14 TOBACCO. 



which affords no nutriment, which every stomach 

 loathes till cruelly drugged into submission, which 

 stupefies the brain, shatters the nerves, destroys 

 the coats of the stomach, creates an insatiable thirst 

 for stimulants, and prepares the system for fatal 

 diseases ? " 



Prof. Brewer : " The sole advantage is that an 

 individual may grow rich from raising it. But 

 what one man gains is obtained at the cost of his 

 son and his son's son." 



Jefferson : " It is a culture productive of infinite 

 wretchedness." 



Gen. John H. Cooke, of Virginia : w Tobacco 

 exhausts the land beyond all other crops. As 

 proof of this, every homestead, from the Atlantic 

 border to the head of tide water, is a mournful 

 monument. It has been the besom of destruction 

 which has swept over this once fertile region." 



Says a traveller : " The old tobacco-lands of 

 Maryland and Virginia are an eyesore, odious 

 f barrens,' looking as though blasted by some ge- 

 nius of evil." 



There are those who claim that the land can be 

 kept in good condition by the free use of fertilizers. 

 But the experience of many years furnishes evi- 

 dence that this crop ultimately exhausts the soil, 

 and that, in consequence, its culture is deprecated 

 by the better class of agriculturists. 



Tobacco-raising consumes the greater part of 

 the year. The seed is planted about the middle of 

 April, and in two or three months the shoots are 



