Proceedings of the Farmers' Club. 219 



nor a rock, except it has been imported for foundations, corner-stones, 

 or obituary purposes. Brick, however, of the best quality can be 

 made, and with them, and the superabundance of timber, the want 

 of rock is little felt. Most of the county is heavily timbered — the 

 predominant growth is cotton wood, black walnut, honey locust, black 

 locust, all the varieties of oak, sugar tree, hickory, persimmon, pecan, 

 mulberry, hackberry, and other species of timber usually found in the 

 river bottoms. Upon the water-courses are immense " brakes " or 

 groves of cypress, a timber equal to pine for building purposes, and 

 superior to it for out-door work, such as weather-boarding, shingles, 

 and fencing. The staple crop of the county is corn, yielding from 

 forty to one hundred bushels per acre. Wheat does well, making 

 from twent}' to thirty bushels per acre, and in a few cases has done 

 better than that. Oats do well, and the coarser grasses, such as 

 timothy, grow very luxuriant, producing three and foiir tons to the 

 acre. Cotton grows finely, and is raised in considerable quantities. 

 Tobacco does well, but grows too large to be a favorite crop. Garden 

 vegetables attain a size that would be deemed fabulous in the hills, or 

 under a more northern clime ; apples are very fine, but orchards are 

 scarce, peaches are plenty, and all the small fruits grow luxuriant, 

 and require but little cultivation to make large crops. The root 

 crops, such as Irish potatoes, sweet potatoes, yams, turnips, onions, 

 &c., grow very fine and yield largely to the acre; so do pumpkins, 

 squashes, melons, and the leguminous vegetables. The Cairo and 

 Fulton railroad runs through the northern portion of the county, 

 commencing at Bird's Point, opposite Cau-o, and passing through 

 Charleston. The Iron Mountain railroad, running from St, Louis to 

 Belmont, passes through the center of the county, and forms a junc- 

 tion with the Cairo and Fulton road at Charleston. AVith a river on 

 three sides of the county, which never freezes or dries up, and two 

 railroads running througli it, certainly it has superior facilities for 

 getting its productions to market ; and as the rivers above the mouth 

 of the Ohio are closed by ice much of the time in the winter, the 

 highest prices are always obtained by the farmers for their grain, 

 pork, and cattle, by shipping sou,th at that time, Charleston is a 

 pleasant village, situated in Matthew's Prairie, and surrounded by 

 fine plantations ; has a court house, two churches, a good hotel, seve- 

 ral stores, saddlers, shoemakers, tailors, and blacksmith shops, and 

 has a printing ofiice, from which issues weekly The Charleston 

 Courier. Belmont (named after tlie American partner of the Eoths- 



