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tributaries of the Mississippi. Upon their banks are the corn-growing 

 districts of the country ; and there, also, at no distant day, will be seat- 

 ed the millions of our race. Experience demonstrates that no people 

 can rely wholly upon exchanges for the substance of their bread-stuffs, 

 but that they must look chiefly to the soil they cultivate. This law of 

 production and consumption, is destined to introduce the gradual use of 

 corn flour, as a partial substitute at least, for its superior rival, in those 

 districts where it is the natural product of }he soil. In the southern 

 portions of the country this principle is already attested, by the fact that 

 corn bread enters as largely into human consumption as wheaten. 

 Next to wheat, this grain, perhaps, contains the largest amount of nu- 

 triment. It is the cheapest and surest of all the grains to cultivate . 

 and is, also, the cheapest article of subsistence known among men. 

 Although wheat can be cultivated in nearly all sections of the country ; 

 although its production can be increased to an unlimited degree by a 

 higher agriculture ; we have yet great reason to be thankful for this se- 

 condary grain, whose reproductive energy is so unmeasured as to secure 

 the millions of our race, through all coming time, against the dangers 

 of scarcity or the pressure of want. 



O-yeh-qua-a-weh, or Indian Tobacco. 



Tobacco is another gift of the Indian to the world ; but a gift, it 

 must be admitted, of questionable utility. We call both corn and to- 

 bacco the legacy of the "Red man ; as these indigenous plants, but for 

 his nurture and culture through so many ages, might have perished, 

 like other varieties of the fruits of the earth. Many of our choicest 

 fruits owe their origin to vegetable combinations entirely fortuitous. 

 They spring up spontaneously, flourish for a season and become extinct, 

 but for the watchful care of man Nature literally pours forth her ve- 

 getable wealth, and buries beneath her advancing exuberance the pro- 

 ducts of the past. But few of the fruits and plants, and flowers of the 

 ancient world, have come down to us unchanged ; and still other plants, 

 perhaps, have perished unknown in the openings of the past, which 

 contained within their shrivelled and stinted foliage, the germ of some 

 fruit, or grain, or plant, which might have nourished or clothed the 

 whole human family. We may therefore, perchance, owe a debt to the 

 Indian, in these particulars, beyond our utmost acknowledgments. 



The Senecas still caltivate tobacco. Their name signifies " The only 

 Tobacco," because they consider this variety superior to all others. A 

 specimen is furnished. It is raised from the seed, which is sown or 



