INDUSTRY OF COUNTIES. 
311 
The Agricultural statistics of a few staples for the year 1859, 
a year second only to 1858, for deficient crops, are as follows: 
Butter 166,163 lbs., cheese 4,060 lbs., hay 7,789 tons, maple 
sugar 144,382 lbs., ’wheat 89,070 bush., rye 4,995 bush., com 
43,475 bush., oats 54,744 bush. The amount-of improved 
land is 32,270 acres, or less than one-tenth of the entire sur¬ 
face of the county. 
The above is not regarded by competent judges as a fair 
exhibit of the agricultural resources of the county. For in¬ 
stance, the wheat crop of 1859 was much below the average. 
The estimate for 1860, of the same staple, is 300,000 bushels. 
The corn crop of 1859, on account of repeated frosts, was not 
half its usual value. Fruit culture has not yet received its due 
share of attention in this comparatively new region. But 
every advancing year is witness of the increasing interest felt 
in the subject by the people at large. No labor or employment 
of life has a more ennobling and elevating influence on the 
human soul than this department of horticulture. Whenever 
the experiment has been faithfully tried by an intelligent man, 
this is found to be the result. Apples, pears, plums and cher¬ 
ries flourish luxuriantly, while berries of every kind, and the 
smaller kinds of garden fruit, adapted to this latitude, either 
grow wflld throughout the county or are cultivated at little 
expense. With proper care and skill, quinces and peaches 
can be successfully cultivated. 
A word on the Meteorology of this part of Wisconsin, and 
this article must close. By consulting the Smithsonian records 
kept at Lawrence University, for the past five years, the fol¬ 
lowing facts are ascertained: 1st. The mean annual temper¬ 
ature is a little below 43°. 2d, The amount of rain and melted 
snow is about 30 inches per annum; one year falling to 23 
inches, and another rising to 36 inches. The mean height of 
barometer is a trifle below 29 inches, say 28.98 inches, giving 
us an altitude above the sea level of about 800 feet. The 
coldest month during that period was January, 1856. Mean 
temperature for the month, 6°. Coldest day, the 8th; mean 
temperature for the day -was 19°. The lowest point which the 
