•• The mildness and humidity of the climate produces some 
very singular results upon vegetation ; often potatoes, cabbages 
and other vegetables are harvested only as fast as they are re¬ 
quired for family use. The cabbage stalks from whieh the 
heads have been cut remain standing in the garden, and often 
produce during the following season from three to seven heads 
of cabbage to each stalk, hard, sound, excellent, but not as 
large as the first head produced. Where the soil is good the 
production is abundant, and that too with moderate tillage. I 
have seen potatoes dropped upon the unplowed ground, covered 
with a shovel-plough, and left until digging time without fur¬ 
ther cultivation. They were then harvested by ploughing them 
up and thus bringing them to the surface, and the yield with 
this primitive culture ranged from 500 to 700 bushels to the 
acre. . . . There are portions of the United States pos¬ 
sessed of soil more uniformly good than that of Washington 
Territory. But for variety and extent of resources, perhaps no 
part of the Union equals it. Agriculture and stock-raising are 
but two and perhaps not the most important of its elements of 
wealth and prosperity. The agricultural and grassing capabil¬ 
ities of the country can yet scarcely be estimated. The popu¬ 
lation is so sparse, the process of culture so simple, and the 
necessity for husbanding and applying fertilizers so light, that 
but little can 3 r et be determined in regard to the cultivable or 
grassing area of the country, or the possible capacity of giving 
areas for production. That fruits, flour, beef, mutton, oats, 
wool, barley, potatoes and other inferior products may be pro¬ 
duced for exportation in immense quantities, no one residing in 
the country seems to doubt. The winters are much milder and 
shorter than upon the Atlantic seaboard, so that comparatively 
little of the products of the summer are consumed during that 
continuance, leaving a much larger portion for sale and exporta¬ 
tion. In many sections of the country no provision is made for 
sheltering or feeding stock during the inclement weather ; still, 
however, the more prudent of our people generally provide for a 
short period of frost and snow, which is likely to occur in two 
or three years.” — Garfield. 
In an earnest desire to give every information relative to our 
mild, genial temperature, and its effect on vegetation and human 
health, we append the following exhibit from the United States 
Coast Survey for the winter of 1866-67 : 
