374 



NEW ENGLAND FAKMER. 



Aug. 



produce for four years, 140 bushels •wheat and 

 beans ; increased produce nearly fourteen 

 bushels a year. 



The Committees visited 135 farms where the 

 steam plough had been more or less used. In 

 all cases the depth of cultivation had been 

 nearly or quite doubled, and the general con- 

 clusion was that the crops were greatly in- 

 creased, and the cultivation was much cleaner 

 and better than under the more shallow 

 ploughing of horses. 



Several important points are brought out in 

 these Reports, but the effect of deeper cultiva- 

 tion is sufficient for our consideration at one 

 time. The amount of wheat per acre, under 

 English cultivation, is constantly increasing, 

 wh.le in this country it is steadily diminishing. 

 This subject is arresting the attention of the 

 wheat raisers on the prairies, and they are 

 wisely coming to the conclusion that the first 

 thing to be attempted is a deeper cultivation 

 of the soil. If they can find in the earth it- 

 self the means of enriching the surface, they 

 can continue for a time to raise their own 

 bread, perhaps until a more compact popula- 

 tion and a better system of stock raising and 

 keeping shall enable them to return to the soil 

 the maourial substances required to preserve 

 its fertility. 



CLASSIFICATION OF IMPORTED ■WOOL. 



The decision of Secretary McCulloch, in 

 relation to the classification of a certain lot of 

 East India wool, made last February, has ex- 

 cited alarms in the minds of many farmers, 

 and led to remarks by editors and correspon- 

 dents of agricultural papers which, it has ap- 

 peared to us, the facts have not fully justified. 

 In their haste and alarm, some have spoken of 

 this decision as proving the wool tariff "a 

 humbug and a snare," as "putting a damper 

 on all our fond hopes, and settling the question 

 as to any benefit we are ever to receive from 

 this tariff." Others have made it the occasion 

 of personal abuse of those who acted on the 

 committee appointed by the wool growers to 

 represent their interests in the commission 

 which framed the law. 



In an article in the Rural New Yorlcer of 

 June 12, Dr. Randall says : — 



The decision, stretched to the furthest limit, 

 does not embrace any extensive amount of wool 

 which can find a profitaijle sale in our markets. 

 Our greatly disturbed friend who si^ns himself 

 "An Ohio Wool Grower," is informed that the de- 



cision includes no "Australian wools," no "Cape 

 wools," no wools of Merino blood, "immediate or 

 remote," from any part of the earth — in short, no 

 wools whatever but "native East India [Hindostan] 

 wools of unmixed blood." It no more "overthrows 

 the wool tariff" than the detachment of two or 

 three bricks overthrows a solid edifice. 



The article from which this paragraph is 

 taken is accompanied by a lengthy correspon- 

 dence between the President of the American 

 Wool Growers' Association and the Assistant 

 Secretary of the Treasury, in relation to Mr. 

 McCulloch's decision, in which we see no evi- 

 dence that Secretary Boutwell has confirmed 

 that decision, nor that he has reversed it. 



Dr. Randall complains, and we think with 

 justice, that in making this decision, the wool 

 growers' committee, who had a hand in mak- 

 ing the law, were not consulted in relation to 

 Its construction. 



The Assistant Secretary of the Treasury, 



Mr. J. F. Hartley, submitted Dr. Randall's 



objections to this decision to Mr. Geo. W. 



Bond. In his reply, addressed to Mr. Hartley, 



Mr. Bond justifies the decision, and says : — 



I sent to the Custom House and obtained the 

 sample of Mr. Heye's wool, and compared it anew 

 with each of the No. 84 samples in the three cabi- 

 nets still in my possession. I found that each of 

 them contained wool more than one-half of which 

 was equal to Mr. Heye's, a small portion finer and 

 a small portion coarser, and I therefore declare 

 that the wool was properly classed as No. 3 by 

 that sample. I submitted these samples to Mr. 

 Daniel Staniford, than whom nu one in this city 

 holds a higher position as a wool broker, to Mr. 

 Anderson, an experienced wool manufacturer of 

 Lowell, and to Mr. Allen Cameron, a very intelli- 

 gent manufacturer of Graniteville, all of whom 

 concur with me in opinion and will be ready to 

 give a certificate to that effect if desired. Mr. 

 Baush, the Appraiser at New York, an excellent 

 judge of wool, I am aware did not think taraple 

 84 represented Mr. Heye's wool. This, I think, 

 was owing to the fact that the coarse part of that 

 sample in his cabinet happened to be at the mouth 

 of the cylinder. It was so when he called my at- 

 tention to it. 



Does this look as though even Mr. Bond 

 regarded blood as the exclusive principle of 

 classification? Here he refers to the charac- 

 ter of the samples, and not to race or "blood," 

 as the standard. 



Mr. Bond, as will be seen by the above ex- 

 tract from his letter to the Secretary, con- 

 sulted a wool broker and two manufacturers. 

 Dr. Randall states the claim of wool growers 

 to a voice In the matter in the following mod- 

 est terms : — 



Inasmuch as the facts (the relative qualities of 

 wools) on which rests the propriety of the pi oposed 

 change in the chissitication of Angora wools — and 

 of all oihcr wools which Mr. Bond or others may 

 attempt to get transferred from Class 1 to Class 3 



