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our productions beyond the demand for them, both at home and abroad. 

 Instead of going on to make an useless surplus of them, we may employ 

 our supernumerary hands on the vine. But that period is not yet 

 arrived. 



The almond tree is also so precarious, that none can depend for 

 subsistence on its produce, but persons of capital. 



The caper, though a more tender plant, is more certain in its 

 produce, because a mound of earth of the size of a cucumber hill, 

 thrown over the plant in the fall, protects it effectually against 

 the cold of winter. When the danger of frost is over in the spring, 

 they uncover it, and begin its culture. There is a great deal of 

 this in the neighborhood of Toulon. The plants are set about eight 

 feet apart, and yield, one year with another, about two pounds of 

 caper each, worth on the spot sixpence sterling per pound. They re- 

 quire little culture, and this may be performed either with the plough 

 or hoe. The principal work is the gathering of the fruit as it forms. 

 Every plant must be picked every other day, from the last of June till 

 the middle of October. But this is the work of women and children. 

 This plant does well in any kind of soil which is dry, or even in 

 walls where there is no soil, and it lasts the life of a man. Toulon 

 would be the proper port to apply for them. I must observe, that the 

 preceding details cannot be relied on with the fullest certainty, 

 because, in the canton v/here this plant is cultivated, the inhabitants 

 speak no written language, but a medley, which I could understand but 

 very imperfectly. 



The fig and mulberry are so well known in America, that nothing 

 need be said of them. Their culture, too is by women and children, 

 and therefore earnestly to be desired in countries where there are 

 slaves. In these, the women and children are often employed in labors 

 disproportioned to their sex and age. By presenting to the master 

 objects of culture, easier and equally beneficial, all temptation to 

 misemploy them would be removed, and the lot of this tender part of 

 our species be much softened. By varying, too, the articles of cul- 

 ture, we multiply the chances for making something, and disarm the 

 seasons in a proportionable degree, of their calamitous effects. 



The olive is a tree the least knov/n in America, and yet the 

 most worthy of being known. Of all the gifts of heaven to man, it is 

 next to the most precious, if it be not the most precious. Perhaps 

 it may claim a preference even to bread, because there is such an 

 infinitude of vegetables, which it renders a proper and comfortable 

 nourishment, In passing the Alps at the Col de Tende, where they are 

 mere masses of rock, wherever there happens to be a little soil, there 

 are a number of olive trees, and a village supported by them. Take 



