582 REPORT OF THE COMMISSIONER OF AGRICULTURE. 
of the country, and to other countries wherever the United States have 
commercial relations. ‘ 
Preserving fruits by canning in hermetically sealed tin-cans was intro- 
duced a few years ago as an experiment, and succeeded so well that it 
has grown into an important business. It was begun in Baltimore on a — 
smal! seale more than twenty years ago, and that city still maintains its 
supremacy in this trade, having established a number of large factories 
for the purpose, and employs, during the canning season, great numbers — 
of men, women, and children in the various stages of the preparation of 
the fruit. 
There are now establishments of this kind in Michigan, Delaware, 
Tilinois, and other States, and all give evidence of increasing business 
and profitable results. Nearly every kind of fruit is now preserved by 
the canning process. 
The export of canned fruits, together with canned vegetables and 
meats, to foreign countries is largely on the increase, and, although con- 
sidered as merely in its infancy, has assumed a magnitude that brings it 
within the range of one of the most important industries of the country. 
Canned fruits and vegetables are held in high estimation in Hurope, for 
the reason that they can be supplied cheaper than fresh fruits and vege- 
tables, although the shipment of the latter is rapidly on the increase. 
Canned fruits exported in the year 1877 amounted in value to $762,344. 
The yearly aggregate of the export trade of canned goods, which includes 
meats and vegetables, ranges from 300,000 to 400,000 cases, averaging 
60 pounds each, in one, two, and three pound cans, making a total ex- 
port of 21,000,000 pounds, and valued at more than a million dollars. 
Large cargoes of these goods are shipped to Great Britain, France, Ger- 
many, Austria, Italy, Turkey, Russia, Norway, Sweden, Egypt, and 
Australia. 
American exhibitors of canned fruits at the recent exposition at Paris 
report unusual interest attached to their goods, and the receipt of many 
orders for the same on the part of dealers in Paris and elsewhere, 
which fact will result in a very considerable increase in the foreign con- 
sumption. 
Preserving fruit by drying in the sun is a practice in the countries of 
the East as old as the introduction of fruit itself. In France, Spain, 
Italy, Turkey, and Egypt this practice still prevails, and the figs, dates, 
prunes, currants, and raisins so largely imported are dried in these eoun- 
tries by this original method. In Normandy they dry the apple whole. 
Dried fruit, by the reduction of more than half the weight by the re- 
moval of water, is more easily transported, and thus prepared may be 
shipped to any climate and preserved perfectly for years. 
Former publications by this department have given in detail the 
methods of gathering, drying, and packing foreign fruits for ecommerce, 
and they need not be further mentioned here. 
This primitive method of drying fruit in the sun is extensively practiced 
in the United States. Everywhere throughout the Middle and Southern 
States may be seen at the farmsteads, in the early fall, rows of boards 
covered with sliced fruit and tilted up to the sun. It is thus prepared 
for home consumption or barter at the village store. Hiven the conven- 
ient little machine for paring and coring has not yet come into general 
use. The work is done entirely by hand by the women of the family. 
In New England the apples are pared, quartered, and then strung with 
a needle, after which they are huug on the sunny side of the house, or 
on a convenient out-building, to dry. In wet weather they are brought 
into the house and hung by the kitchen fire. Many families prepare a 
