wealth; which we shall take the liberty to speak of in the sequel of these desultory observations.

From the junction of the Big Scioto to the mouth of the Muskingum, and extending back some 40 miles, the physical topography presents about the same aspect of hill and dale. The first, when examined as to fertilizing ingredients, is found to contain silica, calcareous, and argillaceous compounds, in all localities, in greater or less proportions of each, and by an improved system of farming-that is, returning a quid pro quo, and keeping the land in heart-can, and does often, turn out from 60 to 100 bushels of corn per acre, and from 20 to 30 of wheat. The valleys or low lands are compounded of deposits of vegetable decompositions, with less portions of calcareous ingredients, based on an argillaceous subsoil, with an adaptation to corn and Irish potatoes more particularly; and, when deprived of its vegetable exuberance, is well adapted to wheat culture. In a latitude of 39°, and in the valley of the Ohio, all products of the temperate zone grow well. Corn is planted in lands already exhausted, and in lands well kept up: the average crop is reckoned at about 35 bushels per acre the present season; which is about an average, in a series of five years, of ordinary seasons.

Wheat is cultivated with more system and care than corn, as it is one of the staple articles of agriculture. From results well ascertained, it is believed the average crop this season is about 15 bushels. The season was remarkably favorable. The spring was wet and cool, and wheat, even in poor lands, shot up and was hastened to maturity, and generally harvested in June, without the presence of fungus, or rust, or Hessian fly. The berry was full and plump, weighing about 62 pounds to the bushel; and never have the millers turned out a better article of flour than is about being shipped to southern markets.

When lands are kept in heart by a rotation of crops or fertilizers, bountiful crops are taken off; but when kept in corn until run down, and then sown in wheat, the crop is invariably small. Many are now going on with a regular rotation of clover and cereal crops, and occasionally bringing in a crop of corn; by which a full remuneration for labor is obtained. When it is supposed that wheat designed for seed contains the embryo of weevil or Hessian fly, previous to being sown it is soaked in alkali, which effectually destroys it. By many, blue grass is preferred as a fertilizer.

Oats succeed well here in an ordinary season; it averages about 40 bushels per acre. With wheat, it is also cultivated for exportation. Since the Mexican war has terminated, it does not command a price to remunerate the labor of cultivating; but our farmers are habituated to cultivating various crops, and continue it more particularly for home consumption; the surplusage is sold for foreign or southern markets.

Potatoes grow well, and on good lands, well adapted to potato culture, 200 bushels are taken from each acre. Those of early varieties, set early in March, and kept clean, need no other labor, and will mature by the 1st of August, and are harvested in September, and sent to market on the first tide in the Ohio. At the present time, on the margin of this county, (Gallia,) there are over 50,000 bushels of potatoes now on flatboats, attached to the Ohio shore, awaiting a tide to go off; they readily command, when dug, 30 cents per bushel.

Beans are an important branch of agriculture in this portion of Ohio? One of our most extensive merchants and produce-dealers is of opinion that some 6,000 bushels will go from this county (Gallia) the present season. While out obtaining that information, and on making inquiry what number of barrels of flour would be shipped from the steam-mills of this county during the present season, one of our largest operators informed me that it would reach some 20,000 or 30,000.

Grasses.-Hay is also an export article, and was most abundant during the past season. On good bottom-lands, the average yield is about one and a half ton per acre. Herdsgrass, or red-top, is the predominant grass; although timothy, on dry lands, succeeds well.

Dairy Husbandry.-No great attention is given to dairy operations; but, during the spring and summer, every family makes a surplus of butter, which is sold to merchants, rewashed, and the extraneous water extracted, and packed into kegs, and sent off to foreign markets.

Cattle. But little attention is paid to the improvement of the breeds of cattle. The common stocks are of a kind that live on browse a great portion of the winter, and short pasture in summer, and are worth, at three years old, from $12 to $16. This is the stock that best suits com. mon farmers not provided with sheds and plenty of provender, and will be fat, with half a chance every fall, with less food than is required to fatten the improved breeds; thus enabling ordinary farmers, on small farms, to supply their families with the luxury of fat heef almost spontaneously. At the same time, a better class of farmers, with extensive pastures of luxuriant grasses, and well supplied with winter food and shelter, are paying some attention to the improvement of their stock, having some fine crosses of Durham and the stock introduced by the Scioto Company some years since.

Horses are not raised, except for domestic purposes, and but few fine horses are to be found; good draft horses are more highly prized than those for the saddle.

