CROPS OF THE COUNTRY. 53 



as it is called, or, more proj)erly, the combustion occasioned by the im- 

 mense velocity with which the stone traveled through our atmosphere, re- 

 mained visible for about two minutes. From the brilliancy and area of 

 the fire surrounding the falling stone, and the splash occasioned by its 

 sudden immersion, it is certain that the aerolite must have been of im- 

 mense size, although, of course, no estirnate could be made with any accu- 

 racy during the few seconds the aerolite was visible. — San Francisco 

 Chronicle. 



The California Earthquakes. — The San Francisco Alta of December 

 21, says : "Seven distinct earthquake shocks — one of them so severe that, 

 according to the local paper, the 'buildings labored like a ship at sea' — vis- 

 ited the town of Silver Mountain, Alpine County, within half an hour in 

 the early evening of the 11th inst., biit did no damage. We have no report 

 yet that these shocks were felt elsewhere. Silver Mountain, which has now, 

 so far as we remember, had its first experience of this kind, is about 6,000 

 feet above the level of the sea, beyond the summit of the Sierra, 150 miles 

 in a direct line eastward from San Francisco, and 200 miles northward from 

 Owen Lake, which last place, on account of the volcanic character of its 

 geological formation and its severe earthquake ot March 26, 1872, has the 

 reputation of being rather shaky. From 1851 to 1868 earthquakes were 

 common in this city — so frequent, indeed, that one observer, who made a 

 lengthy report on them to the San Francisco Academy of Sciences, declared 

 that for a considerable period there was more than one a day on ah average 

 — and rare in the mountains ; but in the last eight years the coast from 

 Monterey northward has been comparatively exempt, while the region east 

 of the Sierra, from Owen Lake to Virginia City, has had the most notable 

 visitations, though no one place has had many. Italy, Greece, Asia Minor, 

 and California are all classical as earthquake countries; but the last will 

 doubtless be as secure for its inhabitants generally as the others have been 

 for thousands of years." 



AGRICULTURE AND HORTICULTURE. 



CROPS OF THE COUNTRY. 



From the December report of the Department of Agriculture we extract 

 as follows on the crops of the year : 



"The returns of JSTovember make the corn crop only two per cent, short 

 of the great crop last year, and fully fifty per cent greater than the crop of 

 1874. The aggregate is 1,295,000,000 bushels. Less than one per cent, of 

 this is raised in New England, scarcely six per cent, in the Middle States, 

 twenty in the Southern, forty-four in the Ohio basin and twenty-nine west 

 of the Mississippi. The South raises 10,000,000 more bushels than last 

 year; l^ew England 300,000 more, and there is less in the Middle and 

 Western States. The Southern States stood twentj^-three in 1870 to twenty 

 now. In 1850 the West produced thirty-two per cent, of the crop ; in 1860 



