80 QUEENSLAND AGRICULTURAL JOURNAL. {Ll Juny, 1898. 
Manufacturers say that the tobies made in Pittsburg are superior to those 
from Lancaster county, as the Lancaster tobies are made of Lancaster tobacco 
only, whereas those manufactured in Pittsburg are made chiefly of the 
Connecticut and Virginia seed. The seed tobies are subdivided into ‘mould”’ 
and “handmade.” In some shops, it is feared, mould tobies are made from 
sweepings, but in the better-class factories the tobacco for them is cut and 
cleaned by machinery, and the “rankness’’ of the tobacco is driven off by a hot- 
air treatment. On account of the expense of preparing the cut tobacco, mould 
tobies are rarely cheaper than the handmade, although the working men who 
“roll”? the latter receive better wages than the girls who make the mould tobies. 
One says “cigar-makers,’’ but it would be heresy to call the toby-makers 
anything else but toby-rollers. Mould toby-rollers earn from 5 dollars to 
9 dollars week. The average wages of hand-rollers are 15 dollars to 18 dollars 
a week. 
That the toby or stogie is not a fine cigar, the price, three and four for 
5 cents, makes evident, but they are made of real, pure tobacco. No flavouring 
or colouring extracts are used, as the tobacco is too cheap to justify that. 
Cheap as they are they must be good, for how else could one explain the 
wonderful spread of the toby in the last few years, and the magnitude to 
which the industry has grown.—Baltimore Sun. 
A BRITISH OPINION OF QUEENSLAND. 
THe colony of Queensland has now become a regular exporter of butter to 
Great Britain, some 300 tons having been shipped during this season. This 
butter has competed on fairly favourable terms with the produce from Victoria, 
New Zealand, and other colonies. Some of this Queensland butter has been 
sent to Glasgow, where it was at once snapped up at highest prices, the light 
colour making it very suitable to the requirements of that city. The Darling 
Downs is the principal dairying district in Queensland. The Downs are an 
undulating tableland, about 2,000 feet above the sea-level, with the main line 
from Sydney to Brisbane running through them. ‘They have an area of 
something like 4,000,000 acres of the richest agricultural soil in the world— 
soil ranging from 10 feet to 60 feet in depth, and as fertile as the Delta of 
Egypt or the river bottoms of Siberia. The climate is perfect, water is 
abundant everywhere, a network of running creeks on the surface and artesian — 
waters under the surface. The district is meant by Nature to be a land of 
wheat and maize and lucerne, of fat cattle and rich dairies, and crowded 
homesteads. In some parts the farmer can grow two crops in one year, maize 
sown in January being ripe in April, and wheat sown in May being fit for the 
sickle in December. ‘The Queensland Government has already taken power to 
repurchase these rich lands, and subdivide them; and ‘a century hence the 
Darling Downs may be a sunnier and more populous Kent.’’—Durrant’s Press 
Cuttings. 
THE SUGAR-BEET IN GREAT BRITAIN. 
Av a meeting of the Central and Associated Chambers of Agriculture, London, 
the subject of the cultivation of the sugar-beet in Great Britain was discussed 
on the introduction of Colonel Milward, who presented some interesting facts 
and figures upon the subject. While admitting that the production of beet 
sugar in this country would not pay so long ‘as export bounties were granted 
on Continental sugar, he said there was good reason to believe that these 
bounties would soon cease to be paid in Germany and France, though it was 
doubtful whether the separate bounty on production in the latter country 
would be given up. He called attention to the numerous experiments carried 
out for years past in England, Scotland, and Ireland, as proving that excellent 
crops, containing a fair percentage of sugar, could be grown. A paper 
prepared by Mr. G. Shack Sommer, circulated at the meeting, gave asummary of 
experiments carried out from 1889 to 1895, inclusive, from which it appears 
that crops ranging from over 14 tons to over 26 tons have been grown in 
Great Britain containing from 2 tons to 3 tons 14 ewt. of sugar per acre. Mr. 
