Pboceedings of the Farmers' Club. 469 



of Nebraska as a place of settlement, its climate, soil, &c., or where 

 we can obtain such knowledge, inasmuch as there are several in tliis 

 vicinity who desire to locate in Nebraska and on the line of the 

 Pacific railroad, if that region really offers fair inducements." 



Mr. Tewksbury. — I am familiar with all that part of the country, 

 but am not very favorably impressed with it. The Platte Valley is 

 very beautiful, and possesses a good soil, but the river for all useful 

 purposes amounts to nothing, except, perhaps, as a depository for 

 sand-bars. There used to be good timber in tlie valley, but the most 

 of it has been cut down by the railroad companies. I have been all 

 through the west, and iN'ebraska is the last place in the whole of it 

 where I should go to stay. 



A Member. — How is it about the drouth in the fall ? 



Answer. — The entire country west of the Missouri river is subject to 

 drouth, and N^ebraska is no exception to the rule. 



Mr. J. B. Lyman. — What kinds of timber trees will grow the best 

 if planted 'i 



Answer. — The locust, and generally those that have been found 

 available on the prairies of the older western States. 



Mr. J. B. Lyman. — Will the gentleman inform us what varieties of 

 fruity will do well in the section we are talking about ? 



Mr, Tewksbury. — JSTebraska cannot be recommended for fruit- 

 growing. ]!^o peaches or anything of the kind seem to flourish there, 

 and only a few varieties of apples ; of these latter the wine-sap is 

 the best. 



Mr. J. B. Ljman. — What can be said of the wheat crop ? 



Mr. Tewksbury. — Yery little wheat is grown there. N"ebraska is 

 emphatically a corn-growing region. The tillage is all done by 

 machinery. Nothing by hand-labor. The corn is not perhaps as well 

 tilled on the average as in some other portions of the country, but it 

 yields as a general rule between thirty and forty bushels to the acre. 



Mr. A. S. Fuller. — It is a truth not generally known that the old 

 lands in the State of Delaware yield on an average nine bushels more 

 of corn to the acre than the famous corn-growing fields of the west. 



Dr. J. Y, C. Smith. — Some portions of Nebraska are very desirable. 

 It is a State that is full of resources that must eventually inure to the 

 great benefit of the inhabitants. The railroad interests are developing 

 with great rapidity, and this enhances the prices of farming lands. 

 Some lands that were bought one year ago for five dollars an acre, 

 are now worth ten dollars. 



