SIR: The accompanying reports and tables of agricultural statistics of the crops of 1859 and 1862, and of the agriculture of California, are laid before you for publication in the agricultural volume for 1862. The census returns for 1860 having been published, it is due to agriculture that at the earliest moment the returns of the principal agricultural products should be republished in the annual report of the Department of Agriculture. The reports accompanying the tables have been prepared in the hope that they would serve to give greater interest in the tables. Any inaccuracies which may be found, must be attributed to the yet imperfect manner of collecting statistics, and to want of time and means for verifying them.

THE tables of agricultural statistics which follow this article are taken from the census report for 1860. Our decennial census embodies much that is instructive. The agriculture of the United States, either as to its amount or the variety and importance of its productions, is without a parallel. The changes it is undergoing, and the causes producing them, cannot but be deeply interesting to all, but more especially to the manufacturing and commercial interests, the prosperity of which is so completely dependent on the progress of agriculture.

The reader will see that these tables give the agricultural statistics of the loyal and disloyal States separately. The year of the rebellion followed that in which these statistics were taken. This fact, therefore, naturally suggested the utility of exhibiting their absolute and comparative progress, that the world might judge how far this rebellion was justified by any want of prosperity in the south, indicative of grievances that demanded redress.

The object of this article is to show the vastness of American agriculture, the changes it is undergoing, the causes of these changes, and the progress made by the loyal and disloyal sections of the Union in their agricultural industry. That object will be best accomplished by a brief consideration, separately, of the leading products of our agriculture.

The northern States are grass-growing, and hence we might expect that their farm stock would exceed that of the southern States. As a general fact this is the case, and the per cent. increase is greater in the former. Still, some of the latter have good grass localities, as Virginia, and the climate of others is excellent for particular species ef farm stock, as Texas for sheep.  The population of the loyal States is about 59 per cent. and of the disloyal States about 41 per cent. of the whole amount. The entire number of horses, mules, cattle, sheep, and hogs is 95,831,960, and of this number 58,722,112 are in the loyal States and 37,119,848 are in the disloyal States. The former have 60¾ per cent. of the whole number, and the latter 39¼ per cent., being nearly in the same ratio as population, but much of the population of the loyal States is engaged in manufacturing and commercial pursuits.

The prosperity of both sections of the Union in this branch of husbandry has been most satisfactory, more especially of the south, when its general unfitness for grass production is considered. The animal production of the country has been as great as it could profitably have been. If much of its industry has found greater encouragement in other branches of agriculture, it has been advantageous to animal production, as the greater per cent. increase of its value over that of its numbers indicates. It will presently be seen that this increased value cannot be attributed to an undue expansion of the paper currency, but to the general progress of the country in its industrial pursuits.

Corn is justly regarded as the national crop of the United States. Its money value is double that of hay, threefold that of wheat, and fourfold that of cotton.

In 1850 the amount of the corn crop was 591,630,564 bushels, and in 1860 827,694,528 bushels—an increase of 39.90 per cent.  Of these crops the loyal States produced as follows:

The disloyal States produced—

The amount of this crop to each of these sections of the country is in nearly the same ratio as population, but in the disloyal States the increase is much below it. Their ratio of population is 39¼ per cent., and their increase of the corn crop but 16⅘ per cent. The cause of this will be found in the greatly enlarged production of cotton; and the chief part of the increase in corn is in the States of Arkansas and Texas, which are large growers of farm stock in the southern States.

Although the exportation of corn is considerable and increasing, yet it is a question of rational doubt whether this export trade is desirable. Corn constitutes too great an element in the raising and fattening of our farm stock to permit its price to be advanced by exportation.  If this exportation could be sustained by a corresponding reduction of the amount consumed in distillation, no more desirable change could be wished. An export trade of a cereal so exhausting to the soil results in ultimate injury, and nothing but feeding our corn crop at home, especially by hogging down, has kept up our corn lands generally to their present fertility. Too much of it already has shared the fate of the Virginia tobacco lands.

