vl!)c JTarmer's illcmtl)to bisttor. 



151 



Crops in Europe for 1848. 



Of the wheat crop in Great Britain and Ire- 

 land, the Mark Lane Express of Sept. 25th, 1848, 

 says — "The yield is not any where large, and 

 taking the kingdom collectively, the deficiency 

 will in ull probability prove rather serious. Un- 

 der these circumstances, and considering the 

 extent of the failure in the potato crop, the com- 

 paratively quiet state of the corn trade appears 

 at the first view somewhat singular; hut when 

 matters arc investigated a little closer, the want 

 of activity may he readily accounted for. 



The modifications which have within the last 

 few years taken place in the corn laws, and the 

 rapid approach of the time when oidy a nominal 

 duly is to he levied (1st February 184 ( J) have 

 placed this country in c|uite a new position ; and 

 it has not yet been ascertained how prices may 

 range when all restriction on importations shall 

 have been withdrawn. If the harvest had heen 

 as unfavorable on the Continent of Europe and 

 in America as in this country, it might have he- 

 come difficult for Great Britain to have obtained 

 the requisite supplies; hut such has not heen 

 the case,and though our present quotations are not 

 high, we question whether it woidd he prudent 

 to enter into speculative investments at the rates 

 now current. There certainly appears little 

 prospect of any fall of consequence, and many 

 well-informed parties are still of opinion that 

 ultimately the value of bread-stuffs must go 

 higher; but that this feeling is not general is 

 sufficiently proved by the actual position of af- 

 fairs. 



With an acknowledged defective wheat crop 

 both in quantity and quality, and a fa' lure of po- 

 tatoes to a greater or less extent in all parts of 

 the kingdom, so little disposition is shown either 

 by merchants or millers to hold stock, that the 

 release of so trifling a quantity of wheat out of 

 bond as 250,000 or 300,000 qrs. (for there is not 

 more probably in the kingdom than the last 

 named amount) has sufficed to cause a pause in 

 the trade ; and at most of the leading provincial 

 markets held since our last the tendency of 

 prices has been rather downward. 



Potatoes, which have been for sometime past 

 selling at such low prices as materially to lessen 

 the consumption of bread, have lately risen con- 

 siderably in value, owing to a great falling oft' in 

 the supplies. Whether this has heen caused by 

 a scarcity of the article, or whether the fear that 

 they might not keep (which first caused the 

 growers to hurry them to market) has subsided, 

 we are not in a position to determine. 



From Ireland we learn that a good deal of the 

 corn which it was at one time feared would be 

 greatly damaged, had been tolerably well boused : 

 still there is reason to conclude that wheat will 

 be a very indifferent crop in all parts of the is- 

 land, and that potatoes are as extensively affected 

 by the disease as in England. Indian corn is 

 therefore likely to he wanted, and its value has 

 ugain rallied of late in the Irish markets. 



Holders of Indian corn on the spot, as well as 

 parties having cargoes on passage to offer, have 

 remained exceedingly firm ; an increased in- 

 quiry being calculated on now that potatoes have 

 begun to rise in price. 



The Corn Trade. — The Mark Lane Express 

 of October 2d, in its review of the corn trade, 

 says — " The reports from all parts of the coun- 

 try agree in confirming what we have before sta- 

 led as to the shortness of the yield to the acre; 

 and though no very accurate estimate can yet be 



given of the extent of deficiency, it is certain 

 that the crops of all articles (beans perhaps ex- 

 cepted) are below an average. The later kinds 

 of potatoes, which are now being dug up, are 

 also reported to turn out more extensively dis- 

 eased than the earlier sorts." And the same au- 

 thority, in the general agricultural report for 

 September", says: — "First in consequence we 

 consider the produce of the year's wheat crop. 

 That this has failed to some extent in some of 

 our generally considered favored counties — Es- 

 sex and Kent, for instance — is a well ascertained 

 fact ; and that a large portion of it has been 

 carted in very bad condition is equally certain. 

 In the western and southern parts of England, 

 sprouted samples of wheat are frequently to be 

 met with, and the yield is represented to be 

 barely an average one. North of the Humber, 

 however, as well as in most of the midland dis- 

 tricts — where less rain has (alien this season 

 than elsewhere — the wheat crop is turning out 

 good, both in quantity and quality." And the 

 conclusion at which the writer arrives is, " that 

 the yield for England is nearly or quite an ave- 

 rage." 



The following are the relative prices of grain 

 and flour in the Mark Lane (London) market: 



Shillings per Quarter. 

