BARRELS.-1. The barrel is made thirty-two inches long, including chines, and the head about seventeen inches across, with a little bulge in the middle. The staves and heading of pine, to be three-quarters or seven-eighths of an inch thick, secured with six strong wooden hoops.

2. A barrel of turpentine must weigh two hundred and eighty pounds, and any over and under weight is added or taken off, as the case may be, in calculating all sales. No allowance for weight of barrel.

3. A cooper's task, when working by the day or month, is five barrels. His price is twenty to twenty-five cents a barrel for making, when all materials are found him, and when he finds all, from thirty-one to thirty-seven cents a piece.

4. Heading and staves of heart pine are worth $5 a thousand. Sap staves onefourth less, as they are only fit to hold the hard turpentine or scrape. They should be got out and hacked up and dried two or three months before being worked up. Hoop-poles, about six feet long, of hickory, white oak, or water oak, are worth twenty to twenty-five cents per hundred, delivered.

5. In a gang of bands getting turpentine every fifth man may be a cooper, and will be employed the year through in providing his own materials and keeping the others supplied with barrels.

GUARDING AGAINST FIRE.-The evil consequence of getting a turpentine plantation on fire is so great as to justify the labor of hoeing around the boxes, so as to clear away all the grass and pine straw to a distance of four or five feet. This will employ a hand four or five weeks in the winter. The State ought to protect this important interest, by enacting severe penalties against those who set out fire where it can extend among trees boxed for turpentine.

GENERAL REMARKS.-The turpentine business is considered a very healthy employment for hands. It may be carried on with little capital, on lands too poor for cultivation, and is, therefore, well suited to persons of small means.

If there is one hand, in the poorest family, able to cut boxes and chip them afterwards, the dipping can be done by women and half-grown children. A poor family, living near a still or river, may make something, even if they hire their boxes to be cut, buy their barrels, and hire the hauling.

On the other hand, no business makes better returns for common labor, take one year with another, not even the culture of cotton and tobacco, especially when the amount of capital employed is taken into consideration. A prime experienced hand, in a plantation newly opened, has gathered $600 or $700 worth of turpentine in a year, leaving a net sum of $400 or $500, after all deductions for barrels, hauling, provisions, &c. Two hundred dollars per hand, clear of all expenses, including the wages to an overseer, is a very moderate result for an average lot of hands.

The usual price for cutting good boxes is $1 per hundred, and food for the hand. Twelve thousand boxes are an average task, in chipping and dipping. Extra prime hands have tended as high as fifteen or sixteen thousand, but ordinary hands will not do justice to more than ten thousand.

Good trees will yield about three barrels to the thousand boxes at each dipping for the first three years, one-sixth of this being hard or scrape the second year, and one-fifth the third year. The proportion of scrape increases as the chipping extends higher up the tree, until it makes half the crop, while the dippings of soft turpentine will be reduced to three or even two a year. It will, therefore, be necessary to add some new boxes to the task every year after the fourth, to keep up the profitable business. In young thrifty trees this may be done without increasing the bonds of a task, if the number of boxes was limited at first, as previously directed.

Virgin dip is the name given to all turpentine gathered the first year from new boxes; although the first three dippings make much the brightest and best rosin, and on this account is worth fifty or seventy-five cents a barrel more than

Yellow dip, which is the name of all soft turpentine taken from the boxes after the first year.

Hard or scrape is the name for the turpentine which hardens on the face of the chipping and never reaches the boxes. This makes a pretty fair rosin, but yields not more than a third of the quantity of spirits, and is worth about half price. The evaporation of spirits from all soft turpentine is very rapid in hot dry weather, and this makes it important to dip and deliver it at the still without unnecessary loss of time.

Virgin dip will yield about five and a half gallons of spirits to the barrel (of 280 pounds) for the first three dippings, and from five and a half to six gallons later in the season.

Yellow dip, if delivered early, will turn out six to six and a half gallons. The scrape rarely makes as much as three gallons, very often not more than two or two and a half to the barrel.

On an average, all kinds will make two barrels of rosin from three of raw turpentine.

The distiller, therefore, will have three of his barrels surplus, which, with slight repairs, will serve as well as new ones for future dippings.

When virgin dip is worth $2 50 or $2 75 a barrel, yellow dip is worth about $2, and the scrape about $1 25 a barrel.

To justify the distiller in paying the above prices, spirits of turpentine should be worth forty cents a gallon in the New Orleans market, upon the supposition that the entire expense from the still does not exceed eight cents a gallon on spirits, and forty cents a barrel on rosin. When spirits are selling in New Orleans at thirty-six cents, the raw article is worth twenty cents a barrel less at the still, at the same rate of expense in sending the manufactured article to market.