Not less satisfactory is the general increase of the wheat crop. It is nearly 70 per cent. between 1850 and 1860. The crop in 1850 was 100,164,350 bushels, and in 1860 170,170,027 bushels. Of the latter amount the loyal States produced 138,809,133 bushels, being 81 per cent. of the whole crop; the disloyal States raised but 19 per cent. of it, that is, 31,366,894 bushels.

The existing rebellion demands that we should look at the corn and wheat crops together. From the corn is produced most of our meats. Unitedly they form the breadstuffs and meats which now have such a controlling influence at home and abroad. Unitedly, too, they stand arrayed against the kingly prerogatives of cotton, and, therefore, against that rebellion which seeks to overthrow a Union which, so wisely and advantageously, has heretofore bound together in peace all interests.

The exportation of wheat and flour to Europe has continued to increase for many years, until it is certain that its dependence on us is permanent varying, of course, as fo the amount, according as the crops of Great Britain and the continent may be greater or less.

In the article on the wheat plant published in this Report there will be found an examination of the important question, From what source and to what extent may this European demand be supplied by other nations? In addition to what is there said, the following view presents itself from the latest sources of information.

The only nation that can ever become a competitor with the United States in supplying this European demand is Russia.  The following account of the grain production of that country is taken from a communication of F. S. Claxton, dur consul at Moscow, addressed to our government in 1861:

   “The great grain-growing district of Russia, whose annual yield is sufficient for the wants of the European continent, lies to the south of its centre, and between the fortieth and seventieth degrees of east longitude. It comprises the governments or provinces of Volliynia, Poltava, Kiev, Podolia, Karkow, Voronegs, Saratov, and Samara. It may be considered as a tract of land over twelve hundred miles long by about four hundred broad.
   “The grain fields extend uninterruptedly for hundreds of square miles; and hour after hour, though whisked along with the best speed of four horses, nothing can be seen, on the road from Koorsk to Kuminchuls, but endless seas of rustling wheat or tall, waving rye.  Many times during the trip I availed myself of some trifling elevation, and from the top of the vehicle obtained an uninterrupted view of the whole country embraced within a horizon at least twelve miles distant; yet the whole of the many thousands of acres thus spread out presented but one gigantic patchwork of yellow wheat and greener grain not then ripe for the harvest, and the whole scene, though devoid of all beauties of landscape and undiversified by hill or valley, without a forest or even a clump of trees to catch the eye, yet was so wonderful a picture of a nation’s wealth and resources that I could not restrain a transient feeling of national envy and jealousy."

"When I beheld the primitive plough with which the land is opened, and which scarce penetrates the surface, and certainly does not open a furrow much wider than one's hand, and when I witnessed the slow process of cutting the grain with the long since abandoned sickle of about two and a half feet in length, I could not but conjecture that with improved implements, such as yearly compete for the prizes at our State fairs, the return from the land must be largely increased, whilst the labor of harvesting the crop will be reduced in still greater proportion. Again, the present process of threshing results in great loss; for, if the operation is performed on a large scale, the grain is scattered over an enclosure into which are turned the almost wild horses of the steppes (prairies)—a drove of which is usually attached to each estate—and it is by their trampling hoofs, whilst urged here and there by the cries and long whips of the attendants that the wheat and rye are separated from the straw.”

“The voyage from Odessa [says Mr. Homans, in his Cyclopedia of Commerce] to Britain is of uncertain duration, but generally very long. It is essential to the importation of wheat in good condition that it should be made during the winter months. When the voyage is made in summer, unless the wheat be very superior. and be shipped in exceedingly good order, it is almost sure to heat, and has sometimes, indeed, been injured to such a degree as to require to be dug from the hold with pickaxes. Unless, therefore; means be devised for lessening the risk of damage during the voyage, there is little reason to think that Odessa wheat will ever be largely imported into Great Britain.”

The price of wheat on shipboard at Odessa he places at 40s. a quarter, and the cost of shipping to England 16s. a quarter, making the entire cost $1 44 per bushel of 60 pounds.

