18 MONTHLY JOURNAL OF AGRICULTURE. 



penetrating the kiln through the crevices at the outer ends of the light-wood, or 

 in any way interfering with its covered combustion. The embankment is thus 

 carried up nearly or quite as high as the light wood, and is in thickness from 

 one to two feet ; intended, effectually to exclude the air from entering the sides 

 of the kiln as it is burning. 



The upper surface is then to be prepared, with a similar view ; and to 

 reach it conveniently, a rude gangway is iirst made with long poles laid 

 side by side from the ground, the upper ends resting on the lop of the kiln : 

 a slope is given to them to make it easy of ascent, and is covered over with 

 turf, as it is to be in constant use while the kiln is on fire. The upper surface of 

 the kiln is to be turfed completely over with spits cut with the spade or hoe 

 from the adjoining ground, where small roots and fibres are most likely to hold 

 the earth together, and v/hich are to be carefully carried by hand to the top of 

 the kiln, and there placed in the best order and position to smother Uame ; therc- 

 ibre the fixing of the gangway or walk to the top is of importance. The surface of 

 the liffht-wood' being first completely covered with green boughs or with the dead 

 pine straw on the earth around it, it is thus turfed, save a small place of three 

 inches all around the rim of it, where the fire is to be applied, and a spot in the 

 center, about two feet over, that is intended to draw the heat and fire from the 

 circle toward the center. The turfing being finished, the kiln is ready for firing, 

 which is done on the top, and at the naked place left around the rim in turfing. 

 When the fire works well, all contiguous to this central place is well watched and 

 gradually lessened until the whole surface is charred when it is as well turfed over 

 as the rest, so that all liame may be entirely suppressed. Thus being fired, the end 

 of the trough in the tar-hole securely plugged air-tight, it must be constantly 

 watched, to keep under any outbreak of flame ; which, if permitted long, 

 would be dangerous and difficult of suppression. In the course of one or two 

 davs it will begin to " run " from the trough (when the plug must be removed) 

 into the tar-hole, which is usually spacious enough to contain ten or fifteen bar- 

 rels, and from which it is baled out into prepared barrels made pretty much after 

 the fashion of turpentine barrels, but with large bung-holes, into which a bucket 

 funnel is placed to fill the barrel. Then it is ready for market. It takes several 

 days for a kiln to" run off." According to size, from four to ten days, and during 

 all that time, it has to be attended or watched day and night by a vigilant, care- 

 ful man. Indeed it is a kind of vocation or trade to be a " tar-burner," as it is in 

 setting and burning brick. Tar is made in the same manner, from light-wood 

 boxed-ofl' from the cast-away turpentine trees as they stand, and it is no doubt 

 true that a man can make more tar, in a given time, from this light-wood than he 

 can from the thickest set light-wood on the surface. The coal from a tar-kiln 

 after it is run ofi" is very valuable, and is looked upon as the very best for smith- 

 works; they afi'ord a large number of bushels — a kiln of a hundred and fifty bar- 

 rels will give five to eight hundred bushels of the best kind of charcoal. 



I have thus, sir, at your pressing solicitation, given a narration of Turpentine 

 and Tar-making, not in polished or searched style and language, but. as you urged, 

 in a fireside-like conversation, and it is done only at spare intervals from various 

 mental and bodily engagements. I am not myself so well pleased with it as I think 

 I might be, if done with a mind more abstracted from other things. If it has 

 any merits, they are based upon experience ; having been myself pretty exten- 

 sively and constantly engaged in the making and distilling of Turpmuine for the 

 last ten years. Un])olished as the relation may be, it may nevertheless be of in- 

 terest to those general readers who are in constant pursuit of knowledge, and 

 who have but an imperfect idea of this branch of business, and it may be of deep 

 and abiding interest to many who live and were born here in tlie Southern Pine 

 forest. I myself have seen the time that I would cheerfully have eiven the price 

 of a volume of your valuable Library for information like this as a guide ; and 

 yet I was born and raised here in the " pine woods." As before remarked, the 

 Long-Leaf Pine forest presents a most interesting subject to the contemplation of 

 the patriot and philosopher, as well as a cheering scene to the eyes of the beholder, 

 and no lands afford a stronger evidence of the versatility of estimates than they do ; 

 for it is within the remembrance of the writer, who is not far in the decline of 

 life, when these lands were looked upon as scarcely worth owning, or paying 

 taxes on them ; while now, they are the most valuable of any, as well for farm- 

 iug as for their natural growth and production. The purification of a noxious at- 

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