PRESENT CROP OP CORN IN THE UNITED STATES. 
363 
will justify their use ; where wood is abundant as 
it is generally south of the Chesapeake ; use char¬ 
coal ashes; husband and apply all the animal and 
vegetable manures which can be procured ; pursue 
a judicious sj^stem of rotation of crops, taking care 
to give back to the soil a part of the vegetable 
matter by turning in a growth of clover, grain, 
peas, &c. ; and finally, introduce stock which shall 
consume a part of the products on the soil, and 
return in their manure an equivalent for what they 
have exhausted. Sheep, of which there are com¬ 
paratively few south of Delaware, would soon pro¬ 
duce a marked and rapid improvement in the soil, 
while they yielded an ample return for the attention 
bestowed on them. The adoption of this system 
would result in slowly, but certainly restoring the 
land ; while such as were more favorably situated, 
where peat, muck, and sea-weed can be obtained 
and profusely applied, would rapidly come up to 
the most satisfactory standard of fertility. Where 
the growth of clover or the cow-pea can be secured, 
success is certain with proper management. These 
will secure the means of augmenting fertility to 
any required extent, by occasionally turning in a 
crop, and making their consumption contribute to 
the same object, by applying the manure from the 
animals, fed upon them. We know nothing beyond 
this; nor has science, or the most successful 
practice, so far as our knowledge extends, discov¬ 
ered anything further. There is no royal road to 
farming, more than to education; and its pursuits 
must be sought by the intelligent and diligent ap¬ 
plication of nature’s slow, but certain means, or 
success is unattainable. 
So far as my route enables me to determine the 
staples of the eastern part of North Carolina, they 
are exclusively turpentine, and its products. For a 
distance of considerably over one hundred miles, 
there is but one interminable plain of pine and oak, 
and mostly of the former. There are two species 
here, the long and short leaf. The former, when 
but a few feet in height, has a very graceful 
appearance with its long, spreading, grass-like, 
tufts of luxuriant leaves, and when grown, giving 
a palmetto aspect to its branches. Both are rich in 
turpentine, while they yield freely. The system 
adopted here, is to bare a part of the trunk of its 
bark, and fresh or external wood, say one-third to 
half its circumference, and two or three feet in 
height, cutting a basin at the bottom to catch the 
turpentine. This is done in the spring, and the 
deposit removed from time to time as it exudes 
and is accumulated through the season. Another 
year requires a fresh cut, which is made higher up 
on another side of the tree, and a thrifty growth 
will bear from five to eight years’ tapping. As may 
be supposed, an extensive forest is required to 
afford adequate employment to many laborers ; yet it 
is found highly remunerating under favorable cir¬ 
cumstances. A single hand will frequently earn 
$500 or $600 in a season, and sometimes $120 in a 
single month is realized by an active person. 
Much of this crude material is manufactured into 
spirits of turpentine in the woods where produced, 
and barreled for market, many of the furnaces 
employed for this purpose meeting the eye as we 
passed. In other localities, the pine is split into 
faggots, piled in heaps, and covered like charcoal 
pits, where a smouldering fire expels the resinous 
matter, which is secured in trenches, and barreled 
in its liquid state as tar. Resin and pitch are other 
forms of the same crude material. One worthy 
citizen observed to me, people might laugh at 
North Carolina for its pine, but the inhabitants did 
mighty well by it. 
The section of the state farther westward, and 
near the base of the mountains, is much more fer¬ 
tile, and produces abundantly of wheat, corn, and 
in many instances of cotton, flax, &c. The lands 
still further back are of a highly productive soil, 
on which is grown almost every variety of pro¬ 
duct suited to the climate, and the river banks, near 
the coast, afford some of the best rice lands in the 
United States. The legislative policy of the citi¬ 
zens of this State has been cautious, and generally 
judicious, and probably no one in the Union is in a 
safer conditi on - 
Wilmington has increased rapidly of late, since the 
construction of the railroad, and now contains some 
8,000 people, with most of the important buildings 
new and well constructed. It enjoys a profitable 
trade from the regions drained by the Cape Fear 
and its branches, and its traffic and manufactures 
of turpentine are productive. Both Richmond 
and Petersburg are thriving from their considerable 
introduction of cotton, iron, and woollen manufac¬ 
tures of late. The former has about 25,000, and 
the latter near 20,000 inhabitants. R. L. Allen 
Charleston, S. C., Nov. 11th, 1846. 
Present Crop of Corn in the United States.—• 
We see that the Louisville Journal estimates this at 
500,000,000 bushels. We should be pleased to 
learn upon what data this estimate is founded. The 
census for 1840 sets it down at 387,380,185 
bushels ; but we place no dependence whatever on 
the careless returns of this census. For example, 
it sets down the potato crop«at 113,183,619 bushels, 
not one-third of that of corn. We are of the opi¬ 
nion, that in the Northern States more potatoes are 
raised than corn ; at the South and West, not near 
so many; still we doubt whether the crop of com 
is double that of the potato. Admitting our present 
census to be 20,000,000, in round numbers,— 
500,000,000 would be 25 bushels of corn to each 
man, woman, and child, in the United States. We 
doubt whether there are 3,000,000 of farmers 
among our people. The above estimate would 
make the average among these 166 bushels each— 
entirely too much in our humble judgment. 
The census for 1845 of the State of New York, 
sets down the potato crop at 23,653,418 bushels; 
the corn crop at 14,722,114— a little over one-half 
of that of potatoes. Admitting the population 
to be 2,604,495, this would be 5,^ bushels of 
corn for each man, woman, and child. Suppose 
the corn crop of this State to be an average of 
that of the Union, the population of which is esti¬ 
mated to be 20,000.000, the whole crop then would 
be only 113,000,000. In a note, page 375 of this 
number of our paper, taking the late U. S. census for 
guide, we estimate the corn crop at 400,000,000 
Without doubt this must be too high. 