“The heated waters df a tropical sea, destructive to most of our articles of export, and a detour in the voyage of over three thousand miles in a direct line to the markets of the world— these considerations have been sufficiently powerful to divert the great flow of animal and vegetable food from the south to the east.  Hence the lake, and canal, and railroad transportation to New York, in preference to the cheaper but longer route to Great Britain by New Orleans.”

These facts show that however great may be the capacity of Russia to grow wheat, that nation will not become our rival in supplying the English demand for breadstuffs.

The cultivation of tobacco exhibits an increase far beyond the usual augmentation of our crops. In 1850 the number of pounds raised was 199,736,336, and in 1860, 429,364,751 pounds; an increase of 115 per cent. Of the crop of 1860, the loyal States produced 230,343,321 pounds, and the disloyal States 199,021,430 pounds. This gives the former 53½ per cent. of the entire crop, and the latter 46½ per cent., which is less to the loyal States than their ratio of population by 7¼ per cent. But the per cent. increase from 1850 to 1860 is more equal, it being 112 per cent. in the loyal, and 118 per cent. in the disloyal States. Such an increase is remarkable, and it becomes an important question to determine how far an increase on the product of 1860 can be sustained?  To answer it requires a brief notice of the foreign trade in our tobacco.

This table shows a general but irregular increase, until disturbed by our political difficulties. From 1855 to the close of 1859 the exports increased about six and one-third millions dollars, or, in pounds, from about 140,000,000 to 210,000,000.  The crop of 1859 was 229,638,116 pounds more than that of 1849, and of this we exported about 70,000,000 pounds; leaving for increased domestic consumption during these ten years 154,638,116 pounds. The increase in the home consumption had, therefore, more than doubled the increase in the exports.

The increase in tobacco between 1850 and 1860 has been, in the loyal States 121,568,415 pounds, and in the disloyal 108,060,001 pounds. It is a crop, therefore, in which all States have an interest, and which seems well adapted to almost every climate of the United States.

The average duties and taxes amount to something more than 50 cents a pound. Great Britain levies a duty of 72 cents per pound and 5 per cent. additional on the leaf, and $2 16 per pound and 5 per cent. on manufactured.  France derives a clear revenue from its government monopoly of 33 per cent., and Austria of 76 per cent. In 1859 we exported to Austria over five millions of pounds.

The above table presents a general average of the revenue derived by foreign nations from our tobacco. Assuming our exports of the crop of 1859 to have been 210,000,000 pounds, their revenue upon it would be $88,825,609.  What our exports would become if these monopolies were broken down can readily be seen.

These statistics indicate that the domestic consumption of tobacco has increased enormously. That it can continue to increase in the same ratio to population, or anything like an approximation to it, is almost impossible. We may hence infer that when our agricultural industry resumes its old channels by the restoration of peace, tobacco cultivation cannot be profitable in the southern States to the extent of their production in 1859, and in the loyal States to the extent of its present cultivation by them. Nor have we any hope that foreign governments will modify their monopolies and duties, for Congress in 1859 fruitlessly sought such a change.

Cotton advanced from 2,445,793 bales of 400 pounds each, in 1850, to 5,192,746 bales in 1860; an increase of 213 per cent. Is it any wonder that this product, like individuals too prosperous, claimed kingly prerogatives to itself?  As it belonged wholly to the disloyal States, its increase is due to their credit alone. Of this product. 3,812,345 bales were exported in 1860, leaving 1,384,599 bales for domestic consumption. It was upon the labor bestowed on this exported cotton that these prerogatives were based; but after all, this labor was bestowed upon it for the purpose of getting its bread, and this bread, more essential to life, won the victory in the strife for royal supremacy.

Almost the only agricultural product that has not greatly increased during the last census decade is wool, although it is one of the most useful. Its increase in this period is but 7,994,384 pounds, being but 16 per cent. Two causes have produced this result—the great consumption of foreign woollen cloths and the substitution of cotton fabrics for woollen. Even in the manufacture of our woollen cloth, about sixteen millions of pounds of cotton have been annually used.

