enter largely into the esti- 
mate we form in relation to the actual pro- 
ductiveness of different parallels of latitude. 
* * * * 

The air diminishes in temperature, as we 
ascend, but the rate of this diminution va- 
ries, within certain limits, in different part* 
of the earth. ***** 

We may assume, that in the temperate 
zone, the diminution due to altitudes, or 
mountains, is about 1° of Fahrenheit for 



300 feet. Furthermore, the air, as we as- 
cend, and the pressure of the superincum- 
bent strata is removed, becomes lighter; 
and though the temperature of the several 
portions diminishes very rapidly, yet the 
whole amount of heat in each pound of air 
is very nearly the same. For example, if 
a certain weight of air were carried from 
the surface of the earth to such a height 
that it would expand into double its volume, 
the heat which it contained would then be 
distributed throughout twice the space, 
and the temperature would consequently 
he much diminished, though the absolute 
amount of heat would be unchanged. If 
the same air was returned to the earth, 
whence it was taken, condensation would 
ensue, and the temperature would be the 
same as at first. 

On this principle, a wind passing over a 
high mountain is not necessarily cooled; for 
the diminution of temperature, which is 
produced by the rarefaction of the ascent, 
would be just equivalent to the increase 
which is due to the condensation in an 
equal descent. This would be the case if 
the air were perfectly dry ; but, if it con- 
tained moisture, paradoxical as it may seem, 
it would be warmer when it returned to the 
lower level than when it left it. In ascend- 
ing to the top of the mountain, it would de- 
posit its moisture in the form of water or 
snow, and the latent heat given out from 
this would increase the heat of the air, and 
when it descended, on the opposite side, to 
the same level from which it ascended, it 
would be warmer, on account of this addi- 
tional heat. The configuration of the sur- 
face of our continent, on this account, has 
therefore a marked influence on the temper- 
ature of its different parts. 

The effect of the position of a country, as 
regards its proximity to the ocean, on its 
climate, will be evident from the facts rela- 
tive to the radiation and absorption of heat 
by different substances. All bodies, on the 
surface of the earth, are constantly receiving 
and giving out heat. A piece of ice, ex- 
posed to the sun, sends rays to this lumina- 
ry, and receives in return a much greater 
amount. The power, however, of radiating 
and receiving heat, in different bodies, is 
very variable. Water, exposed to the same 
source of heat, receives and radiates far 
less in a given time than earth ; consequent- 
ly, the land, especially in the higher lati- 
tudes, during the long summer days, or 



_ 



1859.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



391 



during the growing season, receives much 
more heat than the corresponding waters 
of the same latitude ; and, though the ra- 
diation at night is less from the water than 
the land, yet the accumulating increase of 
temperature of the latter will he much 
greater than that of the former. The re- 
verse takes place in the winter. While, 
therefore, the mean temperature of the 
ocean and of the land, in the same latitude, 
may remain the same, the tendency of the 
land is to receive the greater portion of the 
heat of the whole year during the months 
of summer, and thus, by a harmonious ar- 
rangement with respect to the production 
of organic life, to increase the effect of the 
solar radiation, and to widen the limits 
within which plants of a peculiar character 
may be cultivated. Proximity to the sea, 
however, has another effect on the climate, 
which depends upon the currents of the 
former, by which the temperature of the 
earth, due to the latitude, is materially 
altered. Heated water is constantly car- 
ried, from the equatorial regions towards 
the poles, and streams of cold water re- 
turned, by means of which the temperature 
of the earth is modified, and the extremes 
reduced in intensity. * * * :;< 

The effect of the prevailing currents of 
air, on the climate of different portions of 
the earth, is no less marked than proximity 
to the sea. * * * * * 

Professor Coffin, in his admirable paper 
on the winds of the northern hemisphere, 
has shown that, from the equator to the pole, 
the whole space is occupied by three great 
belts, or zones, of prevailing wind; the first 
extends from the equator to an average lati- 
tude of 35° north, in which the current is 
from the northeast, constantly growing less 
intense as we approach the northern limit; 
the second is that from 35° to about 
T)0°, the current from the west being more 
intense in the middle of the belt, and gradu- 
ally diminishing, almost into a calm, on 
either side ; third, from 60° to the pole, or 
rather, to a point of greatest cold in the 
Arctic regions, the -wind is in a north- 
easterly direction. 

The first of these belts would constitute 
what is called the trade winds, produced by 
the combined effects of the heat of the sun, 
and the rotation of the earth ; the second, 
is the return trade, and the third, the cur- 
rent which would be produced by an oppo- 
site effect to that of the rarefaction of the 



air by the sun at the equator, namely, 
the condensation of the air by the cold 
portion of the earth. The air should flow 
out, in every direction, from the coldest 
point, and, combining its motion towards 
the south with the rotation of the earth, it 
should take a direction from the cast to the 
west, or become a northeasterly wind. 

The effects which these currents must have 
upon the climate of the United States will be 
made clear by a little reflection. The trade 
winds within the tropics, charged with vapor, 
impinging upon the mountainous parts of 
South America, in their course towards the 
west, will deposit their moisture on the 
eastern slope, and produce a rainless district 
on the western side. Again, a lower por- 
tion of the Atlantic and Gulf trade wind 
will be deflected from these mountains along 
the eastern coast of the United States, and 
through the valley of the Mississippi, as a 
surface w r ind, and thus give rise to the moist 
and warm breezes from the south, of our 
summers, while the principal or upper por- 
tion of the trade wind, or the return wester- 
ly current, sweeping over the Pacific ocean, 
and consequently charged with moisture, 
will impinge on the coast range of moun- 
tains of Oregon and California, and, in as- 
cending its sloped, deposit moisture on the 
western declivity, giving fertility and a 
healthful climate to a narrow strip of coun- 
try bordering on the ocean, and sterility to 
the eastern slope. All the moisture, how- 
ever, will not be deposited in the passage 
over the first range, but a portion will be 
precipitated on the western side of the next, 
until it reaches the eastern elevated ridge 
of the Rocky mountain system, where, we 
think, it will be nearly, if not quite, ex- 
hausted. East of this ridge, and, as it were, 
in its shadow, there will exist a sterile belt, 
extending in a northerly and southerly di- 
rection many hundred miles. The whole 
country, also, included between the eastern 
ridge of the Rocky mountains and the Pa- 
cific Ocean, with the exception of the nar- 
row strip before mentioned, will be deficient 
in moisture, and on account of the heat, 
evolved, as before shown, by the condensa- 
tion of moisture on the ridges, will be at a 
much higher temperature than that due to 
latitude. This mountain region, and the 
sterile belt east of it, occupy an area about 
equal to one third of the whole surface of 
the United States, which, with our present 
knowledge of the laws of nature, and their 



392 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[July 



application to the economical purposes, must 
ever remain of little value to the husband- 
man. 

According this view, the whole valley of 
the Mississippi owes its fertility principally 
to the moisture which proceeds from the 
Gulf of Mexico, and the intertropical part 
of the Atlantic ocean. The Atlantic Gulf 
stream, therefore, produces very little effect 
in modifying the climate of the northern 
portion of the United States; first, on ac- 
count of the cold polar current which inter- 
venes between it and the shore; and second- 
ly because of the prevalent westerly wind, 
which carries the heat and moisture from 
us, and precipitates them on the coast of 
Europe. 

The influence of the nature of the soil, 
on the^limate of a country, may be infer- 
red from its greater or less power to absorb 
and radiate heat, and from its capacity to 
absorb, or transmit over its surface, the 
water which may fall upon it in rain, or be 
deposited in dew. In the investigation of 
this part of the subject, the observations of 
the geologist,- and the experiments of the 
chemist and the physicist, must be called 
into requisition. 

In reg-ird to the influence of cultivation 
on the climate of a countiVy, much also may 
be said, though, at first sight, it might ap- 
pear that man, with his feeble powers, could 
hope to have no influence in modifying the 
action of the great physical agents which 
determine the heat and moisture of any ex- 
tended portions of the globe. But, though 
man cannot direct the winds, nor change 
the order of the seasons, he is enabled, by 
altering the conditions under which the 
forces of nature operate, materially to modi- 
fy the results produced ; for example, re- 
moving the forests from an extended portion 
of country exposes the ground to the imme- 
diate radiation of the sun, and increases, in 
many cases, the amount of evaporation ; iu 
other places, it bakes the earth and allows 
the water to be carried off to the ocean, in 
freshets, and, in some instances, in destruc- 
tive inundations. 

Drying extensive marshes, or the intro- 
duction of a general system of drainage 
ha3 a remarkable influence in modifying 
the temperature. The water, which would 
evaporato, and, by the latent heat thu^ ab- 
sorbed, would cool the ground, is suffered to 
pass through it to the drain beneath, and is 
thus carried off without depriving the earth 



of a large amount of heat, which would 
otherwise be lost. Besides this, the remo- 
val of forests gives greater scope to the 
winds, which are hence subjected to less 
friction in their passage over the earth. 

The whole subject of the removal of 
forests is one which deserves more attention 
than it has usually received. In the pro- 
gress of settlement, it is evident that a great 
portion of the wooded land of a new country 
must give place to the cleared field, in order 
that man may reach the rich harvest of the 
cereals, which, in his civilized condition, 
are necessaries, as well as luxuries, of life; 
yet the indiscriminate destruction of the 
forests is of doubtful propriety. By the 
judicious reservation of trees, along the 
boundaries of certain portions of land in 
accordance with the known direction of the 
prevailing wind, the climate, both for the 
production of plants and animals, within a 
restricted portion of the earth, may be ame- 
liorated. While, in some parts of the coun- 
try, the clearing of nearly all the ground is 
absolutely necessary for agricultural purpo- 
ses, in others, it may be profitable to allow 7 for- 
ests of considerable extent to remain in 
their pristine condition. Cases of this kind, 
however, can only be determined by the 
particular climate of each district of coun- 
try. > 

It is now an established truth, that cer- 
tain locations are screened from miasmatic 
influence by the intervention of trees. A 
more general recognition of this fact might 
add much to the health fulness of locations 
in other respects highly desirable. 

The solar rays, in passing through the 
atmosphere, do not heat it in any considera- 
ble degree, but they heat the earth against 
which they impinge ; therefore, the temper- 
ature of the lower stratum of air is derived, 
directly or indirect!} 7 , from the soil on which 
it rests ; and this temperature as has been 
remarked will depend upon whether the 
surface be marshy or dry, clothed with her- 
bage, or covered with sand, clay, or an ex- 
posed rock. From this fact it is evident, 
that man has, in this particular also consid- 
erable power in modifying the climate of 
portions of the earth ; and history furnishes 
us with many examples in which great 
changes, within human control, have been 
produced in the course of ages. Ninevah 
and Babylon, once so celebrated for their 
advance in civilization and opulence, and 
Palmyra and Balbec, for their magnificence, 



1859.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



395 



offer at this day to the traveller the site of 
ruins which attest their past greatness, in 
the midst of desolation. Canaan, described 
in the Bible as a fertile country, " flowing 
with milk and honey," is now nearly de- 
prived of vegetation, and presents a scene 
of almost uninterrupted barrenness. The 
climate of these countries is undoubtedly 
modified by the present state of the surface, 
and might again be ameliorated by cultiva- 
tion, and, were the encroachments of the 
sands of the desert stayed, by borders of 
vegetation of a proper character. Many, 
parts, even of our own country, which now 
exhibit a surface of uninterrupted sand, 
may be rendered productive, or covered 
with trees and herbage. 

A series of observations on the progress 
of temperature below the surface, in differ- 
ent parts of the country, and even in dif- 
ferent fields of the same plantation, would be 
of value in ascertaining the proper time to 
introduce the seed, in order that it might 
not be subjected to decay by premature 
planting, or lose too much of the necessary 
influence of summer, by tardy exposure in 
the ground. This may perhaps be most 
simply effected, by burying a number of bot- 
tles filled with water, at different depths in 
the ground, say one at the depth of 6 
inches, another at 12, and a third at 18 
inches. These, in the course of time, would 
take the temperature of the earth in which 
they were embedded, and would retain it 
sufficiently long unchanged, to admit of its 
measurement, by inserting a thermometer 
into the mouth of the bottles. 

No improvement is more necessary, for 
rendering the art of agriculture precise, 
than the introduction into its processes of 
the two essential principles of science, name- 
ly, those of weight and of measure. All 
the processes in our manufactories, on a 
great scale, which were formerly conducted 
by mere guesses, as to heat and quantities, 
are now subjected to rules, in which the 
measure of temperature, and the weight of 
materials, are definitely ascertained by reli- 
able instruments. 

The foregoing are general views as to the 
great principles which govern the peculiari- 
ties of climate, and especially that of the 
United States, the truth of which, in refer- 
ence to our continent, and the modifications 
to which they are to be subjected, are to be 
settled by observations in the future. 

In order, however, that the science of me- 



teorology may be founded on reliable data, 
and attain that rank which its importance 
demands, it is necessary that extended sys- 
tems of cooperation should be established. 
In regard to climate, no part of the world is 
isolated ; that of the smallest island in the 
Pacific is governed by the general currents 
of the air and the waters of the ocean. To 
fully understand, therefore, the causes which 
influence the climate of anyone country, or 
any one place, it will be necessary to study 
the conditions, as to heat, moisture, and the 
movements of the air, of all others. It is 
evident, also, that, as far as possible, one 
method should be adopted, and that instru- 
ments affording the same indications, under 
the same conditions, should be employed. 

It is true that, for determining the gene- 
ral changes of temperature, and the great 
movements of the atmosphere of the globe, 
comparatively few stations of observation, of 
the first class, arc required ; but, these should 
be properly distributed, well furnished with 
instruments, and supplied with a sufficient 
corps of observers, to record, at all periods 
of the day, the prominent fluctuations. Such 
stations, however, can only be established 
and supported by the cooperation of a com- 
bination of governments. 

A general plan of this kind, for observing 
the meteorogical and magnetical changes, 
more extensively than had ever before been 
projected, was digested by the British Asso- 
ciation, in 1838, in which the principal gov- 
ernments of Europe were induced to take 
an active part ; and had that of the United 
States, and those of South America, joined 
in the enterprise, a series of watch-towers 
of nature would have been distributed over 
every part of the earth. 

* * * * 

These observatories were established to 
carry out a series of observations, at the 
same moment of absolute time, every two 
hours, day and night, (Sunday excepted,) 
during three years, together with observa- 
tions once every month, continuing 24 hours, 
at intervals of five minutes each. * * * 
The comparisons of these observations are 
still in progress, and will occupy the atten- 
tion of the student of magnetism and me- 
teorology, for many years to come. The sys- 
tem was established more particularly to 
study the changes of the magnetic needle, 
and on this subject alone, it has afforded in- 
formation of sufficient importance to repay 
all the labor and time expended on it. It 



394 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[July 



has shown that the magnetic force is scarce- 
ly constant from one moment to another, 
that the needle is almost incessantly in mo- 
tion, that it is affected by the position of the 
sun and moon, and by perturbations, con- 
nected with meteorological phenomena, of a 
most extraordinary character. 

In regard to meteorology, this system fur- 
nished reliable data for the great movements 
of the atmosphere, and the changes in its 
thermal and hygrometric condition. But, 
to obtain a more minute knowledge of the 
special climatology of different countries, it 
is necessary that a series of observations, at 
a great many places, should be continued 
through a number of years, and at stated 
periods of the day — not as frequent as those 
of the observations we have mentioned, but 
embracing as many elements, and even add- 
ing to these, as new facts may be developed, 
or new views entertained. In many coun- 
tries, accordingly, provision has been made, 
by their respective governments, for contin- 
ued though local systems of this kind. The 
government of Prussia appears to have taken 
the lead in this important labor, and its ex- 
ample has been followed by those of Great 
Britain, Russia, Austria, Bavaria, Belgium, 
Holland and France. In these countries, 
regular and' continuous observations are 
made, with reliable instruments, on well-di- 
gested plans. 

Though the government of the United 
States took no part with the other nations of 
the earth, in the great system before descri- 
bed, yet it has established and supported for 
a number of years a partial system of ob- 
servation at the different military posts of 
the army. Among other duties assigned to 
the surgeons, at the suggestion of Surgeon 
General Lovell, was that cf keeping a diary 
of the weather, and of the diseases preva- 
lent in their vicinity. The earliest register 
received, under this regulation, was in Jan- 
uary, 1819. The only instruments at first 
used were a thermometer and wind-vane, to 
"which, in 1836, a rain-gauge was added. 
The observations were made at 7 A. M. and 
9 P. M., and the winds and weather were 
observed morning, noon and evening It is 
to be regretted that, in 1841, the variable 
hour of sunrise was substituted for that of 7 
A. M., since Ihe latter admits of an hourly 
correction which cannot be applied to the 
former, except at the expense of too great 
an amount of labor. 



At the commencement of 1843, an exten- 
sion of the system was made, by the intro- 
duction of new instruments, and an addi- 
tional observation to the number which had 
previously been recorded, each day, and 
hourly observations for twenty-four hours 
were directed to be taken at the equinoxes 
and solstices. 

During the past year, a quarto volume has 
been published, which contains the results 
of the observations of the thermometer, di- 
rection and force of winds, clearness of sky, 
and fall of rain and snow, during a period 
of twelve years, from the first of January, 
1843, to January, 1855, arranged in month- 
ly tables and annual summaries. To these 
are added consolidated tables of tempera- 
ture and rain, for each separate station, com- 
prising the results of all the thermometric 
observations made by medical officers since 
1822, and of all measurements of rain and 
snow, since the introduction of the rain- 
gauge, in 1836. 

The tabular part of this volume contains 
the most important results of the observa- 
tions of the Army system of registration, 
and will be considered the most valuable con- 
tribution yet made toward a knowledge of 
the climatology of the United States. Truth, 
however, will not permit us to express the 
same opinion in reference to the isothermal 
charts which accompany this volume. These 
we consider as premature publications, con- 
structed from insufficient data, and on a prin- 
ciple of projection by which it is not possi- 
ble to represent correctly the relative tem- 
peratures in mountainous regions. 

With the learning and zeal for science 
possessed by the officers of the United States 
Army, and the importance which they at- 
tach to meteorology, in its connection with 
engineering and topography, it is hoped that 
this system may be farther extended and 
improved, that each station may be supplied 
with a compared thermometer and psychrom- 
eter, and that, at a few stations, a series of 
hourly observations may be established, for 
at least a single year. The present Secre- 
tary of War, we are assured, would willingly 
sanction any proposition for the improve- 
ment of this system, and we doubt not the 
Surgeon General is desirous of rendering it 
as perfect as the means at his disposal will 
permit. 

A local system of meteorological observa- 
tions was established in the State of New 
York, in 1825, and has been uninterruptedly 



1859.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER 



395 



continued from that^iine until the present. 
Each of the academies, which participated 
in the literature fund of the State, was fur- 
nished with a thermometer and rain-gauge, 
and directed to make three daily observa- 
tions relative to the temperature, the direc- 
tion of the wind, cloudiness, &c. The sys- 
tem was remodelled, in 1850, so as to con- 
form to the directions of the Smithsonian 
Institution, and a considerable number of 
the academies were furnished with full sets 
of compared instruments, consisting of a 
barometer, thermometer, psychrometer, rain- 
gauge and wind-vane. 

A summary of the results of the observa- 
tions from 1826 to 1850, inclusive, has just 
been published by the State of New York, 
under the direction of the Regents of the 
University. They are presented in the form 
of a quarto volume, to which is prefixed a 
map of the State, showing the direction of 
the wind, and the position of each station. 
This volume, the computations for which 
were made by Dr. Franklin B. Hough, is 
also a. valuable contribution te meteorology, 
and does much credit to the intelligence and 
perseverance of those who introduced and 
have advocated the continuance of this sys- 
tem, and to the liberality of the State which 
has so long and so generously supported it. 

5JC J|( 2B 3fC 

A system of meteorological observations 
was established by the Smithsonian Institu- 
tion, in 1849, the principal object of which 
was to study the storms that visit the United 
States, particularly during the winter months. 
This system, which has been continued up 
to the present time, was afterwards extended, 
with a view to collect the statistics necessa- 
ry to ascertain the character of the climate 
of North America, to determine the average 
temperature of various portions of the coun- 
try, and the variations from this at different 
periods of the year. It was intended to re- 
duce, as far as possible, to one general plan, 
the several systems of observations which 
had previously been established, and to in- 
duce others to engage in the same enter- 
prise. But it was, in the first place, desira- 
ble, in order that the results might be com- 
parable with those obtained in other coun- 
tries, that the instruments should be more 
accurate than those which might be requi- 
site for the mere determination of the phe- 
nomena of storms. The institution, there- 
fore, procured standard barometers and ther- 
mometers from London and Paris, and, with 



the aid of Professor Guyot, a distinguished 
meteorologist, copies of these were made, 
with improvements, by Mr. Jan.cs Green, a 
scientific artist of New York. A large num- 
ber of these instruments have been construc- 
ted and sold to observers. Full sets have 
been furnished by the Institution to parties 
in important positions, and, in some cases, 
half the cost has been paid at the expense 
of the Smithsonian fund. 

A growing taste having been manifestly 
created for the study of practical meteorol- 
ogy, directions for observations, and a vol- 
ume of tables for their reduction, have been 
prepared, and widely circulated at the ex- 
pense of the Institution. It has also dis- 
tributed blanks to all the observers of the 
different systems alluded to, except those of 
the Army, and has received, in turn, copies 
of all the observations which have been 
made. It has, in this way, accumulated a 
large amount of valuable material, relative 
to the climate of this country, and to the 
character of the storms to which it is sub- 
jected. The completeness and accuracy of 
the observations have also increased from 
year to year j and, by an arrangement which 
the Institution has now made with the Pat- 
ent Office, it is hoped that the system will 
be extended, and its character improved. 

It being manifest, from the foregoing state- 
ments, and from other evidences, that much 
interest is awakened in this country on the 
subject of meteorology, it is hoped that the 
means may be afforded for reducing and 
publishing the materials which have been 
and shall be accumulated, and that impor- 
tant results to agriculture, as well as to other 
arts, may be hence deduced. — Abridged from 
Patent Office Report, 1855. 



Hair of Children. 

It is a great mistake to plait the hair of 
children under eleven or twelve years of age. 
The process of plaiting more or less strains 
the hairs in their roots by pulling them tight; 
tends to deprive them of their requisite sup- 
ply of nutriment, and checks their growth. 
The hair of girls should be cut rather short, 
and allowed to curl freely. When they are 
about eleven or twelve, the hair should be 
twisted into a coil not too tight, nor tied at 
the end with thin thread but with a piece of 
ribbon. 



396 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[July 



From the Conservatory Journal. 

Adorn ! 

The law of progress is to adorn. No 
high state of civilization, moral or religious, 
has ever been achieved without a corres- 
ponding attention to the beautiful. While 
the world was without form and void, like 
most of our public places, it was not the 
abode of man. It was only when it was 
adorned with sun, moon, and stars, floods, 
fields, shrubs, and ! flowers, that he was 
placed here below, and then it was in a 
garden. We find nothing in Scripture or 
history to justify us in believing that man 
would have been created to this day, if our 
earth had remained in half the unformed 
and chaotic state that our public garden 
was left in for a long time, or, that he would 
have been created at all, if his eyes were 
to be greeted with no more beauties than 
limit the desires of half the people we 
meet. 

Those people, in ancient times, who un- 
dertook to live without cultivating the 
beautiful, have left no name worth posses- 
sing behind them. Of Babylon, with its 
gates of brass and its hanging gardens ; of 
Jerusalem, with its beautiful temple; of 
Thebes and Athens, and scores of other 
beautiful cities, conspicuous in the arts and 
sciences, we have heard and know ; but 
what do we know of the thousand and one 
other places, alluded to in history, where 
no talent was cultivated, but the so-called 
useful ? the pitch, tar, and turpentine cities, 
and hemp and herbs, grass countries, what 
do we know of them ? Nothing, compar- 
atively, nothing ! There were Scythians, 
and Chaldeans, and Medes, and Gruelfs, and 
Ghibelines, and Huns, and Picts, and all 
very matter-of-fact people^ no doubt ; quite 
indifferent to embellishments; who never 
built any very elaborate temples, nor spent 
their time on works of art, or laying out 
parks and promenades. Their works fol- 
lowed them — perished with them; and so 
will the works of every people who neg- 
lect the work of beautifying and embellish- 
ing. 

There is life, and strength, and power in 
beauty. A beautiful statue or structure is 
immortal, because it is beautiful. Amid all 
the storms of war they are respected. A 
church or a cathedral, designed and embel- 
lished by the hand of a real artist, is a church 
or a cathedral forever. But how is it with 
one of our plain — entirely and hopelessly 



plain — meeting-houses^- It is as evanes- 
cent as the morning mist. It is far less en- 
during than a dwelling-house. Now it is a 
church, now it is a dwelling, and by and 
by a hostlery, auction shop, or something 
else equally unsanctified. It wants the 
grace of dignity and beauty to sanctify and 
save it. The scholar and antiquary who 
has read all his days about the beautiful 
statues, temples, churches, and cathedrals of 
the old world, and who at last goes abroad 
to see them, finds the living record still 
there — memorials of the age of Pericles, 
of Charlemagne, and of Luther. But, how 
is it here ? Why, the merest school boy 
can scarcely venture to stay from home a 
whole term, without danger of finding, 
when he returns, that his play-ground has 
been sold to speculators, and that the 
church of his fathers has been carted away 
to give place to the counting-house of the 
trader. Washington Irving, in one of his 
most humorous views, once gave as a rea- 
son why we now hear so little of ghosts, 
that the spirit of change is going on so in- 
cessantly in our villages, that if a poor un- 
easy ghost does return, and undertakes to 
walk about his old haunts, he finds every- 
thing so changed, that he slinks back to 
his resting place disgusted, never to at- 
tempt it again. If it is not true of ghosts, 
it is certainly true of those who have set- 
tled far away from their native village. 
One returns to it, to find all the old land- 
marks swept away, the church where you 
worshipped, the mall where you played 
cricket and foot-ball, the school-house — 
everything — gone, is generally enough for 
a sensitive, mind. Unless you have left 
near and dear friends behind, there is gen- 
erally very little to tempt the Yankee boy 
back to his native home. He cannot rely 
upon finding one old landmark of his 
youth respected and standing. 

If we want to drive far from us, vice 
and crime; if we want to outbid the wine 
cup and the gaming table, we must adorn. 
We must have paintings and sculpture. 
We must have something to claim the at- 
tention, to mould the taste, and cultivate 
and elevate the minds and hearts of the 
people. 

Few stop to think how much taste has to 
do with morals. But there is nothing bet- 
ter established than that slovenly habits 
beget slovenly morals. All those orders 
of men who have attempted to ignore taste, 



1859,] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



397 



and beauty, and elegance, and to go through 
the world without regard to appearances — 
such as the Cynics, the mendicant friars, 
and the like, have all proved conclusively 
that immorality and ungodliness go hand in 
hand with habitual untidiness and un- 
cleanliness. Tristam Shandy is by no 
means the only person who has felt the 
elevating tendency of a clean shirt. We 
have before us to-day, a very happy illus- 
tration of what taste, beauty, embellish- 
ment, and art can do in civilizing and hu- 
manizing a people. The steamers have 
just brought us news of the revolution in 
Tuscany — the very centre of all that is 
beautiful in nature and in art. The change 
of government is effected without tumult, 
without riot, and without bloodshed ; and 
the deposed monarch is suffered to retire at 
his leisure, without insult, like any ordina- 
ry gentleman. The whole was in harmony 
with all the surroundings. It was just 
what ought and might be expected to flow 
from such humanizing instrumentalities. 

Carl. 



The First Silk Mill. 

One hundred and fifty years ago — ac- 
cording to history — there were no silk 
mills in England, as there now arc ; and 
here I quote from an old book the account 
how it came : 

" The Italians had been long in the ex- 
clusive possession of the art of silk-throw- 
ing, when about the year 1715, a young 
mechanic and draughtsman, named John 
Lombe, undertook the perilous task of vis- 
iting Italy, to procure drawings, or models, 
of the machinery necessary for the under- 
taking. He remained there some time, 
and obtained access to the silk works, by 
corrupting two of the workmen, through 
whose assistance he inspected the machinery 
in private ; and whatever parts he obtained 
a knowledge of in these clandestine visits, 
he recorded on paper before he slept. When 
his plan was just completed his. intention 
was discovered, and he was compelled to 
seek the safety of his life by a precipitate 
flight into England, where he arrived in 
safety with the two Italians who had fa- 
voured his scheme. Fixing on Derby as 
a proper place for his design, he agreed 
with the corporation for an island or swamp 
in the river, on which he erected and es- 
tablished his mill, at an expense of nearly 



£30,000> ($150,000,) which charge he en- 
abled himself to defray, by the erection 
and employment of temporary machines in 
the town hall and other places, before the 
completion of his great work. Jn 1781 
he procured a patent for fourteen years, to 
secure the profits arising from his address 
and ingenuity. But his days verged to a 
close; for before half this period had 
elapsed, treachery and poison had brought 
him to his grave. The Italians, whose 
trade began rapidly to decrease, were ex- 
asperated to vengeance, and resolved on the 
destruction of the man whose ingenuity 
had thus turned the current of their busi- 
ness into another channel ; this they ac- 
complished through the machinations of an 
artful woman, sent from Italy for that pur- 
pose. But though suspicion was almost 
strengthened into certainty from the cir- 
cumstances that transpired on her exami- 
nation, yet, evidence being indecisive, she 
was discharged. The death of this la- 
mented artist did not, however, prove fatal 
to his patriotic scheme ; for the machinery 
was in full action, and the business became 
every day more successful. John Lombe 
was succeeded by his brother William, who 
committed suicide ; on which the property 
devolved to his cousin, Sir Thomas Lombe, 
who, previous to the expiration of the 
patent, petitioned Parliament for its re- 
newal ; but the legislature, washing to re- 
ward the promoters of national benefit, 
and, at the same time, to spread the know- 
ledge of so useful an invention, granted 
him £14,000, (870,000,) in lieu of a 
new patent, on condition that he would suf- 
fer a complete model of the work to be 
taken and deposited in the tower for pub- 
lic inspection, which was accordingly done. 
The extensive fabric occupied by the ma- 
chinery stands upon high piles of oak 
doubly planked, and covered with stone 
work, on which are turned thirteen arches, 
that sustain the walls. Its whole length is 
one hundred and ten feet, its breadth thirty- 
nine feet, and its height fifty-five and a half 
feet ; it contains five stories, besides the 
I under-works, and is lighted by four hundred 
[and sixty-eight windows. The whole of 
[this elaborate machine, comprising about 
14,000 wheels, is put in motion by a water- 
wheel, thirty-three feet in diameter." 

Such was the first silk mill in England, 
and the circumstances under which it was 
erected. — Wes. Chr. Advocate. 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[July 



From the Southern Rural Gentleman. 

Less Land and Better Culture. 

