Geographical Range of the Wheat Region-Crops.

much wheat as they consumed, and large quantities of grain and flour were sent to the same place.

Prior to the revolution the primitive soils of New-York, New-Jersey, and of New-England, appear not to have rewarded the cultivation of this grain much, if any, beyond the wants of the inhabitants. Considerable quantities were raised on the Hudson, and in some parts of New-Jersey and Pennsylvania, which were exported to the West Indies and New-England, and to Great Britain, France, Portugal and Spain, in years of scarcity, previous to 1823.

In 1776, there was entailed upon this country an enduring calamity, in consequence of the introduction of the Hessian or wheat fly, which was supposed to have been brought from Germany in some straw, employed in the debarkation of Howe's troops on the west end of Long Island. From that point the insect gradually spread in various directions, at the rate of twenty or thirty miles a year, and the wheat of the entire regions east of the Alleghanies is now more or less infested with the larva, as well as in large portions of the states bordering on the Ohio and Mississippi, and on the great lakes; and so great have been the ravages of these insects, that the cultivation of this grain has in many places been abandoned.

The geographical range of the wheat region in the Eastern Continent and Australia, lies principally between the 30th and 60th parallels of north latitude, and between the 30th and 40th degrees south, being chiefly confined to France, Spain, Portugal, Italy, Sicily, Greece, Turkey, Russia, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Poland, Prussia, Netherlands, Belgium, Great Britain, Ireland, Northern and Southern Africa, Tartary, India, China, Australia, Van Dieman's Land, and Japan. Along the Atlantic portions of the Western Continent it embraces the tract lying between the 30th and 50th parallels, and in the country west ward of the Rocky Mountains one or two more degrees further north. Along the west coast of South America, as as well as in situations within the Torrid Zone, sufficiently elevated above the level of the sea, and properly irrigated by natural or artificial means, abundant crops are often produced.

VOL. XIV.

6

387

The principal districts of the United States in which this important grain is produced in the greatest abundance, and forms a leading article of commerce, embrace the states of New-York, NewJersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, Ohio, Kentucky, Michigan, Indiana, Illinois, Missouri, Wisconsin, and Iowa. The chief varieties cultivated in the Northern and Eastern States are the white flint, tea, Liberian, bald, Black sea, and the Italian spring wheat. In the Middle and Western States, the Mediterranean, the Virginia white May, the blue stem, the Indiana, the Kentucky white bearded, the old red chaff, and the Talavera. The yield varies from ten to forty bushels, and upwards, per acre, weighing per bushel from fifty-eight to sixty-seven pounds.

It appears that on the whole crop of the United States, there was a gain during the ten years of 15,645,378 bushels. The crop of New England decreased from 2.014,000 to 1,078,000 bushels, exhibiting a decline of 936,000 bushels, and indicating the attention of farmers has been much withdrawn from the culture of wheat. Grouping the states, from the Hudson to the Potomac, including the District of Columbia, it appears that they produced in 1849, 35,085,000 bushels, against 29,936,000 in 1839. In Virginia, there was an increase of 1,123,000 bushels. These states embrace the oldest wheat-growing region of the country, and that in which the soil and climate seem to be adapted to promote the permanent culture of the grain. The increase of production in ten years has been 6,272,000 bushels, equal to 15.6 per cent. The area of tilled land in these states is 36,000,000 acres, only thirty per cent. of the whole amount returned; while the proportion of wheat produced is forty-six per cent. In North Carolina there has been an increase of 170,000 bushels; but in the Southern States, generally, there was a considerable decrease. Indiana, Illinois, Michigan and Wisconsin, contributed to the general aggregate, under the sixth census, only 9,800,000 bushels; under the last, they are shown to have produced upwards of 25,000,000 bushels, an amount equal to the whole increase in the United States for the period.

When we see the growth of wheat keeping up with the progress of popu

lation in the oldest states of the union, awarded by the Royal Commissioners, we need have no apprehension of decline and recently transmitted to Mr. Bell, by in the cultivation of this important crop. the President of the United States, the The amount of flour exported from chairman of the Executive Committee New-Jersey, in 1751, was 6.424 barrels. in the United States. The red MediFrom Philadelphia, in 1752, 125,960 terranean wheat, exhibited from the barrels, besides 86,500 bushels of wheat; United States, attracted much attention. in 1767, 198,816 barrels, besides 367,500 The wheat from South Australia was bushels of wheat; in 1771, 252,744 bar- probably superior to any exhibited, while rels. From Savannah, in 1771, 7,200 much from our own country fell but pounds. From Virginia, for some years little behind, and was unquestionably annually, preceding the revolution, 800,- next in quality. 000 bushels of wheat. The total exports of flour from the United States, in 1791, were 619,681 barrels, besides 1,018,339 bushels of wheat; in 1800, 653,052 barrels, besides 26,853 bushels of wheat; in 1810, 798,431 barrels, besides 325,924 bushels of wheat; in 1820-21, 1,056,119 barrels, besides 25.821 bushels of wheat; in 1830-31, 1,806,529 barrels, besides 408,910 bushels of wheat; in 1840-41, 1,515,817 barrels, besides 868,585 bushels of wheat; in 1845-46, 2,289,476 barrels, besides 1,613,795 bushels of wheat; in 1846-47, 4,382,496 barrels, besides 4,399,951 bushels of wheat; in 1850-51, 2,202,335 barrels, besides 1,026,725 bushels of wheat.

