2792. on the culture of madder. 107 
ON THE CULTURE AND USES OF MADDER. 
Asour thirty years ago, some efforts were made to intro- 
duce the culture of madder into this country: Premiums 
were offered for that purpose} and several treatises were 
publifhed, to turn the attention of the farmers to that im- 
portant subject,—but in vain. A few individuals, with a 
view to obtain the premiums, reared some of it; but in a 
fhort time the cultivation of it was abandoned; and for 
many years past the knowledge of this plant seems to 
have been lost among our farmers. 
The efforts at that time proved unsuccefsful, because 
the circumstances of the country did not afford a market 
sufficiently extensive for this article. Things are greatly 
changed since then, and the time seems now to be come, 
when it may be reared with profit, because the best of all 
premiums is now held out to the rearer, that of a ready 
market, at all times, for almost any quantity of it he can 
produce. 
At the present time the consumption of madder, in the 
manufactures of this country, is astonifhingly great: Not 
only is this substance employed by the dyer in great quan- 
tities, the calico printers consume a still greater quan- 
tity of it, as madder forms the basis of almost all the dark 
colours they make, so that the sums that are annually paid 
by Britain to foreign countries, for madder alone, are now 
immense; and as our manufactures increase, these sums 
must continue to augment more and more. 
In these circumstances, and seeing madder can be rear- 
ed without difficulty in this country, it surely behoves us 
to turn our attention to the rearing of it here ; not only 
because this would tend to benefit the farmer, but because 
it would tend, at the same time, to improve our manufac- 
