PRODUCTION AND COMMERCE. 157 



considerably during ten years, being 21,509 hectares in 

 1863, and 20,918 in 1872, to which must be added the 

 newly annexed provinces of Alsace and Lorraine, which 

 bring up the total to 24,745 hectares. It appears that, 

 with particular regard to the year 1872, the cultivation 

 was carried on in 4067 different localities, by 94,916 

 taxable growers, and by 83,675 smaller growers, whose 

 production, owing to its limited extent, was exempt from 

 taxation. By far the larger number were small growers, 

 the area cultivated by each not exceeding an average of 

 10 ares. In Prussia the aggregate of land cultivated 

 during the year 1871 amounted to 5925 hectares, or 26 

 per cent, of the entire territory of the kingdom; the 

 aggregate yield of the harvest in the same year was 

 198,890 centners. It appears that the extent of tobacco- 

 growing land has, during the last fifty years, been 

 gradually diminishing in Prussia, and that accordingly 

 the expectations entertained in the beginning of that 

 period of a great future development of this branch of 

 agriculture have not been realized. The reasons for the 

 gradual decline are considered to be, on the one hand, the 

 growing competition of the South German growers, and 

 the increase in the importations of American tobacco ; on 

 the other hand, the fact that the cultivation of beetroot 

 for sugar, and of potatoes for distilling purposes, has 

 proved to be a more profitable business than tobacco pro- 

 duction. It has, moreover, been found by many years' 

 experience, that whilst the quality of the tobacco culti- 

 vated in most parts of Prussia is not such as to enable the 

 growers to compete successfully with the importers of 

 foreign, particularly North American sorts, the labour 



