58 MASSACHUSETTS AGRICULTURE. 



continent, wherever the Federal authority extends, I cannot 

 doubt. Thus far a large portion of our territory has been 

 subjected to an exceedingly exhausting mode of tillage. Large 

 tracts of our most fertile lands have become almost useless 

 under that cultivation which is intended to draw the largest 

 annual return from the soil, without restoring its fertility. In 

 spite of this, however, our agricultural productions have been 

 very large, and the increase has been very rapid. 



The summary of the agriculture of the United States in 1840 

 shows that we produced at that time 84,823,272 bushels of 

 wheat, 123,071,341 bushels of oats, 377,531,875 bushels of 

 corn, 35,802,114 pounds of wool, and that the total value 

 of the principal crops of that year was 1336,000,000 — consid- 

 ered at that time an enormous sum. In 1862, however, only 

 twenty-two years later, the yield of twenty-one loyal States 

 alone far exceeded this estimate. The wool clip had increased 

 to nearly 80,000,000, and the value of the crops of that year 

 are estimated to be worth 1736,586,326 — all this exclusive of 

 the vast amounts of cotton, rice, sugar and tobacco which were 

 raised in the Southern States, and which entered into the calcu- 

 lation of 1840. And if we examine the cottoii crop of the same 

 periods we shall find that it had increased from 790,479,275 

 in 1849, to 2,000,000,000, or thereabouts, in 1860, just previous 

 to the breaking out of the war. Guided by these figures, what 

 have we a right to estimate for twenty years to come ? In the 

 twenty-one States upon whose crops the computation of the 

 crops of 1862 has been made, we may estimate the grain crops 

 of 1880 to be worth $1,500,000,000, exclusive of the hay crop 

 and the root, fruit and garden crops, constantly increasing. Of 

 the cotton crop we will make no calculation ; but we may say 

 that if the loose and careless husbandry of slave labor produced 

 2,000,000,000 in 1860, it will be hard to compute the amount 

 which free labor may produce on those same lands twenty years 

 hence. 



In addition to this actual increase in the products of our soil, 

 as shown by figures, we must take into consideration the im- 

 mense changes which have taken place in our country within 

 the last twenty years. I have already spoken of the improve- 

 ments which have been made in our machinery, all within that 

 period. But more than all, the means of transportation have 



