supplement. HISTORY OF AGRICULTURE. 1293 



Wales has been rapidly increasing in value in the home market. (Dr. Lang's Hist, and Statist. Ac- 

 count, ami Sturt's E.vpcd. into the Interior of Australia.) 



8040. Fruits and other vegetable products cultivated in the colony of New South Hales. Vims, 

 which are the most important of the fruit-hearing plants to a young settlement, have only been cultivated 

 a few years to any extent. " There are now, however, many acres of vineyard throughout the country ; " 

 and wine and brandy have been manufactured from grapes grown by Mr. Mac.irthur's sons at Cambilen. 

 The wine is very similar to the light wines ol France and Germany. Tobacco has been grown to great 

 extent, particularly on the rich alluvial lands, and is only inferior in point of manufacture. Olives, hops, 

 indigo, and opium, are beginning to be cultivated : the castor-oil tree (//icinus communis) grows luxu- 

 riantly, and oranges and all the genus Citrus, and figs and peaches, bear abundantly. The hedges to the 

 fields are generally formed of quince or lemon trees. There are several orange orchards, producing 

 annually from 12.000 to 20,000 dozen each. The fruit of the loquat ( Eriobotrya jap6aica) is sold in great 

 quantities in the Sydney market. Cotton, coffee, tea, and sugar have been tried, and found to answer, 

 though their cultivation has not yet been attempted on a larger scale. (Hist, and Statist. Account, vol. i. 

 p. 375. ) 



8047 — 1042. As a country for emigrants. During Sir Thomas Brisbane's administration, any respectable 

 person, who pledged himself to government to maintain and employ ten or twenty convict servants, 

 could obtain 100 acres for each such servant. This occasioned a great demand for convict labourers ; 

 and, instead of government being obliged to establish penal settlements in order to employ them, there 

 was, during the government of General Darling, ''applications for no fewer than 2000 convicts lying 

 unsatisfied at the office of the principal superintendent of convicts." There is no doubt that New 

 South Wales is an excellent country for the agriculturist ; but it is subject to some drawbacks. A season 

 of drought, which continued three years, began in 18^7, and it appeared from the statements of old 

 natives, that the country was subject to periodical visitations of that nature. It is also subject to inunda- 

 tions, particularly from the Hawkesbury River. From the imperfect state of husbandry throughout the 

 country and the fertility of the soil, much may, however, be done by an experienced agriculturist. For 

 eight months in the year, from March to November, the climate is delightful •, but during the Australian 

 summer, the heat is considerable. The most unpleasant part of the year is during the prevalence of the 

 hot winds. " These winds occur on an average four times every summer, and continue from twenty- 

 four to thirty-six hours at a time ; " the atmosphere feeling like a current of heated air from a furnace, 

 and the thermometer generally standing at from 00° to 100°, and sometimes even reaching Ii2° of Fah- 

 renheit. The extreme dryness of the air, however, prevents this degree of heat from being so intolerable 

 as it would be in a moist climate like England. The hot wind ii generally succeeded by a violent gust 

 from the southward, and very often by a shower of hail. (Vol. ii. p. 180.) Very few persons live to 

 attain old age ; but they generally enjoy excellent health and spirits while they do live. In short, 

 observes Dr. Lang, " the lamp of life in the salubrious climate of New South Wales is like a tapet 

 immersed in a vessel filled with oxygen gas ; it burns more brightly than in the common air. but it is 

 sooner extinguished." To persons possessing property to the amount of from 2000/. to 5000/., " New 

 Suuth Wales presents a most eligible prospect for effecting a comfortable settlement. They may put 

 out part of their capital at interest for ten per cent, on excellent security, and 1000/. will not only pur- 

 chase 1000 acres of land at 5s. an acre (the selling price in 1833), but will be amply sufficient to stock it." 

 (Lang's Hist, and Statist. Account, vol. ii. p. 200.) 



