220 AMERICAN HUSBANDRY. 



country. England is at this moment so far from 

 wanting any of our breadstuff's, if we had them to 

 export, that she has been supplying us liberally all 

 winter from her own granaries ; and, according to 

 the latest advices, she had still bread enough and to 

 spare. Again : it is estimated by British writers of 

 high authority, that the subsistence of 9,000,000 peo- 

 ple costs, in raw produce, no less than 72,000,000, 

 or 8 for each individual, per annum. According 

 to this estimate, the annual product of this great 

 branch of national industry is $350,000,000 more at 

 present than it was in 1755; which is more than 

 twice the value of the whole cotton manufacture of 

 the country in 1831. Now if it costs $350,000,000 

 to feed the increased population of 9,000,000, then 

 to feed the whole population of 17,500,000 must cost 

 nearly $700,000,000 ! What an amazing agricultu- 

 ral product for so small a territory ! And yet it is 

 the opinion of practical men of the highest respecta- 

 bility in England, that the raw produce of the island 

 might be wellnigh doubled, without any greater 

 proportional expense being incurred in its produc- 

 tion ; that is to say, 35,000,000 people might draw 

 their subsistence from one little speck in the ocean ! 

 Now we have a territory more than fifteen times as 

 large as the island of Great Britain ; and what should 

 hinder it, when it comes to be brought under no 

 higher cultivation than some parts of England and 

 Scotland, from sustaining a population of 500 or 600 

 millions of people 1 This would give to Virginia 

 something like thirty millions ; to Illinois and Mis- 

 souri about the same number each ; to New- York 

 near twenty-five millions, and so on in proportion 

 to the other states. I am quite aware that this es- 

 timate will be regarded as extremely visionary and 

 incredible by many readers ; but not more so than 

 it would have been thought, in the middle of the last 

 century, that England, Scotland, and Wales could 

 ever be made to sustain thirty-five, or even thirty 

 millions." 