According to the census of 1840, the wheat crop of the United States was 84,823,272 bushels; in 1849, according to the census of 1850, 100,503,899 bushels, although in some of the largest wheat-growing states, the crops of 1849 fell far below the average.

RYE. This grain is supposed to be a native of the Caspian Caucasian desert, and has been cultivated in the north of Europe and Asia from time immemorial, where it constitutes an important article of human subsistence, being generally mixed with barley or wheat. Its introduction into western Europe is comparatively of recent date, as no mention is made of it in the Ortus Sanitatis, published at Augsburg in 1485, which treats at length of barley, millet, oats and wheat.

Rye was cultivated in the North American colonies soon after their settlement by the English. Gorges speaks of it as growing in Nova Scotia in 1622 as well as of barley and wheat. Plantagenet enumerates it among the produc tions of North Virginia (New-England) in 1648, and alludes to the mixing of it with maize in the formation of bread. It was also cultivated in South Virginia, by Sir William Berkley, previous to that year.

In the state of Ohio, especially, there was great deficiency, and was made Geographically, rye and barley assoapparent by the returns of the wheat ciate with one another and grow upon crop for the ensuing year-made in pur- soils the most analogous, and in situasuance of an act of the legislature of tions alike exposed, It is cultivated for that state. From the almost universal bread in northern Ásia, and all over the returns of "short-crop" by the marshals continent of Europe, particularly in Rusin that state, in 1849, which fell below sia, Norway, Denmark, Sweden, Gerthat of 1839 two millions of bushels, and many and Holland, in the latter of which the ascertained crop of 1850, we are fully it is much employed in the manufacture satisfied that the average wheat crop of of gin. It is also grown to some extent Ohio would appear thirty per cent in England, Scotland and Wales. In greater than shown by the census re- this country it is principally restricted to turns. The same causes which operated the middle and eastern states, but its to diminish the wheat crop of Ohio, culture is giving place to more profitable were not without their effects upon that crops. of other states, bordering on the upper The three leading varieties cultivated portion of the valley of the Mississippi. in the United States, are the spring, In the London exhibition, very little winter and southern, the latter differing wheat was exhibited equal to that from from the others only from dissimilarity the United States, especially that from of climate. The yield varies from 10 to Genesee county, in the State of New- 30 or more bushels per acre, weighing York-a soft, white variety, to the ex- from 48 to 56 pounds to the bushel. hibiter of which a prize medal was The production of rye has decreased

Indian Corn-Varieties-Cultivation-Increase of Production. 389

4,457,000 bushels in the aggregate, but the productions of the country, menin New-York it is greater than in 1840 tioned by Nearchus, the commander of by about forty per cent. Pennsylvania, the fleet; neither is it noticed by Arian, which is the largest producer, has fallen Diodorus, Columella, nor any other anoff from 6,613,373 to 4,805,160 bushels. cient author; and even as late as 1491, Perhaps the general diminution in the the year before Columbus discovered quantity of this grain now produced may America, Juan di Cuba, in his "Ortus be accounted for by supposing a corres- Sanitatis," makes no mention of it. It ponding decline in the demand for dis- has never been found in any ancient tilling purposes, to which a large part of tumulus, sarcophagus, or pyramid; nor the crop is applied. has it ever been represented in any ancient painting, sculpture, or work of art, except in America. But in this country, according to Garcilaso de la Vega, one of the ancient Peruvian historians, the palace gardens of the Incas in Perú were ornamented with maize, in gold and silver, with all the grains, spikes, stalks, and leaves; and, in one instance, in the "garden of gold and silver," there was an entire corn-field, of considerable size, representing the maize in its exact and natural shape-a proof no less of the wealth of the Incas, than their veneration for this important grain.

This grain has never entered largely into our foreign commerce, as the home consumption for a long period nearly kept pace with the supply. The amount exported from the United States in 1801, was 392,276 bushels; in 1812, 82,705 bushels; in 1813, 140,136 bushels. In 1820-21 there were exported 23,523 barrels of rye flour; in 1830-31, 19,100 barrels; in 1840-41, 44,031 barrels; in 1845-46, 38,530 barrels; in 1846-47, 48,892 barrels; in 1850-51, 44,152 barrels. During the year ending June 1, 1850, there were consumed of rye, about 2,144,000 bushels in the manufacture of malt and spirituous liquors.

