CULTURE AND CURING IN NEW ENGLAND. 



239 



These figures show production per acre of 1,GGG pounds; value per pound, 17.27 cents; value per acre, $287 74; 

 au increase during the decade of 1,235 per cent, in total production, and an increase of value per pound of 9.07 

 cents, or 101 per cent. 



The state census of 1875 shows the following acreage, production, and value: 



This table shows production per acre, 1,595 pounds; value per pound, 17.22 cents; value per acre, $274 71; a 

 decrease of production, as compared with 1865, of 36 per cent., and with 1870 of 18 per cent. 



Previous to the year 1840 prices for the different grades ranged from $4 to $7 per hundred pounds. After that 

 prices increased rapidly, and good wrappers were worth in 1857 $40 per hundred pounds. 



The erection of numerous warehouses for packing tobacco finally resulted in making them sale houses as 

 well as packing establishments. The custom has become general among farmers to sell their tobacco loose 

 from wagons to the warehousemen at an agreed price for the crop through, the purchasers to assort, pack, and sweat 

 the tobacco, shipping it for sale to such markets as offered the best net returns. Very few planters now assort 

 and pack their own crop, as it is found to interfere very much with the production of another crop, requires more 

 time than can be weH spared from other farm work, and cannot be done as well nor as economical ly by the planter 

 as by the dealer, who is provided with conveniently arranged houses and implements for the purpose. 



SURFACE FEATURES. 



Tobacco in New England is now cultivated in two well defined regions : 1. The Connecticut valley. 2. The 

 Housatonic valley. 



The Connecticut valley is one of the finest regions in America, combining in an unusual degree a quiet beauty 

 with great agricultural capabilities. The valley, so called, of the Connecticut river is about 300 miles in length, 

 and is not far from 20 miles wide. The bounding hills are not, as a general thing, very symmetrical or rounded in 

 outline, but have angular or irregular forms. 



On the west the Connecticut valley is bounded by the Green mountain, the-Hoosic mountain, and the great 

 billowy plain which divides it from the Housatonic. On the east are the White mountains, culminating in Mount 

 Washington, 6,428 feet above the sea. Mount Holyoke, 830 feet above the Connecticut river, which washes its base, 

 and 900 feet above Boston harbor, is part of a greenstone range which, beginning with West Rock, near New Haveu, 

 runs northward across the state of Connecticut, entering Massachusetts between Springfield and Southwick, and 

 at East Hampton, in Connecticut, it mounts into an elevation of over 1,000 feet, forming Mount Tom. The valleys 

 on the north and west of Holyoke are very fertile. 



GEOLOGICAL FORMATIONS AND SOILS. 



A large area of the northern part of New Hampshire is covered by a series of greenstone or trap rocks, 

 a compound of hornblende and feldspar. These occur in groups, and extend along the Connecticut river, 

 through Massachusetts and Connecticut, to the sea-shore, and are believed to be metamorphosed sedimentary 

 accumulations of the Silurian age. Although of a remarkable constancy in respect to their rock constituents and 

 chemical composition, they frequently differ as to the relative proportions of these constituents, extensive granite and 

 gneiss deposits, or sandstone, being frequently found in juxtaposition to the trap or greenstone, and in some instances 

 limestones are found associated with feldspar and free quartz. In some granitoid rocks the feldspathic 

 constituents predominate, in others the hornblende, and in others the mica, while apparently under less favorable 

 conditions for metamorphosis the argillaceous sedimentary accumulations have retained to a considerable 

 degree (heir original stratified amorphous character. Red sandstone ridges and trap rock also contribute largely 

 in some parts of the valley to the striking beauty of the scenery along the river. The valley of the Connecticut 

 river, like many of the New England valleys, has received extensive drift deposits, making thick beds of gravel, 

 sand, clay, or fine silt, during the Champlain period. These drift deposits, composed for the most part of rounded 

 53 AG 833 



