60 MONTHLY JOURNAL OF AGRICULTURE. 



the United States Agent at Vienna, and afterward, for the two succeeding ones, 

 to the kindness of an American Minister." Be it remembered, that this is un- 

 bought testimony from a foreigner, and an entire stranger to this native son of 

 Baltimore — the testimony of no other than one of the Joint Secretaries of the 

 Board of Trade in Great Britain, chosen for his fitness to prepare an herculean 

 work in the most important of all departments of industrial knowledge — Agri- 

 cultural and Commercial Statistics ! JNow, Mr. Editor of The Farbiers' Libra- 

 ry, in respect of this " very competent publicist," author of this " valuable work," 

 for which McGregor " sent frequently to America," this accomplished scholar — 

 son of one of the founders and pillars of Baltimore when it needed support — can 

 you tell me to what high posts of authority or emolument he has been appointed 

 by his native city or State, or by the General Government hard by ? Yet how 

 few of those who have, in the mean time been honored, by all parties, with public 

 trusts of all grades, would be capable of writing a "valuable work" on 



NATIONAL STATISTICS. 



Who can overestimate the labors of the " competent publicist,"' who has the 

 patience to collect and the talents to arrange, lucidly, a body of important statis- 

 tics ? — a work, by-the-by, which every State Government ought to have done 

 periodically and faithfully, particularly as respects its agricultural statistics. 

 Sententiously and most truly has it been said by an admirable French author, 

 Alex. Moreau Jounes — Paris, 1847 : 



" La Siatistique n'est pas moins necessaire a la vie publiqve des peuples qu'a leur vie 

 priv6e ; c'est par ses travaux, ses iiwestigations que les grands int€r&ts, de VEtat, sont 6lu- 

 cides, approfondis et connus; ses chiffres fournissent les meilleurs argiiments, les temoignages 

 les pins piremptoires que Von prodouise chaque jour au conseil du Prince, au Parlement, et 

 a V Acadimie." 



It would be easy to enlarge on this subject, especially as respects the scandal- 

 ous ignorance and neglect of their agricultural statistics, by States calling them- 

 selves civilized, which might yet be put to shame by reflection on their inferi- 

 ority in this greatest of public duties, even to the natives of Peru, who, confined 

 between the high chain of the Andes and the great Ocean, had never yet com- 

 municated with any civilized people, when Pizarro discovered and conquered 

 them. Yet this new country of what we call barbarians, holding no traditions 

 of descent from any other people, and who had no means or knowledge of 

 ■writing, but by cord's of different colors, possessed a system of statistics as com- 

 plete as the best that we have at the present day. It is computed that 7,000 

 lives are annually saved in Great Britain by a law founded on a single statistical 

 fact in respect of the ravages of the small-pox. How many of our State legisla- 

 tors have learned the A B C of the statistics of their own State? — But having 

 already too widely digressed, let us embark on the 



TRIP FROM BALTIMORE TO FREDERICKSBURG, BY V^^ATER. 



For experiment and vanity we took the steamer " Mary Washington " — as good 

 as her name would import— at 4 P. M., for Fredericksburg, and a most agreeable 

 trip we had of it— the fare, and attention from the gentlemanly Commander, 

 Myers, and all on board, everything that the most fastidious could desire. But 

 fully to enjoy the long and winding passage of the Rappahannock, for more than 

 100 miles, which you enter upon at sunrise and complete before he sets, the tour- 

 ist must bear in actual or traditionary remembrance, the social reminiscences con- 

 nected with the times, and the seats, as you pass them successively, of the old 

 aristocracy that illustrated its borders in the palmy days of the Tayloes and Tay- 

 lors, the Taliaferros, Alexanders, Bernards, Carters, Fitzhughs, Pendletons, &c. 

 Earnestly may it be regretted that we have of those old families no connected and 

 reliable biographical anecdotes and memoirs of their domestic and social economy, 

 pastimes and ways of living ; for much may it be feared that in these points of 

 view we ne'er shall look upon their like again, however transcendental may be 

 our " progress," so called ! Nothing, truly, is easier than for the social moralist 

 to decry their convivialities, their reckless management and extravagance, if you 

 will, but is it quite sure, Sir, that their posterity do not, with some exceptions, 

 lack their genuine patriotism, and true hospitality, and open-hearted benevo- 



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