Large farms appear to be the planters 
highest ambition. u More land, more land 
is the perpetual cry." And every farmer 
seems to be stretching his arms for a larger 
area. As a consequence the lands of the 
smaller farmer are sold to his richer neigh- 
bor, and he goes farther West, where lands 
are cheap, to acquire larger farms. Now 
what is the effect- of all this craving of 
more land. It certainly leads to a great 
waste of the soil, and a great diminution of 
the crops. Buy land and wear it out, buy 
more land and strip it of all its fertility and 
turn it out, and thus the process of exhaus- 
tion goes on from year to year. Without a 
great change and a great improvement, our 
lands will soon be stripped of their fertility, 
our country become sterile and barren, and 
much of our best population driven towards 
the setting sun. 

Belgium has the reputation of the best 
farming in the world. It is more highly 
cultivated, and sustains a more dense popu- 
lation than any other country in Europe — 
there fifteen acres is called a respectable 
farm. " The poorest in America, when the 
average for the whole country exceeds one 
hundred and twenty-five !" What makes 
the difference ? The Belgian improves his 
soil by constant manuring — he husbands his 
resources — saves his manure and makes his 
soil richer every year, so that to day it pro- 
duces twice or thrice as much as when re- 
claimed from its native forest. But with us 
the land is scraped over until it has lost its 
fertility, and then we must push westward 
in pursuit of new lands. The process 
of skinning our lands, and getting misera- 
bly poor crops should be abandoned, and 
planters should content themselves with 
farms of such size as they can thoroughly 
cultivata and improve. We have only to 
look to the older States to see the effect of 
this process of skinning the land — it has 
caused them to loose much of their best 
population, and, in some of them, more 
than half the increase of the slave popula- 
tion goes off annually to the new States. 
They have scraped and impoverished their 
lands, until the slave Lbor cannot be profit- 
bly employed on their worn out fields, and 
they are sent to the Southwest. More than 
ten thousand slaves have been sold in the 
Charleston market alone ! Why ? prices 
are good and the improvement of the soil 



has not kept pace with the increase of the 
slave population — they have no new lands 
to bring into cultivation, and the labor can- 
not all be profitably employed. Hence they 
must be sent Southwest where lands are 
cheap and plenty. Over one Railroad more 
than fifty thousand slaves passed in the last 
six or eight months to the Southwest in 
search of better lands, or to supply the de- 
mand for labor by those who wish to in- 
crease their farms. How long will it take 
the constantly increasing slave labor of the 
Southwest to clear up and reduce much of 
our rich land to sterility and barrenness ? 
We might just as well expect our horses 
and mules to live without food to supply the 
waste of their physical strength and vital 
energies, as to expect that our lands will 
continue to produce good crops without ma- 
nure, to supply the exhausted fertility of 
the soil, produced by constant cultivation. 
Besides, this miserable- plowing and shilly- 
shally cultivation is a great waste of labor 
and never pays. If we would turn our at- 
tention to manures, and the improvement of 
our soil, and carefully husband every source 
of fertility to increase the productiveness of 
our lands, and give them more thorough 
cultivation, we should be rewarded with 
more abundant crops. The successful expe- 
rience of Mr. McCloud, of Alabama, shows 
what may be done — that each acre of our 
land by manures and judicious cultivation 
may be made to double its production, and 
that if our farmers would turn their atten- 
tion to the improvement of their lands, they 
would be rewarded and well paid for their 
labour. On many farms what unsightly, 
worn-out fields are seen — fields washed into 
gullies and ruined by bad cultivation. It is 
time for us to abandon this ruinous system 
and to save our lands and enrich them, and 
this can be done only by cultivating less 
land and improving it. But all argument 
on this subject is unnecessary — it is plain 
and apparent to all, and we now reiterate 
our caption,- let us have less land and better 
cidtivatton. 



It you don't want to spoil your children, 
you may have to spoil a good many rods in 
raising them. 

It is said that corn is so sensitive that it is 
shocked at the approach of Jack Frost. 

God had rather see his children humble 
for sin, than proud of grace. 



J 859.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



399 



The Robin. 

At a meeting of the Massachusetts Hor- 
ticultural Society, early in 1858, a resolu- 
tion was introduced, authorizing the Presi- 
dent of that Society to petition the Legisla- 
ture for a repeal of the laws prohibiting 
the killing and destroying of the robin. 
This motion was laid on the table, but a 
committee was appointed to investigate and 
learn the habits of the robin, and report. 
This committee reported March 5th, 1859. 

We give in brief the result of the com- 
mittee's investigations, as reported by its 
chairman, Prof. J. W. P. Jenks, and found 
in the Society Journal : 

1. Early in March numbers of this bird 
made their appearance in this vicinity; but 
until the second week in April, only the 
male birds. 

2. The gizzards of those killed in the 
morning were, as a general rule, either en- 
tirely empty, or but partially distended with 
food, well macerated, while those killed in 
the latter part of the day were as uniformly 
filled with food freshly taken. 

3. From the almost daily examination 
of their gizzards, from the early part of 
March to the first of May, not a particle of 
vegetable matter was found in the gizzard 
of a single bird. On the contrary, insects 
in great variety, both as to number and 
kind, as well as in every variety of condi- 
tion as to growth and development, were 
the sole food. 

But nine-tenths of the aggregate mass of 
food thus collected during this period con- 
sisted of one kind of larva, which, through 
the aid of Baron Ostensacken, Secretary of 
the Russian Legation at Washington, I was 
enabled to identify as the Bibio Albipennis, 
whose history and habits, by the aid of 
Dr. Asa Fitch, entomologist of the New 
York State Agricultural Society, I was ena- 
bled to make out quite satisfactorily. 

From one to two hundred of this larva 
were frequently taken from a single gizzard, 
all in fresh, unmacerated condition; and 
usually, when this larva was found, it was 
the, only food in the stomach. 

4. During the month of May, the Bibio 
larva entirely disappeared from the gizzards, 
but up to the 21st of June, was replaced by 
a variety of insects or worms only, inclu- 
ding spiders, caterpillars, and beetles of the 
family Elateridse, the parents of the well- 
known wire-worms, so destructive to corn 



and various other seeds when committed to 
the ground. 

The earth worm I found to be a favorite 
food for the young bird, but sparingly em- 
ployed by the adult for its own use. 

5. From the date of June 21st, I began 
to find strawberries, cherries, and pulpy 
fruit generally, but in a majority of the ex- 
aminations intermingled with insects, which 
led me to conclude that they were not fond 
of an exclusively vegetable diet, but rather 
adopted it as a dessert, and from the ease of 
procuring it, particularly during the enerva- 
ting season of moulting. At this season of 
the year, I discovered a marked difference 
in the food of the birds killed in or near 
the village and those killed in the country 
at a distance from gardens and fruit trees, 
the latter having less of stone fruit and 
more of insects in their gizzards, which led 
me to conclude that the robin is not an ex- 
tensive forager. 

6. The mixed diet of the robin seems to 
continue from the ripening of the straw- 
berries and cherries to October, the vegeta- 
ble portion consisting during August and 
September, in great part, of elderber- 
ries (Sambucus canadensis) and pokeber- 
ries (Phytolacca decandra.) 

7. During the month of October the 
vegetable diet is wholly discarded, and its 
place supplied by grasshoppers and orthop- 
terous insects generally. 

8. Early in November the robin migrates 
southward — the few remaining eking out 
a miserable existence during the winter 
months on bay berries (Myrica ceritera,) 
privet berries (Ligustrum vulgare,) and ju- 
niper berries (Juniperus communis.) 



From the Cotton Planter and Soil. 

Hill-Side Ditching. 

Dr. Cloud — Bear Sir : Ycu could not 
have made a more valuable contribution to 
the pages of your Journal than the essay of 
of Mr. Hardwick, on the subject of hill-side 
ditches. No one in Georgia has done so 
much to check our' wasteful and reckless 
system of culture. He was among the first 
to introduce hill-side ditches and horizontal 
plowing, and we are indebted to his enlight- 
ened experience for much of our knowledge 
on this subject. 

Our mode of adjusting the level with the 
veiw of obtaining the desired grade, differs 
from Mr. Hardwick's plan, and I will en- 



400 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER 



[July 



deaYor to explain it to you. It is not origi- 
nal with nie, and may be familiar to many 
of your readers. 

The spirit level is attached to the cross 
bar oi % the common rafter level by means of 
a screw, so that when the top or upper sur- 
face of the spirit level is even with the top 
of the cross bar, and the bubble settles in 
the centre, a perfect level is obtained. Thus 
adjusted, the level is ready for laying off 
horizontal guide rows. To obtain the grade 
you wish your ditches to have, obtain first 
the true level and place an inch block under 
it, press one end of the spirit level below 
the top surface of the cross bar, until the 
bubble settles in the centre, and make a 
puncture or mark on the side bar, exactly 
even with the top surface of the depressed 
end of the spirit level. If your grade is 
two inches, place a two inch block under 
one foot and press down the spirit level until 
the bubble again stands in the centre, and 
make a puncture or mark on the cross bar. 
And in the same way make your marks on 
the cross bar to correspond with a grade of 
three, four or five inches. Your level is now 
ready for laying off your ditches. If you 
wish to give them a grade of three inches, 
which I believe is usual in a twelve feet 
stride of a rafter level, you have nothing to 
do, but to press down one end of the spirit 
level as low as mark number 3, screw it 
tight, and when the bubble stands in the 
centre you have the desired grade, or as 
near an approximation to it as is necessary 
for your purpose. This plan dispenses with 
Mr. Hardwick's grade blocks which are 
fastened by screws to one of the side pieces 
of his rafter level. You can, without any 
inconvenience or delay, change your grade 
so as to adapt it to different ditches or the 
same ditch, if the diversity of the soil or 
any other cause should render a change of 
grade necessary. I do not present this mode 
of adjusting the level as a new or an origi- 
nal design, but because I consider it more 
simple and convenient than any which I 



have seen suggested. 



A Planter. 



From the Ohio Farmer. 

The Law of Sex. 
Mr. Editor. — Occasionally there has ap- 
peared in the columns of your paper, arti- 
cles and paragraphs relating to the law which 
determines the sex of animals, though I be- 
lieve nothing very definite or satisfactory 
has been written. 



It seems to be a question which a majori- 
ty of persons consider a mystery which can- 
not be fathomed; while those who do spec- 
ulate upon the subject generally arrive at 
conclusions that are as unreasonable as to 
attribute it to the result of chance alone. — 
There is no reason, however, why this func- 
tion of the animal economy is not governed 
by laws as well as any other function of the 
body, nor any reason why the law should not 
be discovered.' 

I have lately been looking over a work by 
a German author, which contains some views 
on this subject not generally known. He 
claims to have demonstrated the truth of his 
propositions by numerous experiments. — 
With your permission, I will give a synop- 
sis of the law as laid down by him. 

His theory is that each testicle or gland 
yields a peculiar fluid, the right one the 
male, and the left one the female. Also 
that the ovaries contain their peculiar ovum; 
the right ovary forming the ovum for the 
male, and the left one for the female. And, 
further, that the ovum from the right ovary 
can only be impregnated by the seminal 
fluid from the right gland and vice versa. — 
His experiments seem to verify the theory. 
A sow, bred to a boar with the right gland 
removed, bore only female pigs, though the 
experiment was several times repeated. — 
Several dogs had their right glands removed, 
and they invariably begat females. The 
same was true of rabbits when the left one 
was removed, the results were opposite, with- 
out exception. 

On the other hand, he several times re- 
moved the right or ■ left ovary from the fe- 
male, and though bred to perfect animals, 
the results were the same. No female be- 
came pregnant, if bred to a male, the loss of 
whose gland did not correspond to that of the 
missing ovary. 

If these things are true they can easily 
be demonstrated by farmers who have any 
curiosity to gratify, or any interest in the 
matter, by a few carefully conducted experi- 
ments. 

Let the experiments be made and the re- 
sults given. The theory certainly looks 
much more plausible than anything which 
has hitherto been given to the public upon 
the subject. M. L. H. 



Judge thyself with a judgment of sin- 
cerity, and thou wilt judge others with a 
judgment of charity. 



< 



THE SOUTHERN PLANT ER. 



401 



A Statistical View of American Agriculture. 

ITS HOME RESOURCES AND FOREIGN MARKETS, 40. 

An Address delivered at j\'>'i r York, before the American Geographical and 
Society, on (he organization of tike Agricultural Section. 

BY JOHN JAY, ESQ., 

Chairman of the Section, and Foreign Corresponding Secretary of if" 

[concluded from page 333.] 

The census of 1840 did not ascertain the number of acres of improved land in the 
United States, BO that there are no data showing the increase during the last decade. 
But looking at the produce of American agriculture, we find in the report of the 
Secretary of State, for 1S5G, the following: 



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402 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[July 



This table shows us that in 1850 the four 
largest staples of our country, ranking them 
according to their annual value, were — 
Indian Corn, - - - 821)0,000,000 

Hay, 138,000,000 

Wheat, 90,000,000 



Cotton, 



78,000,000 



Before proceeding to note some further 
statistics in regard to Indian Corn, or as it 
is sometimes called, Maize, let me briefly 
mention the doubt expressed at a recent 
meeting of the British Association, whether, 
this grain is strictly a plant of the Newi 
World, and allow me to refer to the evi- 
dence that proves it, as we think conclu- 
sively, to be a native grain. 

Stress was laid in the British Association ! 
on the fact of its occurrence in the floral 
decorations of Rome in the time of Rafaelle; 
but it was said in reply, that botanists had 
always regarded it as a plant of the New 
World, and the evidence on this point, ad- 
duced by Alfonse De Caudolle in his great 
work on the geographical distribution of 
plants, was quite complete; and it was sen- 
sibly suggested that if it had been a plant of 
the Old World they could scarcely have 
failed to raise it, and that Rafaelle's paint- 
ing it might be accounted for by the interest 
with which all the products of the New 
World were then regarded. It is referred 
to by the most ancient Peruvian historians; 
it was cultivated by the Aborigines in the 
time of Columbus, and is still 'found grow- 
ing in a wild state from our Rocky Moun- 
tains to the forests of Paraguay. The vener- 
able Baron Humboldt, whose eminent au- 
thority may be regarded as settling the 
question, says : " It is no longer doubted 
among botanists that Maize, or Turkish 
corn, is a true American grain, and that the 
old continent received it from the new."* 

Indian Corn is pre-eminently the great 
staple of the country, surpassing all others 
in the area of its cultivation, and in the 
amount and value of the crop, yielding in 
1850, within a fraction of three hundred 
millions of dollars, being all but equal to 
the united values of tnc three next staples 
in their order, Wheat, Hay and Cotton; 



* Those persons who may wish to examine 
the authorities on both sides of this question, 
which hits been much discussed, will find them 
arrayed in a learned essay on Indian Corn, by 
Charles Louis Flint, of Roxbury, Mass.. printed 
in the Transactions of the N. Y. State Agricul- 
tural Society, 1840, page 81. 



and as Indian Corn is not only the most im- 
portant, but the most universal crop, ex- 
tending from the northern to the southern 
limit of the United States; its cultivation 
would seem to afford a better test than that 
offered by any other of the progress of 
American tillage. 

In the production of Indian Corn no state 
has retrograded. The crop in 1840 was 
nearly four hundred millions of bushels ; in 
1850 it was within a fraction of six hun- 
dred millions, being a gain of 56 per cent., 
while the increase of the population, dur- 
ing the same time, was only 35 per cent. 
The estimated crop for 1855, according to 
the Secretary of the Treasury, was between 
seven and eight hundred millions, or nearly 
double the crop for 1840, and the crop for 
1856 was estimated at fu% eight hundred 
millions of bushels. 

One of our distinguished agriculturists, 
Prof. Mapes, in an interesting lecture on 
Indian Corn before the American Institute, 
has remarked that it may be said of our 
corn crop, as Mr. Webster said of the turnip 
crop of England, that its failure for three 
successive years would nearly bankrupt the 
nation. 

It is with us a staple food of men and of 
animals. To it we are indebted in part for 
our beef and in a very large proportion for 
our pork. In the far West it is fed largely 
to cattle and pigs for the more convenient 
exportation of the produce of the country. 
The number of hogs- fattened on it nearly 
equals the number of inhabitants, and their 
lard has become a staple article of export. 
The sugar estates in the West Indies are re- 
ported to be mainly supported by American 
Indian Meal, and its use is extending in 
Ireland, England, and throughout the world. 
In 1850, somewhat more than eleven mil- 
lions of bushels were consumed in the manu- 
facture of malt and spirituous liquors. 

While the value of the corn crop has in- 
creased so rapidly, the Wheat crop, from 
1840 to 1850, according to -the census, had 
increased only 15 per cent. It was sug- 
gested in the report of the Patent Office for 
1852 and '53, that this crop would have 
shown an equal advance with that of Indian 
Corn, had it not been badly damaged, es- 
pecially in the North-Westcrn States, before llri 
the harvest from which the census was taken; 
but the statistics of subsequent harvests in 
particular States seem to render this suppo 
sition improbable. 



859.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



403 



The breadth of land iii the United States, 
uited to the wheat crop, is comparatively 

mall, and in the older States would appear 
o be diminishing. 

In New England the culture of wheat is 
apidly declining; in the Middle States it 
3 nearly stationary, the increase for the ten 
ears previous to 1850 being only about 15 
■er cent. In the North-Western States its 
ulture has rapidly increased ; and it is from 
his district that the largest supplies for ex- 
ort are derived. 

Chicago, which, twenty years ago im- 
orted flour and meal for her own consump- 
ion, has established brands of flour, which 
re now recognised throughout Europe ; and 
he is shown by recent statistics to be the 
irgest primary grain depot in the world, 
ivaling Odessa and Galatz, Dantziz and St. 
^tersburg, while she leads all other ports 
f the world also in the quantity and quality 
f her exports. 

The population of Chicago, which, in 
850, was 29,000, in 1856 had increased to 
04,00.0* 

The Census of New York, for 1855, 
hows that her wheat crop, once so famous, 
3 actually decreasing, owing, as it is sup- 
•osed, in part to the ravages of insects, and 
a part to diseases of the plant, assisted, per- 
laps, by a gradual deterioration of the soil. 

The wheat crop in New York was twelve 
aillions (12,286,418) in 1840, and only 
line millions (9,092,402) in 1855, a de- 
rease of twenty-five per cent., while the 
rop of Indian Corn, in the same State, 
Qcreased during the same period from about 
en (10,972,286) to twenty millions (19,- 
199,691), or nearly one hundred per cent., 
howing, when taken together, not a dimi- 
lution in the bread crop of the State, for 
he joint increase is five millions of bushels, 



* The shipment of grain in 1855, was 2,200,- 
00 quarters, (of 8 bushels each,) being the 
irgest quantity ever shipped from anyone port 
Llhe world; 77.000 barrels of pork ; 56,000 bar- 
sis of beef. A direct trade between Chicago 
nd Liverpool, via the St. Lawrence, without 
anshipment. was successfully opened in 1856. 
y the Dean Richmond, a schooner of 380 tons 
agister, drawing 9| feet, with 400 tons of wheat ; 
le was the largest sized vessel that could come 
irough the canal, but it is said that a moderate 
Litlay would admit ships of 1000 tons. 

The freight and charges were less than via 
ew York, or from the Black Sea. Mark Lave 
azeite. Letter of Mr? W. Kernaghan, of Dub- 
n, copied VIII. Vol. Working Farmer, page 234. 



but simply B partial substitution of Indian 

corn for wheat. 

In no country ean a bread crop be raised 
with less labor than Indian corn generally 
throughout the United States, and it has 
been estimated that the .same amount of toil 
of a man and horse which will raise a bushel 
of wheat in England, will raise ten bushels 
of corn on favorable soil in this country. 

The Patent Office Report for 1855) in an 
interesting paper, by Mr. D. J. Brow 
shows that a comparison of the nutritious 
values of corn and wheat, ran<2,in<r at from 
two to three times the price of a bushel of 
corn, gives a decided preference to the corn; 
and this fact has, doubtless, had its influence 
in extending its consumption among our 
people. 

But as yet neither this fact nor the other 
excellencies of corn meal are appreciated in 
Europe; and the exports of this grain are 
very much less than those of wheat. In 
1854 the proportions were $40,000,000 
worth of wheat to $7,000,000 worth of 
corn. Experiments in the preparation of 
corn are being made by the Government of 
Prussia, and elsewhere in Europe, which 
will probably result in its more rapid intro- 
duction as a staple article of food. 

Looking at the aggregate Exports of the 
country for the past year, 1857, to learn the 
proportion due to the culture of the soil, we 
find them to be as follows : 

The Sea •- - - $3,739,644 
" Forest - - 14,699,711 

Agriculture - - 75,722,096 
Tobacco - - - 20,260,772 
Cotton - - - 131,575,859 
Raw Produce - - 2,103,105 

Manufactures - - 30,805,126 
Specie and Bullion - 60,078,352 



Total value of Exports $338,785,065 
of which there was due to the culture of 
the soil (agriculture, tobacco and cotton,) 
two hundred and thirty millions (229,661,- 
832), or more than two-thirds of the sum 
total. 

Comparing this amount with the exports 
due to the culture of the soil in 1847, we 



* (See page 456.) The analyses relied upon 
were those of Sir Humphrey Davy, assigning 95 
per cent, of nutritious matter to wheat, and 77 
per cent, to corn, determining the intrinsic value 
of the two grains to be in this proportion; so 
that $1 being the price of corn, wheat would in 
reality seem to be worth no more than $1.23. 



404 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER 



[July 



find that they were in that year one hundred 
and thirty-one millions, the increase for the 
ten years being more than seventy per cent. 
The exports of breadstuff's For the last fif- 
teen years have singularly fluctuated, and, 
although their large increase from twenty- 
seven millions (27,701,121), in 1846, to 
sixty-eight millions (68,701,921), in 1847, 
and their fall again, in 1848, to thirty-seven 
millions (37,472,761) may be accounted for 
by the Irish famine of 1847, arising from 
the potato rot and short crops generally ; it 
seems less easy to account for the differences 
in the exports of the last five years. They 
were in 

1852, twenty-five millions (25,^57,027) 

1853, thirty-two millions (32,985,322) 
Rising, in 1854, to sixty-five 

millions - - - (65,941,323) 

Sinking, in 1855, to thirty- 
eight millions - - (38,895,348) 
And rising, in 1857, to 

seventy-seven millions - (77,187,301) 
They must be owing, however, to fluctu- 
ations in the home supply, as well as in the 
foreign . demand, affected as the latter has 
recently been by European and Eastern 
wars, and in the consequent suspension of 
trade with the Baltic, as the average export 
price of flour from the country, as ascer- 
tained by the Treasury Department for the 
years in question, throws little light upon it. 
That price was as follows : 

1852 - - - $4.24 

1853 - - - 5.60 

1854 - - - 7.88 

1855 - - - 10.10 

A statement showing the actual average 
export price of flour at New York from the 
year 1800, has been published by the De- 
partment. 

It is desirable that the causes of such 
fluctuations should be ascertained as nearly 
as possible, for, while unexplained, they are 
calculated to excite doubts in regard to the 
certainty of agricultural profits, and the ele- 
ment of uncertainty, wherever found, is cal- 
culated to discourage and to deter.* 

Passing from the great staples of wheat 
and Indian corn to the other agricultural 
products of the country, a comparison of the 



* See a paper by J. J. Dawson, Esq.. on cur- 
rent price and cost of corn in England, dnring 
the last ten year.-', as illustrating the value of 

■iiltiiial Statistics. — London Statistical Jour 
nal,for March 1855. 



: i: 



Census of 1840 with that of 1850 gives us 
these general results, 

And, jirsf, as regards Stock : 

The number of Horses, asses and mules, 
had increased in number something more 
than half a million (560,381), the total in 
1850 being about five millions (4,896,650). 
The number of horses had not increased as 
rapidly as other stock, in consequence of 
the extension of railroads lessening their 
demand for the purposes of travel; but, inj 
the newly-settled States, where railroads wer 
but commencing, the increase of horses had 
kept pace with the population. There i 
about one horse to every five persons in the 
United States. The 500,000 asses and 
mules returned are almost confined to th 
Southern States, where the climate is re 
garded as better adapted to this animal tha 
the horse. 

The Neat Cattle had increased nearly| 
three and a half millions, and numbered 
over eighteen millions (18,378,907), of 
which six millions (6,385,094) were milch< 
cows, about two millions (1,700,744) work-^ 
ing oxen, and ten millions (10,293,069)] 
other cattle. 

The rate of increase of neat cattle for] 
the ten years, was about twenty per cent.] 
The amount of butter produced in 1850,' 
was three hundred and thirteen millions of 
pounds (313,266,962), and of cheese, one 
hundred and five millions of pounds (105,- 
535,129). The average value of the ex-' 



ports of these two articles, from 



1845 
a half 



5 



1850, w T as about one million and 
dollars. 

Swine had increased four millions, num- 
bering in 1850 over thirty millions (30,- 
354,213). 

Sheep had increased two and a half mil- 
lions, and numbered nearly twenty-two mil- 
lions (21,723,220). 

In New England there was a remarkabh 
decrease in their number, from 3,811,307 
in 1840, to 2,164,452, in 1850, a decrease 
of forty-five per cent. In the five Atlantic 
or Middle States, New York, New Jersey^ 
Pennsylvania, Delaware, and Maryland, 
taken together, there was a decrease oj 
twenty-two per cent. The augmentation h 
chiefly been in the States south of Mary' 
land, and west of New York. 

The returns of Wool were as follows 
1840 - 35,802,114 pounds - $11,345,31* 
1850 - 52,516,959 m « - 15,755,08* 



1855 - 61,560,379 



23,392,944 



1859.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER 






an increase of about forty-six pereent. The 
average weight of the fleece yielded by each 
sheep was, in 1840, 1.84 pound, and in 
1850, 2.4o, indicating a great improvement 
in the breed. This improvement is chiefly 
shown in the returns relative to Vermont, 
Massachusetts, and New York.* 

The total value of live stock in the United 
States in 1855, was about five hundred and 
fifty millions (544,189,510,), and the value 
of animals slaughtered, about one hundred 
and twelve millions ($111,703,142). 

The (/rain, root and other crops, from 
1840 to 1850: 

Rye had decreased from eighteen millions 
(18,645,507) of bushels to fourteen millions 
(14,188,813). 

Oats had increased from one hundred 
and twenty-three millions (123,071,341) to 
one hundred and forty-six millions (146,- 
584,179). 

Potatoes (Irish and sweet) had de- 
creased . from one hundred and eight mil- 
lions of bushels (108,298,060) to one hun- 
dred and four millions (104,066,044). 

Hay had increased from ten millions of 
tons (10,248,108) to thirteen millions (13,- 
838,642). 

Hops from one million (1,238,502) of 
pounds to three millions (3,497,029) in 
1850, and, as estimated by the Secretary of 
the Treasury, to nearly five millions (4,820,- 
752) in 1855, indicating a rapid increase in 
the consumption of Lager-beer. 

Cotton had increased from eight hun- 
dred millions of pounds (799,479,275) in 
1840 to nine hundred and eighty millions 

* The consumption of foreign wool in the 
United States, it may be remarked, appears with- 
in the last rive years to be diminishing slightly 
in quantity, although not in value ; but the im- 
portation of woolen manufactures is increasing. 
The importation of foreign wool was, 

in 1840 9.813.312 pounds $819,830 

" 1850... 18.669.794 u 1.681,690 

" 1855. ..17.805.511 ' : 1.940.000 

The importation of woolen manufactures was, 

in 1 S4U $9,970,868 

" 1850 18.614.589 

" 1S55 23.603.223 

The total consumption of foreign wool in 
England, in 1855, was 66 millions of pounds. 
Total production of woole 10.000, and 

exports of woole] 1.000. 

The total consumption of foreign wool in 
France, in 1855, was " nds. Total 

production of woolens $200,000,000, and ex- 
ports of woolens $38,000,000. The total pro- 
duction of woolens in the United States, in 
1854 and 5. was $18,000,000. 



(978,317,200) in 1860, and to one billion 
and eighty-eight millions (1,089,409,908) 
in L85 

Rice Prom eighty millions of pounds | 
841,422) to two hundred and fifteen mil- 
lions (215,313,497), while 

Tobacco has </> "crra.0 <l from two hun- 
dred and nineteen millions of pounds (219,- 
163,319) to oik! hundred and ninety-nine 
millions (199,752, 655). 

Wool had increased from thirty-five mil- 
lions of pounds (35,802,114) to fifty-two 
millions (52,510,959). 

Silk Cocoons had decreased from sixty- 
one thousand pounds (61,652) to ten thou- 
sand (10,843). 

Wine had increased from one hundred 
and twenty-four thousand gallons (124,734) 
to two hundred and twenty-one thousand 
(221,249). 

From a table of the actual crops per acre 
in the different States,* it would seem that 
there is a diversity so great as to confirm 
the doubts in regard to its correctness frank- 
ly intimated by the compiler, who states 
that nothing better can be framed from the 
returns, which, in general, were very care- 
lessly made, or entirely neglected. 

In Wheat we find the average number 
of bushels to the acre to be 5 in Alabama 
and Georgia, 7 in North Carolina, Virginia 
and Tennessee, ranging upwards in the 
other States until it reaches 12 in New 
York, Ohio and Indiana, lo in Maryland 
and Vermont, 14 in Iowa and Wisconsin, 
15 in Florida, Pennsylvania and Texas, and 
10, the highest average, in Massachusetts, 
being three times the average of the lowest. 

In Rye we find the average of bushels 
to the acre to be 5 in Virginia, 7 in Georgia 
and Tennessee, 8 in New Jersey, 17 in 
New York, and 25 in Ohio, or five times 
the lowest average. 

In Indian Corn we find the lowest aver- 
age to be 11 bushels to the acre in South 
Carolina, 15 in Alabama, 16 in Georgia and 
Louisiana, 17 in North Carolina, 18 in Mis- 
sissippi and Virginia, and so rising upwards 
until it readies 27 in New York and Maine, 
82 in Vermont and Iowa, 33 in Indiana, 
Illinois and New Jersey, 34 in Missouri, 
26 in Ohio, and 40 in Connecticut, some 
three and a half times the lowest aver- 



* Given in the Compendium of the,. Census, 

page 17 b. 



406 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[July 



In Oats we find the lowest average, 10 
bushels to the acre in North Carolina, 12 in 
Mississippi and South Carolina and Ala- 
bama, 18 in Virginia, 18 in Arkansas, 
Georgia and Kentucky, 20 in Delaware, In- 
diana and Maine, 2.1 in Connecticut, Mary- 
land and Ohio, 22 in Pennsylvania, 25 in 
New York, 26 in Vermont, New Jersey, 
Missouri, Michigan, and Massachusetts, 29 
in Illinois, 35 in Wisconsin, and 36 in 
Iowa. 

Of Rice we have returns only from three 
States, Louisiana giving 1,400 pounds to 
the acre, South Carolina 1,750, and Florida 
1,850 pounds. • 

Sweet Potatoes vary in quantity from 
65 bushels to the acre in Texas to 175 in 
Louisiana, 200 in Alabama, and 400 in 
Georgia. 

Irish Potatoes yield from 65 bushels 
to the acre in North Carolina, 75 in Mary- 
land, New Jersey, Ohio and Pennsylvania, 
100 in Indiana, Iowa, New York and Rhode 
Island, 120 in Maine and Tennessee, 100 in 
Georgia and Wisconsin, 130 in Kentucky, 
140 in Michigan, 170 in Massachusetts, 
175 in Florida, 178 in Vermont, to 230 in 
New Hampshire, and 250 in Texas. 

