FARMERS' REGISTER— MISSISSIPPI AND CHESAPEAKE RAILWAY 427 



would it not have been much better, directly to 

 leave to A himself the choice of the modus operan- 

 di — in other words, of the particular method of 

 making the transfiir? He mio-ht sometimes pre- 

 fer beanng off the produce in his oivn belly, (as in 

 the case of all kinds of liuit,) rather than send his 

 stock to bear it off in theirs: or he might choose 

 to convey it away in bags, baskets, or wheel-car- 

 riages of some sort or other, either of wliich he 

 surely should liave been at liberty to do, if the pri- 

 vilege that he now enjoys Avas rightfully secured 

 to him. Again, as we liave under the law, this 

 unquestionable right to take (by the agency of our 

 stock as our tbrage-masters,) not only a l)art, but 

 the whole of the produce of other men's lands, 

 unless they will be at the expense and labor of 

 jn'otecting it by a tence fijlly hve feet high, Avhy 

 should this right to take what does not belong to 

 us, be thus most inconveniently limited? Whj' 

 confnie it to the immediate produce of land, and 

 to the taking by the mouths and teeth ol" our 

 stock? If land be really the most valuable species 

 of property, as it is universally admitted to be, 

 why should that which is of the greatest value be 

 held by a tenure less secure and exclusive than 

 that which is of the lesser value? In other words, 

 why should we enjoy privileges in regard to other 

 men's landed possessions, and not have similar 

 jirivileges as to their other kinds of property? 

 Why, tor instance, should our law compel every 

 land cultivator, who would enjoy the exclusive use 

 of that land, which the law itself so generally 

 calls his oivn, to make a fence around it fully five 

 feet high to jjrevent other people Irom using it, 

 and not also compel him to make all his horses, 

 his oxen, his cows, nay, his slaves likewise, of 

 some specified height, to prevent those v>'ho own 

 neither from using them also? It would be nothing 

 more than an extension of the same principle 

 which gives us stock-owners the right of raising 

 them on other people's land, and at their expense, 

 whether they consent to it or not. If the latter 

 privilege could justly and equitably be accorded to 

 us, no imaginable reason can be suggested why 

 the former should not also have been granted. It 

 must have been, we presume, what tlie lawyers 

 call a "casus omissus.'''' We therefore pray, that 

 j'our honorable bod}', instead of granting the peti- 

 tion oi" our adversaries, by repealing the present 

 law relative to enclosures, will so alter it as to sub- 

 ject to our use, every land-owner's horse, ass, ox, 

 cow, sheep, hog, or slave, until he will make each 

 of them such a standard height as yon may deem 

 most advantageous to us to establish. And we 

 farther pray, that another provision be inserted in 

 the new law, giving us the privilege of bearing 

 off, in whatever mode we please, any part, or the 

 whole of the produce growing on other men's 

 lands, instead of" restricting the method <o deporta- 

 tion in the bellies of our stock: provided the said 

 produce be not enclosed by a fence of the full 

 height of six feet, carpenter's measure, the pre- 

 sent standard of five feet having been ascertained 

 by long experience, to be quite too low for some of 

 our most valuable horses and cattle, which, from 

 unavoidable starvation at home, have been driven 

 to the necessity of learning to leap with incon- 

 ceivable ease, over all such paltry enclosures as 

 do not much exceed the height required by the 

 |ircsent law. This was passed, as we hope your 

 honorable body will remember, when lands -were 



cheap, plenty, and productive; when our stock 

 were not, as now, driven to theirwits' end, to gahi 

 an honest livelihood; and wlien a leap of five feet 

 high over another man's fence, was an achieve- 

 ment of far greater difficulty than one almost of 

 seven feet would now be. Justice, sheer justice, 

 consequently demands, that the law of enclosures, 

 if changed at all, should be so altered as to accom- 

 modate itself to the increasing exigencies of stock- 

 owners who have either no land at all, or not 

 enough to supjjort as man)' cattle as they wish. 



All which we respectfullj' submit to the wisdom 

 and patriotism of your honorable body. 



TO MAIiK TOMATO CATSUP. 



Boil tomatos, full ripe, in their juice, to nearly 

 the consistence of pulp, pass them through a hair 

 sieve, and add salt to the taste. Aromatize it suf- 

 ficiently with cloves, pepper and nutmegs. — Cul- 

 tivator. 



RAILWAY TO COKNECT THE MISSISSIPPI AND 

 CHESAPEAKE. 



Report of Col. H. S. Long, United States l^rpo- 

 graphical Engineer, to Gen. E. P. Ga'u\es,and 

 forioarded by him to the Columbia Rail Road 

 Company, with the accompanying letter. 



jimabbena, near Memphis, Ten., Sept. 4th, 1834. 



Gentlemen: — I take much pleasure in transinit- 

 ting lor your information a concise report of this 

 date by Col. H. S. Long, of the United States 

 Topographical Engineers, containing a brief ex- 

 position of the prominent features of the country 

 recently examined by him, through Middle Ten- 

 nessee, between Memphis and the Ifliite^s creek 

 Gorge of the Cumberland mountain, near Kings- 

 ton, East Tennessee — and of the principal difficul- 

 ties to be encountered in the construction of a rail 

 road in that direction — with a view to its extension 

 to Harper's Ferry on the Potomac, and thence to 

 Baltimore, Md., or Washington city, as well as 

 from some suitable point on said rail road, to Rich- 

 mond, Ya. 



The report speaks for itself. Emanating as it 

 does from an experienced head and sound heart, 

 devoted to the true interests and honor of our be- 

 loved country, it cannot fail to awaken the latent 

 energies and enterprise of our brethern and 

 neighbors of the hills and dales to be subdued and 

 decorated and enriched by the proposed great work 

 of internal improvement. 



It is scarcely necessary for me to add that, I 

 must cordially'concur with Col. Long in the views 

 which he has taken of the feasibility, importance 

 and expediency of the proposed work, and the 

 ways and means by Avhich it may be constructed 

 without burdening any citizen of the United States 

 with an oppressive, or even an inconvenient exac- 

 tion. I am moreover of the ojiinion that the work 

 mic-ht be and ought to be commenced in the ensu- 

 int^year, as soon as the surveys can be made, and 

 the best possible location ascertained: and that it 

 may be completed within the ensuing five years, 

 withoiit the imposition of a tax of one dollar on 

 any citizen, excejiting only the legally authorized 

 tolls for transportation on the rail road after its 