According to the census returns of 1840, the product of the country was 18,645,567 bushels; in 1850, 14,188,637 bushels.

MAIZE, OR INDIAN CORN.-Among the objects of culture in the United States, maize, or Indian corn takes precedence in the scale of crops, as it is best adapted to the soil and climate, and furnishes the largest amount of nutritive food. When due regard is paid to the selection of varieties, and cultivated in a proper soil, it may be accounted as a sure crop in almost every portion of the habitable globe, between the forty-fourth degree of north latitude and a corresponding parallel south. Besides its production in this country, its principal culture is limited to Mexico, the West Indies, most of the States of South America, France, Spain, Portugal, Lombardy, and Southern and Central Europe generally. It is also cultivated with success in northern, southern and western Africa, India, China, Japan, Australia, and the Sandwich Islands, the groups of the Azores, the Madeiras, the Canaries, and numerous other ocean isles.

Although there has been much written on the eastern origin of this grain, it did not grow in that part of Asia watered by the Indus, at the time of Alexander the Great's expedition, as it is not among

In further proof of the American origin, it may be stated that this plant is still found growing in a wild state, from the Rocky Mountains, in North America, to the humid forests of Paraguay, where, instead of having each grain naked, as is always the case after long cultivation, it is completely covered with glumes, or husks. It is, furthermore, a well authenticated fact, that maize was found in a state of cultivation by the aboriginies in the island of Cuba, on its discovery by Columbus, as well as in most other places in America, first explored by Americans.

The first successful attempt to culti vate this grain in North America by the English, occurred on James' river, in Virginia, in 1608. It was undertaken by the colonists sent over by the London company, who adopted the mode then practised by the natives, which, with some modifications, has been pursued throughout this country ever since. The yield, at that time, is represented to have been from two hundred to more than one thousand fold. The same increase was noted by the early settlers in Illinois. The present yield, east of the Rocky Mountains, when judiciously cultivated, varies from 20 to 135 bushels to an acre.

The varieties of Indian corn are very numerous, exhibiting every grade of size, color and conformation, between the "chubby reed" that grows on the shores

of Lake Superior-the gigantic stalks of from Virginia, for several years precedthe Ohio Valley-the tiny ears, with ing the revolution, annually 600,000 flat, close, clinging grains, of Canada- bushels; from Philadelphia, in 1765–66, the brilliant, rounded little pearl-the 60,205 bushels; in 1771, 259,441 bushels. bright red grains and white cob of the eight-rowed hæmalite-the swelling ears of the big white and the yellow gourd seed of the South. From the flexibility of this plant, it may be acclimatized, by gradual cultivation, from Texas to Maine, or from Canada to Brazil; but its character, in either case, is somewhat changed, and often new varieties are the result. The blades of the plant are of great value as food for stock, and is an article but rarely estimated sufficiently, when considering the agricultural products of the southern and southwestern states especially.

The increase of production, from 1840 to 1850, was 214,000,000 bushels, equal to 56 per cent.

In

The total amount exported from this country in 1770, was 578,349 bushels ; in 1791, 2,064,936 bushels, 351,695 of which were Indian meal; in 1800, 2,032,435 bushels, 338,108 of which were in meal; in 1810, 1,140,960 bushels, 86,744 of which were meal. 1820-21, there were exported 607,277 bushels of corn, and 131,669 barrels of Indian meal; in 1830-31, 571,312 bushels of corn, and 207,604 barrels of meal; in 1840-41, 535,727 bushels of corn, and 232,284 barrels of meal; in 1845-46, 1,286,068 bushels of corn, and 298.790 barrels of meal; in 1846-47, 16,326,050 bushels of corn, and 948,060 barrels of meal; in 1850-51, 3,426,811 bushels of corn, and 203,622 barrels of meal. More than eleven millions of bushels of Indian corn were consumed in 1850, in the manufacture of malt and spirituous liquors.

According to the census of 1840, the corn corp of the United States was 377,531,875 bushels; in 1850, 592,326,612 bushels.

The production of New-England has advanced from 6,993,000 to 10,377,000 bushels, showing an increase of 3,384,000 bushels, nearly fifty per cent. NewYork, New-Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware and Maryland, increased 20,812,000 bushels more than fifty per cent. In the production of this crop, no state has retrograded. Ohio, which, in 1840, oc- OATS.-The oat, when considered in cupied the fourth place as a corn-produc- connection with the artificial grasses, ing state, now ranks as the first. Ken- and the nourishment and improvement tucky is second, Illinois third, Tennessee it affords to live stock may be regarded fourth. The orop of Illinois has increased from 2,000,000 to 5,500,000 bushels, or at the rate of one hundred and sixty per cent. in ten years.