In this table particularly it is difficult to 
account, except on the supposition of error, 
for so large a difference in the average 
yield per acre between States so alike in 
character, as Alabama (60) and Georgia 
(125), or between Connecticut (85), Ver- 
mont (178) and New Hampshire, (230). 

No question, perhaps, connected with 
American Agriculture is of more general 
interest and importance than the measure 
of profit which may reasonably be expect- 
ed from capital invested in farms, and 
managed with that degree of skill and in- 
dustry, which are the recognized requisites 
to success, in the various branches of com- 
merce and manufactures, in the trades, and 
learned professions. 

It has been truly remarked, that " man- 
kind have a habit of graduating the rank 
of labor by the recompense it receives; and 
it is undoubtedly the conviction that agri- 
cultural labor is less profitable than many 
other employments pursued in cities and 
large towns, that induces so many thousands 
of our ambitious and energetic youths, es- 
pecially in New England and the Atlantic 
States, fo forsake their rural homes, and the 
half-cultivated farms of their fathers, in the 
hope of more rapidly achieving independ- 



ence, and perhaps fortune, in com muni tie: 
where every branch of trade is already over 
crowded with anxious competitors. 

The same idea is not unfrcquently enter- . 
tained by capitalists. The common beliefj! 
seems to be, and it is, doubtless, foundec 
upon common experience, that the profits o. 
farming operations are very moderate, anc 
that it is idle to expect more than a smal 
per centagc from capital thus invested. A 
contrary belief is usually attributed to ar 
undue enthusiasm with no basis of fact, 
and occasional instances of large profits are 
regarded as extraordinary exceptions, tha' 
are to be attributed to local and specia 
causes, and are not, therefore, to be allowed 
any weight in the support of a general 
theory. 

It is most desirable that accurate statis- 
tics in regard to the fair profits of capital 
invested in agriculture, after just allowanc 
for the industry required for its develop- 
ment, should be gathered from all section 
of the country, and it would be well i 
some inquiries to this end were embodied ii 
the Agricultural schedules for the approch- 
ing Census. 

The fact is as yet but imperfectly appre- 
ciated among us, that Agriculture, which, 
in its origin was but an art, has been gradu- 
ally raised to the dignity of a science ; and 
now thanks to the discoveries of the great 
practical and analytical chemists in Europe 
and America, of whom Liebig is the chief, 
stimulated and aided by the mechanical in- 
vention, for which our age and country a/e 
so remarkable, it occupies a position of pre 
eminence unknown during the last century. 

" There is, I believe/' says Mr. Everett 
" no exaggeration in stating that as great an 
amount and variety of scientific, physical 
and mechanical knowledge, is required for 
the most successful conduct of the various 
operations of husbandry, as for any of the \ 
arts, trades or professions." 

Assuming this position to be correct, it is 
clear that no amount of evidence in regard 
to the profits of farms conducted by men 
wanting in this wide range of scientific, « 
physical and mechanical knowledge, can de- fa 
termine the profits that may be reasonably to 
expected from farms of the like capability, pi 
where that varied knowledge institutes and 
guides every operation. 

But there is reason to believe, that while 
the limit of Agricultural profits generally 
the country is as much below 



throughout 



. 



1«59.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER 



407 



the line it is capable of reaching, as the 
present standard of Agricultural education 
is below that high standard to which Mr. 
Everett directs the ambition of the Ameri- 
can farmer, there are good grounds for the 
opinion, that with the increase of an Agri- 
cultural literature, the diffusion of books 
and newspapers, of farmers' clubs, of State, 
county, and town, Agricultural Societies, of 
national and local fairs and exhibitions, 
there is a perceptible and repaid improve- 
ment in the rural economy of the country, 
in the intelligent culture of the soil, and in 
the profits of Agricultural capital. 

So long ago as 1795, Mr. Burke placed 
the proper profits of a proprietor of 1,200 
acres at 12 per cent. Sir John Sinclair a 
quarter of a century later, declared the 
proper profits at 10 to 15 per cent. Mr. 
Rives, of Virginia, by whom these facts 
were mentioned in a very inleresting Agri- 
cultural address, stated the profit of the 
model farin at Gignon, near Versailles, at 14 
per cent. The " Revue des deux Mondes " 
for February 15th, 1858, in an article en- 
titled, " Les Questions Agricoles en 1848," 
mentions that the net profits of the farm at 
Bresles, in the department of the Oise, rose 
in 1856, to 246,000 francs upon a capital of 
800,000 being more than 30 per cent. 

Occasional accounts in our Agricultural 
papers indicate a rate of interest, which if 
verified as one that could be reasonably an- 
ticipated with a due share of skill and in- 
dustry, would immediately induce the in- 
vestment of millions of capital in Agricul- 
tural operations, to the benefit of the coun- 
try at large, as well as to the individuals 
making the advances. 

One point that should not be lost sight of 
in a consideration of the advantages attend- 
ant upon agricultural operations is the safe- 
ty of the capital iuvested, compared with 
the chances of loss attendant upon commer- 
cial or manufacturing investments. The 
Hon. Emory Washburne, of Massachusetts, 
in an address before the Worcester Agricul- 
tural Society, in 1854, stated some facts 
bearing upon the question, which a statisti- 
cal inquiry, if one could be accurately made, 
into the successes or reverses of the various 
pursuits in which our countrymen engage, 
might probably multiply to an extent, that, 
without proof, would hardly be credited. 
Of the merchants in Boston doing business 
at a certain wharf during forty years, only 
six became independent, the remainder 



failed or died destitute of property. Of 
one thousand merchants, having accounts at 
a principal Boston bank during the same 
year, only six had become independent. 

Another investigation led to the startling 
result, that of every hundred traders, but 
seven succeed in acquiring wealth. From 
such reverses the farmer is comparatively 
free. Of eleven hundred and twelve bank- 
rupts who took the benefit of the bankrupt 
law in Massachusetts only fourteen were far- 
mers ; and of twenty-five hundred and fifty 
bankrupts in New York, only forty-six were 
farmers. Less than two per cent, of the 
bankrupts belonged to the Agricultural 
population, although that population so 
largely exceeds all the rest of the people 
however classified. 

At the present moment, when the lead- 
ing manufacturing interests of the country 
are in a languishing condition from their re- 
cent reverses, and the conviction is general- 
ly felt, of the precariousness of their profits 
for the future, dependent as those profits 
are upon the varying policy of opposing 
parties ; the claims of Agriculture upon the 
attention of capitalists, as well as statesmen, 
are likely to be more fairly scrutinized than 
when commerce and manufactures were in 
the full tide of success. Should the sched- 
ule for the approaching Census include the 
question of Agricultural profit in such a 
form that the returns may afford reliable 
data for prudent calculation, the next decade 
may perhaps see an investment of capital 
from the Atlantic States, in the cultivation 
of wheat and corn in our w r estern valleys, 
to an extent that shall materially swell our 
exports of breadstuff's, and constitute them 
the chief element in our foreign exchanges 

Much has been said of late years of a 
gradual deterioration of the soil in the 
older States, as evidenced in part by the de- 
creasing ratio of crops to the acre, as com- 
pared with the ratio in former years and 
with the usual ratio in other countries. 

Mr. Morrill, M. C, of Vermont, by whom 
a bill has been introduced into the House 
of Representatives designed to grant to the 
several States some ten millions of acres to 
be divided amongst them in proportion to 
the number of senators and representatives 
they send to Washington, with the view of 
promoting Agricultural education and Agri- 
cultural science, by the establishment of an 
Agricultural college in each State, has made 
some startling statements upon this subject. 



408 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[JU*Y 



He affirms that Agriculture is rapidly de- 
clining in every State of the Union, that 
the quantity of food produced bears each 
year a smaller proportion to the number of 
acres under cultivation, and that over a 
very wide area some of the most useful 
crops bid fair to become extinct. 

A writer in the " Year Rook of Agricul- 
ture for 1855," on the " Alarming Deterio- 
ration of the soil," referred to various statis- 
tics of great significance in connection with 
this subject, Some of them regarded Mas- 
sachusetts, where the hay crop declined 12 
per cent, from 1840 to 1850, notwithstand- 
ing the addition of 90,000 acres to its mow- 
ing lands, and the grain crop absolutely de- 
preciated 6,000 bushels, although the tillage 
lands hud been increased by the addition of 
60,000 acres. 

In Indiana the river bottoms which used to 
produce an average crop of sixty bushels of 
corn to the acre, now produce but forty. In 
Wisconsin, which is younger still, it is esti- 
mated that only one-half the bushels of 
wheat are now raised to the acre that were 
raised twleve years ago ; and the writer de- 
clares as the conclusion of the whole matter, 
" that the soils of New England, after all 
the admonitions we have received, are annu- 
ally growing poorer, and that even the lands 
of the great West are rapidly becoming ex- 
hausted of Iheir fertility." 

He refers to the large falling off of the 
wheat and potato crops in New England, 
which have however been replaced by Indi- 
an corn, and also to the falling off of wheat 
in Tennessee, Kentucky, Georgia and Ala- 
bama, to the extent of 60 per cent, from 
1840 to 1850, and assumes that the Agri- 
cultural statistics of each State tell the same 
sad story.* 

As regards falling off in the production 
of the country, I think it is clear from a 
comparison, not of wheat and potatoes alone, 
but of the total products of the soil, espcial- 
ly of Indian corn, in 1840, with that of the 
same crops in 1850, that Mr. Morrell is mis- 
taken; but as productiveness of crops and dis- 
tructiveness of soil are saidto be the two most 
prominent features of American Agricul- 
ture, the large harvests in our young States 
ought not to blind us to the fact that the fer- 
tility of those parts of the older States which 
once yielded as abundantly, seems to have 



been steadily diminishing for a course of 
years. 

This fact is exhibited, not only in the 
wheat lands of New England and other parts 
of the North, but on. the tobacco fields of 
Virginia, and the cotton plantations of the 
South;* and the subject undoubtedly de- 
serves the most careful investigation .f 

The deterioration of our soil is doubtless 
owing, in a great part, to a careless system 
of cultivation, common to new countries 
where land is cheap and labor is dear, and 
the soil is naturally productive, and the in- 
dividual cultivator is intent upon large 
immediate returns, thoughtless of the per- 
manent fertility of his farm, careless of 
the interests of his successors, and regard- 
less of the prosperity of the community 
at large. It has been suggested that every 
agricultural people runs the same race of 
exhausting culture, shallow plowing, a con- 
tinuous course of impoverishing, with nei- 
ther rest, rotation nor sufficient manure ; 
and that necessity alone can convince them 
that duty and interest both demand, that land 
shall be so tilled- as to increase rather than 
diminish in fruitfulness. Such a necessity 
in the lessening crops of the Atlantic States, 
and westward emigration in search of more 
fertile territories, already presents itself to 
the intelligent American agriculturist : and 
the reasonable belief that the same exhaus- 
tive system will soon begin to tell upon the 
most productive regions of the West, has 
led to the discussion in agricultural newspa- 
pers, and at farmers' clubs, of the philoso- 
phical causes of the exhaustion, and the 
best means of renovation. 

In some sections of the country efforts to 
restore exhausted lands have been attended 



* I gather this account of Mr. Morrell's state- 
ments from an editorial in the N. Y. Evening Post. 



* Progress of Agriculture in the United States, 
by Daniel Lee, M. D., Patent Office Reports for 
1853,p.2, and "Southern Agricultural Exhaustion 
and its Remedy,''' by Edmund Ruffin, Esq., of 
Virginia: read before the South Carolina Institute 
at Charleston, same volume, page 373. 

"j" Prof. Liebig mentions the fact, that the 
value of tobacco depends upon the quantity of 
potash contained in the ashes; and that accurate 
analyses of the various sorts of tobacco have 
been executed by the Administration at. Paris, 
as furnishing a mode of distingushing the differ- 
ent soils on which tobacco was raised, as well 
as the peculiar class to which it belonged. The 
Professor then says: "Another striking fact was 
disclosed through these analyses. Certain cele- 
brated kinds of American tobacco were found grad- 
ually to yield a smaller quantity of ashes, and their 
value diminished in proportion." 1 



1859.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



409 



•with the most marked pecuniary bug 
Mr. Ruffin, of Virginia, estimates the in- 
creased value of reclaimed lands in Eastern 
Virginia, by marling and liming, from 1838 
to 1850, at some thirty millions of dollars. 
In the well known ease of a similar BUCCess 
from claying- a light soil by the celebrated 
Coke of Norfolk, afterwards Karl Leicester,' 
that gentleman doubled the value of his 
estates in Norfolkshire : and among numer- 
ous instances of immense improvement 
simply from drainage and deep plowing, 
with but little aid from fertilizers, may be 
mentioned one cited by Prof. Johnston of 
the Home farm at Ycstees, belonging to the 
Marquis of Twecdale, where the land, by 
these means, was raised in value eight times 
— from 5 shillings to 40 shillings rent per acre. 

There are no reliable data from which we 
can now gather the progress of deterioration 
in productive lands in the United States, or 
the reclamation of exhausted lands; but the 
rapid increase in the use of guano, the most 
powerful of restoratives, indicates to some 
extent the increasing attention paid to fer- 
tilizing. 

The consumption of guano for 1855, as 
stated by Prof. Mapes, w r as about 140,000 
tons. The amount sold in England, during 
the year 1855, was stated by Mr. Nesbitt at 
210,000 tons being an increase of twenty 
per cent, on the consumption of 1854, 
which was also an increase of twenty per 
cent, over that of 1853 ; this increase has 
taken place in the face of a rise in the price, 
from forty-five to about eighty dollars per ton. 

It would seem proper that the schedules 
for the new Census, should embrace inqui- 
ries in regard to the deterioration or im- 
provement of the soil, which maybe shown, 
not only by the ratio of crops to the acre at 
successive periods, but by the market value 
of the same lands at the stated intervals ; 
and that the schedules should also exhibit 
generally the quantity and prices of the va- 
rious fertilizers in use — barn-yard manure 
firstly and chiefly, then guano, poudrette, 
lime, gypsum, marl, muck, and so forth, that 
are yearly devoted to the enrichment of our 
soils. Upon this item of manure insignifi- 
cant as it might seem to the unreflecting 
mind, depends the continuous prosperity of 
our country. This is the secret of England's 
Agricultural wealth. Mr. Webster, in his 
sketch of English Agriculture, quoted the 
extraordinary fact stated by M'Quecn, "that 
the value of the animal manure annually 



applied to the crops in England, at current 
prices, surpasses in value the wdiolc amount 
of its foreign commerce/' and he added, 
1 there is do doubt thai it greatly exceeds it.'* 

The schedules might also advantageously 
give us, not simply the amount of new lands 
brought into cultivation, but of the worth- 
less lands that have been reclaimed by 
drainage. 

In almost all the States extensive tracts 
of swamp lands are found, not only unfit 
for cultivation, but frequently indueive of 
that fearful scourge of health and happi- 
ness, fever and ague, that year after year 
prostrates the energies, and shortens the 
lives of tens of thousands of our countrymen. 

Large grants of these swamp lands have 
been gratuitously made by the Federal Gov- 
ernment to the States, in the hope of their 
reclamation through measures to be adopted 
by the State Governments. Since 1849 
nearly sixty millions of acres have been 
thus granted.")" In the drainage of large 
tracts of land we have the benefit of the 
experience of Europe, especially Holland, 
where the Harlem Lake, thirty-three miles 
in circumference, and thirteen feet deep 
below the tide, has, since 1839, been con- 
verted into a most fertile tract, occupied by 
some two thousand inhabitants, and exhibit- 
ing fields of verdure, dotted with numerous 
cottages, and enlivened by cattle, horses and 
sheep, grazing on the fruitful meadows. The 
lands thus reclaimed from the ocean are of 
extraordinary fertility, and are estimated as 
capable of supporting seventy thousand per- 
sons. 

Of the pecuniary results of drainage in 
this country Gov. Wright, of Indiana, quo- 
ted an example in a public address touch- 
ing the marshy lands of that State embra- 
cing three thousand acres. He mentioned 
a farm of 1G0 acres which had been sold at 
five hundred dollars, and after an expendi- 
ture of two hundred dollars in drainage, was 
worth upwards of three thousand dollars, or 
an advance of more than 500 per cent. 

But, apa^t from these large tracts of 
overflowed lands, scarcely a farm in the 
country but would be improved by thorough 
drainage, and it would not be difficult to as- 
certain the number of acres under-drained in 
each year of the Census, nor the estimated 

* Webster's Works, Vol. I., p. 448. 

f See an interesting paper on drainage by 
Henry F. French, of Exeter, New Hampshire, in 
the Patent Office Reports for 1S56, page 1G0. 



410 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[July 



additional value which they thereby re- 
ceived.* 

Looking at the acreage now devoted to 
Indian corn, to say nothing of our other 
crops, it lias been estimated that by the 
adoption of an improved system of Agri- 
culture, embracing drainage, deep plough- 
ing and skilful manuring, the entire crop 
now yielding 400 millions of dollars, might, 
upon the same breadth of land, be trebled 
if not quadrupled. At present, with occa- 
sional exceptions, our average crops per 
acre are even less in our most fertile and 
almost virgin States than in the soil of Eu- 
rope, that has been cultivated for centuries. 

Take Wheat, for instance. The average 
crop per acre in New York, Ohio and In- 
diana, is 12 bushels ; in France it is 13 ; in 
England, 21 jf in Flanders, 23 j in Scot- 
land, 30 (on the authority of Professor 
Johnston); and in New Brunswick, 19. 

How the average might be increased 
throughout this country by careful culture, 
we may, in part, learn fron the returns of 
occasional crops in England of seventy 
bushels, in New York of sixty, on the prai- 
ries of forty-four, and at San Jose, as is 
reported, of eighty-seven. 

Yet another topic closely connected with 
the interests of American Agriculture is 
the recent diminution . of the proportion of 
the male population engaged in Agricultu- 
ral pursuits, as compared with the num- 
ber engaged in commercial and other pur- 
suits. The precise ratio of that diminution 
cannot be ascertained from the Census, for 
the reason that the tables of 1850, on the 
leading occupations of the people, were 
based upon the whole number of male in- 
habitants over fifteen years of age, includ- 
ing all the free males, and three-fifths of 
the male slaves ; whereas the former tables 
of occupation, made in 1840 and 1830, 
were based upon the entire population. The 
Census of 1840 made the portion engag- 
ed in Agriculture 77.4 per cent, for both 
sexes, that of 1840 only 44.69. 

There is, therefore, reason for believing 

* The committee on drainage, in their report 
to the State Agricultural Society of New York, 
in 1848, assert, that "there is not one farm out 
of every seventy-five in this State, but needs 
draining — much draining — to bring it into high 
cultivation. May we venture to say that every 
wheat-field would produce a larger and finer 
crop if properly drained." 

| Prof. J. F. Johnston, 1849. 



that the proportion of the population devo- 
ted to Agricultural pursuits is decreasing : 
and it is important that the schedules of 
the next Census should be drawn with 
reference to the determination of this point 
with entire accuracy, and should develop 
whatever facts may be essential, to enable 
us to discover, and if possible to correct, 
the causes that may be diverting an undue 
proportion of American industry from the 
culture of the soil. 

The attractiveness of town and city life 
for the labouring classes may be lessened 
by a study of the tables of mortality, show- 
ing that the average duration of life is 
much larger in the rural districts. 

In England the average duration of life 
is forty-five years in Surrey, but only twen- 
ty-five in Manchester and Liverpool.* 

A paper, by Mr. Edward Jarvis, on vital 
statistics at Dorchester, in Massachusetts, 
red before the British Association in Jan- 
uary, 1840, showed that, out of 1,700 
persons, 

The average life of Farmers was 45 years 

" Merchants 33 " 

" Mechanics 29 " 

" Labourers 27 " 

Looking from the average years of life 
to the increase of the male population, we 
find it stated that in Massachusetts, among 
the cities and towns it is six per cent., 
while among the Agricultural population it 
is 8 per cent., a difference of male births in 
favour of the rural districts of 33 1-3 per 
cent. 

These facts, if verified by the national 
statistics, and brought home to the con- 
sciousness of the people, are certainly cal- 
culated to restrain a preference for the 
crowded streets and impure atmosphere of 
our cities, over the broad fields and brac- 
ing air of the country ; and the feverish 
anxiety for rapid gains in mercantile pur- 
suits, may be advantageously checked by 
statistics showing the uncertain gains of 
commercial speculations, and the certain 
profit of enlightened Agricultural toil. 

The leading facts at which we have 
glanced, of an increasing foreign demand 
for breadstuffs, the limited breadth of our 

* John Yates', Esq., Paper on our National 
Strength, tested by the numbers, the age, and 
the industrial qualities of the people, read be- 
fore the British Association at Glasgow, Sep- 
tember, 1855. 



1859.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



411 



arable land, which thousands of our citi- 
zens have been taught to regard as inex- 
haustible, the gradual deterioration of the 
soil from a wasteful system by which the 
constituents of fertility are removed with 
each successive crop, without being restored 
by appropriate manures — a system based 
upon the desire for immediate gains, with- 
out thought of the sacred duty that de- 
volves upon us to transmit the soil to our 
posterity, with undiminished productiveness, 
that it may sustain in comfort and happi- 
ness the unnumbered millions that are pres- 
ently to occupy our land ; these and simi- 
lar consideratians connected with the pres- 
ent and future prosperity of our country, 
appealing at once to the interest and the 
patriotism of the nation, may be so elabo- 
rated and diversified, and verified by the 
tables of the Census, that its returns shall 
teach us not simply lessons in political 
economy but lessons of daily duty, the ben- 
efits of which shall be reaped alike by the 
present and future generations. 

There are various topics connected with 
x\merican Agriculture on which I would 
like to touch, did time permit me. One, 
the recent and rapid introduction of im- 
proved agricultural machinery soon proba- 
bly to be followed by the use of steam 
plows and other machinery worked by the 
same motor, overcoming, to a great extent, 
the chief difficulty of the American far- 
mer in the high price of labour ; that fea- 
ture of our agriculture which constitutes 
so marked and essential a difference be- 
tween the practical agriculture of America 
and Europe. 

Another is the spread of agricultural 
science, through the efforts of the patent 
office distributing their reports and seeds ' 
gathered from Europe ; through the multi- 
plication of books and papers devoted to 
the subject, and by county, state and na- 
tional societies and farmers' clubs, in their 
frequent meetings, addresses, and exhibi- 
tions of agricultural implements and pro- 
ducts. 

What the country now most requires in 
reference to its agriculture, is, that its con- 
dition should be faithfully photographed in 
the returns to each Federal Census, and it 
will be for the Agricultural Section of this 
body to prepare well considered suggestions 
for the new schedule and submit them to 
the Federal Government. Such suggestions 
will appropriately come from the American 



Geographican and Statistical Society, in 
view of its national character and the scope 
of its labours; and such suggestions, judg- 
ing from the past, the Federal Government, 
will cheerfully receive and carefully consider. 

Among the additional items which might 
advantageously be included in the schedules, 
I would suggest the following : 

As regards parsons employed in farm- 
ing. — The proportion of the population thus 
employed of both sexes. Their average 
life, as compared with that of persons liv- 
ing in towns, and of other trades. 

As regards capital employed in agricul- 
ture. — Not only the proportion invested in 
land, stock and implements, but the profit 
thereon received during the year immedi- 
ately preceding the Census. 

As regards the farms. — Not only the im- 
proved and unimproved lands, and the pro- 
portion in meadow, pasture or tillage, but 
the number of acres of each farm that have 
been drained ; the number requiring drain- 
age; the number drained during the last 
year; the cost of draining, and the value 
of the land before and after. 

In regard to the improvement or deterio- 
ration of the soil. — The average of each 
crop and cost of each per acre ; the aver- 
age of bushels or tons to the acre, and the 
cash value of each on the spot. 

In regard to manures. — The amount, va- 
riety, and cost of those applied during the 
last year, and the rate of cost per acre. 

Other suggestions will doubtless, be made, a 
collation of which, by the Bureau of the Cen- 
sus, may afford us in future years, the means 
of tracing the progress of American agri- 
culture, and reading its actual condition at 
each decade, with the same facility with 
which a prudent merchant reads the past 
and present of his business in the carefully 
prepared balance sheet; and if the future 
of America shall continue to exhibit the 
same steadily progressive advance that we 
find in her past, the tabular results of each 
succeeding Census, dry and uninteresting 
as they may seem to those who shall see in 
them but columns of figures, will in fact 
develop the fulfilment of some of those 
prophesies of the coming wealth and splen- 
dour of the Western Continent, that when 
occasionally uttered by our far-seeing econ- 
omists, are apt to be regarded as the care- 
less dreams of visionary enthusiasts. 

Mr. President and Gentlemen, I 
cannot close this address without remark- 



412i 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[July 



ing, that the increasing application of na- 
tural science to rural economy, will closely 
connect the Agricultural with the other 
Sections of your hotly, and that our Ag- 
riculture is the National interest which is 
to be chiefly benefitted by their learned 
researches. 

The late Prof. Johnston, of Edinboro', 
•whom I was so happy as to know during 
his visit to this country, and whose admira- 
ble lectures in the United States have con- 
nected his name with American as it was 
already identified with British Agriculture, 
on one occasion dwelt upon the aid which 
the art of culture receives from every 
branch of science, and this association is, 
I trust, destined to verify the correctness 
of his remarks. 

The Section of Topography,* embracing 
the physical geography of the Continent, 
and the topography of the several States 
and Territories in detail, concerns, among 
much else that is interesting, the extent 
and character of our arable soil , or moun 
tain elevations and depressions; our table- 
lands and low plains, and in connection 
with the section on Hydrology,-)- will ex- 
hibit the influence of the ocean and the 
gulf, of our lakes and rivers, of tides, gulf- 
streams, prevailing winds and storms on 
the capabilities of the country, and the 
practices and profits of its cultivators. 

The Sections on GeologyJ; and Mete- 



tion, domestic animals and their commer- 
cial value, their various breeds, the rearing 
of stock, and it perhaps properly includes 
the agency of animal life in fertilizing the 
soil. That on Commerce relates to the 
transport and exports of breadstuffs, and 
their relation to our foreign exchanges ; 
that on Manufactures to our Agricultu- 
ral implements, enlarging our production 
by diminishing the necessity for human 
labour; and that on Finance, to our na- 
tional wealth, of which Agriculture is the 
most prominent feature. 

We began, gentlemen, by recognizing in 
Agriculture the largest material interest of 
our country, confuting the bulk of her 
wealth, and indicating, in no small degree, 
the physical comfort, the prosperity, and 
the civilization of our people. 

We next consider its relation to less fa- 
voured foreign lands, whose children look 
to us for food : — a relation that invests the 
quiet labours of our farmers with an inter- 
est beyond the seas, not simply in shap- 
ing commercial speculation, and regulating 
among merchants the price of bread, but in 
gladdening distant homes, in staying the 
march of famine and starvation, in allay- 
ing popular discontent, and even averting 
national revolutions. 

After a survey at the area, the popula- 



tion, the products, and the statistics of our 
great American farm, of its home resources, 
its foreign markets, and its probable fu- 
OROLOGY,|| have an equally direct bearing t we close with the thought, that for 
upon Agriculture, in explaining the nature j^e advancement of this ereat interest, 
of the rocks and of the soil, the fall of j w hi e li supplies millions with 'healthful and 
rain, the necessity for irrigation and for | pro fi t able employment, and other millions 
drainage. ! ^h their daily bread ; canals and railroads 

The Section on Botany,§ may materi- i utersect ur continent, extending westward 
ally aid the farmer, by teaching him the towar a s the far Pacific ; ships whiten the 
nature of the weeds that check his pro- ocean? and steam labours in a thousand 
gress; of the rust, smut, and mildew which | forms Thafc tQ gupply itg workmen witn 
attack his cereals ; of the cause yet to be fitting implements, inventive genius is ever 
discovered, of the rot in the potato; of the! ^eft^ a nd mechanical skill unceasingly 
mutual adaptation of plants to the soil; of active That in t]ieir behalf chemistry, by 
their special habits and natural structure, I the crucible and analysis, is extorting from 
their increase and decrease in various lo-| nature ner hidden secrets; and science, 
calities. I in all her forms, is leading her skillful 

The Section on Zoology and Animal' id to p Cr f ec t, in this advanced and ad 



Physiology, embraces by your classifica- 



* Mr. H. V. Poor, Chairman. 

tRcv. Dr. Hawks, Chairman. 

J Lieut. E. L. Yiele, Chairman. 

|| Henry E. Pierrepont. Esq., Chairman. 

§ Rev. Joseph P. Thompson, Chairman. 



vancing age, the art that was born with 
the creation, in the garden that was given 
to man to dress and to keep it. 

We close with the thought, suggestive 
of thankfulness and good will, that all 
these agencies are at work for the benefit 
of our universal brotherhood, to lighten 



1859.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANT Kit. 



413 



tlio primeval curse, and to compel from 
our common mother, for the benefit of the 
children of a common Father, more va- 
ried and abundant harvests, with greater 
certainty and with lessened toil. 

Let us also reverently remember, gen- 
tlemen, 'in our study of the laws of Po- 
litical Economy by the guiding light of 
statistics, that the truths which we seek to 
discover, are a part of that universal law 
whose seat is the bosom of God, and 
whose voice the harmony of the world. 

Nor let us ever forget, in the contem- 
plation of our unparalleled blessings, that 
the happiness and prosperity of a nation 
depends infinitely less . on their material 
wealth, than upon the observance of those 
great rights and duties which our fathers 
solemnly recognized when we took our place 
in the family of nations. 



Fr 



the Working Fat 



Increase in the Cost of Food. 

It may be considered as one of the most 
serious questions in the political economy of 
the United States that, notwithstanding the 
infancy of the nation compared with the 
venerable empires of the old continent, and 
the newness and natural fertility of its soil, 
the price of human - food, particularly that 
of animal products, has been gradually in- 
creasing for a long series of years. In 
other words, the miner of gold, silver, cop- 
per, iron, lead or coal, or the worker in any 
natural products, must give a larger quan- 
tity of them now for his necessary supply of 
meat, than he ever gave before, taking the 
average of any decade of years since 
America began to be a civilized nation. 

With the exception of occasional spas-, 
modic advances, or depressions below the 
line, the upward tendency of the price of 
food-producing animals in the United States 
is just as regular and certain as the inclined 
plane of any railway from the sea-board to 
the interior. * * * * * 

Now, that the present prices are not 
spasmodic, nor attributable to the ordinary 
fluctuations of trade, nor to the short 
crops of any year, nor to the increased 
foreign demand, nor to the diversion of 
trade in cattle in any unusual direction, nor 
to an unusual short supply for this year, nor 
to an increase of circulating medium, we 
thrnk we shall be able to show. According 
to the opinion of good judges and men of 
long experience, the general average price 



of beeves, sheep and swine, in November 

and December, lias never ranged so high 
throughout the country as it has this year. 
The general quality has never ranged higher 
in this city, while the number weekly re- 
ported will prove a most abundant supply. 
What is the cause of the continued and 
gradual advancement of the price of food, 
producing animals in the United States ? 
and is it likely to be permanent ? or will 
the day come when we shall return to the 
" good old time" of cheap roast beef, and 
when the ordinary fluctuations in trade 
shall establish corresponding prices with 
those we have stated ? These are impor- 
tant questions; and we know that many 
persons consider the present prices of 
meats exorbitant and unreasonable, simply 
because they are so much higher than they 
have been accustomed to, without even 
thinking they are so only as the work 
of " speculators," and so only as that work 
ceases the price will run down the scale to 
the old standard. 