The distiller incurs great expense in the single article of spirit barrels. These must be iron bound, made in the best manner of seasoned white oak, and well coated within with glue, to prevent evaporation. They should contain from forty to forty-five gallons, and when ready for use cost little short of $2 a piece. As there must be one spirit barrel provided to every seven of soft turpentine, the demand for these barrels will of itself open an extensive new branch of bnsiness. Let these, by all means, be made at home.

A word more at the close. It is said above that a turpentine plantation will last eight or ten years. This is meant for Florida and southwestern Georgia. In - North Carolina, with careful working, it lasts twelve or fourteen years. And then begins the business of making tar from trees exactly prepared for it by the previous culture. This is nearly as profitable as making turpentine, and will furnish employment for several years longer.

METEOROLOGY FOR THE FARMERS.

LIEUT. MAURY'S NEW ENTERPRISE.

Lieutenant Maury has presented to the farmers of the United States, through the columns of the American Farmer, the outline of a plan for a general system of meteorological observations on land. The high reputation of this gentleman, his eminent services not only to physical science but to the commercial interests of the country, his practical sense and trustworthy judgment, cannot fail to secure attention to his suggestions.

The plan is simple. It proposes that farmers and planters should co-operate all over the country in a regular and systematic method of meteorological observations. The information so collected as to the winds, rains, and similar phenomena, is to be forwarded to Washington city, and measures are to be adopted to enlist the agency of the government in arranging the facts for publication. There can be no doubt that the government will lend its aid to the furtherance of this great work. Lieutenant Maury states that such an office as will be required in Washington to carry out the details of this plan is already in existence. It was established by Mr. Calhoun when he was Secretary of War, and it is under the control of the Surgeon General of the army. The meteorological observations that are made at our military posts are discussed and published at this office; and "one of the most valuable and interesting reports concerning the meteorology and climates of the country that have ever appeared is now in course of publication there."

The plan, it will be perceived, is similar to the one which has been so successfully adopted on the sea. By the observations which have been made on the ocean, a vast mass of most important and valuable information has been collected. The results of these extended observations have been embodied in the "Wind and Current Charts," which have proved of such immense service to navigation. Other nations, following the scientific lead of Lieutenant Maury,

have united in this useful work, so that now the ocean is literally covered with "floating observatories," and "every ship that sails is converted into a temple of science. It has been estimated that millions of dollars have already been saved to commerce by the "Wind and Current Charts." The farmers and planters of the country have been likewise benefitted; for not only have ships been enabled to make quicker voyages, and at lower rates, but new markets, that were before practically inaccessible by reason of length of time, have been brought within easy reach by the increased facilities of transportation.

If this system of close and accurate observation of the facts of meteorology in all its relations to agriculture, health, and similar matters, is adopted on land, it must result in great benefit to our country. As Lieutenant Maury justly remarks, there are "mighty harvests of many sorts" in these meteorological fields, and we have no doubt whatever, that if the proper spirit of research is applied, we shall have a new era in our knowledge of the wonders of the atmosphere, and its connexion with industry, health, and life. We beg the attention of our farmers and planters to this movement. It deserves the largest and most liberal sympathy. It is fraught with invaluable advantages to every domestic interest of the country. Our agricultural associations ought to take up the subject immediately, and prepare memorials to Congress for the slight aid that might be needed to get it under way.

We publish below a letter to us from Lieutenant Maury on this subject. Though not written for the public eye, we have taken the liberty, in view of the important matter discussed, to lay it before our readers, hoping that its vigorous thought and philanthropic spirit may induce general attention to the views advanced :

CHARLOTTSVILLE, Virginia, August 23, 1855. MY DEAR SIR: I am in want of a champion in Alabama for a good cause, and therefore address myself to you without further apology.

My investigations of the winds at sea have impressed me with the idea that as much may be done for agricultural and sanitary meteorology as has been done for that of the sea. I have so stated publicly, and given the details of the plan in the August number of the American Farmer, an agricultural paper published in Baltimore. I will send you a copy of it if I can procure one. The plan is simply that the farmers and planters should lend that sort of co-operation on the land that the merchants and sailors have afforded at sea, and that the government should then do its part by having the observations thus procured, discussed, and published.

There are truth-loving, knowledge-seeking men in every county in every State, who would be glad to co-operate in such a plan. They would readily undertake to make the requisite observations if they were furnished with the needful formule, and had the assurance that their observations should be discussed and published for the benefit of all. Nay, there are unreduced observations enough now in the country, lying in the desks of those who made them, from which as much useful information may be gathered as we culled from the old log-books; and I have no doubt that the desks and drawers of meteorological observers on the land would open quite as readily to the call as the old sea-chests of the mariner did. As for the trial to see what a systematic plan of observations will do for the advancement of agricultural meteorology and for the benefit of farmers and planters, I'll answer for the observations if government will furnish the means for their discussion and publication. I'll go further, and promise that the observations shall be furnished to the government for such a purpose without cost. You know the materials for the "Wind and Current Charts" were all furnished gratuitously, and that without asking government for a single cent we have literally covered the ocean with floating observatories, and converted every ship that sails into a temple of science. Not only governments but nations and people have united with me, and are assisting to carry out a system of meteorological research for the sea. As much may be done for the land if the planters and farmers of the United States will only second the effort, and tell their representatives in Congress that they want as much done by the governinent for agricultural and sanitary meteorology as it has permitted to be done at sea for the benefit of commerce and navigation. By the saving of time on the voyage, and the lessening of the dangers by the way, these interests, it has been computed both in this country and England, have been benefitted to the extent of millions annually. Some of