But the rebellion is giving to wool-growing an impetus it would never have received if peace had continued. The amount produced in the several States in 1860 was 59,932,328 pounds, of which the disloyal States raised 9,748,702 pounds, leaving 50,183,626 pounds as the wool product of the loyal States.

What is the present amount of wool, and how far can the present rate of increase of sheep be sustained?

By the census of 1860 the whole number of sheep in the United States is 24,823,566; but to ascertain the present condition of the wool market, the sheep of the loyal States only should be considered. These were, in 1860, 17,198,219; from which one million should be deducted for the destruction by war of those in Kentucky and Missouri. The returns to this Department for 1863 state the increase of the sheep for this year at 25 per cent. Allowing the same increase for 1861 and 1862, the number of sheep in 1861 would be 20,248,024, and in 1862, 25,312,5630. This is the number that gave the clip for 1863.

At three pounds per head, the clip of wool for 1863 would be 75,931,590 pounds; and at three and a quarter pounds, which is probably nearer the actual yield, the clip would be 82,259,222 pounds.

The importation of unmanufactured wool in. 1862 was about 60,009,000 pounds, and of manufactured about 40,000,000 pounds. The domestic wool of last year was 60,744,072 pounds at 3 pounds per fleece, or 65,806,078 at 3¼ pounds. The entire wool consumed for 1862 would, therefore, be 160,744,072 pounds to 165,806,078 pounds, being more than double the clip for 1860. Our present wool product may therefore be nearly doubled so long as the supplies of cotton are cut off by the war.

The anti-slavery sentiment of the country will, perhaps, find as conscientious and as effective opposition to slavery, by a less encouragement of its productions, as in any other way. The return of peace should not result in a materially lessened consumption of woollen cloths, but the fashions of the country should adhere to the elegant, light, and healthy woollen goods now in general use for summer clothing. A branch of agricultural industry so beneficial in every respect as wool-growing should receive every encouragement.  Wool is better adapted to the wants of our climate, both in summer and winter, than cotton or linen, and mutton is the cheapest of all our meats. No animal is so beneficial to the farm, both in enriching it and keeping it clean of weeds, briers, and undergrowth.

The statistics of the Department show that ten of the States are producing sorghum molasses in large quantities, at an average yield of 148½ gallons to the acre, (a too high estimate, however,) which sells at an average price of 52 cents per gallon. The yield of 1863, with a favorable season, will not be under twenty millions of gallons. But the extent of this crop will be governed very much by the success of the northern cane as a sugar-making plant. Everything is favorable to that success, as will be seen from the report of the chemist of this Department as well as from the numerous specimens of sorghum sugar forwarded to it.

The domestic molasses and sugar from the Louisiana cane are about 16,000,000 gallons of the former, and about 300,000,000 pounds of the latter, making the annual consumption about forty-five million gallons of molasses, and about one billion pounds of sugar. This amount is almost incredible.  Comparing the sugar of the first three years, in the above table, with that of the last three, we find the increase has been eighteen percent. The ratio of population and the increase of the consumption of sugar is as follows:

The consumption per head in 1840 was about sixteen pounds, and now, deducting the slave population, it is about thirty-nine pounds. And this is not an approximation to the amount it would be, it a cheap and home-made article was accessible to all.

These statistics show the great inducements that exist to stimulate the farmer and the sugar-refiner to continued exertion for the complete success of the northern cane.

The hay crop of 1850 was 13,831,558 tons; that of 1860, 19,073,726 tons, an increase of thirty-eight per cent. Of this last crop the loyal States produced 18,004,443 tons, and the disloyal 1,069,283 tons. Most of the south does not grow grasses for hay, because much of its stock can winter without it, and the remainder needs but little. Thus in Texas and Arkansas, which produce much stock, there is scarcely any hay harvested. Still there is considerable hay sent from the west to southern cities. But greater attention had been given to this product in the south than formerly, for its increase between 1850 and 1860 was 48½ per cent. And this increase is a general one in the southern States.

But in the north the hay crop is second to the corn crop only, being double in value the cotton crop. Its long winters demand a bountiful supply of it for all farm stock except hogs. A comparison, therefore, between the increase of this stock and the hay crop will not be without interest.