In that they will be disappointed. Meats 
in the United States will never again be 
sold, as a general thing, at the prices we 
have noticed in this article ; and the reason 
which we shall give is one that no mer- 
j chant or political economist will dispute, 
because it is based upon that fundamen- 
tal rule — the existing relation of demand 
and supply. The demand in any market 
town in the country cannot remain a single 
month in such relation to the supply as 
materially to increase the price, without 
bringing from the remotest districts such a 
supply — and it is astonishing how rapidly 
the animals slide down the inclined plane 
from the mountains and plains of the in- 
terior — that the price becomes equalized, 
less the cost of transit, all over the coun- 
try. " Then why don't we get our beef, 
and pork, and mutton cheaper ?" is the 
question naturally arising in every mind 
which does not trace effect to its cause. 

The law of demand and supply is not an ar- 
bitrary one ; and the supply of beef-cattle, 
mutton-sheep, and fatted swine, is beyond 
the reach and control of any speculator 
or company of speculators ; and certainly none 
exist which has produced the present prices. 

Why, then, has the price for a series of 
years continued in one general, regular 
progression up the scale ? It can only be 
accounted for by the fact that there has 
been a regular diminution in the supply, 



414 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[July 



until fcha natural law has increased the 
price ; and the next question of any im- 
portance is, whether that diminution is per- 
manent, and it' so, why? 

We do not mean to be understood that 
there is a real diminution of food-produ- 
cing animals, but only a relative one to the 
consumers. The case is just this: A man 
and his wife, in commencing life, fatted 
and killed one hog every fall for their sup- 
ply of winter meat, and the supply was suf- 
ficient for the demand. But in due course 
of time there was an increase of mouths, 
till the number to be filled was quadrupled, 
and then the one hog was insufficient for 
them all; and if they had not been 
contented to continue to make an equit- 
able division of the flesh between all 
the mouths, it is probable that one would 
have outbid the other, and so enhanced 
the price in money to those who did not 
consume it. Now, is this the case with, 
the people of the United States? Has 
the family become too large for the na- 
tional pig-pen ? 

We lay it down as an axiom, that do- 
mestic animals decrease as human beings 
increase. China is a witness of this fact j j 
and so is our own country, though it has j 
not generally been supposed that this re- 
lative diminution had taken place in the: 
United States to a degree sufficient to per- 
manently affect the supply and price of the 
three great feed-producing class of ani- 
mals. Facts derived from figures, which,! 
it is said, though somewhat figuratively, can-! 
not lie, prove that the diminution has com- 
menced j and the increase of prices further 
prove that the supply is insufficient for the 
demand ; so that the high prices are a le- 
gitimate result j and that they will not re- 
cede permanently, becomes a moral cer- 
tainty. The increase of population rela^ 
tive to the increase of animals, particularly; 
the non-producing class of persons, such as 
reside in cities, or are engaged in other em- J 
ployments than farming, is much greater 
than we would believe possible, but for the 
proof of the figures found in the census re- , 
turns. Again, another reason of short sup- 
ply for home consumption, is the increased 
exportation of all animal products, and that 
is more likely to grow larger than it is to' 
decrease. 

We have been for years endeavouring to 
encourage farmers to increase the supply of 
meat in this great emporium, constantly as- 



suring them that good beef cattle would al- 
ways sell at prices equivalent to the ten 
cents a pound for the meat, and that they 
could better afford to make beef at that than 
to grow grain at the general average price. 
We were asked last spring, by one farmer, 
if we really believed that beef cattle would 
be worth this price the present fall; and 
assured us if he could think so, that he 
would buy and feed a hundred bullocks; 
but his opinion was that the Great West 
was so full of cattle, that prices must come 
down. On the contrary, with much less 
packing, the price has advanced beyond the 
anticipations of the most shrewd men en- 
gaged in the business of feeding, and buy- 
ing and selling beef cattle. It is highly 
important for producers and consumers and 
dealers to inquire for the cause, and see if 
they can think, as we do, that the present rates 
will continue so, as to base their operations 
upon the new truths they may discover. 
In proof of our proposition, we offer the 
following tables, which we find ready pre- 
pared to our use in the Cincinnati Gazette, 
in an article taking the same view we do, 
that the general production of the country 
is insufficient for the consumption the people 
have accustomed themselves to during a 
long period of low prices — that is compar- 
tively low with the present, as the present 
here are with prices in the older countries 
of Europe. 

The first table shows the United States 
census at two decades, of animals, and the 
per cent, increase of each, and compara- 
tive per cent, increase of population. 

NUMBER AND INCREASE OF CATTLE IN 

THE UNITED STATES. 
Animals. 1840. 1850. Ratio of in. 

Horses and 

Mules, 4,385,399 4,896,060 13 pr ct. 

Neat Cattle, 14,971.586 18,378,907 24 pr ct. 

Swine, 26,201,293 30,854,213 16 pr ct. 

Sheep, 19,111,374 21,723,290 13 pr ct. 

Increase of population, 35 pr ct. 

It will strike every one with force that 
population has increased so much faster than 
cattle. The "bullocks have increased only 
two-thirds as fast as the people, and the 
swine only half as fast, in all the country, 
while in twelve of the oldest States the fol- 
lowing table shows just what we have al- 
leged, that an increase of population, and 
more extensive subjugation of wild lands 
to domestic purposes has a tendency to de- 
crease the number of domestic animals, and 
produce the necessity for the people to 



1859.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



415 



oease, in sonic measure, their meat-eating 

habits, and adopt a diet of roots, erreals, 

legumens, and culinary vegetables. Btwi 

butter and cheese must be given up, in a 
great measure, or continue to grow more 
and more expensive to the consumer, as the 
great pasturage of these old States nre con- 
verted into grain fields or gardens to pro- 
duce vegetables for the use of the cities and 
the constantly increasing, densely populated 
rural and manufacturing districts, or to fur- 
nish the immense demand for milk, which 
the growing cities create, and which the 
railways have extended in a radius of a hun- 
dred miles inland, so that farmers cannot af- 
ford to manufacture their milk which was for- 
merly otherwise worthless, into butter and 
cheese, at the old, or even the present 
prices. This milk business also has another 
important effect upon the production of ani- 
mal food, because it induces an almost en- 
tire destruction of calves throughout all the 
region devoted to the production of milk 



butter, cheese, and meat) and all other ani- 
mal products. 

As the ureal is populating with almost 
fabulous rapidity, and towns, and cities, and 
manufacturing villages are growing there 
as well as here ; and as a large number of 
persons are, and will continue to be, 



;ed in railway building, mining, and other 
non-agricultural employments, it is a matter 
of interest to cattle-raisers and consumers 
to know whether this increase of population 
carries with it such a corresponding increase 
of food-producing animals as will enable the 
West to continue to supply the great de- 
mand of the East, even at the present 
prices. This may be guessed at by the 
guessing population of the Eastern States, 
and " reckoned'' over by the producers of 
the West. The table embraces Ohio, In- 
diana, Illinois, Kentucky, Tennessee, and 
Missouri : 



DOMESTIC ANIMALS 

1840. 



IN THE NEW STATES. 



1S50. Increase. 



1.804,092 

4,307,952 

11,720,209 

5,197,906 



2,116,160 

5,280,433 

13,843,041 

8,435,658 



312,068 

972,481 

2,116,832 

3,237,752 



for city use. A great portion of these 
calves, too, are destroyed while so young Mules* 11 
that they are absolutely unfit for human ^ eat Cattle 
food, though largely consumed by a low ■ Swine, 
grade of the foreign population of cities ;; Sheep. 

but the amount of sustenance in a calf only J ^ow, to make up the decrease of animals 
two or three days old is of course very j n t h e oJd Stateg> these new ones ought to 
small, as the weight is light and the meat' s h ow an i ncre ase very considerably in ex- 
innutritious. This destruction of the very| cess f tne i ncre ase of population; instead 
seed of cows as well as beeves, in the very j f wn ich, the population appears to have 

increased 35 per cent, while the increase in 



extensive regions furnishing milk to the in- 



habitants of towns and cities^ necessitates a; these two great food-producing classes, the 
continual and annually increasing draft upon^y^ race an( j sw i ne? does not exceed 20 



the newer lands of the Northwest. 



per C2nt. 



Let us first look at the actual decrease of i Now, if we look at one more table, which 
animals in New England, New York, New t shows the exports of animal products, and 
Jersey, Delaware, Maryland, and Virginia, how they have gradually increased during 

the last twenty years, w T e think that no one 
can fail to see the cause of an increased 
price of meats. 

Exports of animal products and bread- 
stuffs : 



DOMESTIC 


ANIMALS IN THE OLD STATES. 




1840. 


1850. Decrease. 


Horses and 






Mules, 


1,612,883 


1,529,189 83,694 


Neat Cattle, 


6,172,569 


6,033,841 89,728 


Swine, 


6,897,396 


4,909,334 1,988,012 


Sheep, 


11,872,622 


5,450,678 6,221,950 



This shows a very large decrease, but 
nothing to be compared with what will ke'Jg^^g 
shown at the next census ; while the popu- 
lation in the whole of those States is increa- 
sing every day, and becoming more and 
more concentrated in 



Period of 
1836-'40 inclusive, 
1842-'46 



Amount. 
I <V 1,050,000 
110,521,000 
191,330.000 
233,679,000 



The exports have trebled in this period, 
while the production of meat has decreased, 



concentrated in cities, and conse- ( and thus the demand has exceeded the sup- 
quently dependent upon the immediately ply, while, from long acquired habits of 
surrounding county for milk and vegetables, Consuming large quantities of meat, butter, 
and upon the Great West for a supply of 4 and cheese, our population are unwilling to 



416 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[July 



:»> their use for vegetable food, notwith- 
standing the increase of price; and conse- 
quently, there has been a very large increase 
in the price of all food-producing animals ; 
and that increase will be permanent ; and 
hence the producers are perfectly safe in 
basing their calculations upon this fact, and 
in enlarging their operations. 

Nothing but a rise of prices of animal 
food to a point that will induce a decrease 
of consumption can now effect the present 
condition of the cattle-market of the coun- 
try. The prices of butcher's meats in New 
York are still so far below those of London 
that exportation would take place if the 
meats could be transported in their fresh 
state ; but the difference in price does allow 
shipments of salted provisions, and that 
will, as it already has done, continue to af- 
fect the price of cattle to the remotest farm 
of the great North-western region of the 
Mississippi Valley; and, while it enhances 
the profits of the producing class, will con- 
tinue to raise the price to all the non-pro- 
ducers who rush into the vortex of cities, 
or in any way cease to raise the food they 
consume. 

If our facts shall have a tendency to as- 
sure producers that the demand will not 
abate, and therefore induce them to increase 
the supply, we shall be content, for that is 
the object of this article. 



The Coffee and Sugar Plantations of 
Cuba. 

BY RICHARD H. DANA, JR. 

[From "A Vacation Voyage to Cuba and 
Back."] 

The change from coffee plantations to 
sugar plantations — from the cafetal to the 
ingenio, has seriously affected the social, as 
it has the economic condition of Cuba. 

Coffee must grow under shade. Conse- 
quently the coffee estate was, in the first 
place, a plantation of trees, and by the hun- 
dred acres. Economy and taste led the 
planters, who were chiefly the French refu- 
gees from St. Domingo, to select fruit-trees, 
and trees valuable for their wood, as well as 
pleasing for their beauty and shade. Under 
these plantations of trees, grew the coffee 
plant, an evergreen, and almost an ever- 
flowing plant, with berries of changing 
hues, and, twice a year, brought its fruit to 
maturity. That the coffee might be tended 



and gathered, avenues wide enough for 
wagons must be carried through the planta- 
tions at frequent intervals. The plantation 
was, therefore, laid out like a garden, with 
avenues and foot-paths, all under the shade 
of the finest trees, and the spaces between 
the avenues were groves of fruit-trees and 
shade-trees, under which grew, trimmed 
down to the height of five or six feet, the 
coffee plant. The labor of the plantation 
was in tending, picking, drying, and shell- 
ing the coffee, and gathering the fresh 
fruits of trees for use and for the market, 
and for preserves and sweet meats, and in 
raising vegetables and poultry, and in rear- 
ing sheep and horned cattle and horses. It 
was a beautiful and simple horticulture, on 
a very large scale. Time was required to 
perfect this garden — the Cubans call it par- 
adise — of a cafetal; but when matured, it 
was a cherished home. It required and ad- 
mitted of no extraordinary mechanical 
power, or .of the application of steam, or of 
science, beyond the knowledge of soils, of 
simple culture, and of plants and trees. 

For twenty years and more it has been 
forced upon the knowledge of the reluctant 
Cubans, that Brazil, the West India Islands 
to the southward of Cuba, and the Spanish 
Main, can exceed them in coffee-raising. 
The successive disastrous hurricanes of 1843 
and 1845, which destroyed many and dam- 
aged most of the coffee estates, added to 
the colonial system of the mother-country, 
which did not give extraordinary protection 
to this product, are commonly said to have 
put an end to the coffee plantations. Prob- 
ably they only hastened a change which 
must at some time have come. But the 
same causes of soil and climate which made 
Cuba inferior in coffee-growing, gave her a 
marked superiority in the cultivation of 
sugar. The damaged plantations were not 
restored as coffee estates, but were laid down 
to the sugar-cane; and gradually, first in 
the western and northern parts, and daily 
extending easterly and southerly over the 
entire island, the exquisite cafetals have 
been prostrated and dismantled, the groves 
of shade and fruit trees cut down, the ave- 
nues and foot-paths plowed up, and the de- 
nuded land laid down to wastes of sugar- 
cane. 

The sugar-cane allows of no shade. 
Therefore the groves and avenues must fall. 
To make its culture profitable, it must be 
raised in the largest possible quantities that 



1859.] THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 417 

the extent of land will permit. To attempt laborers. The value of this chief item in 
the raiding of fruit, or of the ornamental the investment depends largely on moral 
woods, is bad economy for the sugar planter, ami intellectual considerations. How un- 
Most of the fruits, especially the orange, satisfactory is it, then, to caleulate the pro- 
which is the chief export, ripen in the fits of the investment, when you leave out 
midst of the sugar season, and no hands of the calculation the value of the control- 
can be spared to attend to them. The su- Jtng power, the power that extorts the eon- 
gar planter .often buys the fruits he needs tiibulions of labor front the steam and the 
for daily use and for making preserves, from engine and the fire, and from the more diffi- 
the neighboring eafetals. The cane ripens cult human will. This is the " plus x" of 
but once a year. Between the time when the formula, which, unascertained, gives us 
enough of it is ripe to justify beginning to little light as to the result. 
work the mill, and the time when the heat ! But, to turn to the changes wrought by 
and rains spoil its qualities, all the sugar this substitution of sugar for coffee. The 
making of the year must be done. In Lou- sugar-plantation is no grove, or garden, or 
isiana this period does not exceed eight orchard. It is not the home of the pride 
weeks. In Cuba it is full four months, and affections of the planter's family. It is 
This gives Cuba a great advantage. Yet not a coveted, indeed, hardly a desirable 
these four months are short enough ; and residence. Such families as would like to 
during that time the steam engine plies and remain on these plantations, are driven off 
the furnace fires burn night and day. jfor want of neighboring society. Thus the 

Sugar making brings with it steam, fire, estates, largely abandoned by the families 
smoke, and a drive of labor, and admits of of the planters, suffer the evils of absentee- 
and requires the application of science, ism, w r hile the owners live in the suburbs of 
Managed with skill and energy it is ex- j Havana and Matanzas, and in the Fifth 
tremely productive. Indifferently managed, ' Avenue of New York. The slave system 
it may be a loss. The sugar estate is not loses its patriarchal character. The master 
valuable, like the coffee estate, for w T hat the is not the head of a great family, its judge, 
land will produce, aided by ordinary and its governor, its physician, its priest and its 
quiet manual labor only. Its value is in the ; father, as the fond dream of the advocates 
skill and the character of the labor. The ! of slavery, and sometimes, ^oubtless, the 
land is there, and the negroes are there; reality, made him. Middlemen, in the 
but the result is loss or gain, according to shape of administradores, stand between the 
the amount of labor that can be obtained, 'owner and the slaves. The slave is little 
and the skill with which the manual labor else than an item of labor raised or bought, 
and the mechanical powers are applied. It The sympathies of common home, common 
is said that at the present time, in the pres- childhood, long and intimate relations and 
ent state of the market, a well-managed many kind offices, common attachments to 
sugar estate yields from 15 to 25 per cent house, to cats, to dogs, to cattle, to trees, to 
on the investment. This is true, I am in- .birds — the knowledge of births, sicknesses 
clined to think, if by the investment be and deaths, and the duties and sympathies 
meant only the land, the machinery and the ; of a common religion — all those things that 
slaves. But the land is not a large element! may ameliorate the legal relations of the 
in the investment. The machinery is costly, I master and slave, and often give to the face 
yet its value depends on the science applied ! of servitude itself precarious but interest- 
to its construction and operation. The chief ^ing features of beauty and strength — these 
item in the investment is the slave labor. | they must not look to have. 



Taking all the slaves together, men, women 
and children, the young and the old, the 
sick and the well, the good and the bad, 
their market value averages above S1,0C0 a 
head. Yet of these, allowing for those too 
young or too old, for the sick and for those 
who must tend the young, the old and the 
sick, and for those whose labor, like that of 
the cooks, only sustains the others, not more 
than one-half are able-bodied, productive 
27 



This change lias had some effect already, 
and will produce much more on the social 
system of Cuba. 

There are still plantations on which the 
families of the wealthy and educated plan- 
ters reside. And in some cases the admin- 
istrador is a younger member or a relative 
of the family, holding the same social posi- 
tion ; and the permanent administrador will 
have his family with him. Yet, it is enough 



418 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER 



[July 






to say that the same causes which render 
the ingenio no longer a desirable residence 
for the owner, make it probable that the ad- 
ministrador will be either a dependent or 
an adventurer ; a person from whom the 
owner will expect a great deal, and the 
slaves but little, and from whom none will 
get all they expect, and perhaps none all 
they are entitled to. 

In the afternoon we went to the sugar- 
house, and I was initiated into the myste- 
ries of the work. There are four agents ; 
steam, fire, cane-juice and negroes. The 
results are sugar and molasses. At the in- 
genio, they make only the Muscovado, or 
brown sugar. The processes are easily de- 
scribed, but it is difficult to give an idea to 
the scene. It is one of condensed and de- 
termined labor. 

To begin at the beginning. The cane is 
cut from the fields by companies of men 
and women, working together, who use an 
instrument called a machete, which is some- 
thing between a sword and a cleaver. Two 
blows with this, slash off the. long leaves, 
and a third blow cuts off the stalk, near to 
the ground. At this woTk, the laborers 
move like reapers, in even lines, at stated 
distances. Before them is a field of dense, 
high-waving cane ; and behind them, strewn 
wrecks of stajks and leaves. Near, and in 
charge of the party, stands a driver, or 
more grandiloquently, a contra-mayoral, wfth 
the short, limber plantation whip, the badge 
of his office, under his arm. 

Ox-carts pass over the field, and are 
loaded with the cane, which they carry to 
the mill. The oxen are worked in the 
Spanish fashion, the yoke being strapped 
upon the head, close to the horns, instead 
of being hung round the neck, as with us, 
and are guided by goads, and by a rope at- 
tached to a ring through the nostrils. At 
the mill, the cane is tipped from the cart 
into large piles, by the side of the platform. 
From these piles, it is placed carefully, by 
hand, lengthwise, in a long trough. This 
trough is made of slats, and moved by the 
power of the endless chain, connected with 
the engine. In this trough, it is carried 
•between heavy, horizontal, cylindrical roll- 
ers, where it is crushed, its juice falling 
into receivers below, and the crushed cane 
passing off and falling into a pile on the 
other side. 

This crushed cane (bagazo), falling from 
between the rollers, is gathered into baskets 



by men and women, who carry it on their 
heads into the fields and spread it for dry- 
ing. There it is watched and tended as 
carefully as new mown grass in hay-making, 
and raked into cocks or winrows on an alarm 
of rain. When dry, it is placed under 
sheds for protection from wet. From the 
sheds and from the fields, it is loaded into 
carts and drawn to the furnace doors, into 
which it is thrown by negroes, who crowd 
it in by the armful, and rake it about with 
long poles. Here it feeds the perpetual 
fires by which the steam is made, the ma- 
chinery moved, and the cane-juice boiled. 
The care of the bagazo is an important part 
of the system ; for if that becomes wet and 
fails, the fires must stop, or resort be had to 
wood, which is scarce and expensive. 

Thus, on the one side of the rollers is 
the ceaseless current of fresh, full, juicy 
cane-stalks, just cut from the open field; 
and on the other side, is the crushed, man- 
gled, juiceless mass, drifting out at the 
draught, and fit only to be cast into the 
oven and burned. This is the way of the 
world, as it is the course of art. The cane 
is made to destroy itself. The ruined and 
corrupted furnish the fuel and fan the flame 
that lures on and draws in and crushes the 
fresh and wholesome; and the operation 
seems about as mechanical and unceasing 
in the one case as in the other. 

From the rollers, the juice falls below 
into a large receiver, from which it flows 
into great, open vats, called defecators. 
These defecators are heated by the exhaust 
steam of the engine, led through them in 
pipes. All the steam condensed forms wa- 
ter, which is returned warm into the boiler 
of the engine. In the defecators, as their 
name denotes, the scum of the juice is 
purged off, so far as heat alone will do it. 
From the last defecator, the juice is passed 
through a trough into the first caldron. Of 
the caldrons there is a series, or, as they 
call it, a train, through all which the juice 
must go. Each caldron is a large, deep, 
copper vat, heated very hot, in which, the 
juice seethes and boils. At each, stands a 



strong negro, with long, heavy skimmer in 
hand, stirring the juice and skimming off 
the surface. This scum is collected and 
given to the hogs, or thrown upon the muck 
heap, and is said to be very fructifying. 
The juice is ladled from one caldron to the 
next, as fast as the office of each is finished. 
From the last caldron, where its complete 



1859.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



419 



crystallization is effected, it is transferred to 
coolers, which are large, shallow pans. 
When fully cooled, it looks like brown 
sugar and molasses mixed. It is then shov- 
eled from the coolers into hogsheads. These 
hogsheads have holes bored in their bottoms; 
and, to facilitate the drainage, strips of cane 
are placed in the hogsheads, with their ends 
in these holes, and the hogshead is filled. 
The hogsheads are set on open frames, un- 
der which are copper receivers, on an in- 
clined plane, to catch and carry off the 
irippings from the hogsheads. These drip- 
pings are the molasses, which is collected 
ind put into tight casks. 

I believe I have given the entire process. 
When it is remembered that all this, in 
ivery stage, is going on at once, within the 
imits of the mill, it may well be supposed 
o present a busy scene. The smell of juice 
tnd of sugar vapor, in all its stages, is in- 
ense. The negroes fatten on it. The clank 
f the engine, the steady grind of the ma- 
hines, and the high, wild cry of the ne- 
;roes at the caldrons to the stokers at the 
iirnace doors, as they chant out their direc- 
ions or wants — now for more fire, and now 
o scatter the fire — which must be heard 
bove the din, "A-a-b'la! A-a-b'la!" " E-e- 
ha candela !" " Pu-er-ta !" and the bar- 
aric African chant and chorus of the gang 
t work filling the cane-troughs — all these 
lake the first visit at the sugar-house a 
range experience. But after one to two 
isits, the monotony is as tiresome as the 
rst view is exciting. There is, literally, no 
hange in the work. There are the same 
oises of the machines, the same cries from 
egroes at the same spots, the same intense- 
sweet smell, the same state of the work 
all its stages, at whatever hour you visit 
, whether in the morning, or evening, at 
idnight, or at the dawn of the day. If 
du wake up at night, you hear the " A-a- 
la! A-a-b'la!" "E-e-cha! E-e-cha !" of 
le caldron — men crying to the stokers, 
d the high, monotonous chant of the 
ings filling the wagons or the trough, a 
lort, improvisated stave, and then the cho- 
is- — not a tune, like the song of sailors at 
le tackles and falls, but a barbaric, tuue- 
ss intonation. 



Florida Grass. — Dr. S. S. Mills, of 
harleston, S. C, has invented and pat- 
lted a machine which prepares the grass 
" the Florida Keys for rope-making. 



From Quarterly Journal of Agriculture. 

Country and City Life. 

(Froin an Address dtUverd at the Tennessee 

State Exhibition, 1858.) 
BY THE LATE POSTMASTER GEN. BROWN. 

In this country the farmer generally holds 
an indefeasible title to the broad acres he 
cultivates. He moves, proudly over nig 
fields, and surveys with satisfaction the crops 
which are upon them. But he will not stop 
in his money making career to build his 
neat cottage, or his more costly mansion, ac- 
cording to his circumstances. He will not 
adorn his grounds, nor plant his orchards of 
delicious fruits. He will waste no time on 
shrubberry and flowers. He will prepare 
no healthful cistern, nor lead the gushing 
fountain to his door. All is left rude, in- 
convenient and uncomfortable around him, 
with nothing to lure either himself or his 
family away from the blandishments of some 
neighboring town or city. Every farmer 
and planter should make his home to him- 
self and his household the dearest and love- 
liest spot on earth. Though he may have 
no marble palace, no rich and costly furni- 
ture, no liveried servants, still, there is his 
homestead beautified and adorned with 
every embellishment of taste and fancy. 
Who would be willing to leave such a home, 
with its Arcadian bowers and its pure and 
sparkling waters, for the dust and smoke of 
the crowded city 1 

And how strange is this passion for city 
over country life which we so often encoun- 
ter ! It cannot spring from any inordinate 
desire to grow rich, for agriculture rewards 
her followers more bountifully than any 
other pursuit. It is a passion for pleasure 
and display more than for riches. Some 
men desire to live in palaces built in the 
city, that they may be seen and admired. 
They desire costly equipages, but they must 
glitter in the city, attracting the admiration 
of thousands who would never behold them 
in the solitude of the country. The thea- 
tre, the ball, and the masquerade present 
their nightly attractions, whilst they are 
seldom heard of in rural life. The devotee of 
more questionable pleasures finds in the 
city ready facilities of indulgence, which 
are entirely removed in the plain and vir- 
tuous organization of country society. 
Whatever the motive, this preference given 
by so many to city life, is productive of some 
of the greatest evils of the present age. In 



420 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER 



[July 



the fondness of hope that something mav 
chance to turn up in their favor, hundreds 
and thousands precipitate themselves into 
towns and cities without preconcerted ar- 
rangements for regular and permanent em- 
ployment. It is the great law of our being, 
that if we would be either happy or pros- 
perous, we must have employment, physical 
or intellectual. This is emphatically true 
<*f city life. But this disproportionate rush 
to the city renders such employment impos- 
sible ; no demands of commerce, manufac- 
tures, or the mechanic arts can furnish it to 
the redundant crowds that pour themselves 
into our cities. Hence, that mass of pover- 
ty and suffering — for shelter, for fuel, for 
raiment, for bread — which no ordinances 
can relieve. Hence, also, those great mobs 
and processions through the streets in times 
of scarcity, demanding employment and sub- 
sistence, which oftentime nothing but mar- 
tial law can subdue ; and hence, too, that 
foul and festering mass of corruption and 
vice, which too often afflict and disgrace our 
07er-crowded cities. 

How delightful it is to turn from the con- 
templation of these scenes to the caljn, con- 
tented, and virtuous life of the country, 
with its comfortable, and sometimes its mag- 1 
nificent mansions ; with its outstretched ; 
lawns and landscapes, its churches and ! 
school-houses, its abundant supply of rai-j 
ment, and almost boundless store of subsis- j 
tence for man and all the animals that min- 1 
ister to either his necessities or pleasures ! 

Still, I must remind you that the great' 
law of employment and labor applies equally | 
to country and city life. It is by labor that i 
man must work out the great problem of 
his existence — labor of the head, labor of i 
the heart, and labor of the hand. 

Wherever man has failed to labour he| 
has remained a savage ; where he has la- 1 
boured most he has risen highest in the ; 
scale of his physical, moral, and intellectual 
being. If one Angel with his flaming! 
sword drove Adam from his Eden, another! 
Angel, though disguised in the humble j 
-form of Labour, will gently lead his de- 
scendants back to their native paradise. 
Look at the progress they have already 
made in that celestial and glorious direc- 
tion. Look backward to the dark ages of j 
man's existence, when he was a mere bar-! 
barian. Look at him now, how noble and ! 
majestic he stands, with all his temples de- 
dicated to learning and piety, and good| 



government around him. Once a savage* 
now almost a God. 

Re not startled at the boldness of these 
words. The grandeur of what man has al- 
ready done and is now achieving, must 
plead apologetic for the apparent impiety. 
He has scanned the Heavens, and almost 
numbered the stars; he has gently stolen 
away its lightnings and sent them over the 
land and through the deep waters, to con 
vey his thoughts and wishes around the 
world ; he has laid hold on another of the 
elements, and dispatched his huge ships ini 
a few days over the w r idest oceans ; he has 1 
levelled the mountains of the earth that im 
peded his pathway, and brought forth from 
their deep and hidden recesses the rich 
treasures they contained. 

In the majesly of man's civilization and' 
progress, the earth, the seas, and the winds, 
all stand subdued and conquered by his 
presence and power; and how animating is 
the reflection, my countrymen, that in all 
this improvement and progress, America 
our young and vigorous America, holds sc 
proud a pre-eminence. Her glorious form \ 
of government, stretching like the rainbow , 
of hope and promise from ocean to ocean ,! 
gives shelter and. protection to nearly thirtj , 
millions of the sons and daughters of free , 
dom. Her luxuriant valleys, reposing ir.|'! 
every climate, yield in superabundance , 
every fruit and grain suited to the subsis a 
tence of man. Her mountains, teeming 
with ores and the precious metals, give emj 
ployment to millions of artisans, and caij 
furnish the long desired currency of gol( i 
aud silver, the most stable and unerring ^ 
standard of values and exchanges ever de | e 
vised by the wit of man. m 

These great advantages of good govern! lie 
ment — of climate and soil — of mineral proi k 
duction — have stimulated the zeal an«b 
quickened the capacities of the American pec lis 
pie, until they stand unsurpassed in agricul| lira 
ture, in manufactures, in the mechanic art* ftt 
in scientific pursuits, in the learned profes fail 
sions, and, indeed, unsurpassed in all th 
elements of national greatness. 