 Wheat, Essex and Kent, old. new 



white, 55 to 62 48 to 58 



Ditto red, 50 to 55 44 to 53 



Ditto extra, 56 to 58 54 to 55 



American, 46 to 54 



Canada, 44 to 51 



Dantzic and Koningsherg, 52 to 56 

 Dantzic, fine white, extra, 56 to 62 

 Stetten and Hamburgh, 52 to 56 

 Danish, 50 to 54 



Rostock, Pomeranian and 



Rhine, 54 to 59 



Mediterranean, Odessa 



and St. Petersburgh, 54 to 56 

 Spanish, 51 to 58 



Maize, white, 36 to 38 



Ditto yellow, 37 to 40 



Flour, American sweet, 28 to 32 

 Canadia sweet, 28 to 31 



Dantzic and Silesia, extra 



superfine, 27 to 31 



Indian corn, 35 to 36 



Indian corn meal (per bhl. 



196 lbs.,) 16s6tol7s5 



It will he seen by the above that the English 

 and European production leads the American in 

 price and probably in quality. 



The spirit of an improved agriculture is surely 

 awakened throughout New England, for almost 

 every county seems to be moving some new as- 

 sociation for promoting the growth and increase 

 of the productions of the soil. What is most 

 gratifying is the fact that the greater the produc- 

 tion of any standard article, the greater becomes 

 the demand for that article. We know of no 

 vegetable production of the present season that 

 may not readily find a market for cash. It would 

 do the readers of the Visitor good to spread be- 

 fore them accounts of the many societies which 

 had their exhibitions the present year: these so- 

 cieties have the good effect of collecting as in a 

 focus the best knowledge and experience of 

 some of the best agriculturists of the country : 

 they show the better productions, and they im- 

 part valuable information as to the better meth- 

 ods of culture. The farmer who looks only to 



his own experience for information might forever 

 remain in ignorance of that which, with little 

 trouble and no risque, might be appropriated to 

 his great advantage. Through our agricultural 

 associations the best knowledge of a whole coun- 

 ty may be brought to bear on the general im- 

 provement of that neighborhood ; and from the 

 exhibitions of the most enterprising districts of 

 the United Slates, the whole country may reap 

 advantages beyond individual calculation. 



In a former number of the Visitor, noticing a 

 journey of the editor in July last to the county 

 of Penobscot in Maine, may be remembered 

 what we said of the improvements on new land 

 made by G. W. Chamberlain, Esq. in the town 

 of Carmel. Mr. Chamberlain went there from 

 this part of New Hampshire as the agent of 

 some timber-speculation gentlemen who were 

 considered unfortunate in the high prices paid 

 for lands. If they were unfortunate in the tim- 

 ber, the Slate of Maine has certainly profited in 

 the opening of the country to a valuable agricul- 

 tural production. Mr. Chamberlain in the town 

 of Carmel, as the produce of his new lands 

 mainly cleared within the last ten years, shows 

 himself the champion of the premium list of his 

 county. For the best pair of working oxen in 

 the county (probably as good a pair as can be 

 found in New England) he received the first pre- 

 mium; for the best milch cow, the first premi- 

 um; for the best stock cow, the second premi- 

 um ; for the best two year old heifer, the first 

 premium ; for the best heifer calf, the first pre- 

 mium; and for the best bull calf, the first premi- 

 um; likewise for the best stallion, the first pre- 

 mium : so much for amount of the cattle and 

 horse kinds. If the swine come in addition — and 

 his crop of corn equal to last year, will he not, 

 show the notion to be once true, that what a 

 man of enterprise and action wills to do he gen- 

 erally may do ? 



The true Political Economy. 



Fully and entirely do we agree with the writer 

 of the following article which we find in a Bos- 

 ton paper where we had not been in the habit of 

 looking for such sentiments. There are men in 

 England, who in face of a most obdurate oppo- 

 site policy existing until lately in her govern- 

 ment, have been and continue to be pioneers in 

 every just sentiment even before the true doc- 

 trine is made the policy of freer governments : 

 such a man was the illustrious Huskisson who 

 lost his life some twenty years ago while stand- 

 ing exposed to the cars of the Manchester and 

 Liverpool railway. His principles have become 

 the policy of the British government of the pre- 

 sent time : after the month of February next the 

 duty on breadsluffs imported into England is to be 

 merely nominal. The doctrine there now is — a 

 true doctrine every where — that the best prosperity 

 of the country will come from cheap bread: 

 From the Buslon Evening Transcript. 



What no the People Want? — Repeal in 

 Ireland, Chartism in England, and Communism 

 in France have very naturally raised the inquiry, 

 What do the people want ? " They testily," says 

 the Liverpool Journal, "that the people are sick, 

 and want a cure. Why are the people sick? 

 Simply because they have not enough to eat: 

 they want more food. The food question is the 

 question — has been, and ever will be, the ques- 

 tion. The rebellion of the belly is recorded in 

 every nation's history." The Journal sees the 

 only safety-valve for existing European evil:- in 

 increasing the quantity of human food. On this 

 subject it remarks : 



Apparently, modern statesmen direct their al- 