Of the numerous varieties some are best adapted to the Southern States, while others are better suited for the Northern and Eastern. Those generally cultivated in the former are the Southern big and small yellow, the Southern big and small white flint, the yellow Peruvian, and the Virginian white gourd seed. In the more Northerly and Easterly States, they cultivate the golden Sioux or Northern yellow flint, the King Philip or eight-rowed yellow, the Canadian early white, the Tuscarora, the white flour, and the Rhode Island white flint. The extended cultivation of this grain is chiefly confined to the Eastern, Middle and Western States, though much more successfully grown in the latter. The amount exported from South Carolina, in 1748, was 39,308 bushels; from North Carolina, in 1753, 61,580 bushels; from Georgia, in 1755, 600 bushels;

as one of the most important crops we produce. Its history is highly interesting, from the circumstance that while in many portions of Europe it is formed into meal, it forms an important aliment for man; one sort at least has been cultivated from the days of Pliny, on account of its fitness as an article of diet for the sick. The country of its origin is somewhat uncertain, though the most common variety is said to be indigenous to the island of Juan Fernandez. Another oat, resembling the cultivated variety, is also found growing wild in California.

This plant was introduced into the North American Colonies soon after their settlement by the English. It was sown by Gosnold on the Elizabeth Islands in 1602; cultivated in Newfoundland in 1622; and in Virginia by Berkley, prior to 1648.

The oat is a hardy grain, and is suited to climates too hot and too cold either for wheat or rye. Indeed, its flexibility is so great, that it is cultivated with suc

Introduction of Oats-Annual Exports and Total Produce. 391

cess in Bengal, as low as latitude twen- pounds to the bushel. The Egyptian ty-five degrees north, but refuses to oat is cultivated south of Tennessee, yield profitable crops as we approach which, after being sown in autumn, and the equator. It flourishes remarkably fed off by stock in winter and spring, well when due regard is paid to the se- yields from ten to twenty bushels per lection of varieties, throughout the in- acre. In the manufacture of malt and habited parts of Europe, the northern spirituous liquors, oats enter but lightly, and central portions of Asia, Australia, and their consumption for this purpose Southern and Northern Africa, the cul- does not exceed 60,000 bushels annually tivated regions of nearly all North Ame- in the United States. rica, and a large portion of South America.

In this country the growth of the oat is confined principally to the Middle, Western and Northern States. The varieties cultivated are the common white, the black, the gray, the imperial, the Hopetown, the Polish, the Egyptian, and the potato oat. The yield of the common varieties varies from forty to ninety bushels and upwards, per acre, and weighing from twenty-five to fifty

The oat, like rye, never has entered much into our foreign commerce, as the domestic consumption has always been nearly equal to the quantity produced. The annual average exports for several years preceding 1817, were 70,000 bushels.

By the census returns of 1840 it will be seen that the total produce of the United States was 123,071,341 bushels; of 1850, 146,678,879 bushels.

ART. VIII.-COMMERCIAL GROWTH AND PROSPECTS OF ST. LOUIS.

THE GREAT CITIES OF AMERICA.

No. III.

[In volume 13th of the Review the reader will find elaborate articles upon the Commercial Progress of New-Orleans and Cincinnati, with much interesting material in regard to St. Louis. We continued our references to the great cities of the Union by the introduction of Boston into our March number, vol. 14th, and will follow it up with a regular series of similar papers.

Our present subject will be St. Louis; and having hitherto, in the Review and the Industrial Resources, discussed its early history and advancement, we complete the subject to date from the elaborate report, in pamphlet form, for 1852-3, made by A. B. Chambers, Esq., of the St. Louis Republican.]

ST. LOUIS must at no distant day be- artisans elsewhere for the manufacture come important as a manufacturing city. The heaviest business in this department will doubtless be in iron. The state boasts of her mountains of ore, and the coal region is immediately at our doors. Within a few years past the articles made of iron have multiplied beyond any expectation. Railing, fencing for agricultural uses, window sash, doorfronts, columns, caps, telegraph wire, water pipe, are a few only of the uses to which the article has lately been applied; while speculation begins to whisper about entire buildings being constructed, and entire streets paved with it. Our shops already compete with the best

of steam engines, and of every species of machinery. A connection with Pilot Knob and the Iron Mountain by railroad, will obviate at once the difficulty to an embarkation of the kind, by placing the ore at the furnace cheaply and expeditiously, and thus bringing into general use this great metal. Missouri contains thus, within her own bosom, an element of wealth that has not yet been brought into requisition, and which is destined at no distant day to give a strong and vigorous pulsation to her growth in wealth. Besides this, we have lead and copper ore in abundance, exhaustless, and second in quality to the yield of no