But what avails our national greatness i 
we have not national and individual virtu 
to inspire us with obedience to law and 
reverence for the glorious Constitution an 
Union under which we live ! These ar 
the sources of our unexampled growt 
and prosperity, and with his last breat say 



lU'jttl 



1859.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



421 



every true patriot should fervently pray that 
they might last and endure forever : 

'Our union of lakes and union of lands, 
Our union of States, none shall sever, 
Our union of hearts and union of hands, 
And the Flag of our Union forever." 



Wearing out Land. 

" Our land does not produce two-thirds as 
much now as it did fifteen years ago." 

So writes a fanner from a region which 
san not have been settled more than from 
twenty to thirty years. 

Our reflection is, that the farmers there 
cannot be worth more than two-thirds as 
much as they would have been if they had 
>o managed their lands as to increase in- 
stead of diminishing its productiveness. 

There may be exceptions — some men 
may be keen enough to make money and 
year out their land by the same operation. 
But the general rule is the reverse of this 
—that, the most profitable husbandry im- 
3roves the land, and that the husbandry 
vhich deteriorates the land is not profita- 
)le. We hold that a farmer of only or- 
linary means cannot afford to make his own 
and poorer ; and that even if he were cul- 
ivating another man's land for a succession 
)f years, he could not possibly afford to 
eave it much worse than he found it. 

American Farmers' Magazine. 



LESS LAND OR MORE LABOUR — WHICH ? 

We are not one of those who indiscrimi- 
nately recommend small farms. We fear 
here is a tendency in small farms to make 
■mall men; and we deprecate the idea that 
he farmer is to be a man to be looked 
lown upon by men in other callings. There 
las been enough of that in the history of 
his world, and we want to see the tables 
urned. Nevertheless it would be better to 
jet a good living from ten acres than to 
ail of a living from a hundred. 

In another place we have intimated that 
t is cheaper to make land more productive 
han to wear it out, as the phrase is; that 
f we enrich the land, it enriches us ; and 
hat if we impoverish it, it impoverishes 
is. Something like a demonstration of 
his would gratify some of our readers, 
rhis we will attempt ; and what we have to 
iay shall be in close connection with our 
notto, Less land or more labour. 



That it is cheaper to raise a farm to a 
higher than to sink to a lower productive- 
ness is our proposition ; and what wo mean 
by it is, not that it costs more labour to di- 
minish than to increase the productive 
power of the soil, but that it does require 
more unpaid labour to wear out a soil by a 
ten years' cultivation than to enhance its 
productiveness in the same time. 

To simplify as much as may be, we will 
suppose here are three acres, arable land, 
now in turf, and of a fair quality, to be 
cultivated respectively by' A, B, and C, for 
the next ten years. A is a calculating, 
thinking farmer, in no way extravagant, 
but willing to expend money and labour 
where he sees a reasonable prospect of a re- 
turn with profit. B is a careful soul, wil- 
ling to labour, but as shy of all other ex- 
penses for crops as of the itch. C takes it 
easy, and will reap what his land will give, 
without giving it back much of either la- 
bour or manure. 

Indian corn, we will suppose, to be the 
crop the first year. A turns over the turf 
in November to a good depth ; harrows in 
fifty loads of compost in the spring, made, 
it may be, of twenty loads of barn ma- 
nure and thirty loads of something which 
his industry and integrity have gathered 
up at a cheap rate for the purpose ; plants 
the best variety of corn that he can get 
any certain knowledge of, about the middle 
of March ; tends the crop well, and gets 
eighty bushels to the acre. 

B wants all his manure for other crops, 
and thinks tho turf land will do pretty 
well without manure. He plows in March, 
five or six inches deep, but very nicely. 
His team is not strong enough to plow much 
deeper ; and as for paying for extra team 
work and manure to warm the deep soil 
that would be plowed up, he cannot think 
of it. Farming, in his opinion, is not a 
business to spend money in, but to get 
money by. But he plants in good season, 
tends the corn well all summer, and gets 
thirty bushels. 

C takes it easy; plows when it is most 
convenient; plants and hoes when nothing 
hinders; does the work shabbily, according 
to his wont ; and more by providential fa- 
vour, than by his skill or industry, gets six- 
teen bushels of decent corn and plenty of 
pig ears. 

Now B has done more work than C ; A 
has expended more labour than either, be- 



422 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[Jui/ 



sides costly manuring ; and if the race end- 
ed here they might not come out so very 
unequally. 

But suppose all three to follow the corn 
crop with rye, and seed with clover, herds- 
grass and redtop in April. It is not un- 
reasonable to suppose that A will get twen- 
ty-five bushels. B will have nothing to 
complain of if he gets fifteen bushels. If 
C gets more than ten he ought to be 
thankful. But these crops cost one no 
more than the other. And now A is fairly 
ahead — has been better paid for his outlay. 
But this is only the beginning. 

The third year A gets two and a half 
tons of hay ; B one and three-fourths, and 
C not more than one and a half at best ; 
besides that, A's acre will pasture a cow 
well from the middle of Julv to winter, 
whereas the feed on B's and C's is of but 
little worth. Next year the disparity will 
be still greater, if all three acres are kept 
to graze without further manure. A's acre 
will produce more value, though perhaps 
less quantity, both of hay and fall feed, 
than the previous year. B's grass will have 
nearly, and C's quite run out. Neither 
will be much more than worth cutting; and 
as for fall feed, cows that are condemned to 
it will give little milk and make less but- 
ter ; and if they have much pluck, will be 
apt to break fence and seek better fare, es- 
pecially those on C's premises, where the 
fences cannot be expected to be over and 
above good. We suppose our readers have 
noticed that poor fences generally keep 
company with shallow culture and poor 
feed, on the principle that " Birds of a 
feather will flock together." 

By this time the expenses of B's and 
C's cultivation will have been more than 
half as much as that of A, but A's return 
will have more than doubled theirs. Nor 
is this all. A's land has now a deeper, 
richer turf than theirs — is in far better con- 
dition for another round of crops. 

We intended to have gone through with 
the remaining six years, but it is unneces- 
sary. • Our readers will understand that if 
calculating A, and careful B, and careless 
C were going on in their respective ways 
to the end of ten years, there would be a 
wide difference in the value of their acres 
for after cultivation. C's land would be 
pretty thoroughly worn out; B's would be 
ditto ; and A's would be a great deal better 
than when he began. Is it not so ? Has 



not A been better paid for what he ha 
done and expended than the others ? — an< 
does it not follow that it is cheaper to en 
hance the productiveness of land than 
diminish it ? 

Some will say it is all talk ; there 
nothing practical in it; let him try it, an( 
he will find farming one thing and writing 
about it another. But our reply is, tha 
we know the truthfulness of all this by ac 
tual trial, and we know it by the wides 
observation. If you cheat the land it will 
cheat you. u As a man soweth, so shall \a 
reap." In a higher sense we have indu 
bitable authority for this. In our applica 
tion of it to soil culture, we appeal to tht 
very best and most successful farmers, if ii 
is not so. It follows that the farmer wants 
less land or more labour. The latter is oui 
remedy. The farmer, it seems to us, should 
not ask how little help he can skim along 
with, but how much he can employ profit- 
ably. 

And remember, farmers, that the more 
help you can employ, and yet secure a fair 
return to yourself, the better for the coun- 
try; for you thereby afford encouragement 
to men to escape from the filth and wretch- 
edness of our cities, and to seek an em- 
ployment more favourable to whatever is 
virtuous', elevating, and patriotic. 

It would be too much to ask the farmer 
to employ men to keep them out of idle 
ness and vice, without a reasonable prospect 
of remuneration. But when such a pros 
pect is presented, the fanner who rejects 
the opportunity sins against his own inter- 
est, and fails of being a benefactor where 



he might be one. 



Agricultural Science — Mechanical Tex- 
ture of Soils. 

At a late meeting of the Farmers' Club, 
held at the American Institute, New York, 
Professor S. W. Johnson, of Yale College, 
furnished an able essay on soils, in which 
certain views were presented, which together 
with some facts, connected with our own 
observation upon the mechanical treatment 
of certain sandy and gravelly soils, seem to 
require the light of science to explain. We 
copy from the essay, the following remarks : 

" The labors of chemists to discover posi- 
tively all the causes of the fertility of the 
soils, have not yet met with conclusive suc- 
cess. The mechanical structure of soil is 
of primary importance. Naked rock grows 



pi 
di 



1859.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



423 



lichen — the same rock crushed into coarse 
grains, grows a much higher order of vege- 
table — pulverized fine, the cereals grow in 
it. Geology, chemistry, botany, physiolo- 
gy, meteorology, mechanics, hydrodynamics, 
heat, light and electricity, are all intimately 
combined in the grand process of vegetation. 
There are sandy soils in our Eastern States. 
which, without manure, yield meagre crops I 
of rye and buckwheat ; but there are sandy I 
soils in Ohio, which without manure, yield | 
on an average, eighty bushels of Indian < 
corn an acre, and have yielded it for twenty 3 
to fifty years in unbroken succession ; the 
ingreaients of these soils being, by chemi- 
cal analysis, the same. At present no dif- 
ference is known between them, except the 
coarseness of the particles, ; the first being 
coarse, while the Ohio sand is an exceed- 
ingly fine powder. The power of soils to 
attract and imbibe moisture and oxygen, 
was well shown by Sehubler, and Hoffen, 
forty years ago. Of thirteen different 
soils, quartz sand absorbed in thirty days 
over 1-1000 parts of oxygen and no moist- 
ure, while humus absorbed 13 of oxygen 
and 120 of moisture." 

There is a piece of land, embracing sixty 
or eighty acres, within three miles of where 
we now write of the character of the fine 
sandy land of Ohio, as referred to by Pro- 
fessor Johnson. While in pursuit of land 
some years ago, we became acquainted with 
this piece, and from a knowledge of the 
character of the sandy land in some of the 
Eastern States, we were induced to place a 
very low estimate upon our neighbor's land. 
This land has since been sold and converted 
into a vegetable and fruit farm, and has 
proved to be one of the most sure and pro- 
ductive pieces of land with which we are 
acquainted. Of course, it is extremely 
warm and brings to maturity vegetables and 
fruit, some days earlier than any other land 
in the neighbourhood of the city ; and for 
the growth of grapes, the fruit is almost in- 
variably sound, while that grown in any other 
character of soil is subject to rot ; and the 
capacity of this soil to retain moisture, is 
not surpassed by any other soil combining 
any portion of loam that we have seen. 
Probably the great secret of the fertility of 
this soil, lies in its capacity to absorb and 
retain heat, moisture and various gases es- 
sential to vegetable growth ; and this is in 
consequence of the finely divided character 
of its particles, which renders it one of the 



most perfect and desirable soils to culti- 
vate. 

Last summer, while exploring certain 
portions of Long Island, in the State of 
New York, which is noted for its light, 
sandy and gravelly soil, we visited a gentle- 
marA garden and nursery, to witness the 
effect of trenching a light, open, porous 
soil — purely sand, coarse gravel and stones, 
with a thin surface soil. This ground had 
been trenched, and entirely inverted to the 
depth of three and a half feet. Upon the 
surface a moderate dressing of manure had 
been cast and spaded in. On the trenched 
portion were growing various nursery plants, 
grape-vines, roses, &c, of great luxuriance; 
but the most remarkable feature was a few 
rows of cabbage, upon the same prepared 
ground, no head of which was less than ten 
inches in diameter, up to a much larger 
size, all firm and solid, while in the adjoin- 
ing rows, planted the same time upon pre- 
cisely the same soil, manured in the same 
manner, and spaded to the ordinary depth, 
but not trenched, not one cabbage had 
headed, but still remained large, loose plants. 

In another fruit garden and vineyard of 
some magnitude, a mile distant, upon simi- 
lar soil, but more sandy and less gravelly, 
resting upon a kind of marl or hard-pan 
bottom four feet below the surface, this 
ground had been trenched in a similar 
manner, with an incorporation of a compost 
of peat, stable manure, lime, ashes, &c; and 
during three months' travel among gardens, 
we saw no more vigorous grape-vines, dwarf 
pear trees, or other fruit-trees, even upon 
the richest soils of Western New York. 

We had supposed that trenching such 
light thin soils, was worse than labor lost. 
But these instances prove to the contrary, 
and afford conclusive evidence that without 
this preparation of that kind of soil, gar- 
dening and fruit growing would not pay the 
cost. It also establishes the most important 
fact in agriculture, that the more perfectly 
the mechanical disintegration of the soil is 
effected, whether light or heavy, the more 
perfectly it is adapted to vegetable growth j 
and if such results are the effects of the 
deep culture of light soils, how much more 
important is it that more tenacious soils be 
deeply and thoroughly pulverized ! The 
more perfect and free the circulation of 
heat, moisture, and the atmosphere, and 
gases in the surface soil, and in contact with 



424 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER 



[July 



the ronN of growing crops, the more perfect 
will be their development. 

The largest crops of corn we have on re- 
cord, were grown upon the light sandy soils 
of the South ; although upon thin, poor soils ; 
but owing to their open, porous texture, with 
moderate dressings of manure and timely 
rains, these soils produced heavy crops. But 
such loose, sandy soils cannot be depended 
on, because of the uncertainty of a due 
degree of moisture in all seasons. Heavy 
soils are more retentive of moisture, and 
are more sure to afford regular crops ; but 
the crops upon these soils would be greatly 
augmented by a thoroughly broken and pul- 
verized surface. A deep and thorough 
breaking up in the spring is not sufficient 
for summer crops, but the surface must be 
kept loose and porous, during the growing- 
season, or until the time of u laying by." 
In this lies the great secret of large crops. 
[ Valley Farmer. 



branch of trade which competition has 
forced into a high state of perfection;, and 
not only are the seeds sold at the lowest re- 
munerative point to the grower, but the 
quality of the articles is in most cases in- 
finitely better and truer to kind than the 
miscellaneous gathering to which I have re- 
ferred can possibly be. No saving will re- 
compense the use of inferior seeds ; a spu- 
rious article requires the same amount of 
labor upon it as that of the* highest excel- 



lence. 



Nothing can 



be a greater mistake, 



Seed Saving. 

It is a frequent " bone of contention " 
between gardeners and their employers, 
whether the former should grow and collect 
the necessary seeds for cropping the gar- 
den — most gardeners of experience prefer- 
ring to purchase from a reliable source, 
rather than trust to their own savings; and 
most employers hold an opinion quite the 
reverse. 

So far as regards economy the subject is 
not difficult to understand, as it can only 
refer to the collecting of such seeds as are 
the common produce of gardens, and provi- 
ded and sold at all respectable seed stores. 
The trouble of watching and collecting 
these, as they accidentally ripen, will great- 
ly depend upon circumstances. If economy 
is the only object, the matter will be easily 
determined, for if the amount of time, ac- 
cording to the estimated value of time and 
labor, is greater than the price of the same 
articles in the seed store, or otherwise, can 
readily be settled as the evidence prepon- 
derates. It is a fallacy to suppose, in such 
cases, that if the seeds are saved, there is 
just the saving of so much money effected. 
This is a great mistake. If the gardener 
takes time to gather seeds, he must necessa- 
rily be neglecting something else. My ex- 
perience convinces me, that every six cents 
worth of seed saved in this way, costs the 
employer twelve cents. Seed growing is a 



in ordinary garden management, than to 
suppose that a trifle saved in the price of 
seeds, or anything short of what will pro- 
duce the best article of its kind, can de- 
serve the name of economy. Of course ex- 
ceptions are to be made, as in the case of a 
new variety of vegetable, superior to others 
of its kind, which it would be important to 
preserve; but this is a different affair to 
making a promiscuous collection of all kinds 
of common garden seeds to grow from year 
to year. The inevitable tendency of such 
a practice would be to hasten the degenera- 
cy of three-fourths of ordinary vegetables 
to their primitive condition, as weeds of the 
wayside, or the sea shore. 

With flower seeds the case is different. 
Many of these may be perpetuated in the 
same place, so long as it is only de- 
sirable to preserve the natural or original 
condition of the plant. But most garden 
esculent plants, such as peas, cabbages, bro- 
coli, cauliflower, radishes, turnips, parsnips, 
&c, are in an artificial state, and to main- 
tain them in their excellence, requires par- 
ticular conditions, one of the most indispen- 
sable of which seems to be frequent change 
both of soil and climate — advantages which 
are not often possible to be secured in the 
same garden. 

Even in the general saving of 
seeds, there are broad exceptions 
rule. Who would care to grow 
Chinnastcrs, or single balsams ? 
although these produce seed 
plants from home-grown seeds 



flower 
to the 
single 
Yet 
freely, the 
soon dete- 
riorate, and in countries where the produc- 
tion of these is made a special business, a 
special course of culture is resorted to in 
order to preserve their purity and excel- 
lence. 

Looking at this subject in its proper 
light, it seems obvious that neither on the 
score of economy nor with a view to obtain 
superior stock, can it be desirable for gar- 



1859.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



425 



dencrs to collect their own seeds, with the 
exception of some ornamental or rare botan- 
ical plants. — Germantown Telegraph. 



From the American Agriculturist. 

Enlarging a Farm Without Buying 
Land. 

If a man does not know how much land 
he actually owns, and gets no benefit out of 
that part with which he is unacquainted, 
and then is informed that he has more, and 
is told how to use it, why^ is not this equiva- 
lent to the purchase of more acres? Farm- 
ers arc often heard to exclaim : " Oh that I 
were rich enough to buy a little more land, 
then T could fatten more cattle and sheep, 
and I could carry more grain to market !" 
Now, to such men, at least to some of them, 
we beg leave to say, your farms are already 
larger than you suppose. You seem to 
think that your ownership extends only six 
inches deep into the earth ; but this is a 
misapprehension. It is not very strange, 
however, since all the former owners of the 
soil had the same idea, and the Indians 
from whom your ancestors bought or stole 
the land, .were content with only the sur- 
face, just enough to hunt upon and to grub 
a few roots out of. But this is all a mis- 
take, as you will see on reflection. Exam- 
ine' the title deeds to your land and see if 
there is any limit to your rights in a down- 
ward direction. You will not find any; we 
know you won't. 

Now, therefore, do not fear to go at once 
and take possession of the rest of your 
farm. * It is virgin soil, covered over with 
only a few inches of partly worn land ; and 
it will return you fine crops if you will only 
lay it open to the sun and air, or mix it 
with the soil you have long cultivated. Per- 
haps it will not be wise for you to try to 
use it all the first year ; use a little modera- 
tion in entering upon your new property, 
for your own sake and for the farm's sake. 
[In connection with the advice here given, 
it may be well for the reader to turn back 
to page 71 (March No.,) and study what is 
said about plowing deep and plowing shal- 
low. — Ed.] 

Here is what some writer has said on the 
subject — not strictly correct perhaps, but 
highly suggestive : " At the present time, 
the average crop of wheat per acre in Great 
Britain on a soil cultivated for centuries, is 
about double that produced on the compara- 



tively new soil of Ohio. Why is this? 
Simply because the leading British farmers 
are educated men, and apply their work 
wisely. They pay back to the earth what 
they borrow from her; they endeavor by 
every means in their power to enrich their 
ground, and in return it enriches them. If 
American farmers, instead of laboring to 
double the number of their acres, would en- 
deavor to double their crops, they would 
find it a saving of time and toil, and an in- 
crease of profit. . . . Many men never 
think of digging ten inches into the soil, 
unless they have dreamed about a crock of 
gold, hid in the earth ; but if they would 
set about the work of digging in earnest, 
every man would find his crock of gold 
without the aid of dreams or devination." 

We once heard of some remarkable straw- 
berries raised in a neighboring town, and 
called the " Washington Excelsior " straw- 
berry. Rumor said that the leaves were 
large, vividly green all summer, the fruit 
large and abundant for a long time, and not 
diminished by the severest droughts. The 
plants were sold at a half a dollar apiece, 
and were considered cheap at that price. 
Attracted by these wonderful stories of the 
new fruit, we went to see it and learn all 
about it. The plants were indeed beautiful, 
and the fruit very fine. But our eyes were 
opened, when Mr. Smith, the owner, told 
us frankly, that the plants were some com- 
mon sort, the name of which he had for- 
gotten, but that they were grown on a bed 
in the corner of his garden, which was made 
(/round for at least six feet deep. Why 
did this not account for the persistent ver- 
dure of the foliage and the size and abun- 
dance of the fruit ? Yet, the superior beau- 
ty of the plants and berries had attracted 
much attention in the neighborhood, and 
seemed to call for a high sounding name ; 
and so Mr. Smith dubbed them the Wash- 
ington Exeelsior. Plainly, this man's straw- 
berry bed was enlarged without fencing in 
more land. 



Mental Labor. 

The injurious effects of mental labor are 
in a great measure owing to extensive 
forcing in early youth, to sudden or misdi- 
rected study; to the co-operation of depress- 
ing emotions or passions, to the neglect of 
the hints of the body ; or to the presence 
of the seeds of disease, degeneration and 
decay in the system. The man of healthy 



426 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[July 



palegmetic or choleric temperament is less 
likely to be injured by application than one 
of sanguine or melancholic type ; yet these 
latter, with allowance for the original consti- 
tution, may be capable of vast efforts. The 
extended and deep culture of the mind 
exerts a directly conservative influence upon 
the body. Fellow laborer ! one word to you. 
Fear not to do manfully the work for which 
your gifts qualify you, but do it as one who 
must give an account of both soul and body. 
Work, and work hard while it is day ; the 
night cometh soon enough — do not hasten 
it. Use your faculties — use them to the 
utmost, but do not abuse them ; make not 
the mortal do the work of the immortal. 
The body has its claims — it is a servant ; 
treat it well and it will do your work; it 
knows its own business ; do not attempt to 
teach or force if, attend to its wants and re- 
quirements, listen kindly and patiently to all 
its hints, occasionally forestall its necessities 
by a little indulgence, and your considera- 
tion will be paid with interest. But task it 
and pine it, and suffocate it — make it a 
slave instead of a servant, it may not com- 
plain much, but like the weary camel in the 
desert, it will lie down and die. — Journal of 
Physiology. 

Effect of Bones and other Manures on 
Plants. 

u That certain manures produce very pow- 
erful effect on various plants, was an early 
remark of the cultivators of the soil." An 
article exemplifying this statement, by C. 
W. Johnson, Esq., appears in the Mark 
Lane Express, from which we propose to 
condense a few paragraphs for our readers. 

Phosphate of lime promotes in a remark- 
able degree the growth of clover. An in- 
stance showing this is related by Mr. Dixon, 
in his prize essay on the Manuring of Grass 
Land. A pasture of 20 acres was heavily 
dressed with broken bones nearly 70 years 
ago, and kept in grass without plowing. — 
The dry portions of the field was remarka- 
bly fertile, but such parts of the ground as 
were wet, had scarcely any other covering 
than carex and the coarsest grasses. Mr. 
D. on becoming tenant, set about draining 
the wet parts. In regard to this, he says: 

"In the operation we found, at from five 
to eight inches from the surface, much bone, 
in various states of decomposition ; the large 
pieces, when broken, appeared fresh inside. 
I felt at the time some regret that much 



value must have been lost for many years, 
and, as I then supposed, forever lost, on, ac- 
count of the manure having been in a soil 
saturated with water ever since it had been 
laid on. However, before my draining ope- 
rations had been completed twelve months, 
the coarse herbage began to disappear, and 
in its place appeared white clover, marl clo- 
ver, and others of the best pasture grasses; 
and in the secon 1 summer after being drain- 
ed, the soil was equally luxuriant with the 
natural dry parts of the land." 

Of another case it is said : 

" Previous to boning, the herbage on these 
pastures were of the poorest kind imagina- 
ble — there being few of any plants except 
the small carex. In the second summer, af- 
ter boning, the carex had disappeared, and 
the pasture had become long and thick-set 
with white clover, cow grass, or marl clover, 
and trefoil." 

Messrs. Lawes and Gilbert, in the last 
half volume of the Royal Agricultural So- 
ciety, report a course of experiments with 
different manures in permanent grass land. 
They sum up the result as follows : 

" That the effect of a mixed, but purely 
mineral manure upon the complex herbage 
of permanent meadow land was chiefly to 
develope the growth of the leguminous 
plants (clover, &c.) it contained, and scarce- 
ly to increase at all the produce of the gra- 
minaceous plants, or commonly called natu- 
ral grasses. That the action of purely ni- 
trogenous manures upon the permanent 
meadow, was to discourage the growth of 
the leguminous herbage, and to increase the 
produce of the graminaceous hay. * . * * 
That peculiar carbonaceous manures had lit- 
tle or no beneficial effect on the amount of 
produce of the hay." 

We may see at home the change vegeta- 
tion produces either by breaking up, or 
clearing land, by burning off the turf of 
mucky swamps, etc., and sometimes by turn- 
ing up a lower strata of earth by deep plow- 
ing. Forests burned over, send up a thick 
growth of fire weed, followed soon by bram- 
bles of different kinds of trees and plants 
often introduced by occurrences which bring 
their appropriate food before them. They 
are not "spontaneously" generated, but grow 
from seeds lying dormant in the soil, or car- 
ried there by the wind, birds, or animals, 
and the subject is worthy of closer investi- 
gation, but we can devote no more space to 
it to-day. — Country Gentleman. 



1859.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



427 



From the Conservatory Journal. 

Relations of Air, Water, and Light, to 
Animal and Vegetable Life. 

BY CHARLES T. JACKSON, M.D., STATE AS- 
SAYER. 

When an animal draws air into its lungs, 
and then exhales it, the expired air no lon- 
ger will support flame, but the lighted taper, 
inserted in a receiver filled with it, is in- 
'stantly extinguished. 

If we now bring a branch of a living 
plant, having foliage, into this receiver, and 
expose the whole to sunlight, in a few min- 
utes the air is restored to its original state 
and will support combustion. 

On analysis, we find that the air which 
has been breathed by an animal, has lost the 
chief part of its oxygen, which is converted 
into carbonic acid gas. This gas is the re- 
spiratory food of plants, and the leaves, 
which are their lungs, absorb the carbonic 
acid, and by aid of the sun's rays decom- 
pose it, converting its carbon into its carbo- 
naceous juices, fibre and cells; while pure 
oxygen is exhaled and the air is again ren- 
dered fit for the respiration of animals. 

The same relations also exist in the action 
of the respiration of fishes, which draw from 
the air, dissolved in water, their respiratory 
element, while sub-aqueous vegetation ab- 
sorbs their exhaled carbonic acid, and re- 
place it by pure oxygen. The gills of fishes 
act in the same physiological manner as the 
lungs of air-breathing animals. They can- 
not decompose water, rich as it is in com- 
bined oxygen, but they depend on the small 
proportion of free oxygen which is dissolved 
in all water that has been properly ventila- 
ted. 

These facts have now come to be popular- 
ly apprehended, since the aqua-vivarium has 
become so common in many households. — 
We shall proceed now to some details and 
generalizations on this and related subjects, 
to which we invite the reader's attention. 

We live at the bottom of a great atmos- 
pheric ocean, between forty-five and fifty 
miles deep.* This ocean consists of nitro- 
gen and oxygen gases, commingled, but not 
chemically combined. In addition to these 
two great components, there is a small pro- 
portion of carbonic acid gas, and variable 



* Recent researches seem to indicate that the 
height of the atmosphere is between seventy and 
ninety-nine miles. See Kaeintz' Meteorology, 
note by Charles Martins. 



proportions of aqueous vapor, also dissolved 
and intimately commingled with them. By 
the law of diffusion, gases become, in a short 
time, intimately and uniformly mixed, so 
that, though of different densities, they do 
not separate by gravitation. Were it not 
for this law, animals at the surface of the 
earth would soon be drowned in a stratum 
of carbonic acid gas, it being much heavier 
than air. Aqueous vapor is held in solution 
in the air, at a certain tension in ratio to the 
temperature of the air. When the air is 
cooled to a certain point, a portion of the 
water is condensed in the form of rain, snow, 
or hail; and when the earth, by radiation 
of heat, has its temperature lowered below 
the dew point, a deposition of moisture takes 
place on its surface. 

The atmosphere consists of 

By weight. By hulk or measure. 

Oxygen, 23.10 20.90 

Nitrogen, 76.90 79.10 



100.00 



100.00 



In addition, we have in bulk, on the aver- 
age, 4-10,000, four ten thousandths of car- 
bonic acid, and occasionally a little carbu- 
retted hydrogen, and ammonia; but these 
two last are accidental and irregular in their 
presence, depending chiefly on the abodes 
of men for their production. 

Carbonic acid, in proportion of from three 
to six ten thousandths of the atmosphere's 
bulk, is essential to vegetable life, but much 
more of it would prove injurious to animals. 
Hence, Nature has nicely adjusted the pow- 
ers of animal and vegetable life, so as to 
keep the atmosphere always exactly balanced 
with its due proportions of these gases, and 
by the winds, or atmospheric currents, pre- 
vents an undue accumulation of injurious 
gases from taking place in any portion of 
the globe. Simple and beautiful as these 
laws are, we should not neglect to contem- 
plate and admire them. 

If we now look to the composition of wa- 
ter, we shall find that it consists of, 



By weight. 
Oxygen, 88.91 
Hydrogen, 11.09 



By measure of gases. 
1 
2 
condensed and combin- 
100.00 ed chemically. 
Rain water contains, dissolved in it, on 
the average, about 2 J per cent, of its bulk 
of air, in which the proportions of oxygen 
are, according to Guy Lussac and Humboldt, 



428 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[July 



from 32 to 34.8 per cent., while the oxygen 
in the atmosphere is but 21 per cent, as be- 
fore stated, oxygen being more soluble in 
water than nitrogen. 

This dissolved, but not chemically com- 
bined oxygen, is essentially necessary for the 
life of fishes, and of all sub-aqueous animals, 
and the rain supplies it in part; while sub- 
aqueous vegetation, under influence of sun- 
light, also contributes to furnish oxygen ; 
and at the same time, the plant withdraws 
carbonic acid from the water. 

After a long season of drought, water in 
our small lakes and pools, becomes stagnant, 
as happened a few years since to Cochituate 
Lake, which supplies Boston with water by 
its aqueduct. Then immense quantities of 
microscopic confervas, of a bright green col- 1 
or, appeared in the water, and it had then a 
peculiar disagreeable taste and smell, which j 
was compared to that of cucumbers, and by 
some to that of fishes, but which really was 
nothing more than the odor of this micro- 
scopic plant. It seems that this low order 
of vegetation is favored by the diminished 
supply of oxygen from rain, and the preva- 
lence of* carbonic acid in the water. Whe- 
ther the subsequent rains, or the sudden in- 
crease of minute Crustacea, Cyclops, Daph-j 
nea, etc., caused the disappearance of these I 
confervas, we do not know; but it is certain j 
that a large increase of these minute crea- 
tures suddenly accompanied the clearing of; 
the water from the peculiar taste and smell, | 
which for some months so annoyed our citi- ' 
zens, and that the microscopic confervae i 
gradually diminished in quantities, if it has, 
not wholly disappeared. The Cyclops cer- ' 
tainly is quite abundant, when the water is 
the sweetest and considered most pure. We 
wish to discharge these animalculae from any 
imputation of having tainted the waters of, 
Cochituate Lake, for we believe that they ' 
were not guilty. Pray, reader, excuse this j 
digression, for this matter was once a subject 
of animated dispute in this city, and the 
public generally do not know how the ques- 1 
tion was finally disposed of. We give our 
opinion, for what it may be worth, observ- 
ing at the same time, that for years this sub- 
ject has been one of frequent researches in j 
our laboratory; and has also been duly in- 
vestigated, with the same results, in the sci- j 
entific school of Cambridge; Prof. Horsford 
having first noticed the microscopic confer- 
vae in the water, and mentioned then in his 
Report to the water board. 



