16 



to g'ather information of the estimates really placed on them by our farmers and others, I am 

 fully prepared to say that no report, journal or other published matter, lias met. with so much 

 favor, or been of so much value to our people, as these. My office has become a kind ot 

 headquarters for both farmers and produce dealers, each striving to get a glimpse of proba- 

 ble future demand and supply, and I do positively knoio that the farmers whu have paid the 

 strictest attention to your reports during the past year have met with tlie best success in 

 their calculations. The government should, at the earliest possible moment, publish and 

 circulate them more extensively ; for they are, in d^ed and in truth, to the farmer what the 

 chart and compass are to the mariner — a guide to safety and prosperity. 

 " I remain, your obedient servant, 



"S. D. NORTON." 



The following extracts are taken from letters received a day or two since. 

 Many similar extracts could be given, but these are sufficient to show the prac- 

 tical utility of the monihly reports : 



"Whatfxy, Massachusetts, January 21, 1866. 



"Dear Sir: In accordance with a vote of the Whately Farmers' Club, passed at their 

 annual meeting on the evening of January 2, I hereby extend to you the thanks of the 

 club for the many favors received from you, more particularly for the regular receij)t of five 

 copies of your monthly report. The statistics Athich they contain are of immense value to 

 us, as a community ; especially so to all of us who are tobacco-growers. Many men sold 

 their crops for four and tiftern cents per pound — tliat is, four for tillers and fifteen for wrap- 

 pers, while those who heeded the facts given in your statistics (like myself) received twenty- 

 five cents per pound for the entire crop. 



"JAMES M. CROFTS, 

 " Corresponding Secretary." 



" Mt. Carroll, Carroll Couxtv, ///., 



" February 2, 1866. 



"Dear Sir : Please send me your monthly reports, if convenient. I would have gained 

 over §300 last summer in my sale of hogs, if 1 had seen your statistics of the number of 

 hogs in the country, but I did not until after the hogs were sold. 



"JOHNMACKAY." 



THE CANADIAN RECIPROCITY TREATY-OXCE MORE. 



A recent number of the New York Times contains an article exposing a 

 miserable deception practiced on the people of this country through the tables 

 showing the amount of the imports and exports of the trade under this treaty. 

 To understand aright tables of statistics much other infoi-mation is essential.' 

 Everybody knows the different notes in music, and everybody can look upon 

 a piece of music as easily as he can a column of figures ; but few can read 

 aright either. So, taking advantage of our miserable system of valuing imports 

 *and exports differently, our Canadian neighbors prepared tables showing the 

 imports and exports of the trade between the two countries under the recipro- 

 city treaty. The Times very truly remarks that "the only semblance of an 

 argument we have ever seen in favor of the existing system of reciprocity con- 

 sists in a recital of the aggregate trade," as exhibited by these tables. Biit the 

 Buffalo Board of Trade has exposed the deception concealed in these tables, by 

 exhibiting the widely different basis upon which the valuation of the exports ot 

 Canada and of our own have been made. It says : 



Thus, coal imported for the provinces is entered at an average per ton of $2 68 ; exported 

 to the provinces it is estimated at §5 30. Dried fish, imported, is rated at fi'i 90 per 100 

 pounds; exported at $4 60. Meats, iuiporled, are rated at $4 67 per J 00 pounds ; ex])orted, 

 $6 72. Flour, impcirted, $1 65 per barrel; exported, $'.i 82. " Onr coal," remarks the 

 Buffalo writer, "is estimated at twice the price ot theirs ; our fish at sixty per cent, higher 