these benefits have inured also to agriculture, not only by giving an opportunity to the farmer to get markets beyond the sea cheaper, and enabling ships to fetch and carry for him at lower figures, but by bringing within reach markets which before were inaccessible by reason of the great length in time of the voyage.

Let us, therefore, extend this system of philosophical research to the land. It is very rich with promises of good, it will cost literally almost nothing, and will not the planters of Alabama, as well as the agriculturalists and agricultural societies of the other States, lend me a hand in "getting it under way?"

Yours, truly,

Rev. Dr. LIPSCOMв, of Southern Times, Montgomery, Alabama.

AGAVA PLANT.

M. F. MAURY.

As this plant is becoming one of great importance to the country, a few remarks in relation to it will, no doubt, be interesting to the public.

It is a species of the "cactus," indigenous to South America, more particularly to that portion termed the Spanish Main, where it grows spontaneous in great abundance. The leaves of the plant are prepared into hemp, (called sisal.) Its sale in our market amounts to several thousand tons annually, at prices varying from $200 to $250 per ton.

Many years ago an enterprising gentleman, Dr. Perrine, a native of France, attempted to propagate its growth in this country at Key West and adjacent islands. Death, resulting from Indian hostilities in the vicinity, arrested him in his laudable endeavor. Since that period little attention has been given to its cultivation. The large demand, however, latterly, for the article, for manufacture into cordage, and that, too, at a high price, has produced an incentive among the citizens of Key West to turn their attention to its culture, at which place it grows to a limited extent, as will be shown by the following extract of a letter from a resident there:

"The sisal hemp is very successful. The plant (Agava Sisalana, or Americana) grows in the poorest kind of land; and even on the stony, barren island it grows very well. There are a few acres here just ready to be cleaned out for market; and it has been ascertained by experiment that an acre will yield one thousand dollars per annum after the fourth year. It requires no cultivation; just drop the seed in the ground, and you have nothing more to do with it for four years, when you can begin to cut and clean. The suckers are constantly springing up, so that by the time you cut down the first crop the second is ready to begin with, and so on untill the land is entirely exhausted."

Some nine years ago my attention was called to the weed by a gentleman from Florida, with a view to encourage its growth and to prepare it into hemp. The principal difficulty in the process was found in converting the leaves into hemp by machinery. To give facility to the operation, the ordinary mode of cleaning them (as practised by the natives of South America, where labor is of little or no value) being too tedious, I suggested a method (the one now in use at Key West) which gave facility to some extent, but which does not answer the purpose sufficiently well to make the enterprise profitable.

I also directed my attention to the best mode of cleaning the leaves by requesting the attention of some scientific gentlemen, Professor David A. Wells, of Springfield, Massachusetts, among others, to the discovery of some chemical process for the purpose, who hit upon a quick and cheap process. It, however, discolored the leaves to an extent which made them unsuitable for cordage.

Subsequently, at the request of Senator Mallory, I addressed a number of the eastern machinists on the subject, who, with much spirit and zeal, entered upon the experiment for devising a proper plan; and I am now happy to believe that this object is likely to be effected. As a proof of this, I give here an extract of a letter from Messrs. Kellogg & Co., of Pine Meadow, Connecticut. They say:

"The machine about which we wrote you March 20th, cleans the 'Agava plant' to our entire satisfaction. We had to make some little alteration in the construction of it after receiving the plant, but we have retained the principle. It works charmingly."

D. M.

Export of breadstuffs from the United States to Great Britain and Ireland, from September 1, 1854, to September 1, 1855.*

170,329

1,824,920

1,618,060

1,444,640

1,581,702

463,460

1,118,316

183,533

Do..........do....1847.... 3,150,689

5,536 317,713 6,843,242 40,660 5,918,317 6,215,936

683 5,543,460 1,517,087 1,810 2,712,120 1,576,749 5,553 1,523,908 2,368,860 6,086 463,015 4,873,446 86,058 1,091,385 12,729,62 105,350 251,622 4,581,367 847,280 4,015, 134 17,298,744

*From the able commercial letter of Neuffer & Hendrix, Charleston, S. C.

NOTICES OF BOOKS.