The sun's rays have the power of aiding 
in the formation of organic matters. By 
their aid the foliage of plants, whether sub- 
aerial or sub-aquatic, decompose the carbonic 
acid gas of the air, or that dissolved in wa- 
ter. Only the lowest orders of vegetable 
life can grow in darkness, namely, the Fun- 
gi, (mushrooms, etc.) which it is well known 
will grow in the darkness of the catacombs 4 
Paris, or in the galleries of mines, where no 
light enters. 

The higher orders of vegetable life re- 
quire sun-light for their growth, and their 
power of abstracting carbon from this gas is 
truly wonderful, especially when we know, 
from chemical experiments, that the most 
powerful of our electro-positive elements — 
potassium, is required, and that, too, at a 
red heat, to decompose carbonic acid, so as 
to set free its carbon while the oxygen com- 
bines with potassium to form potash. Now 
the plant takes the carbon, and liberates the 
oxygen from this gas; two atoms of oxygen 
for every atom of carbon which it absorbs. 
Dumas says, if we place a branch of a tree, 
in full foliage, in a globe, and blow a blast 
of air over the confined foliage, while the 
sun shines on it, all the carbonic acid will 
be taken from the air by the plant, during 
this momentary contact with the leaves of 
the plant. It is a certain fact of science, 
and not a mere figure of speech, when we 
say, we draw the air into our lungs, and throw 
it forth unfit for animal respiration; the 
leaves of the trees catch this foul air and 
return it to us in the form of fruit, flowers 
and fuel. 

Enterprise and Obstacles. 

No higher eulogy, aside from considera- 
tions of a religious nature, can be pronounc- 
ed upon any man, than that he was one pos- 
sessed of energy of character commensurate 
with every undertaking — an ardor vigorous 
enough to surmount all difficulties, especial- 
ly such as came inadvertently in his way. — 
That he could sever the gordion knot of dif- 
ficulty by one masterly blow; and that he 
was one of those fearless, resolute, and en- 
terprising men, who, when thrown upon the 
world without friends and without resources, 
could make his progress through it smooth 
and triumphant, and could even gather 
grapes of thorns, and figs of thistles. 

Under any circumstances, no matter how 
unfavorable, to rise from an humble station 
in life to places of eminence and usefulness, 



1859.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



429 



and to retain these places without any par- 1 
ticnlarly favorable external circumstance*, 
but solely by the energy of his own charac- 
ter, and the fertility of his personal resour- 
ccs, argue a truly great man. Strength, 
bravery, dexterity, and unfaltering nerve 
and resolution, must be the portion and at- 
tributes of those who pursue their fortune 
amidst the stormy waves of life. It is a 
crowning triumph or a disastrous defeat; 
garlands or chains; a prison or a prize. — 
We need the eloquence of Demosthenes to 
plead in our behalf — the arrows of Hercu- 
les to fight upon our side. 

The severe trials and hardships of life 
call into exercise the latent faculties of the ' 
soul of man. Incentives to virtue and su- 
periority, they are prepared and predestina- 
ted for him, to put his manhood to the test, 
and to inculcate in him strength, hardihood, 
and valor. Pusillanimous and r eeble with- 
out great exertions, he is only what he was 
designed to be when he makes them; and 
forms a commendable and heroic resolution 
not to let life pass away in trifles, but to ac- 
complish something even in spite of obsta- 
cles, but more especially if they do not ex- 
ist. At slight difficulties he will not be dis- 
mayed, nor magnify them by weakness and 
despondency, but boldly meet them and put 
them to flight. 

There are cobble-stones in every road, and 
pebbles in every path. All have cares, dis- 
appointments, and stumbling-blocks. Sobs 
and sighs, groans and regrets avail not. All 
have need of heart and mind, wit, wisdom, 
address, management, patience, and perse- 
verance. Besides, most difficulties are mere- 
ly imaginary. In the Homeric ages virtue 
and glory were identified, but always implied 
greatness of soul, great exploits, and great 
honors. 

"Twined with the wreath Parnassian laurels 
yield, 
Or reaped in iron harvests of the field."' 

It is indolence and deficiency of spirit 
which produce torpor and stagnation; for 
both in the daily difficulties of life, and in 
the arduous career of moral greatness, dan- 
gers and impediments abound, as well as in 
the perilous triumphs of heroism; but we 
perceive them not. The contest reveals 
them, and shows how difficult and onerous 
is the task of zealous and active goodness — 
of resolute and determined virtue — of pa- 
tient and consistent fortitude — of useful and 
laudable exertion and enterprise. 



Pressing emergencies are to be nut with 
which demand talents, wealth, power, energy, 
character — in short, every possible help and 
advantage to extricate ourselves with honor 
and success from the straits and difficulties 
in which we are placed. " lie," says one, 
"who weakly shrinks from the struggle, who 
will endure no labor, nor fatigue, can neither 
fulfil his own vocation, nor contribute aught 
to the general welfare of mankind. " 

The difficulties of life teach us wisdom, 
its vanities humility, its calumnies pity, its 
hopes resignation, its sufferings charity, it« 
afflictions fortitude, its necessities prudence, 
its brevity the value of time, and its dan- 
gers and uncertainties a constant dependence 
upon a higher and All-protecting Power. — 
Waverley Magazine. 



Francis Gillet on Gravel-Wall Houses. 

Having been often asked my opinion of 
the concrete or gravel-wall style of building, 
whether it is equal or superior to other 
styles, and its relative cost — I take this mode 
of answering the inquiry, for the informa- 
tion of all persons, who may feel interested 
on the subject. 

1 am every way pleased with the gravel 
wall, and think it superior, in all respects, 
to any other. It is now nearly three years 
since I built a large square- walled dwelling 
house of this material, and I have found it 
to combine every quality desirable in the 
walls of such a structure. It is permanent, 
not having settled or cracked. It is warm 
in winter, and cool in summer. It is entire- 
ly f ree f'om dampness, even in the dampest 
dog-days, no moisture having at any time 
been detected on the interior surface, though 
plastered directly upon the wall, without 
furring out, as is customary in stone or brick 
walls. Having formerly occupied a stone 
house, which was at times damp, though 
furred out with great care, the contrast in 
this respect is very noticeable. I>cing thus 
plastered directly upon the wall it affords no 
harbor or race course for vermin, to chase 
up and down at all hours, day and night, 
more to their own amusement than the en- 
tertainment of the helpless occupants with- 
in. It holds the. stucco perfectly, the stucco, 
being rough and admirably suited to this 
style of finish. 

It is cheap, costing in this vicinity, where 
gravel and filling-stone are easily obtained, 
about one-third the price of brick. Indeed, 



430 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[July 



with my present experience, I could build 
at a loss comparative cost, perhaps one-quar- 
ter. 

All things considered, I am so well satis- 
fied with the concrete or gravel wall that 
should I build again, I should prefer it to 
any other material with which I am ac- 
quainted even at the same cost. 

In conclusion, I will volunteer one sug- 
gestion as to the manner of constructing the 
wall. I pursued the common mode and 
used "flasks," or boxes in laying the wall. 
Were I to build again, I should cast the ma- 
terial beforehand, in rough boxes of the 
width of the wall and of any convenient 
length, and lay the blocks thus cast into 
mortar, this mode has many advantages. — 
All danger from rain while the walls are 
still green and liable to washing is thus ob- 
viated; the walls can be made perfectly true 
and perpendicular without the constant trou- 
ble of moving and adjusting the flasks, which 
are very liable to be moved out of place; 
juts and angles can easily be accommodated 
to the shape of the wall, and the builder's 
taste can be gratified in this respect as readi- 
ly as by other material. Instead of the 
square or octagon form, best suited to the 
flask mode of construction, he can adopt the 
cottage, or any other style, however irregu- 
lar and angular. 

I shall be pleased to communicate any in- 
formation which my experience may have 
afforded me, in relation to the details of this 
mode of building, believing it to be highly 
conducive to the promotion of domestic 
economy and comfort. — Homestead. 

Francis Gillette, Hartford. 



For the Southern Planter. 

Mr. Baker's Apples. 
Loudon Co., Va., 5th Mo. 18th, 1859. 
In the issue of the Planter for this month 
is a communication from H. M. Baker of 
Winchester, on fruit growing, and speaking 
highly of a native fruit of that section as a 
valuable keeper. The description corres- 
ponds to an apple that is a native of that 
county, and known as Ross' Green. It was 
brought into notice by the late Abraham 
Branson, under these circumstances : he was 
at the house of a neighbor of the name of 
Ross, when he was opening a hole of buried 
apples in the Spring, and observing one va- 
riety less rotten than the others, he asked to 
be shown the tree from which these were 



taken, when he took some grafts and put 
them in his own trees. The trees thus graft- 
ed have been very profitable since, and now 
belong to his son, Joseph Branson; but as 
the trees became old they seem to be more 
addicted to the bitter rot than formerly. I 
introduced them here in this county, some 
years ago, but they seem more inclined to 
rot while the trees are young than in the 
limestone soils near Winchester. We now 
do not cultivate them. My own opinion is, 
that in a strong limestone soil, while the 
trees are young they do well and are good 
bearers, but in lighter soils are not so good. 
The apples are of fine size, green in the fall, 
becoming yellowish green in the spring; 
very fine, brittle and juicy. 

If this apple of H. M. Baker's is differ- 
ent from the Ross Green, and he can ascer- 
tain the fact by enquiry of Joseph Branson 
of Frederick county, I shall be pleased to 
exchange grafts with him, and as the pro- 
mulgator of a fruit is, by the common con- 
sent of pomologists, entitled to christen it, 
he may himself give it a name. 

Yardley Taylor. 



From the U. S. Patent Office Report. 

Investigation of the Sugar-Bearing* ca- 
pacity of the Chinese Sugar-Cane. 

BY PROF. J. L. SMITH, OP LOUISVILLE, 
KENTUCKY. 

On investigating the sugar-bearing ca- 
pacity of the Chinese sugar cane, the first 
step required was to ascertain the true 
chemical constitution of the juice extracted 
from the plant. From various conflicting 
statements on the subject, nothing satisfac- 
tory could be gleaned, some of the best au- 
thorities insisting that there was not any 
crystallizable sugar in the juice, or but a 
very small portion, while others, equally as 
strong, held the contrary opinion. 

There are two kinds of sugar of common 
occurrence, namely, glucose, or grape sugar, 
(a sugar moderately sweet and difficult of 
crystallization,) and cane sugar, with a very 
sweet taste and easily crystallized. The 
first form of sugar occurs most abundantly 
in fruits — the latter in the sugar cane, the 
beat-root, maple, melon, &c. I would re- 
mark, in addition, that cane sugar is easily 
convertible into grape sugar, and, in all pro- 
cesses for extracting the former, one im- 
portant aim is to prevent the transforma- 



1859.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER 



431 



tion. For instance, were we to take the 
juice of the sugar cane, (containing about 
20 per cent, of crystallizable sugar,) and 
concentrate it without subjecting it to the 
action of lime or some other defecating 
agent, fully half of the sugar would be render- 
ed uncrystallizable, and there would be only 
a small yield of sugar but a large amount 
of molasses. For this reason in regarding 
the sugar-yielding capacity of any vegeta- 
ble, the two facts to be considered are, first, 
the quantity of cane sugar it contains, and 
secondly, the amount and character of the 
impurities associated with the sugar — for 
the latter, during the concentration of the 
juice, may give rise to the alteration al- 
ready mentioned, or they may prevent the 
sugar from crystallizing without altering it. 

The juices of the sugar cane, beet- root, 
and maple, present about the best condi- 
tions of any of the vegetable juices for fur- 
nishing sugar, and according to the care 
and skill exercised in the working of them 
so is the yield of sugar. 

Without further preliminaries, I will pro- 
ceed to state the results of the investiga- 
tion of the Sorgho mere, as far as possible 
to make it at the present time. Owing to 
the season being far advanced when the ex- 
periment was commenced, it was impossible 
to undertake anything more than a chemi- 
cal examination of the jaiice, as the frost 
had already affected most of the cane which 
was not cut. Here I would remark that it 
is of the utmost importance to examine 
plants perfectly fresh and unaltered, if we 
expect correct results in relation to the 
crystallizable sugar they will produce ; and 
it is a well known fact that even the broken 
and bruised canes of a field will deteriorate 
the juices, if passed through the mill with 
the perfect canes. Even on the surface 
which is cut, an alteration commences, at 
once the sugar is changed, and this altera- 
tion gradually creeps from the cut extrem- 
ity into all joints of the stalk. I have ver- 
ified this fact in relation to the sorgho. By 
examining different joints, after it had been 
cut two or three weeks, the results were as 
follows, the joints being numbered from the 
extremity next to the root : 

Juice from Crystallizable Uncrystallizable 
joints. sugar. sugar. 

1st jt. contained 6 per cent. 7 percent. 
3d jt. contained 8 per cent. 4£ pr. cent. 
5th jt. contained 9£ pr. cent. 4 pr. cent. 



1 1* nee it is evident that no time is to be 
lost, after cutting it, in expressing the 
juice. 

Not being able to supply myself with the 
fresh cane as Deeded for examination, the 
structure of the plant, with reference to its 
sugar-bearing cells, was not investigated. 
My inquiries, therefore, were directed to 
the more important study of the composi- 
tion of the juice. 

Some of the sorgho, perfectly matured 
and recently cut, was compressed, and the 
juice submitted immediately to analysis. 
The process adopted for ascertaining the 
quality and character of sugar is the only 
one that can be relied on for anything like 
accurate results. It is known as the 
process by polarized light, in which the 
juice to be examined is first made in a few 
moments as transparent and colourless as 
water, and that without the agency of heat. 
The juice as compressed is of a light green 
colour, opaque, and largely mixed with cell- 
ulous tissue from the plant. It is readily 
clarified by acetate of lead, and when thus 
submitted to examination by Solid's polar- 
izing saccharometer, three specimens gave 



the following results : 






No. of Crystallizable 


N 


Dn-Crystallizable 


specimens. sugar. 




sugar. 


1st. 10 per cent. 




l£ per cent. 


2d. 9^ per cent. 




2 per cent. 


3d. 10 per cent. 




2 per cent. 



The result settles the question that the 
gfreat bulk of the sugar contained in the 
sorgho is crystallizable or cane sugar pro- 
per. 

The difference of opinion which has ex- 
isted on this subject, doubtless arose from 
the fact that different degrees of care had 
been taken in the concentration of the 
juice, or that a more or less perfect process 
of defecation was resorted to, sometimes 
rendering the juice altogether crystallizable, 
while at others it furnished a reasonable 
quantity of sugar. 

The results obtained in the analysis of 
liquids containing sugar by polarized light 
are especially valuable, as the impurities 
which may be associated with the sugar in 
no way affect the accuracy of the analysis, 
the only requisite being to render it per- 
fectly transparent. Besides the sugar and 
water contained in the sorgho, the following 
constituents are found : Cellulose, woody 
fibre, pectine, pectic acid, albuminous mat- 



432 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[July 



tor, phosphates, sulphates, oxalates, potash, 
soda and lime salts, starch, and aromatic 

matter, (probably a volatile oil.") Owing to 
the complex nature of the juice, and the 
difficulty of its examination, some of the 
constituents (existing in small quantities) 
may have been overlooked, but the promi- 
nent ones are those recorded in the above 
list. 

Further examination made upon pieces 
of the stalk showed it to be constituted as 
follows : 



Per cent. 
. 75.6 
12.0 
. 12.4 



Water, . 

Sugar, .... 

Woody fibre, salts, &c. . 

So were it possible to compress all the 
juice from the cane, there would be a yield 
of 87.6 per cent. In some operations, by 
compression, I have obtained a yield of 66 
per cent., but I do not think that the ordi- 
nary method of passing the cane between 
the rollers furnishes over 50 per cent, of 



juice. 

The followin 



g table gives at a glance, 



the 



composition of the Sorgho sucre, the sugar- 
cane, and the beet-root : 

Sugar-ran e. Beet-root. 



Sorgho. 

Water 75.6 

Sugar? 12.0 

Woody fibre and 

salts 12.4 

100.0 



72.1 
18.0 



9.9 



100.0 



83.5 
10.5 



6.0 



100.0 



Satisfied as to the composition of the sor- 
gho juice, the next step was to examine into 
some process of separating the sugar. The 
first method tried was the one transmitted 
from the Patent Office, and proposed by 
Leonard Wray. It consisted in treating the 
cold juice with lime, filtering, then treating 
with a solution of nut-galls, filtering, again 
treating with lime, filtering and evaporating 
to proper consistency, and allowing it to 
crystalize. This method did not succeed in 
my hands, the juice becoming very much 
blackened. All subsequent experiments 
were made with those methods already suc- 
cessfully practised on the juices of the su- 
gar-cane and beet-root. 

The first of these methods is to take the 
fresh juice, heat quickly to 130 deg. Fahr., 
add sufficient lime to enable the solution to 
act on reddened litmus paper, filter, evapo- 
rate about a third of the liquid, filter through 
well-washed animal charcoal; evaporate at a 
temperature not exceeding 220°, and when 



sufficiently concentrated, set aside to crysta- 
lize. 

. A second method, which I prefer to the 
one last mentioned, is to warm the fresh 
juice rapidly to 120°; then add to each gal- 
lon of juice three ounces of lime, first slak- 
ing it with five or six times its weight of 
water, then bringing the temperature up to 
200°. It is then filtered, and carbonic acid 
passed through the juice, afterwards filtered 
and evaporated to a proper consistency for 
crystallization. Each time that the juice is 
filtered, if it be allowed to pass through 
well-washed animal charcoal, the syrup may 
be made very clear, and the sugar prepared 
from it will be perfectly white. During the 
evaporation the temperature should at no | 
time exceed 215 degrees. 

It often happens that we have to wait 
days and even weeks for the crystallization 
to take place; but it may always be hasten- 
ed by adding to the thick syrup, when cool, j 
a few grains of brown sugar, or a little pul- 
verized white sugar. 

I do not profess to give the methods de- 
scribed as those best adapted to the extrac- 
tion of sugar from the sorgho, but there are 
others not yet experimented with, which may 
succeed better. Although much of the 
sorgho syrup which I have tasted is far from 
being agreeable, yet, when properly prepar- 
ed, it cannot be readily distinguished from 
that of the sugar-cane of the tropics. 

It must not be forgotten that sugar mak- 
ing is an art that cannot be practised by 
every one with a mill and a set of kettles; 
and, moreover, that the sugar 
present is a vast improvement on 
former days, and where those improvements 
are not employed, the process is carried on 
to a disadvantage. Also, in extracting su- 
gar from one vegetable, we are not to ex- 
pect to apply successfully those methods 
practised on other vegetables. It was not 
by applying to the beet root the method of 
extracting sugar from the cane that France 
is now able to produce 120,000,000 pounds 
of sugar from that root, a quantity equal to 
one-half of what is consumed by her entire 
population of 30,000,000. Beside, it was 
not in a year or two that the beautiful and 
economical processes now employed were 
brought to their present degree of perfec- 
tion. What was necessary for the beet root 
is doubtless required for the sorgho, namely, 
thorough study of its nature, with a process of 
extracting the sugar specially adapted to it 



making at 
that of 



L859.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



433 



In regard to the economical results to 
irise from the cultivation of the Chinese 
sugar cane, I have no data upon which to 
form a correct opinion, as it would require 
in entire season, at least, to go over the sub- 
ect, and to examine the plant in its differ- 
ent stages; also to examine its fixed princi- 
jles, and ascertain its exhausting effects on 
;he soil. As already stated, the cane cxam- 
ned was in a perfectly matured state, but I 
lave been informed that in the earlier stages 
Jiere is more sugar in the plant. If this be 
;rue, an investigation should be made of its 
sugar bearing qualities in the different pe- 
riods of its growth. 

The economical value of this plant in re- 
gard to its sugar or syrup, is far from being 
settled, even should the syrup be readily 
jonverted into sugar. It grows in a tempe- 
rate climate, it is true, but so does the beet 
•oot, which, under skilful cultivation and a 
well directed manufacturing process, will 
field from 1,300 to 2,000 pounds of sugar 
X) an acre. 

The following are the most important 
•acts established by the present inquiry : 

1. The sorgho contains about 10 per ct. 
)f crystallizable sugar. 

2. The sugar can be obtained by process- 
is analagous to those employed for extract- 
ng sugar from other plants. 

3. The uncrystallizable sugar forms ra- 
pidly after the cane is fully ripe and recent- 
ly cut. 

The present investigation I regard only as 
i preliminary to the proper study of the 
plant in question. Some of the points yet 
remaining for investigation are : 

First, the composition of its ash, compar- 
ed with that of the sugar cane, in order to 
learn its requirements of soil, when compar- 
3d with those of the latter. 

Secondly, the analysis of the plant in cer- 
tain stages of its growth, and from different 
localities, to learn when it contains the lar- 
gest amount of sugar, and what latitude is 
most favorable to its development. 

Accompanying this report are specimens 
of syrup and sugar; the former transparent 
and of a light wine color, the sugar perfect- 
ly white and fine flavored. 




fi^T* The violet grows low and covers it- 
self with its own tears, and of all flowers 
yields the sweetest fragrance — such is hu- 
mility. 

28 



%\ii Soutjtrn planter. 

RICHMOND, VHUHNIA. 



The War in Europe. 

In calculating the advantages likely to accrue 
to the agricultural interests of this country from 
an increased demand. — at enhanced prices, — 
for breadstuff, for exportation, we are too prone 
to overlook, or forget, the many drawbacks upon 
our otherwise prosperous condition, arising from 
the obvious effects of a foreign war upon the 
currency of the country. Among these we notice 
the first — after the fitful agitation of the Food 
Market — to be, a largely increased demand for 
gold, and a decline in most other commodities, 
proportionate to its rise in value, — a stringency 
in the money market consequent upon its ab- 
straction, and a curtailment of that part of the 
circulating medium based upon it, and purport- 
ing to represent it, — consisting of credit, and 
composed primarily of the promissory notes of 
banks, and secondarily of those of merchants 
and other classes and corporations. A medium 
so sensitive, that like an iEolian Harp, in all 
but its melody, gives forth notes of alarm and 
distress at the touch of every breeze that blows, 
and like the atmosphere, all the lighter for its 
expansion, losing power in proportion to its at- 
tenuation, but very unlike it in this: that it is 
least to be relied upon when most needed — an in- 
flated balloon in the flush times of prosperity — 
a millstone about the neck in the time of ad- 
versity. Yet, unstable and fluctuating as the 
currency is, for that reason it is the better fitted 
to subserve the purpose of a barometer, to note 
the perturbations and changes constantly occur- 
ing in the monetary atmosphere, nnd by which 
to foresee the storms and calms, and clouds and 
sunshine which alternately darken or brighten 
the horizon. We shall, from time to time, notice 
the operations in the money market, as affording 
to our readers the means of judging for them- 
selves of the course which may seem best for 
them to pursue in the sale of their productions, 



434 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[July 



and in the purchase of property for permanent 
investment, or commodities for their consump- 
tion. 

As germain to our purpose, we now call at- 
tention to the following article, extracted from 
the United States Economist: 

BATES OF INTEREST IN EUROPE. 

The occurrence of the war produced an im- 
mense derangement in the money markets of 
Europe, as well as fall in prices. The first shock 
caused a depreciation in stock values which has 
been estimated at $1,000,000,000, and over 300 
failures of banking and commercial firms have 
been reported, whose liabilities are not short of 
300 millions, and the effects of which are now 
corrupting the standing of those still existing. 
The demand is only for gold, and values of all 



kinds sink in comparison with that; at the same 
time there is no demand for capital for any 
business or commercial enterprises. There are 
few merchants of England, or Western Europe, 
who will project ventures to other countries 
when the course of war is so uncertain, and the 
demand for all sorts of merchandise is so much 
diminished that no one demands capital to em- 
bark in it, hence, although gold is actively run- 
ning out from the great reservoirs, the supply of 
capital at the leading centres is increasing, seek- 
ing employment at lower rates, but this only 
on the most undoubted securities. The first 
panic of the war caused a demand to extinguish 
obligations, and the rate of interest rose. That 
accomplished, the rates are again falling for in- 
vestments where the security is undoubted. The 
following are the rates of interest at the leading 
centres : 





Ham- 


Bre- 


Frank- 


Ber- 


Ant- 


Amster- 


Leip- 


Vienna. 


Paris. 


Lon- 




burg. 


men. 


fort. 


lin. 


werp. 


dam. 


zic. 


gold. 




don. 


Dec. 23. 


..2±(2>2f 


3 


4 


4 


3 


3 


5 


5— lOl* 


3 


2* 


April 1. 


..3£(2>3± 


3 


3* 


5 


3 


3 


5 


5—108 


3± 


2*. 


April 15. 


..3£(2>— 


H 


H 


5 


3 


3 


5 


5—112 


3±' 


2* 


April 27. 


..5£(o>— 


7 


H 


5 


4 


3 


5 


5—120 


3* 


3* 


May 3. 


..5 (a)— 


6 


H 


5 


4 


3 


6 


5—143 


4 


4* 


May 17. 


..4 (2>— 


6 


«l 


5 


4 


3 


6 


5—145 


4 


4* 


May 23. 


..2p>— 
















4 


4* 



The rate was first to rise at Hamburg, and it 
declines there the first, after the pressure to 
meet obligations has passed. The demand for 
gold is, however, everywhere active, and the 
degree in which it rises is apparent in its agio 
at Vienna, where the bank is suspending pay- 
ments and emitting paper money, and main- 
taining its rate of interest. The agio has risen 
with the Exchange on London from par to 145, 
and the demand for the metals is everywhere 
met with its concealment and export. The 



reservoirs subject to the demand for the metals 
are more chary of those demands, which have 
for an object the obtaining of it for export. In 
New York the outward current of the metals 
has been very large. The amount of specie in 
the city has been reduced during the month of 
May about $4,700,000. In the same period last 
year there was an increase. The export from 
Boston and New York, together, for May, has 
been $12,632,511. The diminution in the banks 
of four cities has been as follows: 



Loans. 



May 1. 

Boston $58,178,264 

New York 128,706,705 

Philadelphia . .. 27,747,339 

New Orleans 19.926,487 



June 5. 

57,328,243 

125,006,766 

26,406,458 

18,594,556 



May 1. 

6,726,647 
32.898,400 

6,689,591 
15,650,736 



Specie. 



June 5. 

6.700,975 
28,055,400 

5,521,759 
14,784,944 



$234,538,795 227,326,023 



61,985,374 55,063,078 



A Manual of 'Scientific and Practical Agriculture, 
for the Farm and the School. By J. L. Camp- 
bell, A.M., of Washington College, Lexing- 
ton Va. With numerous illustrations. In one 
volume. Price $1 00. 

Table op Contents.— -Preliminary Definitions 
and Illustrations; Heat, Light, and Electricity; 
Chemical Symbols, Equivalents, and Nomen- 
clature; History and Properties of the Metal- 
loids; History and Properties of the Metals; Or- 
ganic Chemistry; Chemistry of Plants; Mineral 
Constituents, or Ashes of Plants; Animal Chem- 
istry; Sources from which Plants derive their 



nourishment; General Principles of Vegetable 
Physiology ; Structure and Functions of the 
Organs of Plants; The Soil: Its Geological 
Origin, &c._^- Mechanical Management of the 
Soil; Chemical Treatment of the Soil; History 
and Properties of Special Manures ; Application 
of Fertilizers; Planting and Culture of Crops; 
Culture of Indian Corn ; Culture of Wheat and 
Oats ; Planting and Culture of Potatoes ; Hay 
Crops and Pasture; Beans and Peas, especially 
the " Southern Pea ;" Culture and Management 
of Tobacco ; The Cotton Crop ; Rotation of 
Crops ; Value of Crops as Food ; Animal Physi- 



1859.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



435 



ology; Selection and Preparation of Food ; Se- 
lection and Care of Stock. 

Lindsay & Blakiston, Publishers, Philadelphia. 

Having enjoyed the opportunity of examining 
the manuscript of the above work, (which) 
though ready for delivery, has not yet reached 
us in print,) we can, with great confidence, 
recommend it as eminently worthy of general 
circulation among farmers, as a concise, accu- 
rate and systematic treatise, calculated to im- 
part the most valuable instruction in respect to 
the science and practice of agriculture, and " re- 
duced to such a form that it may be applied to 
the daily business" of the farm. It is truly "A 
Book for every Farmer and every Farmer's 
Son." \ 



Southern Field and Fireside. 

We have received the two first numbers of 
the above paper, published weekly in Augusta. 
Georgia, by James Gardner, at $2 per annum, 
always in advance, and edited by Dr. Lee in the 
Agricultural, W. W. Mann in the Literary, and 
Wm. N, White in the Horticultural department. 

Devoted to Agriculture, Literature and Art. 
It is in quarto form of eight pages, folio size™ 
each issue containing forty columns of matter. 
It is executed in the best style of typography. 

The high reputation of Dr. Lee, as an Agri- 
cultural writer, will make the paper a welcome 
visitor to the Southern Planters and Farmers; 
and we have no doubt but that the other depart- 
ments will be equally well sustained. We com- 
mend it to the attention and patronage of our 
readers. The Publisher offers the following 
prizes to Southern Writers: 
For the best Novelette, or Tale of Fiction, $100 

For the best Literary Essay, 50 

For the best Agricultural Essay, 50 

For the best Poem, not less than 60 lines, 25 
For the best Poem, less than 60 lines,. ... 25 



Pringle'l Orange, Pringle's Red, Cattawassa, and 
Fastolf— all of which are very fine,— the two 
varieties first named superb. We also received, 
while they were in season, several remarkably 
fine samples of the varieties of the Strawberry 
cultivated by him. He intends to enlarge the 
allotment of land for the growth of these luscious 
fruits. 



Natural Agriculturist. 

A new paper, published at Pittsburg, and 
edited by J. T. F. Wright, proprietor, at $1 per 
annum— a quarto of 8 pages, well filled with 
original and selected matter. We wish it a useful 
and prosperous career. 



Acknowledgment. 

We received from H. J. Smith, Esq.,— who is 
already distinguished for the superiority of his 
fruits and vegetables,— specimens of six varieties 
of Raspberries— Allen's Hardy, Antwerp Red, 



Scientific American. 

There is no one paper to which we are more 
indebted for valuable articles, with which to 
enrich our own pages, than to the Scientific 
American, and there is none, therefore, that can 
have higher claims to courtesy at our hands, or 
in whose prosperity we take a deeper interest. 
It gives us pleasure to insert its prospectus be- 
low, by which it will be seen that important 
improvements and considerable enlargement 
are in contemplation. Now is the time for new 
subscribers to enter their names: 

NEW PROSPECTUS 

OK THE 

SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN. 

enlargement. 
Vol. 1., No. 1— New Series. 