Some attention is paid to raising mules, both for domestic purposes and other markets. They readilycommand, at 2 years old, from $40 to $60. They are in demand, and are considered profitable stock.

Sheep and Wool attract much attention, both for home consumption and foreign markets; but few have engaged in the sheep business as an exclusive branch of agriculture. Every farmer has his flock, and many have those of the best crosses of the merinos and South Downs, and other approved stocks; and all sell wool. Large quantities are annually purchased and shipped to eastern markets; it commands remunerating prices, and is considered a profitable branch of business to those who raise.

wool to sell.

Some extensive woollen factories are established among and near us, and are in active operation, manufacturing fabrics for home consumption and for the people in the valley of the Ohio, and thus relieving them of the burden of duties on imports, or onerous charges for land transportation from eastern manufactories; and enabling every one, in that respect, to be independent, and consequently happy.

Hogs are not produced in great abundance. The continual demand for corn, to supply the wants of the people at the iron furnaces in our vicinity, and the Kanawha saline, distant some sixty miles by the Kanawha river, makes the stock of corn too limited to spare much to hogs; com

sequently, pork cannot be raised here, converted into bacon, and go into market in competition with that produced in the more fertile regions of the Western country. Tobacco succeeds well; yet but w are engaged in it beyond a home demand.

Fruits of fine varieties are being raised in this country. Apples, peaches, pears, apricots, nectarines, cherries, &c., are produced to a limited extent; but, as yet, fruit culture is in its infancy, though the day is not far distant when the valley of the Ohio will vie with any portion of the United States in the production of good fruit.

When these desultory sketches are read, the reader may at once conclude that this is truly a region better adapted to sheep-farming than other agricultural operations; but we say to such that agriculture here is not the predominant and exclusive business of the country, like the other more favored agricultural districts of Ohio. We boast of our inexhaustible beds of iron-ore, stone-coal, lime-stone, Burr mill-stone,* earths for stone-ware, fire-proof brick, with our forests abounding in timber suitable for ship-building, steam-boats, house-building, and a variety of other purposes; while we possess the enviable privilege of being in the vicinity of one of the noblest and most majestic rivers in the known world-"the beautiful Ohio."

Already is the mineral wealth of the country being developed; within the extent of forty miles are some twenty blast-furnaces in operation, turning out annually some 40,000 tons of pig-iron, worth $25 per ton-thus returning at least $1,000,000. To dig the ore, to haul it, to chop the wood to make the charcoal sufficient to make that quantity of iron, to quarry and haul the lime-stone, to haul the iron to the Ohio river, and take it to market—require an expenditure of money and labor to an extent that is unknown to any but the owners. But the farmers in this region of country can bear witness to the immense quantity of beef, pork, vegetables, butter, eggs, and other agricultural products sold annually at the furnaces. The millers in the vicinity can also tell that it takes a "right smart chance" of flour to supply them. So, also, the merchants can tell what an immense quantity of shoes and boots, coffee, sugar, molasses, ready-made clothing, shovels and axes, it takes to supply them. And the two or three hundred wagons can tell how many tons of pig iron they have hauled to the river. Indeed, so lucrative is the iron business considered, that all concerned are promptly remunerated for their labor, and all are in favor of laying an import duty on foreign iron, and thus giving home manufactures an increased spur to more extended operations.

In the vicinity of the furnaces, agricultural products find a ready market, and often seemingly at exorbitant prices.

The coal business is a no less concern. The Pomeroy banks, some 16 miles above, are extensively engaged in digging and shipping coal to towns on the Ohio, and supplying steamboats. A steamboat of immense

power is running in that trade, often taking down some 6 or 8 barges, averaging say 6,000 bushels; and often, on her return-trips, she propels against the stream from 8 to 13 empty barges.

[* We suspect that proper "burr mill-stone" is not found anywhere north or west of the Allegany mountains. The rock exists in Georgia, and, doubtless, to some extent, in South Carolina and Alabama. In Georgia it is extensively wrought, and is equal, in every respect, to the best French burr-being precisely similar in its geolological position and lithological character.]

If it were possible to ascertain the number of bushels mined; the hands required in all the operations of loading, going to market, selling, and de. livering; together with the hands engaged in every department, and families dependent on that enterprise for support; it would be swelled to an immense amount, and astonish those not acquainted with such operations. Here, again, is a home demand for an immense amount of ag ricultural products. So extensive are the coal operations of the Pomeroy banks, that a town has sprung up at that locality, numbering some 2,000 persons; where but a few years since was a forest and rocky desert-fit abode of the owl and beasts of the forest. From the upper banks in Pomeroy to the Middleport banks are some four miles, and presents a continuous village, although subdivided into four local towns, united on the river. Within that distance there are perhaps some two or three merchant flouring-mills; as many, or more, steam saw-mills; one or two founderies; a rolling-mill; and many other extensive establishments, required by the enterprise and industry of the people at that place.

