48 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



farm worth a thousand dollars, exempt from attachment and execu- 

 tion. It holds out an equal inducement to the man of capital. 

 Land can be cleared for $10 per acre, and an average crop will sell 

 for $20, and leave the land in condition to produce a handsome 

 annual income, with but little outlay. The short distance from 

 northern Maine to our extensive sea-coast, navigable rivers, and 

 immense water power, must forever give her citizens the important 

 advantages of cheap exports and imports, and a never failing market 

 for all the products of the farm. How unlike the farming in the 

 great west, where, although the soil is of great fertility, and easy 

 of cultivation, yet, the distance from market is so great as to con- 

 sume nearly, or quite its whole value, in transportation. The 

 dazzling prospects, so constantly held out by the great west to the 

 anxious emigrant, are very seldom realized. The bright side of 

 the picture is presented, and the dark one veiled. We hear of 

 nothing but beautiful fields of astonishing fertility ; of large sheep 

 and cattle, feeding in green pastures throughout the year, &c. But 

 the whole story is not told. Nothing is said about fever and ague, 

 almost poisonous water, venomous reptiles, and many other evils 

 entirely unknown in Maine. These facts are plainly proved by 

 those who have been there and returned, in disappointment, dis- 

 gust, and poverty. 



Mr. Lancaster said that nobody doubted that the virgin soils of 

 Maine were highly productive. He would not offer a word in 

 opposition to the eulogistic remarks in respect to nortliorn Maine 

 that had been offered. But he wanted to hear a little more of 

 central Maine. It was just to the older parts of the State to say 

 that there was probably little natural superiority of the Northern 

 over the Southern or Central. When the new lands should be re- 

 duced by cropping, as the old lands had been, they would also 

 need to be fertilized. There were peculiar advantages pertaining 

 to the old as well as to the new settlements. One afforded cheaper 

 lands and larger crops of particular kinds ; in the other, certain 

 crops were surer, the markets broader, and social privileges greater. 

 The same degree of economy would be followed by as valuable 

 returns, perhaps, in tlie old as in the new settlements. 



Mr. Anderson said llic hist remark contained the admission tliat 

 there was not the same degree of economy practiced in the old as 

 in the new settlements. There was a vast amount of idleness and 

 want of zeal incident to old societies, where drones were manufac- 

 tured. But as a general rule, only the earnest and industrious seek 