The Publishers of the Scientific America* 
respectfully announce te their readers and the 
public generally, that, on the first day of July 
next. (1859), their journal will be enlarged and 
otherwise greatly improved ; and at that time 
will be commenced "Volume I., No. 1 — New 
Series," which will afford a more suitable op- 
portunity for the commencement of new sub- 
scriptions than is likely to occur again for many 
years. 

The form of the journal will be somewhat 
changed from what it now is, so as to render it 
better adapted for binding and preservation ; 
and instead of eight pages in each number, as 
now, there will be sixteen, and in a completed 
yearly volume the number of pages will be 
doubled to 832, or 416 more than now. 

The Scientific American is published at a 
price which places it within the reach of all; 
and as a work of reference for the Workshop, 
Manufactory, Farm and Household, no other 
journal exceeds or even equals it in the value 
and utility of its information. Its practical 
rectpes alone oft-times repay the subscription 
price ten fold. Inventors will find it, as hereto- 
fore, the mirror of the Patent Office, and the re- 
liable record of every claim issued weekly by 
the Office, the li^t being officially reported for 
its columns* 

With the enlargement of the Scientific Ameri- 
can, we shall be enabled to widen the sphere of 
our operations, omitting none of the features 



436 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER 



[July 



which now characterizes it, but adding many 
new ones, which will render the work more 
valuable to all classes of the community than it 
has heretofore, among which is the devoting of 
space to B Trice Current, and a column or two 
to the Metal and Lumber markets, and such 
other branches of trade as may be interesting 
and useful. 

The increased outlay to carry out our design 
of enlargement will amount to eight thousand 
dollars a year on our present edition; and in 
view of this we appeal to our readers and friends 
to take hold and aid in extending our circula- 
tion. Think of getting, at our most liberal club 
rates, a yearly volume containing about 600 
original engravings and 832 pages of useful 
reading matter, for less than three cents a week! 
Who can afford to be without it at even ten 
times this sum? 

Two Volumes will be issued each year ; but 
there will be NO CHANGE IN THE TERMS 
OF SUBSCRIPTION, as the two yearly volumes 
together will be Two Dollars a Year, or One 
Dolrar for Six Months. 

Club Rates: 

Five Copies, for Six Months, ... $4 

Ten Copies, for Six Months, . - - - $8 

Ten Copies, for Twelve Months, - - $15 

Fifteen Copies, for Twelve Months, - $22 

Twenty Copies, for Twelve Months, - $28 

Southern, Western and Canadian money or 
Post-office stamps, taken at par for subscriptions. 
Canadian subscribers will please to remit twen- 
ty-six cents extra on each year's subscription, to 
pre-pay postage. 

For all clubs of Twenty and over, the yearly 
subscription is only $1 40. Names can be sent 
in at different times and from different Post- 
offiees. Specimen copies will be sent gratis to 
any part of the country. 

When you order the Scientific American, be 
careful to give the name of the Post-office, 
County, ami State, to which you wish the paper 
sent. And when you change your residence, 
and desire your paper changed accordingly, 
state the name of the Post-office where you 
have been receiving it, and that where you wish 
it sent in future. 

MUNN & CO., 
Publishers and Patent Agents, 
No. 37 Park-row, New York. 



Fruit-Trees, Shrubs and Evergreens. 

We are indebted to Messrs. W. M. Hoyt & Co. 
for a handsome pamphlet of forty-eight pages, 
containing their descriptive catalogue of Fruits, 
Trees, Shrubs, Evergreens, etc., cultivated and 
for sale at the East Avenue Nurseries, East 
Avenue, corner of Clover Street, two miles east 
of Rochester, New York. 



The Conservatory Journal, 

A beautiful specimen of neatness in its exe- 
cution, printed at Boston, and edited with taste 
and ability, "will be issued every other Satur- 
day, on a folio-medium sheet. The paper is de- 
voted to establishing a Massachusetts Conser- 
vatory of Art, Science, and Historical Relics. 
It, therefore, will be published and freely circu- 
lated without regard to pecuniary gain. The 
Journal will thus receive a circulation that will 
place it before certain classes of society, both 
in the United States and in Europe, that no other 
single paper, however large its issue, can hope 
to reach." 

u It is intended to make the ' Conservatory' 
a first-class Journal of Art, Science, and Litera- 
ture. The subjoined are the European arrange- 
ments which we have completed ; and which 
will enable us to secure the most reliable and 
original information upon all matters pertaining 
to art, science, and literature on the other side 
of the Atlantic. 

" I. A foreign correspondence, furnishing a 
compendium of literary, scientific, and artistic 
information, from London and aris ; embracing 
the proceedings and transaciions of the various 
societies and associations ; intelligence of all 
the literary and artistic movements and topics 
of the day ; a report of the current conversa- 
tions and ' chit-chat' among literary and scien- 
tific circles ; also, notices'of new publications. 

"II. A consecutive transmission of the best 
London and Parisian artistic, literary, and sci- 
entific journals : also, regular exchanges of the 
best American art and literary journals and re- 
views. 

"We shall also be prepared to publish, from 
original sources, American intelligence of these 
departments ; and we have been promised lite- 
rary support from several distinguished writers 
in Boston and throughout the State. * * * * 

"As the expense of postage (particularly on 
those papers forwarded to Europe) is large, a 
few select advertisements will be accepted in 
order to reduce the burden of this extra 
charge. 

u The subscription is One Dollar ; a price 
which will barely cover the prime cost of pa- 
per and printing. All the other work will be 
freely given ; and from those who are familiar 
with the laborious and onerous duties connected 
with editing a journal, we may expect both 
mental and pecuniary sympathy in a practical 
form."- 



1859.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER 



437 



From the. British Farmer's Magazine. 

The Principles that should Guide the 
Farmer in Breeding Stock, with more 
especial reference to Houses. 

A quarterly meeting of the members of 
the Wen lock Farmers' Club was recently 
held, at the Raven Hotel, Much Wenlock, 
to hear Mr. Griffith Evans, of Bridgnorth, 
deliver a lecture upon " The principles that 
should guide the farmers in breeding stock, 
with more especial reference to horses." 

In the absence of the President, the Rev. 
H. R. Smythies was called to the chair. 

The lecturer began by contrasting the 
present Shropshire-down sheep with their 
ancestors thirty years ago, and he showed 
how that the great improvement had been 
made by breeding upon some scientific prin- 
ciples. Yet he was persuaded that many 
follow the new system who are not acquaint- 
ed with the principles. They do it because 
it is the fashion, and answers the purpose 
better — not knowing the why and the 
wherefore it should answer better. He 
should therefore draw their attention to Na- 
ture's laws of breeding. The same law is 
applicable to all animals, only, of course, 
requiring certain modifications which their 
good sense might easily direct. It is a la- 
mentable fact that horse-breeding is very 
much neglected throughout the country, 
especially hunters and carriage horses; nor 
has the draught horse had the attention he 
deserves. He (Mr. Evans) should, there- 
fore, more especially point out how to apply 
the principles of breeding to horses than to 
other animals. Mr. Robert Smith, in his 
excellent "Report on the Exhibition of 
Live Stock at Chester," published in the 
last volume of the Royal Agricultural So- 
ciety's Journal, says that " The breeding of 
the horse is a national subject, but as yet 
has not been treated as such. There is a 
want of system in our arrangement and 
management." He quite agreed with Mr. 
Smith. Our fairs are overstocked with 
horses, but so shapeless that it is difficult to 
say for what purpose most of them are 
adapted. He thought he might safely say 
that the average value of four-fifths of our 
four-year-old horses, of all sorts that we see 
in the fairs, is hardly £20 to £25, and it is 
difficult to sell many of them at any price. 
Now, taking into consideration their cost of 
breeding and rearing, with all risks and so 
on, no wonder, then, breeders say they do 



not pay. The average value of the re- 
maining one-fifth it is difficult to say ; but 
they sell readily for from £40 up to almost 
any amount you can reasonably conceive. 
Now, I ask those breeders who complain, 
why do they breed horses at all ? " Oh," 
they say, " to consume the grass properly 
we must have cattle, sheep, and horses, too, 
— they all differ in their bite so." Very 
well, then, if you breed horses of some 
sort, why don't you breed good ones ? Does 
an ill-shaped horse consume less food than a 
good one ? Is it cheaper to breed poor 
than good horses ? My motto is this al- 
ways : " If it is worth my while to do a 
thing at all, it is worth my while to do it as 
well as I possibly can ;" and I have no hes- 
itation at all in saying that it would pay 
you as well as anything to breed real good 
horses. Some of you may perhaps say, as 
I have heard others say, that in breeding 
cattle and sheep you are seldom disappoint- 
ed; the progeny is always what you ex- 
pected ; while in breeding horses you have 
no idea what the colour or shape of the 
colt will be until you see it, it is quite a 
lottery. It may be this : it may be that. 
You hope the best, and the worst will dis- 
appoint you; for you do not believe in 
horse-flesh. Thank you, my dear friend, 
that is a candid confession at any rate, 
which goes so far as to prove that you have 
never practised horse-breeding upon right 
principles. Before I came here I lived in 
Lincolnshire. There, good horses are com- 
paratively plentiful ; much better than those 
bred in Shropshire, taking all together. 
You excel in sheep ; I wish you to excel in 
horses, too ; I wish to see dealers flocking 
from all parts of the world to Shropshire 
for horses. I wish to see the tide turned 
from Lincoln and Horncastle fairs to 
Shrewsberry and Bridgnorth; or, at any 
rate, to see the trade as strong here as 
there. It is not impossible ; the country 
is naturally well adapted for breeding pur- 
poses; you only want the system. Don't 
despair, a patient perseverance will over- 
come all difficulties. Let us all, then, this 
evening, enter into the subject in good 
earnest, determined to sift the matter tho- 
roughly, and to profit by the investigation. 
He went on to notice that the first great 
law of nature in breeding is, that like 
should produce like ; if it was not for this 
law, which is constant and without excep- 
tion, a mare might produce a calf, a sow 



438 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[July 



produce a dog, a bitch produce a lamb, 
&c. ; but it must be accompanied in our 
mind with another law, tho law of varia- 
tion. The child is not always like its pa- 
rent in every respect, and sometimes not 
like its species, as when a lamb has two 
heads or six legs, &c, as we often find. 
Then we call it a monster. This diversity 
forms the problem of hereditary influence, 
and it is for the causes of, and reasons for, 
the variation that the breeder must en- 
quire, and make himself acquainted with, 
so that he may, as far as possible, modify 
them. One of the causes of variation is 
what is called " breeding back." It is of- 
ten a source of disappointment to the 
breeder that when he puts a well-formed 
female and a well-formed male, he gets an 
ill-formed colt or calf, and of quite a differ- 
ent colour to what he expected. If you en- 
quire into the pedigree of the parents you 
will find the child answering in every re- 
spect to the description of an ancestor. 
This is the law of atavism. It is this that 
makes many say that horse-breeding is a 
lottery. However, if you breed properly 
you have little to fear. Pure and thorough- 
bred animals comparatively seldom breed 
back, or disappoint their owners in doing 
so. By thorough-bred is meant those 
whose ancestors were for a long time of 
the same shape, and adapted for the same 
purpose as themselves. The more the ani- 
mals have been crossed the more subject 
are they to breed back, and more the dif- 
ference in shape in crossing the more likely 
is breeding back to prove a disappointment. 
A case was related to illustrate this law. 
How is it to be explained ? The " West- 
minster Review" very properly says, " It 
is to be explained on the supposition that 
the qualities were transmitted from the 
grandfather to the father (the other sex 
may convey it equally well,) in whom they 
remain latent or were marked by the pres- 
ence of some antagonistic or controlling in- 
fluence, and thence transmitted to the son, 
in whom the antagonistic influence being 
withdrawn they manifest themselves. Mr. 
Singer, let us say, has a remarkable apti- 
tude for music, but the influence of Mrs. 
Singer is such that the children, inheriting 
her imperfect ear, manifest no musical talent 
whatever. These children, however, have 
inherited the disposition of their father in 
spite of its non-manifestation ; and if, when 
they transmit what in them is latent, the 



influence of their wives is favourable, the 
grand-children may turn out musically 
gifted. In the same way consumption or 
insanity and other hereditary diseases seem 
to lie dormant for a generation or more, 
and in the next flashes out with the same 
fury as of old." This should make you 
very careful in breeding stock, and to as- 
certain that not only the sire and dam are 
free from spavin, curbs, &c, but that their 
ancestors were not subject to any heredi- 
tary affection, and not only that they were 
free from hereditary evils, but that they 
possess the same good qualities, and are 
adapted for the same purpose as them- 
selves. Several very beautiful, instructive, 
and interesting illustrations were produced 
to prove that diseases arising from accident, 
as well as constitutional idiosyncracy, curious 
tricks, acquired habits, vicious and peevish 
tempers, as well as good tempers, &c, were he- 
reditary, or transmissible from parent to off- 
spring. Now comes the vexed question, 
" Which has the predominating influence on 
the progeny, the male or the female parent ? 
If both parents join to form the child, does 
the parent give one group of organs and 
the other parent another group; or do both 
give all ?" This subject is so very inter- 
esting, and it is so important, that the 
breeder should come to some definite con- 
clusion upon it, that he felt justified in oc- 
cupying a considerable part of their time 
in its investigation. Several great men 
were mentioned who maintain that the male 
parent furnishes the external configuration, 
or, in other words, the locomotive organs ; 
while the female parent gives the internal 
or vital organs, each absolutely independent 
of the other. Other equally celebrated ob- 
servers declare that it is quite the reverse, 
the female preponderates always in the lo- 
comotive organs, and the male in the vital 
organs. Others again, equally as eminent, 
assert that both theories are wrong ; that 
the male always gives external configura- 
tion or locomotive organs, and the female 
the internal or vital organs, but do not mean 
it to be inferred that either parent gives 
either set of organs uninfluenced by the 
other parent, but merely that the leading 
characteristics and qualities of both sets of 
qualities are due to the male on the one 
side and to the female on the other, the 
opposite parent modifying them only. He 
(Mr. Evans) believed they were all wrong 
— that the truth lies between them. He 



1859.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER 



439 



related many very beautiful and interesting 
facts in support of each theory, which seem- 
ed conclusive in themselves ; but he main- 
tained it was not fair to look at one set of 
facts alone, and shut our eyes to others. It 
was by an impartial survey of them all that 
we get the truth. There was an able ar- 
ticle upon this subject in the Westminster 
Review, with which he fully agreed, which 
says, " That both parents are always repre- 
sented in the offspring ; and although the 
male influence is sometimes seen to pre- 
dominate in one direction, and the female 
influence in another, yet this direction is 
by no means constant, is often reversed, and 
admits of no absolute reduction to a known 
formula. We cannot say absolutely, the 
male give such organs ; we cannot even say 
the male always predominates in such or 
such a direction. Both give all organs. 
Sometimes one predominates, sometimes the 
other. In one family we see children re- 
sembling the father, children resembling 
the mother, and children resembling both.?' 
He (Mr. Evans) knew many breeders who 
had suffered great disappointments and 
losses by practising upon the theory that 
the female does not give the external con- 
figuration, nor has any part in the locomo- 
tive organs. One of the greatest curses in 
horse-breeding is that there are but few 
good brood mares kept. He had no hesita- 
tion in saying that, as a general rule, and 
the only safe one to go by, the female has 
as much influence on the configuration of 
the progeny as the male has. The success- 
ful breeder never uses a middling female 
to breed from, trusting to the excellency of 
the male to make amends. If he has not 
a good female he will not attempt to breed. 
Seeing, then, that there is a diversity, that 
sometimes the influence of the male parent 
predominates, and sometimes the females, 
in each system of organs, let us inquire 
into the causes. Several illustrations were 
brought forward to prove that it depended 
upon potency of race, upon the vigour, 
health, and age of the parents at the time 
of copulation. The most potent or vigor- 
ous parent will have the greatest influence 
upon the offspring. The lecturer said, I 
shall now pass on to notice more particular- 
ly the practical application of these laws. 
It is a common but silly question, " Which 
breed of animals is the best for the far- 
mer f" Some advocate short-horns, others 
advocate the long-horns, others the medium- 



horns, and others will have no horns at all. 
A particular kind is sometimes advocated 
under all circumstances to the exclusion of 
all others. Such persons remind me of 
those disputants about the true colour of 
the chamelion ; all are right, and all are 
wrong, depending upon the point from 
which the object is examined. That breed 
of animals is the most profitable which is 
best adapted to that particular locality. 
One class does better on upland, others on 
lowland ; some do better grassing, others 
do better housed. It also depends upon the 
demand of the neighbouring markets. In 
some parts cheese-making pays best; in 
other parts milk ; in other parts meat, &c. 
In some districts it pays better to breed 
draught horses, in others hackneys and 
hunters, in others race-horses, in others po- 
nies, &c. What I wish to impress deeply 
upon your mind is this: Every breed 
has its own peculiar conformation, and that 
conformation you will find, upon close in- 
vestigation, to be peculiarly well adapted 
for a particular purpose ', and when you 
adopt and cultivate a certain breed, you 
must always keep that purpose and that 
conformation steadily in view. If you lose 
the conformation, you will soon lose the 
purpose. For instance, we may divide cat- 
tle into two primary classes : 1, For fatten- 
ing and arriving at early maturity ) 2, For 
dairy purposes. For illustration, take two 
cows, one from each class, and you will find 
their shape or conformation diametrically 
opposed. Go to any herd you please, and 
you will find that just in proportion as the 
animals represent the shape of class 1 so 
are they disposed to fatten ; and in the 
proportion they represent class 2 are they 
fit for dairy purposes. These classes may 
again each be divided into different divis- 
ions : A is better adapted for high land ; 
B is better adapted to low land ; C is bet- 
ter adapted for out-door living ) D is better 
ter adapted for living in-doors, and so on. 
Each division has its own distinct peculi- 
arity of external conformation. That en- 
ables us to say at once which will do here, 
and which will do there. It is all-impor- 
tant that the breeder should be thoroughly 
acquainted with these " points/'' or proper 
shape of his stock ; but I should depart 
from my subject if I discussed them this 
evening. However, I know many farmers 
who think that there is only one proper 
shape for the horse — draught horses, hack- 



440 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[July 



bulk of bone and 
height and length. 

slender and finer, and the cart- 
As I know 



neys, hunters, racers, all should be the same 
outline. They take the hunter as a standard 
of comparison, and the only proper differ- 
ence they allow between him and others is 
not in the shape, but in the weight and 
muscle within the same 
The race-horse should 
be more 

horse stouter and more hairy, 
that such a notion exists, you will permit 
me to say a few words, to show its absurd- 
ity. It is surprising how few farmers know 
the proper points of a horse j and many of 
the " knowing ones," in fact, know less 
than nothing. In that excellent journal, 
the Farmers' Magazine, for October, 1836, 
there is an article upon the cart-horse, ad- 
vocating the same oblique shoulder, for the 
draught and for the hackney-horse, which 
is certainly a most ignofantly absurd and 
grossly fallacious doctrine. We may also 
divide horses into two primary classes : to 
carry weights on their back, and go fast j 
and to draw weights after them. It is evi- 
dent that they are destined for very differ- 
ent purposes, and must set to work in a very 
different manner. The first-class has to 
carry the rider safe at a fast rate. For this 
purpose the fore-legs ought to reach over 
much ground when in motion, and the sad- 
dle should be so set that it will not inter- 
fere with the motion of the shoulders ; and 
the weight should be so carried that it will 
not balance over the fore-legs, and make 
him tumble forward. The chief points to 
attain this are, that the withers and fore- 
hand should be high and thin. The 
shoulders should have much obliquity from 
the top to the point, and a line drawn ver- 



when a horse is not able to pull or start a 
load, to jump on his neck or withers, and 
by the weight overbalancing him, the load 
starts easily. The proper shape of the 
draught-horse, in contradistinction to the 
saddle-horse, then, should be a low and 
thick fore-hand and withers. The shoulder 
should be comparatively upright, and con- 
sequently the line drawn vertically from the 
point of the shoulder will fall considerably 
in front of the toe. The draught-horse 
should, as the saying is, " stand over his 
legs," and you now see that what is an ex- 
cellent point in one horse is the worst that 
can be for another. Class 1 may be di- 
vided into — A, the race-horse for galloping ; 
B, hunters, for galloping across country, 
and jumping, &c; C, hackneys, for trotting 
and cantering on the road. Class 2 may 
also be divided into — A, the town dray- 
horse ; B, the farm dranght-horse, (both 
pull heavy weights and go comparatively 
slow ;) C, £he carriage-horse, (he goes on 
the road, pulls heavy weight, and must go 
fast, therefore in many respects his shape 
should approach the saddle-horse.) I have 
already said that I should be out of place 
in dwelling upon the proper shape of ani- 
mals — it would form a subject for an inter- 
esting lecture of Itself. I now merely draw 
your attention to the fact that there is a 
peculiar shape adapted to perform any par- 
ticular work, and it is essential that the 
young man should make himself thorough- 
ly acquainted with those before he can ex- 
pect to be a successful breeder. Starting, 
then,' upon the great law of nature, that 
like produces like, and being prepared to 
guard against variations by breeding from 
tically from this point should drop at the] animals of the same sort, &c, breeding good 
toe when the animal stands in his natural ! stock becomes a simple matter of course, 
position. The second-class has* to pull First ascertain what animals your land is 
heavy weights at a slow rate, therefore, its best adapted for. Secondly, what have the 
shape should be quite the contrary to the | readiest sale in your markets. Thirdly, 
first-class. The animal should be able to! having decided upon the purpose of your 
throw its whole weight into the collar, and animal, study the best shape and conforma- 
to overbalance its centre of gravity, so that tion calculated to attain your object in a 
it has to step forward to avoid coming: most perfect manner; if you wish to breed 
down. When the hackney or saddle-horse j fat stock, study the shape most disposed to 
is in the collar he cannot pull a weight be- lay on fat with the least food, and to arrive 
yond the power of its hind-quarters. The at early maturity; if you wish to breed 
shape of its fore-quarters rather prevents milk cows, study the proper shapes for 
than help him to pull ; while the draught- ' them ; if you breed horses, study the pro- 
horse, by the peculiar shape of his fore- [per shape to perform their various duties, 
parts, is able to throw his whole weight into 'Fourthly, don't breed from an animal, whether 
the collar to assist the muscles of the hin- male or female, whose shape is not well- 
der-parts. It is common with waggoners, I adapted to perform the work it is intended 



1859.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



441 



for : let them be of the most perfect shape 
you can get of their kind. Fifthly, being 
acquainted with the law of attavism, or 
breeding back, you will not be satisfied un- 
less their ancestors were also of the same 
sort, and equally good ; in fact, thorough- 
bred, and free from hereditary evils. Re- 
member that I do not confine the term tho- 
rough-bred to the race-horse. It may be 
equally well applied to the cart-horse, or 
hunter, or pony, or carriage-horse, &c. It 
means those whose pedigrees for a consid- 
erable time back were of the same class, 
and adapted for the same purpose as 
themselves. Unless you commence to 
establish a new breed you should never 
breed from a half-bred animal. Let 
them all be castrated, and treat all such 
mares and geldings. There is two much 
risk connected with it; it is based upon a 
wrong principle ; you should carry the 
right principle out thoroughly. Why should 
you breed from a half-bred mare more than 
from a half-bred cow ? I know many ex- 
cellent horses bred from half-bred mares, 
but there are many more failures. Some of 
you may say that you have no pure or tho 
rough breeds except racers ; therefore, you 
ask how can you avoid crossing. Well, 
"it is never too late to mend." Suppose 
Messrs. Bakewell, Adney, Smith, and other 
eminent breeders, had listened to such an 
excuse? We never should have had the 
improved Leicester sheep, nor the improved 
Shropshire down. Though you may not 
have good distinct breeds of coach-horses, 
hackneys, &c, now, you may seon have by 
following the directions I lay down. Un- 
less breeders will reform, that useful animal 
the hackney will soon become extinct. The 
present system of breeding hunters and 
coach-horses is a bad one ; because by put- 
ting a race-horse to a half-bred mare you 
may get a good hunter, and you often fail ; 
you may get a hack, you may get a useless 
one. By putting a hunting-horse to a 
Cleveland mare, you may get a carriage- 
horse, or you may often get one good-for- 
nothing. You have no law to depend upon. 
By breeding exclusively from animals of 
the same shape, and, therefore, adapted for 
the same purpose with careful attention to 
pedigree, you may easily establish a breed 
for any purpose whatever. At first, when 
originating the breed of hunters and car- 
riage horses, of course we cannot avoid 
using crosses or half-bred animals, and such 



'was the origin of the race-horse. They 
will soon bear the name thorough; and 
when, in after generations, a progeny will 
show the original cross, by breeding back, 
it must not on any account be used for 
breeding purposes. I should recommend 
you to breed from your own stock exclu- 
sively, only as long as you cannot find a 
better male than your own, and your stock 
improves. I do not object to a cautious 
admixture of blood, but you must not cross 
the breed. I do not object crossing two 
families, but those families must be of the 
same breed. That word " breed" is very 
comprehensive, and has many different 
meanings. By those of the same breed I 
wish it to be understood those of the same 
shape and adapted for the same work, with 
good pedigree. They may or may not be 
related. For example, you must not breed 
between a thorough-bred draught-horse and 
a thorough-bred hunter or racer. You 
would get a good-for-nothing mongrel, too 
weak for draught, too ugly for harness, and 
not the shape for saddle ; yet our fairs are 
overstocked with such animals, which prove 
that the present system of breeding is a 
wrong one. I can countenance no crossing 
of the breeds. Keep them distinct. Have 
thorough-bred draught-horses, thorough-bred 
hackneys, thorough-bred hunters, as well as 
thorough-bred racers. Each has its own 
peculiar shape, suitable for its particular 
purpose. Why should they be mixed ? As 
to the qualities of the brood-mare, there 
are some peculiarities essential for all 
breeds. She must be what is called roomy, 
allowing sufficient space to carry a foal, and 
for its passage into the world. For this 
purpose the carcase should be long, and the 
back ribs deep, the pelvis or hips should be 
wide and deep. The forehand is usually 
lower in the mare than in horses of the 
same kind. This, as Stonehenge observes, 
" gives the whole framework of the trunk 
a larger proportion than is always desirable 
in the race-horse, which may easily be over- 
topped ; and here many good runners have 
failed as brood-mares, whilst a good num- 
ber of bad runners have been dams of good 
race-horses. Beyond this roomy frame 
necessary as the eggshell of the foal, the 
mare only requires such a shape and make 
as is well adapted for the peculiar purpose 
she is intended for. It is better to bree4 
from animals of a medium size of their 
kind, whether male or female, not too big, 



442 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[July 



nor too small." To ensure the mare being 
stinted she should be perfectly healthy, and 
living as much as possible in a state of na- 
ture ; not overfed with corn, but rather 
have cooling diet, unless she is poor. Fat- 
tened animals often prove barren. The 
best time for covering is when the heat 
commences. If convenient it is often re- 
commended to do so a second time when 
the heat passes off. " Like the brood- 
mare," says Stonehenge, "the stallion re- 
quires several essentials, commencing also, 
like her, 1st with his blood ; 2ndly, his in- 
dividual shape ; 3rdly, his health ; 4thly, 
his temper. But there is this difficulty in 
selecting the stallion, that he must not only 
be suitable, but he must also be adapted to 
the particular mare which he is to serve. 
Thus it will be manifest that the task is 
more difficult than the fixing upon a brood- 
mare, because (leaving out of consideration 
all other points but blood) in the case a 
mare only has to be chosen, which is of 
good blood, for her particular work ; while 
in the other there must be the same atten- 
tion paid to this particular, and also to the 
stallion's suitability to the mare, or to 
" hit" with her blood. The rock upon 
which most men split is a bigoted favourit- 
ism for some particular horse ; thus one 
puts all his mares to Birkenhead, another 
to Hunting Horn, although they may every 
one be of different blood and form. Now 
this cannot possibly be righf, if there is 
any principle whatever in breeding; and 
however good a horse may be, he cannot be 
suited to all mares. Some say that any 
sound thorough-bred horse will do for a 
thorough-bred mare of the same kind, and 
that all is a lottery ; but I hope you now 
perceive that there is some science required 
to enable the breeder to draw many 'prizes. 
That the system generally followed of late 
is a bad one, I am satisfied, and with the 
usual and constant crossing and recrossing 
it is almost a lottery; but upon proper prin- 
ciples and careful management, there would 
be fewer blanks than at present. We can- 
not expect to find a perfect mare nor a per 
feet horse; there is some' "if this," or 
"but that" in all them. The breeder, 
however, must be particularly careful that 
both should not be faulty in the same place 
— that both should not have the same ob- 
jection — and whereon one is deficient the 
other must be unusually developed. In 
thus matching his mares the judgment of 



the breeder is proved, that they may " hit" 
well. The same rule of course applies to 
all animals. Mr. Bell well observes, that 
" the importance of the influence of the 
sire in breeding horses is in no point more 
clearly proved than by the fact that the 
progeny of the most celebrated race-horses 
have generally sustained the reputation of 
their sires. Thus the descendants of 
Eclipse numbered no less than 364 winners, 
and those of Matchem, Highflyer, and 
other celebrated horses have partaken of 
the same inherited excellence. Sultan, the 
property of the Duke of Beaufort, which 
covered at £30 a mare after he was 20 
years old, Snap of the House, General, and 
Admiral of Ludlow, and not forgetting Sir 
Sampson, were celebrated stallions in this 
country 20 and 30 years ago ; and though 
they are long since dead, yet they now live, 
and are well known in their descendants. 
It is a remarkable fact that the first male 
put to a female, especially if he be potent, 
influences more or less the progeny of that 
female by subsequent males. A striking 
case of this kind was first published in the 
Philosophical Transactions. A splendid 
mare, seven-eighths Arab, had a mule by 
a quagga, in the year 1816, the mule bear- 
ing the unmistakable marks and stripes of 
the quagga. In the year 1817, 1818, and 
1823, this mare again foaled, and although 
she had not seen the quagga since 1816, 
her three foals were all marked with the 
curious quagga marks. Nor is this by any 
means an isolated case. Meckel observed 
similar results in the crossing of a wild 
boar with a domestic sow. Mr. Orton veri- 
fied this fact in the case of dogs, and poul- 
try. Mr. Merrick, in the Veterinarian, re- 
cords the experience of his groom, who has 
had the management of stallions for 14 
years, " that he has frequently noticed that 
well-bred mares, which had been difficult to 
stint with thorough-bred horses, have bred 
to an inferior, and subsequently to a tho- 
rough-bred stallion ; but her stock by the 
latter has frequently showed traces of infe- 
rior blood, not to have been expected from 
the breed of either the sire or dam. You 
will, therefore, bear in mind that it is es- 
pecially important that the first male given 
to a female should be well bred. I know 
that there is a foolish notion with some 
people about dogs, that the first litter is 
not likely to be good, therefore they allow 
the bitch for the first time to go about with 



1859.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



443 



any and every dog, little thinking the bad 
effect such treatment has upon future litters. 
In explanation of this phenomenon that 
eminent physiologist, Professor Carpenter, 
in his celebrated work upon " Human 
Physiology," writes : " Some of these cases 
appear referrable to the strong mental im- 
pressions left by 4 the first male parent upon 
the female ; but there are others which 
seem to render it more likely that the 
blood of the female has imbibed from that 
of the foetus, Ihrough the placental circu- 
lation, some of the attributes which the 
latter has derived from its male parent; 
and that the female may communicate these, 
with those proper to herself, to the subse- 
quent offspring of a different male parent- 
age." The same author also writes : 
" There seems good reason to believe that 
the attributes of the germ are in great de- 
gree dependent not merely upon the habit- 
ual condition of the parents, which have 
furnished its original components, but even 
upon the condition in which those parents 
may be at time of sexual congress. Of 
this we have a remarkable proof in the 
phenomenon well known to breeders of 
horses, that a strong mental impression, 
made upon the female by a particular male, 
will give the offspring a resemblance to 
him, even though she had no sexual in- 
tercourse with him. In conclusion, allow 
me to say that agricultural societies are to 
be blamed very much for the little atten- 
tion they pay to horses as compared with 
other stock, especially poultry. They ought 
to give liberal prizes to the brood mares 
and stallions of all breeds, and pay as much 
attention to them — they deserve more — as 
to cattle, &c. The best stallion should 
have to travel within the district of the 
society during next season, and not to re- 
ceive the prize until the end of that time. 
I must add that our great landlords gen- 
erally overlook the interest of their ten- 
ants, and consequently their own also, in 
not keeping good thorough-bred stallions, 
of different breeds, for the use of their 
tenants at a nominal charge. Farmers 
themselves also overlook their own inter- 
est too often by being " penny wise and 
pound foolish," in looking more at the 
fee of the horse, when they engage him, 
than at his shape. 



