MANUFACTURES. 



605 



The following table, deduced from the above, will make the changes 

 that have occurred plainer : 



Table shoiuing. the Percentage Rate of Increase and Decrease {the latter marked 

 by *) in the Lumber Industry in South Carolina and in the United States, 

 in the two Census decades embraced between 1860 and 1880. 



The decade of war and reconstruction does not seem to have promoted 

 the lumber business as it did manufactures in general, and it was actually 

 disastrous to this industry in South Carolina, as shown by the decrease 

 during this period in the number of mills and in the capital, hands, ma- 

 terials and products of the industry. 



In the last decade, 1870 to 1880, however, the losses are much more 

 than recovered, and the rate of increase is much greater in each partic- 

 ular in Carolina than it is in the country at large. Next to the pine for- 

 ests, which cover 20,000 square miles in the lower part of the 

 State, and furnish the very best quality of yellow pine, the c}- 

 press is, perhaps, the most important timber tree in Carolina. The 

 lumber is light and durable, especially for outside work. The 

 tree is of rapid growth, and attains a great size, occupying swamps 

 and waste places. Whenever the timber supply is reduced to the 