8048 — 1014. Ian Diemen's Land. This colonymay be considered as the most prosperous in Australia, 

 and the suitableness of its climate for Englishmen is every year more and more confirmed. " The colony," 

 Mrs. Prinsep observes (Journal of a Voyage from Calcutta to Van Diemen's Land), " contains every 

 source of wealth and health, in short, every thing but money. Interest on mortgages, with the very best 

 securities, is 15 or 20 per cent. Bank shares pay 10 per cent. There is no immediate prospect of any 

 cheek to that rise in the value of land which is now observable. Money well invested in land here, and 

 allowed to accumulate, will be tenfold its original value in fifteen years. 200/. would purchase a noble 

 property here. 1000/. will buy a fine, healthy, and beautiful estate of 1200 acres, 200 of them already 

 in cultivation, and the whole becoming more valuable every year. Corn and potatoes are exported tc 

 Sydney ; and wool to England. Wool averages 6rf. per pound. The whole colony is on the advance, and 

 its resources remain to be developed. Fresh lands are granted in square miles, in the proportion of the 

 square mile, or 040 acres, for every 500/. sterling of capital ; which is the largest grant that is made to 

 any settler without purchase, as the smallest is 320 acres. The total territory in acres is 15,000,0(10. of 

 which about one half is rocky, or thickly wooded ; tiie rest arable and pasture; the proportion of arable 

 being as one to six of pasture. The total number of acres granted to individuals, up to December, 1829, 

 is 1,323,523 ; consequently there are 13,07*1,447 unlocated acres." 



8040. The vool of Van Diemen's Land is of peculiar softness, and, from the greater attention now 

 paid to cleaning and packing, the price is rising. Wheat is of a very superior quality, weighing 

 generally about sixty, and sometimes as much as sixty-five pounds per bushel. Oats are beginning to be 

 raised ; barley has not yet succeeded ; peas, and other species of pulse, are plentiful. Skinsare also valuable; 

 seal-skins the most so, being worth about 25s. each in England. Kangaroo skins are essentially useful 

 in the colony for hats, and also for shoes! which are remarkably durable : when well packed, and of a 

 good size, these skins fetch nearly 6d. a pound in London. Shoemakers make 100 per cent, on the raw 

 material. (Cape of Good Hope Lit. Gax., vol. iii. p. 187. ; see Backhouse's Narrative of a Visit to the 

 Australian Colonies, 1843, 1 vol. 8vo., with maps and etchings.) 



8050.— 1054. New Zealand, from its climate, which resembles that of the south of England ; from its 

 soil, which is in most places good ; and from the inhabitants, which may be described as at least hall 

 civilised ; appears to be one of the most desirable countries in the world to which a native of Britain can 

 emigrate. (See Diejfenbach's New Zealand, 1813, 2 \ols. 8vo. ; Gard. Chron.. 1H40, p. 99. : Gard. Mag., 

 1843. pp. 126 and 325. ; and Butler's Emigrant's Handbook of Facts concerning Canada, New Zealand 

 Australia, Cape of Good Hope, tgc , 1843, 1 vol. I2mo.) 



Egypt. 



8051.— 1077. Egypt, under the government of the present pasha, is undergoing extensive political im- 

 provements, among which agriculture, Mr. St. John observes, is not altogether forgotten. The culture 

 of cotton has been commenced on a large scale by government ; and an extensive tract of country round 

 Cairo, which was long rendered useless by prodigious mounds of rubbish, many of them exceeding 

 seventy feet in height, has been cleared, the mounds having been levelled, and planted with olive trees, 

 which bore fruit the second year. The teak tree has been introduced from India, and is found to thrive 

 near Cairo as well as in its native country. The mango, the pine-apple, and other tropical fruits, hue 

 been tried; and there is an English garden of naturalisation, under the direction of Mr. Trail, an English 

 bo anist. On the whole, there can he no doubt, that, if the present comparatively liberal policy ol the 



Egyptian government be continued for another generation, the face of the country, and the conditi f 



its "inhabitants, will be entirely changed. Nature has supplied an excellent soil, and abundance of water, 

 under a climate sufficiently hot to mature the fruits of tropical countries, and yet not so much s .as 

 to prevent the grains of temperate regions from being profitably cultivated. I F. ypt and Mohammed Mi, 

 p. 443.) In Dr. Bowring's Report on Egypt, presented to parliament in 1810, that country is shown to 

 be making gigantic strides in civilisation, through the efforts of the present viceroy, Mahomet AH. 

 Agriculture is improving, though not verv rapidly. The principal agricultural produce of the country 

 is clover, corn, beans, barley, peas, and various other seeds. Watering is an essential element of culture 