Examine your pickles, sweet-meats, and 
everything put away. 



Treatment of Peach Trees. 

R. Seamans, of Cccilton, Maryland, thus 
gives his plan of treatment of peach trees, 
which he cultivates on a large scale : 

" They should be carefully examined 
every year, and all the worms and ova de- 
stroyed. A shovelful of wood ashes thrown 
around the roots every spring is beneficial. 
When six years old, the soil should be cau- 
tiously removed for about two feet round 
the trunk, so as to examine the root. A 
strong wash of lime and some salt should 
then be applied to the top of the root at 
the trunk and for about eighteen inches 
above it, prior to which application the 
rough bark should be scraped off. The re- 
moved soil is left open for one week, then 
placed in its former position. A yearly ex- 
amination for worms, a rich soil, and care- 
ful cultivation, are all necessary for the 
prosperity of the peach tree. 



Extirpating Thistles from Grass Land. - 

To me there have appeared few things 
more extraordinary in the history of farm- 
ing knowledge than the perverse tenacity 
with which prejudice has so long preferred 
thef scythe to the roller in keeping down 
thistles. In the North Riding of York- 
shire, as far back as forty years ago, the 
roller was an approved instrument for de- 
stroying thistles in pasture grounds: and 
most effective it proved to be — the bruise 
and crush of the top of the plant extend- 
ing in mortification to the root. No doubt 
of it, the scythe makes a clean sweep — so 
does a surgeon when he cuts a leg oft'; but 
let a crushed leg remain attached to the 
body, and the undertaker will assuredly 
have employment. 



Pitch Phenomenon at Sea. 

While the bark Holla, of New York, 
was in the Gulf of Mexico, on May 4th, it 
passed through a scum of smoking pitch, 
which extended for several miles, and emit- 
ted a most nauseating odour. It was sup- 
posed by her captain (Mr. Rogers) to be 
thrown up by' a submarine eruption from 
some part of the bottom of the ocean. 
This, we think, is the true explanation of 
the phenomenon. There are extensive for- 
mations of mineral pitch in Cuba, Trinidad, 
and other West India islands, and no doubt 
there are beds of this material under the 
waters of the gulf. — Scientific American. 



444 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[July 



Reclaiming: Clay Soils. 

No subject can be more important to large 
districts of our country, than the reclaim- 
ing of clayey and other heavy soils. Among 
these we may name the red-kellis hard pan 
soils, ferruginous clays, ferruginous loams, 
etc. As to the first, in common with some 
of the others, we will not be disputed in 
the assertion, that when clayey or heavy 
soils are properly reclaimed, they are more 
valuable than lighter soils. The fact that 
they retain manures, requiring less in 
amount to raise crops, is alone a strong ar- 
gument in their favor. Their ability to re- 
peat a greater number of crops without ex- 
haustion, and their general adaptability to 
all crops instead of being suited only to 
special crops, add materially to their value. 

Clay soils are always more fully charged 
with the inorganic constituents of plants 
than light soils; and when once in the 
proper mechanical condition to avail of at- 
mospheric influences, insuring higher tem- 
perature and consequent chemical action to 
liberate phosphates, alkalies, etc., they form 
the most profitable farms. One of the pe- 
culiar properties of clay is to receive and 
retain ammonia, even against the effort of 
running water to remove it ; the formation 
of new chemical compounds with the divi- 
ded silicious matters pervading it in degree, 
as each grain surrounded by alumina pre- 
sents all its surface upon the slightest con- 
traction of the clay by drainage. No clay 
soil is entirely without sand, and in such 
soils the land may be viewed as miniature 
rocks, generally of diversified kinds, con- 
taining all the primaries of nature ; while 
in sandy soils the particles all arising from 
the same or similar rocks, do not supply 
so great a variety of pabulum for plants. 
Most clays, therefore, when in admixture 
with the other materials which go to make 
up a soil, have a greater variety of constitu- 
ents, are in better Condition for improve- 
ment than other soils. Their compact con- 
dition requires amendment, however, befbre 
their advantages can be availed of. 

First — Under-drain them thoroughly; the 
redundant water being parted with, the clay 
contracts and a series of pipe-like openings 
first occur ; these permit a more thorough 
circulation of atmosphere, which in turn di- 
vides these pipes into lesser portions, like 
broken and partially ground tobacco pipes ; 
the adhesive property of the clay is now 
lessened, and sub-soil plowing ameliorates 



k 



it materially. Fall plowing by ridging and 
back furrowing, leaving the surface like a 
succession of inverted letter V's, permits 
the freezings and thawings of winter to 
ameliorate still further their condition; 
these ridges split in the spring by a double 
mould-board plow, and then cross-plowed, 
give a kindly soil, capable of being used 
even for garden purposes. The day has 
passed when farmers suppose that clay soils 
retain manures because they will not pass 
water. They now know that water heavily 
ladened with any matters in solution, if w ( 
filtered through sand containing only one 
per cent, of clay, will be rendered pure, the 
clay retaining all the matters before held in 
solution. They also know that all the gases 
are received and retained by clays ; and, 
therefore, manures decomposing in clay soils 
can neither filter downward in solution, or rise 
into the atmosphere as gases, and for these f 
reasons the clay soils retain manures. If " 
clay has such properties, it has always had J 
them, and during all time clayey soils havf 
been storing up Nature's treasures ; put 
them in proper mechanical condition to per- 
mit roots and atmosphere to percolate them, 
and they will furnish food to plants. 

All the above remarks apply to all the J" 
kinds of soil named in the opening of this 
article. If deleterious matters are contain- 
ed in them, as in the copperas clays, the ad- 
mission of atmosphere renders these foreign 
substances the more soluble, and while the 
clay retains all matters required by plants, 
it freely parts with such solutions as are un- 
friendly to vegetation. The red-kellis sub- 
soils fall to pieces as soon as under-drained 
and sub-soiled plowed, and in doing so yield 
up potash in abundance. 

We dug a well sixty feet deep seven 
years ago through this red kellis, blasting 
all the way, and the kellis seeming to be 
solid sand-stone. When exposed to the at- 
mosphere for a few months, it fell to pieces 
and made a soil worthy of being used as 
a manure on many other soils. — Working 
Farmer. 



to 



Deep Plowing— When to do it. 
I am a practical advocate of deep plow- 
ing, having been engaged for several years 
past in deepening my farm, and having 
found it more profitahle to add to my land in 
this way than by buying more acres. My 
deed runs down to the centre of the earth, 
and I mean to make the most of it, and I 



\\ 



859.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



445 



iavc found that this also gives me another 
.dvantage, for the deeper I get my farm, 
he higher my grain grows, so I gain in 
10th directions, and by this means I reckon 
've got at least thirty per cent, more availa- 
»le space than formerly; at any rate my 
cventy dollars per acre land would now 
►ring me ninety dollars — but I hav'nt got 
o the bottom nor top of it yet, and I mean 
o stick to it. 

I have found by experiment that it is 
•est to run the plow deeper when raising 
ats and winter grain, rather than when 
ireaking up for corn. 

Corn is an aristocratic plant as you might 
mow by its tasseled head, silk gloves, and 
3ng ears, and like such gentry it must have 
;ood nursing in the beginning, and the best 
iving the land will afford. It sends its 
oots about, near the surface where it can 
ind plenty of food, and where they can 
;row comfortably near the warm surface, 
f you plow deep enough to turn up the 
old and hard subsoil, the seed planted at 
he usual depth will germinate where they 
oeet With a cold reception, especially if 
he season be wet. Scarce any crop seems 
o be more benefitted by an early start, or to 
•e more injured by a slow, painful growth in 
n the commencement. The young plants 
eem to be discouraged, and not having 
brce enough to dig down to find a good 
iving, they are apt to grow up sickly. 

In cultivating this crop I have, therefore, 
>ractised turning up all the soil, gaging my 
>low to run just on the subsoil, and let the 
:orn have the full benefit of the manure 
,nd clover which were plowed under. The 
:rop is followed with oats, which can stand 
, cold and wet soil better. Then I drive 
he plow deeper, about an inch, as you re- 
:ommended in your last number. The soil, 
nellowed by the previous hoed crops, gives 
he oats a good chance, and they bear the 
ubsoil mixture on the top quite well. The 
bllowing crop with me is rye and seeded 
lown with clover and timothy, especially 
he former. Now I give the gage another 
urn, and bring up say another inch of sub- 
loil, and the rye and the clover dig for 
heir living — and mine — most admirably. 

. « ■• • > > 

dotation and Deep Soil—A Corn Expe- 
riment. 

Regular rotation of crops and deep plow- 
ng are working wonders upon some of the 
)ld and long-worn farms of New England 



In the discussions before the Maine State 
Board of Agriculture, which met at the 
seat of government in January, many of 
the delegates bore striking and uniform tes- 
timony to the value of both these practices, 
especially upon land* that had been cropped 
hard. One of the members mentioned a field 
of fifteen acres, "badly bound out," which 
was plowed three inches deeper than ever be- 
fore, and after an application of three bush- 
els of plaster of Paris, produced a yield of 
600 bushels of oats This is forty bushels 
to the acre. Another reported a yield 82 
bushels shelled corn per acre — 56 lbs., to 
the bushel, from a field similarly treated. 

Results very much like these could be 
obtained from many of the old fields in 
Kentucky, which now grow nothing but 
sedge and briars, if deeply plowed, and the 
application of plaster were substituted by a 
generous quantity of barn-yard manure or a 
compost of which the base should be stable 
dung and scrapings from the woods. 

We have our mind's eye now upon an 
old field twelve miles from Louisville, which 
was treated in this manner three years ago, 
and gave a yield of corn in return that much 
more than paid expenses. Without further 
preparation it was seeded to grass, sown 
upon the corn stubble, and will this season 
be more than fair pasture or meadow, for one 
or the other of which it is designed. The 
corn in this experiment was manured in 
the hill. 

Our farmers complain of the great labor 
and heavy cost of such experiments. But 
such complaints are without reason. Every 
farmer who keeps merely two or three 
horses, four or, five cattle, a half dozen 
hogs, if he will only litter his stalls, pens 
and .barn-yard, with the cheap litter afford- 
ed by the woods a short distance from his. 
dwelling-house, in quantities enough to fur- 
nish his animals with comfortable bedding, 
he can have every year, by planting time 
in the spring, a mountain of compost such 
as we have described that will perfectly as- 
tonish his own eyes. 

So much for the cost of that part of the 
experiment. It really costs nothing, for it 
will pay for itself in the increased comfort 
supplied to his stock, and the diminished 
quantity of food necessary to carry them 
through the winter. As for the labor and 
expense of hauling out, that is not very for- 
midable, when you post up and look the 
thing right in the face. 



446 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[July 



In the instance to which we have referred, 
after the field was checked off for the seed, 
a two-horse wagon and three men manured 
four acres per day — giving to each hill a 
large shovel full of the compost. The ac- 
tual expense in this case was probably two 
dollars per day, but in any case would not 
be over four dollars, or one dollar per acre. 
Without the manure, the old field might 
possibly have yielded 25 bushels to the 
acre ; with it, it yielded about 40 bushels. 
Difference, 15 bushels, which, only at 33$ 
cents per bushel, is $5. 

All this is clear gain, for the cost of haul- 
ing out and applying the manure is fully re- 
paid by the condition in which the crop left 
the ground for grass. 

After this field has lain in grass two or 
three years, it will probably be turned over 
for another trial, and we will then speak of 
it again. — Louisville Journal. 



Subsoil Plowing. 

Before commencing spring work it will 
be well to consider which lands should, and 
which should not be subsoiled. 

From the days of Jethro Tull until with- 
in the last twenty-five or thirty years, the 
farmers of England were content, in com- 
mon with those of other countries, to stir 
the immediate surface of the soil, and were 
not aware that a greater depth of disturb- 
ance would produce a larger and better re- 
sult. Indeed, it was generally believed that 
the whole matter which went to fertilize 
plants, belonged to the immediate surface, 
or that portion known as loam — a name 
given, until very recently, to the disturbed 
portion only — which, by the combined influ- 
ences of the sun, air, and decay of vegeta- 
tion, changes its color. The fact that the 
components of the soil beneath these points 
were all to be found as part of the inte- 
grants of plants was scarcely known, and 
still less so that they could not be absorbed 
by them, and thus go to make up the struc- 
ture, until acted on by a series of influences 
caused by atmospheric contact and the 
presence of humidity ; not the result of 
stagnant water. Liebig first exposed the 
true value of the inorganic substances of 
the soil, or those parts which were not the 
immediate result of plant decay ; and farm- 
ers slowly yielded their long cherished be- 
lief that the black portions of the soil 
alone could make plants. These new doc- 



rise to the use of a subsoil plow, 
which, without elevating the subsoil to the 
surface, disturbed it in places, and permit- 
ted a free circulation of atmosphere be- 
tween its particles. The deep cuts made 
by the plow also acted in degree as under- 
drains, and permitted, under some special 
conditions of surface — such as the slope 
of hills, etc. — redundant water to pass 
way. Air necessarily entered, and chemi- 
cal changes occurred; the surface of the 
particles of the subsoil were soon condi- 
tioned so as to sustain roots, and the 
passed into it to a greater depth than h: 
been before known. These, in turn, 
sorbed from the subsoil larger quantiti 
of inorganic matter, rendered soluble 
chemical changes consequent upon mois 
ure and air. The constituents were take 
into the plants above, and portions not 
marketable as crops, decay in the upper 
soil, adding to the greasy, unctuous, organic 
matter new portions of inorganic food for 
future crops. Plants had longer roots as 
well as greater number of fibres, and larger 
crops was the consequence. The decay of 
these roots in the soil left tubes to great 
depths; the atmosphere could come in 
laden with gases, resulting from vegeta- 
ble decomposition required by plants ; rains 
and dews, which was the nitrogenous exha- 
lations of all organic nature from the atmos- 
phere, descended into the subsoils, which 
gradually changed color so as to make deep 
loamy soils in localities where before only 
sparse, shallow-rooted crops could be grown. 
All this was heard of by the American far- 
mer long before he was awakened to action; 
and even now, when every truly practical 
farmer owns a subsoil plow, he can tell you 
of some neighbor who cautioned him against 
its use, and who insisted that the deep dis- 
turbance of his soil would let all the ma- 
nure filter downward ; that, if that were 
true, every well would be the receptacle of 
the results of decay, every spring would be 
a cesspool, and every rivulet but an organic 
charnel-house. Nature, in the wisdom of 
her laws, has rendered the carbon and 
alumina of the soil, after proper exposure 
to atmospheric influences, capable of re- 
ceiving and retailing all the results of de 
cay ; and the value of a farm must depend 
upon the depth to which its surface by dis 
turbance is, rendered capable of performing 
this peculiar function. 

Thoroughly subsoil-plowed lands soon be 



1859.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



447 



come capable of deeper surface plowing, 
without injuring the crops ; and if under- 
drained, which is but the perfection of the 
very principles presented in the theory of 
subsoil plowing, then all the mechanical 
conditions necessary for maximum results 
are secured. And when these exist, the 
chemical conditions follow as a natural con- 
sequence. 

Among the advantages arising from sub- 
soil plowing may be enumerated the follow- 
ing : The value of land for agricultural 
purposes is doubled ; the relative amount of 
manure required, as compared with the 
amount of produce, lessened ; the farm is 
essentially protected from the effects of 
drought ; all future labor of the farm is ma- 
terially lessened, and thus the expenses of 
teams, the wear and tear of agricultural im- 
plements, are all decreased, while the quali- 
ty of crops, and their quantity, are so aug- 
mented that, per bushel or per pound, they 
take a preference in every market. 

It has been said, and probably with truth, 
that if the subsoil plows and underdrains of 
England had not been introduced up to this 
time, the area of land under cultivation 
could not have sustained her population. 
Fifteen years ago there was not in the State 

of , as many subsoil plows as there are 

now foundries for casting them ; and when 
a friend of the writer first introduced the 
subsoil plow he had not a neighbor who had 
seen one. We suppose this may be said of 
farmers in every county in the United States 
within the last twenty-five years. 

Harper's Weekly. 

A Hole in the Pocket. 

A great many men have a hole in the 
pocket, and so loose all the little change 
they put in And the worst of it is they do 
not know it — if they did, they could mend 
up the hole and so put an end to the loss. 
Every day they are minus a few dimes, and 
they wonder how they come so short. When 
bills are to be paid they cannot imagine how 
they came to be so short of change. At 
the end of the year they are surprised to 
find so poor a footing up. They work hard, 
rack their brains on plans, and still they do 
not get ahead much. Bills accmulate, in- 
come diminishes, and still they do not dis- 
cover the hole in the pocket. 

One man has bad fences, gates and bars. 
The cattle break through every now and 
then and destroy crops, and occupy time in 



driving them out. The pigs creep through 
the holes. The geese find many entrances. 
The horses get away. The boys and men 
and servants and dogs are kept on the run 
after rougish cows and jumping horses and 
climbing hogs. The stock becomes uneasy 
and does not thrive. The crops are injured. 
The fences are often broken down. Time is 
consumed. The trouble is — that man has a 
hole in the pocket. One man has no sheds, 
nor barns, nor grainries, nor tool-houses. 
His hay and grain he stacks. His vegeta- 
ble he buries. The rain spoils much of 
his hay. His grain is much injured and 
wasted. The rats eat his corn; and the 
damp weather moulds it. His potatoes rot. 
His pumpkins are destroyed. His apples 
do him but little good. His tools are rotted 
and rusted in the open weather. His stock 
is chilled and stunted for want of shelter. 
His trouble is a hole in his pocket, out of 
which slips all his profits, much of the fruits 
of his hard labor. 

One man has poor plows of the senile 
stamp of his ancestors. He only skins the 
land with it. He can't afford a modern 
plow. He don't believe in sub-soiling. 
Draining is the nonsense of scientific fools. 
Drills are a humbug. Deep plowing would 
spoil the land. So he plows and sows as 
his grandfather did, on the worn-out soil 
of his venerable ancestor. He has a hole 
in his pocket, and will have till he takes 
up to the importance of good tools and 
good culture of himself and soil. 

One man don't take apaper; can't afford 
it; has no time to read; don't believe in 
book-farming ; likes the old ways best ; de- 
nies all the stories he has heard from rumor, 
about large cattle and crops and profits ; 
doesn't believe in new notions. For forty 
years he has planted his corn on the same 
ground ; sown wheat in the same field ; pas- 
tured the same land and mowed the same 
meadows. He has heard of "rotation of 



crops, 



but doesn't know what it means nor 



cares to know. A bad hole has this man 
in his pocket. 

And who hasn't got a hole in his pocket ? 
Reader, haven't you ? Look and see. Is 
there not some way in which you let slip the 
dimes you might better save ; some way in 
which you waste time and strength and 
mind ? If so, then you have a hole in your 
pocket. Indeed, many a man's pocket is 
like a seive. Whose pocket is a treasury, 
safe and sure ? — Valley Farmer. 



448 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[July 




The Blind Boy. 

An editor, from whose selections we take the 
following lines, has beautifully said, that for him- 
self he could not see to read them through. 

It was a blessed summer's day; 

The flowers bloomed, the air was mild, 
The birds poured forth their tender lay, 

And everything in nature smiled. 

In pleasant thought I wandered on, 

Beneath the deep wood's simple shade ; 

Till, suddenly, I came upon 

Two children who had thereto strayed. 

Just at an aged beech-tree's foot, 

A little boy and girl reclined; 
His hand in hers he gently put — 

And then I saw the child was blind. 

The chidren knew not I was near — 

The tree concealed me from their view- 
But all they said 1 well could hear. 
And could see all that they might do. 

" Dear Mary,'' said the poor blind boy, 

"That little bird sings very long; 
Say do you see him in his joy, 

And is he pretty as his song !" 

"Yes, Willie, yes, replied the maid, 

"I see the bird in yonder tree," 
The poor boy sighed and gently said, 

" Sister, I wish that I could see !" 

'•The flowers, you say, are very fair, 

And bright green leaves are on the trees, 

And pretty birds are singing there, 
How beautiful to one who sees! 

" Yet. I the fragrant flowers can smell, 
And I can feel the green leaf's shade, 

And I can hear the notes that swell 

From those dear birds that God has made. 

" So, sister, God to me is kind ; 

Though sight, alas, He has not given; 
But tell me are there any blind 

Among the children up in heaven?" 

" No, dearest Willie ; there all see : 

But why ask me a thing so odd?" 
"0, Mary, He's so good to me, 

I thought I'd like to look at God." 



Ere long, disease his hand had laid, 
On that dear boy so meek and mild, 

His widowed mother wept and prayed 
That God might have her sightless child. 

He felt her warm tears on his face, 
And said, " O, never weep for me, 

I'm going to a bright, bright place, 
Where Mary says I God shall see. 

"And you'll come there, dear Mary, too, 
But, mother dear, when you come there, 

Tell Willie, mother, that 'tis you — 
You know I never saw you here!" 

He spoke no more, but sweetly smiled, 
Until the final blow was given ; 

When God took up the poor blind child, 
And opened first his eyes — in heaven. 



Water Music. 

'Twas in summer — glorious summer, 

Far beyond the smoky town, 
Weary with a long day's ramble 
Through the fern and blooming bramble, 

Needing rest, I sat me down. 
Beetling crags hung high above me, 

Ever looking grandly rude; 
Still there was some trace of mildness 
In this scene so weird— -its wildness 

Might be sought for solitude. 

Birds and flowers, songs and beauty, 

Seemed this rugged realm to fill ; 
That which was my soul entrancing 
Was the music and the glancing 

Of a rock born plashing rill. 
Lingering there, I was delighted, 

Musing on the day gone by, 
Watching its bright spray pearls sprinkled, 
Every silvery tone that tinkled 

Touch'd some chord of memory. 

'Twas as if sweet spirit voices 

Threw a spell around me there; 
Now in lightest notes of gladness. 
Now in deeper tones of sadness, 

Waiting, whispers to my ear. 
Memory, hope, imagination, 

Seemed to have usurp'd my will; 
And my thoughts kept on a dreaming 
'Till the bright stars were a gleaming, 

To the music of the rill. 

What a world of strange reflections 

Carne upon me then unsought ! 
Strange that sounds should find responses— - 
Where e'en mystery ensconces — 

In the corridors of thought! 
Then emotions were awakened, 

Making my heart wildly thrill, 
As I lingered there and listened, 
While the dew around me glistened 

To the music of the rill. 



SOUTHERN PLANTER.— ADVERTISING SHEET. 



ALEXANDRIA, VA., 

IMPORTERS AND DEALERS IN ALL KINDS OF 

FERTILIZERS, 

Have received their SPRING SUPPLIES, and offer for sale— 

No. 1 PEKUVIAN GUANO, 

Put up iii bags.) furnished and branded by tlie Agents of the Peruvian" Government 

COLUMBIAN GUANO, 

In bags and barrels, a very excellent Manure, rich in Phosphates, as will appear from annexe 1 * 
Analysis by Dr. R. H. Stabler, 

Organic Matter, yielding Ammonia, 14.55 

Water • < . 



Phosphate of Lime 

Magnesia. . , , 

Sand and other insoluble matter. 



,00.88 
, .10 
,15.92 



SOMBRERO GUANO. 



100 



In calling the attention of the public to the recently discovered deposit of this valuable ferti- 
lizer, we will merely state) that like all other phosphatic GUANOS, its most valuable constituent 
is phosphoric acid, or bone phosphate of lime ; and that its mercantile value as compared with 
Other GUANOS of its kind, may be easily determined by the amount of phosphoric acid or bone 
phosphate of lime it contains. In order, therefore, to give the public a thorough knowledge of 
What SOMBRERO GUANO does contain, we beg to refer to the following list of eminent chemists 
in different parts of the world, who have analyzed different cargoes, from average samples taken 
by themselves from the cargoes just as they arrived from the island, without drying or selection 
of specimens for analyzation. Each analysis will be exhibited, if required, under the original 
signature of each chemist named. 

Of pkosphoric acid, estimated as equivalent to phosphate of lime, it is found to contain 

per cent. 
79.70 
79.31 



By Prof. Morfit, of New York, 
" Piggot, Baltimore, 



Hayes, Boston, 


of 1st sample 


, 89.60 


it II 


2d 


•( 


89.20 


Reese, Baltimore, 


1st 


u 


85.14 


II li 


2d 


ii 


86.60 


It II 


3d 


•« 


72.04 


(( i( 


4th 


" 


72.04 


Chilton, New York 


, 1st 


" 


86.34 


(1 U 


2d 


" 


84.94 


Piggot, Baltimore, 


1st 


i; 


76.85 


Huson, Liverpool, 


Eng. 




80.20 


Deck, New York, 


1st 


" 


88.00 


•• (of a selected specimen) 


98.25 



per cent. 
By Pro f.Maupin&Tuttle, University of Va., 85.16 
Gilham, of Virginia Military Insti- 
tute, 81i 
" Stabler, Alexandria, Va., 79* 
" Booth, Garrett & Camac's (Philadel- 
phia,) analysis of three cargoes, 80» 
" Way, London, 71, 
Nesbit, " 79, 
" Voelcker, Royal Agricultural Col- 
lege, England, 75, 
" Leudet, Havre, France, 78. 
" Kindt & Toel, Government Che- 
mists, Bremen, 78. 
u Johnson, Yale College, 80.26 
Thus proving that the value of this GUANO is not determined by a selected chemist, or selec- 
ted specimens, or even selected cargoes, but an average of the inportations just as they arrive, 
and just as they are offered to the public for sale. 

And for a like array of eminent authority, promiscuously obtained from promiscuous cargoes in 
different parts of the world, we challenge a comparison with any phosphatic GUANO now for said 

A. A. & A. MEXICAN GUANO, in barrels. 

BONE DUST, of best quality, in barrels. 

SUP. PHOSPHATE OF LIME, 

Manufactured by POTTS & KLETT. and COE & CO., warranted equal to any ever offered to the 
Farming community. 

Analysis by Dr. R. H. Stabler. 

Soluble Phosphate of Lime 37.00 

Sulphuric Acid. . , 11,00 

Organic Matter 29 10 

Water 22.90 



ap '59 — 3t 



100 



SOUTHERN PLANTER— ADVERTISING SHEET. 



Corner of Grace and Foushee Streets, RICHMOND, VA. 

The next Session of this Institution will open on the FIRST DAY OF OCTOBER, 185^ 
and close on the First Day of July, 1859. 

TERMS FOB THE SCHOLASTIC YEAR, 



$200 

20 

6 

40 

20 

40 
20 



For Board, .»■'«• 

For Washing, - 

Fur Lights, 

For English Tuition, 

For Modern Languages, (each,) 

For French, when studied exclusively of 

the English branches, 
For Latin, • 

For Music on Piano, Harp, Guitar, Or- 
gan or Singing : 

For one lesson (of an hour) a week, 

REFERENCES: 

The Patrons of the School. — Right Rev. Bishop Meade, Right Rev. Bishop Johns, Right Re 
Bishop Elliott of Georgia, Right Rev. Bishop Cobbs of Alabama, Rev. Moses D. Hoge, ] 
D., Rev. Charles II. Read, D. D., Rev. T. V. Mo .re, D. D., Rev. B. Gildersleve. The Clerji 
of the Episcopal Church in Virginia. 

DPAetrx,TX. 

HUBERT P. LEFEBVRE, A. M., Principal. 



40 



For two lessons (of an hour) a week, 
For three lessons (of an hour) a week, 
For four lessons (of an hour) a week 

For the use of Piano, 

For Drawing, from Models, 

For Drawing, from Nature, 

For Painting in Water Colors, 

For Oil Painting, 

Primary Department — for Children un 
der 11 years of age, 



$ 8i 
12 
16 

2 



3 



Rev. II. S. Kefpler, 
William G. Williams, a. m. 
John P. Little, M. D. 
R. A. Lewis, M. D. 

Eliodoro Camps, 



John A. Calyo, 
C. W. Thilow, 
W. F. Grabau, 
Mrs. A. E. J. Gibson, 
Miss Mary Gordon, 
MAD'ELLE L. VILLEMET, French Governess. 
All letters to be directed to Hubert P. Lefebvre, Richmond, Va. 



Miss E. Bartlett, 
Mrs. M. Taylor, 
Mad'me M. Estvan, 
Mad'elle Lacy, 
Charles H. Roseen, 



[July '58 — lyi 



P^IISTTS. PAINTS. FAINTS. 

PURCELL, LADD & CO., 

IDDElTTGi-GrlJSTJS, 

No. 122 Main Street, corner 13th, RICHMOND, VIRGINIA, 

Offer at low prices, a large and well assorted stock of articles in their line — embracing 

PAINTS, COLORS, VARNISHES, JILS, &C. 



J 

LEWIS' WHITE LEAD, 
NEW J. WHITE ZINC, Horsehead brand, 
CHROME GREEN, 
VERDIGRIS. 

TERRA DI SIENNA, 
LINSEED OIL, 



J 

MACHINE OIL, 
PARIS GREEN, 
CHROME YELLOW, 
TURKEY UMBKE, 
LAMP OILS, 
SPTS. TURPENTINE. 



All Colors for Painters, Conch Makers, and others, Dry and in Oil, Paint Brushes, Sand Paper, and a vi 

large stock of best 

WINDOW GLASS, 

omprising nearly every size made. We are also prepared to take orders for Imported 

Polished Plate, Sky Light and Ornamental Glass. 

13P 3 Particular attention to packing and forwarding all goods — mid the quality warranted. 

rURCELL, LAM) k CO, Druggists, 

June 1858. 122 Main Street. Rich mom