''t^ 



IHE CULTURE OF 

 TOBACCO. 



^^INCE the day when Columbus observed the natives of his 

 newly-discovered Western Land whiffing its fragrant 

 leaves, tobacco h'ls been making the concjuest of the 

 world, until tn-day but few peoples, civilized or savage, 

 have not lieconie the devotees of the pipe, or the 

 consumers of the weed in snnie form. Tlie peace pipe 

 of the red man has Ijecome the peace pipe of the white 

 man, and the black man, and the yellow man. 



While tills seductively aromatic and mildly nai-cotic plant has 

 been charming the senses of man, it has also been producing the 

 wealth of its culturists, and increasing tlie revenues of nations. It 

 has assisted at the liirth ni new lands, and aided in the maintenance 

 of old ones. 



The plant thrives in neai-ly every portion of the world, yet the 

 )iati(uis that consume it most largely have been strangely slow in 

 adopting its culture, or in learning the intricacies of its production. 

 America, its natal continent, with its virgin soil, its cheap lands, 

 and its people trained in its culture, remains the mother' of the 

 industry to-day, and from the shores of this continent sail fleets, to 

 carry this solace to far-off peoples, and to bring back wealth ffu- 

 its producers. But the soils of America will soon be no longer 

 virgin, their fertility will ha\'d Ijeen cai-ried away to other countiaes, 

 the value of the lands will lie higher, and the cost of production 

 will be increased. Then strange will it be if the culture of toliaeco 

 be not wrenched away from its mother land, and the pipes of the 

 world supplied from fields newly discovered, and now yielding for 

 the first time to the hand of man. 



The pi'imitive methods of culture employed by the red man 

 and the early colonists have yielded to methods highly complex, 

 and better adapted to the production of an article suited to the 

 educated tastes of modern peoples. Coarse leaves diied <jn the 

 bushes in the streets of Jamestown would not receive the approval 

 of a twentieth-century Raleigh. 



Science has recently been summoned to the aid of experience, 

 with the result that this marvellous plant, with its relation to the 

 soil, climate, culture and palate of its ardent consumers, has at 

 last divulged many of its long and tenaciously kejjt secrets. 