In addition to the blast-iron furnaces and coal operations, there is springing up another operation that will require a large number of hands, and another demand for agricultural products-we mean the salt furnaces about going into operation at Pomeroy, where salt water equal to the best Kanawha water has been found, and can be manufactured into salt at as little cost as perhaps at any other establishment in the Western country; to which may be added the immense lumber trade going on from Racoon river, in Gallia county, to Cincinnati, employing, during the winter season, an immense number of hands, who have to be fed and clad also. A large number of hands are also employed in building barges, or, in Western parlance, flat-bottomed boats, to carry off the surplus products of agriculture. And now--taking some thirty-five miles on the Ohio, and embraced in Gallia county-there are some 40 barges, loaded with agricultural products, which will depart for other markets on the first tide in the Ohio, averaging some 80 tons each. And with such an association of varied interests, acting as handmaids to each other, it will at once be seen that this part of southern Ohio is to be the favored spot in Ohio, and, in point of industry and intelligence, will outstrip many of the older portions.

We set out to write on the subject of agriculture; but it was found necessary to notice the home demand for agricultural products, and to show that all the varied interests are going hand-in-hand in making the people of southern Ohio rank among the most intelligent and wealthy portion of the western country.

I am, sir, very respectfully,

LEWIS NEWSOM.

MUSKINGUM COUNTY, OHIO.

SIR: In answer to your Circular, I send the following:

Wheat has been more than an average crop this year. I think it will be near 20 bushels per acre. There is a decided improvement in farming throughout this county. Farmers are beginning to inquire into the best modes and most advantageous manner of farming, that they may get

Rye, Barley, Pcas, and Beans are but little cultivated in this county for export.

Oats.-Great quantities raised; produces well, and is a profitable crop for feeding horses. I sow 2 to 3 bushels per acre; product, from 30 to 50 bushels per acre.

Clover and Timothy, and their Seeds.-Clover is sown for pasture and the renovation of the land, and for seed. When intended for seed, the first crop is mown for hay, which crop will average 2 tons per acre. This crop is cut in the first part of June. The second crop is let grow for the seed, which is cut in September, and produces from 1 to 21 bushels to the acre. Clover makes the best pasture for horses of all grasses, but not so good for cattle or sheep. The hay is good for wintering sheep, and horses do very well on it; but cattle have no relish for it. Clover is mostly used in this county for the renovation of land.

Butter and Cheese.-As to cheese, there is but little made; none for export. As to butter, there is considerable made and exported; but theyearly average product of butter per cow is something I have not experimented on. From observation of my own cows, I think a good cow will make 12 pounds per week, allowing her to give milk nine months in the year, which would make 432 pounds in the year. Ten cents being the price of butter in Belleville and Mansfield, will make the valueof the butter from the cow in one year, $43 20; but the cow must be well fed during the year.

Neat Cattle.-Cost of rearing till three years old, $6 a year, making $18; price at that age, from $16 to $24; value of dairy cows, from $12 to $20 in spring; but in fall there is no demand for them. The beef fattened in this county is made principally on grass, and on corn ground and fed dry. The amount of beef made by one hundred pounds of corn I cannot tell; for I have not made the experiment. But few oxen are *worked here, and I can give no information as to breaking steers to the yoke.

Horses and Mules. Of mules there are but few raised. Rearing horses is the most profitable business the farmer can pursue. On no kind of stock that we rear in this county can we make more net profit than on horses. The expense of rearing horses till three years old is $12 per year, which will make $36. There is no particular method of taking care of the brood mare; we put to the horse in the months of April,. May, or June-working them moderately until the time of foaling. We let the colts run with the mare till five months old; we then take them from the mare and put them in a close stable till they forget their damfeeding them, during this time, one-half gallon morning and evening, with good hay. We then turn them out in good pasture, and give them their usual quantity of oats till spring. They are then put to pasture, and kept there till cold weather. They are then fed their gallon of oats per day with good hay, and so on, till they are three or four years old. At five or six we think they are ready for sale, when we get from $70 to $100 per head. To break them, we commence when they are two or three years old, by putting gears on and leading them about, to accustom

[* A cow well fed, and a good milker, will give 200 pounds per annum.]