LETTERS FROM THE SOUTH.—NO. 12. 
my 
the measure assigned to it at the current rales in 
dollars and cents. Besides the large expense of 
preparing, sacking, and sending to market, there to 
pay additional sums in freight, drayage, storage, 
“ ratage,” and commissions, there is a corresponding 
expense of purchasing, freight, drayage, etc., in 
bringing it back to the plantation for consumption. 
All these several items must first be subtracted, be¬ 
fore we can get at the relative value of corn raised 
on a remote plantation and the one where it is con¬ 
sumed. If we go a step further, and consider its 
presence or absence in our granaries as involving 
the question of sustenance or starvation, of life or 
death (of which we have at the present moment so 
terrible an example in Europe), we shall hereafter 
place a higher value on this article than we have 
hitherto done since the early settlement of the 
country. What has occurred elsewhere may occur 
here, and exemption from any particular calamity 
hitherto, is no guarantee against its presence here¬ 
after. The cultivation of maize on nearly every 
plantation within this State, to the extent atledsf of 
its own consumption, ought to be considered a fun¬ 
damental principle in its management. 
Although not equally adapted to the highest pro¬ 
duction of corn, as some of the choice lands between 
the great chain of northern lakes and the south line 
of Tennessee, yet where well drained and properly 
treated, the delta of Louisiana everywhere gives a 
remunerating crop of corn; and the lighter soils of 
the uplands require but a judicious system of til¬ 
lage, to make a fair return in this crop for the labor 
and expense bestowed upon them. 
If considered in an economical or domestic point 
of view, Indian corn, throughout the valley of the 
Mississippi, is the most profitable crop that can be 
raised; as one man’s labor will produce more human 
and animal food, than in the cultivation of any other 
one product. With the best plows, a planting ma¬ 
chine, cultivators, and harrows, one person can 
easily plant, cultivate, and harvest fifteen or twenty 
acres with four months’ labor, that will produce an 
average of forty bushels per acre, a quantity suffi¬ 
cient to sustain the existence of forty or fifty per¬ 
sons for an entire year. Like the cane, also, it is 
subject to fewer accidents or maladies than any 
other crop. Nothing but frost, excessive moisture, 
poverty of the soil, or negligent management, will 
prevent a good crop. The first may be always 
avoided by a late planting; thorough drainage ef¬ 
fectually removes injurious moisture; deep plow¬ 
ing and fine pulverization, and especially the use of 
the subsoil-plow, will mitigate, if it does not wholly 
obviate, the effects of drought; and rotation of 
crops and occasional application of green manures, 
if others are deficient, will be sufficient to prevent 
exhaustion. 
Rice, at one time, formed an important staple of 
the State, and is now produced in quantities far 
greater than is generally supposed, yet to an extent 
much less than the soil, climate, and value of the 
article will justify. The rice-lands of the Carolinas 
and Georgia are considered among their most valu¬ 
able, the best being worth five hundred dollars per 
acre, while the best cotton-lands will not command 
more than fifty. W hy should they not be of equal 
value here; the want of skilful management, w r e 
fear, must be the only answer. Next to maize, rice 
is capable of affording the largest amount of food to 
man. In localities precisely suited to it, this capa¬ 
city even much exceeds its rival, and nowhere, it is 
believed, can it be raised more advantageously than 
in this State. Immense bodies of the swamps and 
low-lands throughout the delta, are easily suscepti 
ble of being every way fitted for the highest and 
most profitable production of this grain. Suitable 
dykes or levees, proper ditches, both for draining 
and flooding the fields, with the addition of draining- 
wheels, where their presence is necessary, are all 
that is essential to secure millions of acres for this 
object, that are now solely tenanted hy every worth¬ 
less specimen of the amphibious vegetable and 
animal creation. Rice may also be very advanta¬ 
geously grown upon the uplands, and even the 
highest pine-soils will yield enough to make it an 
object of attention. But in such, great care is re¬ 
quisite to prevent exhaustion, which is scarcely 
possible on the rich alluvial bottoms that can be 
properly flooded, as the turbid water that over¬ 
spreads the fields, comes to the support of the crop, 
charged with every necessary ingredient of vegeta¬ 
ble nutrition. 
One reason why rice has not hitherto been made 
an object of greater attention here, is the want of 
proper machines for planting and preparing for mar¬ 
ket. Those of the latest and best construction have 
been for some time used in the Alantic States, and 
may now be had in this city. With these at com¬ 
mand, with a soil, climate, and the facilities for irri¬ 
gation so entirely adapted to the purpose, there is 
no good reason why rice should not again become 
one of the most important branches of agricultural 
attention in Louisiana. 
Indigo was the leading product of this State a 
century since, yet now it is scarcely cultivated. 
Two millions of acres of the most fertile cotton- 
lands within the State are every way adapted to its 
profitable growth. Its culture here was gradually 
abandoned for the greater profits afforded by other 
articles, particularly sugar and cotton. The de¬ 
mand for it from the extension of our manufac¬ 
tures, is annually increasing its consumption in this 
country, and the application of the latest chemical 
science to its maceration and preparation for mar¬ 
ket, would undoubtedly render this an object well 
worthy of attention at the present time. 
Tobacco may be raised here of the finest quality 
and to an unlimited extent. If production be com¬ 
bined with its manufacture, for the supply of this 
and others markets, few objects would better pay 
the labor and capital invested than this. The 
choicest qualities of leaf are produced on this soil, 
which are scarcely surpassed by the best brands of 
the Havana. 
Madder, woad, weld, saffron, sumach, etc., used 
primarily for dyes, and already in large demand by 
the northern manufacturers in this country, can be 
raised here with decided profit. The first is also a 
valuable food for cattle; saffron is used medici¬ 
nally ; and the astringent properties of the sumach 
render it a substitute for the tannin of the oak and 
hemlock where they do not exist. Roots and al¬ 
most every species of culinary vegetable ^ can be 
raised to the full extent of the wants of the inhabit¬ 
ants, and the sweet potato may he grown for ex¬ 
portation with decided profit. 
