389 
Bullock, Coffee, Chickasaw, Chambers, Monroe, and Macon. Drought 
is reported as the cause of reduced yield in several counties. 
The causes of injury in Mississippi are worms, drought, wet weather, 
and frosts. Late cotton will be seriously injured by worms in Grenada 
and Choctaw. In Hancock, Paris green was used successfully against 
the caterpillar. A frost, sufficiently severe to do some injury, is reported 
in several counties. Injury from wet weather‘is reported in Hinds,- 
Choctaw, and in other counties. 
The crop is injured in Louisiana very generally by drought—continu- 
ing in Jackson for ten weeks, causing rust, shedding, and premature 
opening; 75 per cent. of the product was in readiness for harvest at 
the first picking. The caterpillar is doing some damage to the top crop. 
A favorable season for picking is reported generally in Texas. Pick- 
ing is progressing very rapidly, and in some counties drought will 
reduce the length of the harvest period. The loss from drought is 
placed at 50 per cent. in Bexar. The top crop in Bell is nearly destroyed 
by grasshoppers, and in Dallas their injuries are serious. The boll-worm 
is reported in Red River and Rusk. 
Fine weather for picking, a heavy growth, a tendency to run to weed 
in rich lands, more or less injury from drought in light soils, and early 
ripening are indices of the state of the crop in Arkansas. The boll-worm 
has been destructive in several counties; more so than ever before in 
Franklin County. A frost occurred on the 1st of October. 
Late cotton has been injured by frost in Tennessee. The season has 
been fine for ripening and gathering, picking is one to two weeks early, 
and the harvest will be completed at an early date. 
Finally, the general harvest is more advanced than usual; the season 
is generally favorable for picking; the later pickings will be compara- 
tively light; the causes of injury are not unusually excessive, drought 
being somewhat prominent in the Gulf States, the September storms on 
the Atlantic coast, the caterpillar in Alabama especially, and the boll- 
worm in Arkansas. The season promises to be much shorter than last 
year; there is less vigor and thrift for future development of fruitage in 
case of a prolonged season like the extraordinary one of 1875. Though 
the indications of condition-reports of this Department up to October 
pointed to four and two-thirds millions of bales last season, there was 
proved to be a deficiency of lint to seed in the ginning, and other unfa- 
vorable indications, which would have limited the crop inevitably to 
four and one-third millions, but for a full month’s delay of killing frost 
in the Gulf States, fields being green in a large belt up to December 
8th. The future of the present season cannot make the crop a defi- 
cient one, but will determine how near to the large one of 1875 the 
result shall come. 
POTATOES, 
Returns from Maine indicate a fair crop in yield and quality, with 
the prospect of very remunerative prices. In the other Eastern, and in 
the Middle States, the condition was largely reduced by a general 
drought, beginning early in August and protracted into September. 
The beetle has injured the crop extensively in New York, and occasion- 
ally in all the other States of this section, except Maine. In Indiana, 
Pennsylvania, the crop is rotting badly in the gronnd; Elk had 
almost a failure in yield, with excellent quality; Lycoming, a like 
deficiency in yield with very poor quality ; Cambria, a large growth of 
. vines, but not more than 75 or 80 bushels per acre; Sullivan, small and 
