Texas...bales TABLE I Crop of the United States. 1848. 44,000 RECEIPTS. 1849. 1850. 1851. ESTIMATE. 1852. 39,000 31,000 46,000 50,000 New Orleans 1,191,000 1,094,000 782,000 933,000 1,150,000 Mobile 436,000 519,000 351,000 452,000 Florida.. 154,000 200,000 181,000 181,000 ...... ... Georgia 255,000 391,000 344,000 322,000 500,000 170,000 300,000 350,000 30,000 Years. English Imports from Brazil, Egypt &c. About the Whole year 1st Oct. for Liverpool. G. Brit'n. Years. 1st Oct. Liverpool. G. Brit'n. About the Whole year for 1846...bales 121,000 155,000 | 1849...bales 178,000 245,000 1847......... 1848.... 75,000 135,000 1850......... 205,000 252,000 94,000 137,000 1851....... 138,000 190,000 TABLE V. Supply of 1850 and Estimate for 1851 and 1852. 1852. Crop of the United States...bales 2,097,000 2,855,000 2,550,000 English imports from East Indies 308,000 350,000 250,000 English receipts from other places 252,000 195,000 200,000 Total from these sources...... 2,657,000 2,900,000 3,000,000 Oct. 3......... 1,220,000 1,086,001 27,850 1,167,000 29,923 Oct. 10......... 1,287,000 1,116,000 27,900 Whole year Consumption on the Continent - not including France Con sumption. 1846 ...... 53,000 452,000 1849. 1850. 1851. 1852. G. Brit'n of all kinds 1,588,000 1,515,000 1,600,000 1,650,000 United States......... 518,000 487,000 404,000 450,000 France, of Amer. cotton 351,000 301,000 310,000 300,000 The rest of the continent 596,000 466,000 550,000 600,000 SHORT NOTES on Ruffin's Essay on calcareous manures. 1. "Soil seldom extends more than a few inches below the surface, as on the surface only are received those natural supplies of vegetable and animal matters, which are necessary to constitute soil." Page 10. Vegetable extracts are carried down, in the soil, by rains; and there, if not taken up by the chemical attraction of the earth, because it is already saturated, or has no affinity for them, will be brought back to the surface, by capillary attraction; and must be left there, because water, when evaporated, always leaves them behind. 2. In soils of ridge lands, "the product may be from five bushels of corn, or as much of wheat, to the acre, on the most clayey soils, to twelve bushels of corn, and three of wheat, on the most sandy." Page 11. "Whortleberry bushes, as well as pines, are abundant on ridge lands." Page 11. How is food furnished for the growth of Whortleberry-bushes, and pine trees, on these poor ridges? May not oxygen be furnished to the soil, from the air, in too large a proportion, and thereby * In his communication to us, the author says: "In copying my notes, I added a few remarks, on some of the questions discussed. My notes were not intended as a general revision of Mr. Ruffin's able and useful Essay, but merely as suggestions of my own, upon a few prominent points, that struck me with much force."-Editor. acids formed, in plants, and thus Whortleberry bushes and pines be produced? 3. "The slopes extend from the ridges to the streams." "Most of this kind of land has been cleared, and greatly exhausted. Its virgin growth is often more of oak, hickory, and dog-wood, than pine - but when turned out of cultivation, an unmixed growth of pine follows." "Its usual best product of corn may be, for a few crops, eighteen or twenty bushels." Page 11 and 12. The growth of oak, hickory, and dogwood, upon the slopes, and their product of corn, for a few crops, (18 or 20 bushels per acre) shows that naturally they possess more fertility than the ridge land. But the necessary food for oak, hickory, and dogwood, having been consumed by crops - by too severe a cultivation of the land, there was left in the soil food suitable only for "an unmixed growth of pine." 4. Mr. Ruffin is undoubtedly correct, in controverting the opinions of Arator as to "the most powerful means of fertilizing the earth, by leaving fields to receive their own vegetable cover, for their improvement, during the years of rest." Page 14. Arator does not take into consideration, that after the capacity of land to relain vegetable food is fully supplied, land cannot be farther enriched simply by resting. Hence the error into which he has fallen. If his views were correct, it would necessarily follow, that our woodland would be in a perpetual state of improvement, when so situated as not to be subject to have their soil washed away by heavy rains. Mr. Ruffin correctly remarks, that "no where can a farm be found, which has been improved beyond its original fertility, by means of the vegetable resources of its own arable fields." P. 15. 5. "The richest and poorest soils each exert, strongly, a force to retain as much fertility as nature gave them." "When worn and reduced; each may easily be restored to its original state, but cannot be raised higher, with either durability or profit, by putrescent manures, whether applied by the bounty of nature, or the industry of man." P. 16. The reason of this appears by the remarks showing the foundation of Arator's error. 6. Mr. Ruffin considers acids to be very prejudicial to soils, as doubtless they are, if not neutralized. He says: "it will be neu tralized, and its powers destroyed, by applying enough of calcareous earth to the soil; and precisely such effects are found, whenever that remedy is applied." P. 25. This application of calcareous earth to the soil will be advantageous, not only in neutralizing the acids; but the increased capacity of the soil, produced by carbonate of lime, will enable it to draw gein to the surface, and thus increase the fertility of the soil. 7. "Gein forms soluble combinations with alkalies. When an excess of gein is used, the caustic alkalies are so neutralized by this substance, that they lose their peculiar chemical action and properties." P. 79. The statement above shows one of the valuable properties of gein, as stated in No. 6. 8. "Water converts to the extract of mould a part of the insoluble gein, contained in the soil, and this transformation extends more and more, so that finally the greater part of the gein becomes soluble.' P. 80. This also shows the importance of gein in soils. 9. Land in Lower Virginia, "is rendered unproductive by acidity." P. 29. If the barrenness of the lands in Lower Virginia were produced by acidity alone, the application of a suitable proportion of lime would remedy the evil, and restore them to a complete state of fertility. But Mr. Ruffin admits that you cannot do more than restore them to such a state of fertility permanently as they possessed in a state of nature. These lands then, in a state of nature, lack fertility because they do not possess, and are incapable of retaining those constituent principles, which are essentially necessary to enable them to imbibe and retain in combination in suitable proportion of all those substances, which are found in our most fertile soils, and constitute the foundation of their fertility. |