349 



The imports of fertilizers into the United States were, in 1864: guano, 9,568 

 tons, worth $138,555 ; gypsum, 31,114 tons, worth §28,012 ; and a considerable 

 quantity of nitrate of soda, and other special fertilizers. 



European crops. — There is less than an average yield of cereals in France, 

 and a great activity has resulted in obtaining supplies from neighboring coun- 

 tries, followed by advances in the price of wheat. The English harvest, too, 

 is somewhat deficient. 



A promising indication of the future prosperity of the south, where a large 

 element of the population has heretofore dreaded more the necessity of labor 

 than the endurance of poverty, is found in the following extract from a letter 

 from Texas : 



"I would say, if you will promise not to tell any one, that there are some white folks here 

 that have actually gone to work." 



The amount paid for butter and cheese is scarcely realized. Consumption 

 has greatly increased, in ten years past, in both products. The imports of but- 

 ter alone, in 1865, into Great Britain, amounted to nearly thirty million dollars. 

 The people of the United States, on the other hand, exported, last year, 

 21,388,185 pounds of butter, worth $7,234,173, and 53,089,468 pounds of 

 cheese, worth $11,684,927. 



A correspondent in Lamar county, Texas, says : " The Reason has been a 

 peculiar one. I have been planting in this and the State of Mississippi for 

 nearly thirty years, and have never known as difficult a season to make a crop, 

 more rain has fallen in the last six months than I ever saw fall in any one year 

 before ;,but I do not attribute the failure to that cause. In the first place, our 

 lands were in a worse condition than I ever knew them, from the fact that 

 nothing but grain had been raised for several years, and owing to the troubles 

 of the country, planters had become very indifferent as to the cultivation of 

 their lands. In the second place, the change in the status of the laboring class 

 had a very decided effect upon the planting interest." 



A correspondent in Berkeley county, "West Virginia, reports a heavy acorn 

 crop, and says that much mast-fed pork wili be produced in that vicinity. He 

 reports a poor yield of hay, scarcely a sufficiency for home consumption and 

 none for market, but returns a product of 2,670 tons from 2,750 acres. Berke- 

 ley and Hampshire, between the mountains and the Shenandoah valley, are 

 fahijus for the production of grass and hay, as the flict above, in a year of partial 

 failure, would indicate. Clarendon, Arkansas : " The farmers have gone to work 

 with a hearty good will, and if the price of cotton continues remunerative, it 

 will require but a few years for the country, at least this section of it, to be re- 

 stored to its former state of prosperity." 



Wheat in Texas. — A correspondent at Honey Grove, Texas, says : " No 

 spring wheat is raised in this section, nor so far as I can learn in northern Texas. 

 The varieties principally raised are the smooth-headed JMay wheat, the Mediter- 

 ranean, and the old white wheat to a limited extent. The usual average of 

 wheat on the black lands of the above-mentioned counties is about eighteen 

 bushels to the acre, but although the prospect was very fine last spring, it was 

 blasted by the excessive rains. The quality, size, and weight of the wheat is de- 

 cidedly inferior to that of 1865. We usually sow wheat from the middle of 

 September to the first of November." 



Sheep. — De Witt county, Texas : " Sheep are beginning to receive their merited 

 attention. The assessor's roll for 1860 shows the number in this county at that 

 time to be only 5,618 head, while in 1866 it is estimated that they will 

 reach 50,000. The value in 1860 is put down at $15,945, in 1866 .at $59,989. 



