THE CULTIVATOE. 
125 
We do not raise large cattle or hogs, or make large 
yields of corn like our northern brethren; but have a 
fair range, and with land not worth over $5 to $15 per 
acre, we can afford to cultivate more. 
I have a friend, who in South Carolina even, makes 
What is considered a fair crop there, and though he works 
something over 100 hands, yet makes corn to sell with 
his own meat. In an address delivered in South Caroli¬ 
na, by the Hon. George McDuffie, he states he makes a 
fair crop, raises his own corn and meat, and even his work 
horses. I think this statement is made in his address; 
and I think it entirely feasible, for every county in a cot¬ 
ton growing State to do the same, and supply its county 
seat with bread and meat. 
Were I to devote myself entirely to a cotton farm, not 
attend to improving stock and buildings, I feel perfectly 
certain that I could sell as much meat as I would use, 
raise enough horses to fully supply the wear and tear, 
and yet sell my 6 bales of cotton. There are many even 
here who would doubt it, but sir, I am a practical farmer, 
make farming my only business, and I feel that injustice 
is done, when called theoretical, because I have had the 
chance of receiving a first rate education, and read more 
or less every day of my life. I only ask for the same 
measure to be meted unto me, as is done to other men 
who reside on their farms and superintend themselves 
all the minutiae of farming. Yours, &c. 
M. W. Philips. 
Log Hall, Miss., Dec. 31, 1844. 
SWAMP WILLOW —(Salix discolor.) 
Messrs. Gaylord & Tucker —In a postscript to my 
communication published in the Cultivator, vol. 10, p. 98, 
I promised you some information relative to the cultiva¬ 
tion of the swamp willow for economical purposes, at¬ 
tention having been directed thereto by Mr. Wm. Par¬ 
tridge of New-York. The promise had slipped from my 
memory, until recently turning over the leaves of the last 
volume of the Cultivator, I was reminded of my promise, 
and now proceed to redeem it. 
An important and extensive employment has grown out 
of the use and cultivation of the willow. Great quanti¬ 
ties are imported, while we see it growing wild in 
swamps and along water courses, from one end of the 
United States to the other, and almost untouched, although 
if collected in its native state, or cultivated as in Europe 
and some parts of this country, it would afford a profitable 
occupation to the industrious, at seasons of the year when 
Other work would not interfere. 
Hoops for casks are made of willow in Europe, as we 
see in the wine casks of France and Portugal. Irish po¬ 
tatoes are imported in hampers of the same material, and 
champagne in willow baskets. Bottles and demijohns 
come to us covered with willow, and willow is cut and 
dried to be converted into charcoal, which makes a bet¬ 
ter article than any other wood for the manufacture of 
gunpowder. 
But of all the uses to which willow is applied, both 
here and in Europe, that of making baskets of all kinds, 
and many articles of wooden ware, is the most extensive. 
It gives employment to many, and might to many more, 
if our own resources were husbanded, and our own raw 
material more generally sought, cultivated and used. 
Willow and willow baskets are both imported from 
Holland and France. Most of the baskets manufactured 
in this country, are made from the imported willow, but 
some of American growth is also converted into useful 
articles, as will hereafter be shown. The imported wil¬ 
low is of the osier kind, long, slender and flexible. It 
comes in bundles four feet in circumference or sixteen 
inches in diameter, and of three lengths. It is sold in as¬ 
sorted parcels, and the purchaser is required to take a 
portion of each length. The smallest size is from three 
to four feet long; the middle size five to six, and the 
third size seven feet or over. The present price of such 
willow, free of bark and in good condition, in the city 
of New-York, is 8 cents per pound. The writer has 
known it to sell at $1 to $1,25 by the bundle. 
Immense quantities of willow baskets are imported 
from France, but they are all of the smaller and finer 
kinds of wooden ware made of split willow. Our arti- 
zans cannot compete with the French in the manufacture 
of these kinds of willow work, on account of the very 
low wages in France, or other cause. There, much 
of the fine and fancy work is executed by females, while 
here, willow baskets are wholly made by males, who 
require higher wages than males or females in European 
countries. Hence it is that France and Germany have 
possession of the American market in the supply and sale 
of fine and fancy willow-ware, which can be manufactu¬ 
red here by American artists, but they are undersold by 
!foreign workmen. There is perhaps another reason for 
this state of things. Some years ago, a French merchant 
now retired from business, informed the writer that he 
could not conceive how the French willow baskets could 
be imported and sold so cheap, unless the government 
was defrauded in the duties. 
But on the other hand, our countrymen have exclu¬ 
sive possession of the manufacture of the large, coarse 
and bulky articles made of willow, which cannot be im¬ 
ported on account of the space they occupy, and the 
amount of freight such space would command. The 
greater part of the willow they use however, is that im¬ 
ported from Holland and France. The trade of making 
willow-ware is an extensive one, and is principally car¬ 
ried on in our large cities; though of late, it is extend¬ 
ing to other parts of the country where the native raw 
material is abundant and easily procured, or where, this 
and the foreign varieties are cultivated. 
Here then we have a trade, an occupation for many of 
our countrymen, which consumes a great amount of raw 
material, much of which might be supplied from indi¬ 
genous growth, or from cultivated plants of native and 
foreign varieties of willow. There is much to encour¬ 
age this undertaking, were it more generally known how 
easily it may be accomplished. The following informa¬ 
tion was obtained from a person who has a plantation of 
willows on Staten Island. 
Mr. John Reed of Southfield in Richmond county and 
State of New-York, is an Englishman by birth and has 
followed the business of cultivating the native and for¬ 
eign willows for thirty years or more in this country. 
The farm he cultivates, contained a useless bog of an 
acre or more, which by ditching and draining, he has 
converted into a willow plantation, from which he reaps 
an annual harvest much greater than from an equal 
amount of land on the best part of his farm. He has the 
native willow at the head of this article, the Pennsylva¬ 
nia, the Welch, the Dutch and other varieties which he 
imported from England. He has another plantation of 
willows in the adjoining township of Westfield. 
Mr. Reed has at different periods imported fifteen va¬ 
rieties of willow of the osier kind from England, but the 
best kinds raised there, degenerate here from the nature 
of the climate. They start well in the spring, but stop 
growing in the heat of summer, and limb out rough. 
Two varieties however, grow here as well if not better 
than in England. One of these is the Welch, the other 
known there as the Dutch, with a white bark. These 
are important facts for those who may hereafter under¬ 
take to cultivate willow plants, derived from the experi¬ 
ence of thirty years in lat. 40 deg. 30m. north. 
The American swamp or wild willow, grows all over 
the United States, of which there are several varieties. 
The Dutch immigrants who settle in the interior, cut and 
use it in the manufacture of articles of utility. Some is 
cut in the neighborhood of Albany, and sent in bundles 
to the New-York market. The native willow is best for 
coarse, strong and tight work, but is not adapted for split¬ 
ting or twisting, qualities which belong in an eminent 
degree, to the cultivated Welsh willow. 
There is a variety of willow cultivated along the 
Schuylkill and Delaware rivers in Pennsylvania, which 
is reputed to be the best in this country for all kinds of 
work. It is extensively cultivated by the Dutch, who 
are said to have imported it into that State in the time of 
William Penn, the original founder of the colony of 
Pennsylvania. It is known there by the name of the 
Green willow. Mr. Reed also cultivates the Pennsylva¬ 
nia willow, which he introduced into this State in 1810. 
Several besides himself, raise this and other varieties of 
I the willow on Staten Island. The green willow grows 