The increase in the last census decade in farm stock consuming hay, in the loyal States, is 316½, and in the disloyal 243½ per cent.; whilst that of hay is but thirty-six per cent. in the former, and 48½ in the latter. These statistics present a remarkable difference, and show at a glance that there is a large amount of foddering substances besides hay consumed, and which does not appear in the census statistics. This is true, and they will be found in the corn fodder and wheat and oats straw. The cut-up cornfields and the large wheat straw stacks of the west form a striking feature of western farming.  The droughts of summer often cut short the meadows, and when this is the case, the farmer always protects himself from want by the fall cutting up of his cornfields. And this supply is at all times desirable, for the heating and binding, but nutritious timothy hay is tempered in its ill effects by the aperient and cooling properties of the corn fodder and wheat straw.

Whilst our national pride is gratified in contemplating such a greatly increased production, it must occur to every reflecting mind that under our present mode of agriculture, it may be at the expense of the soil. But few greater calamities could befall a nation than the impoverishment of its lands.   Virginia stands as & lesson to the other States, Her unskilful tobacco cultivation ruined the finest portions of her territory. As in Palestine and other countries of the east, now barren from the destruction of their soil by reckless cultivation, our lands once destroyed remain so, and thus the territorial limits of our States are in fact diminished. Nations wage wars in vindication of their right to a few acres, but permit the destruction of many from want of knowledge in the farmer.

In the absence of an account in the census returns of the acres of pasture lands and of the ploughed acres, it is difficult to determine the extent of the deterioration of our soils by these immense annual crops. It must be great.  Still we know that our agriculturists are aware of this evil, and that the use of fertilizers is rapidly increasing. The columns of clover seeds and grass seeds give some evidence of this. The increase of clover seeds during the last decade has been one hundred per cent., and of grass seeds one hundred and sixteen per cent. This would have added not less than twenty-six millions of acres to our pasture and meadow lands, had it not been for the greatly increased exportation of seeds. This exportation was but $13,570 in 1855, and in 1861, $1,063,141; but in 1862 it fell as low as $299,255. The increase of our improved lands from 1850 to 1860 has been about fifty millions of acres; that of clover and grass seeds should have been sufficient to have seeded that number of acres.

The domestic manufactures appear to decrease with the increase of those made by machinery. In 1840, the value of these was $29,023,380; in 1850, $27,484,144; and in 1860, $24,226,461. This decrease has been much greater in the northern States than in the southern and new States.

The cause which leads to this result is the increase of general manufactures, which have a twofold operation.  They cheapen articles of apparel below the price that governs the value of home manufactures, and give so great a demand to garden and farm products, that may be produced by the female portion of the household, that their labor is given to these.

The prevalence of home-made manufactures is indicative of a want of market facilities, such as exists in the new States, and an absence of manufactures by machinery, such as characterizes the southern States. Still it is questionable whether the decline of home manufactures is a good, either to the public or the household. A dependence on the store for wearing apparel begets extravagance in dress, and a dependence, too, on dressmakers and others.  It is now not uncommon, in towns as well as in cities, to find the female portion of the household unable, and also unwilling, to make up their own dresses, or any portion of that of the male part. Every right-thinking person must regret such a consequence of the decay of household manufactures, for the phases of American life are too changing to permit an ignorance of household duties, and the ability to personally discharge them under all circumstances, either of necessity or proper economy.

This decrease will be temporarily checked, at least, by the war, for the high prices of cotton and wool have so advanced the prices of manufactures generally that home-made goods now once more resume their former economical value.

The progress of our agriculture is best seen in the column representing the cash value of farms. Their increased value is evidently greater than the augmentation of the crops would justify.  That the farmers have given much of their gains to making railroads and other commercial highways is known to those familiar with the progress of these roads. This investment has been returned to them, and is found in this column. The increased value of farms has been 103 per cent., or $3,370,534,976. This is enormous.

A similar increase from railroad investment will be found also in the great increase of the value of stock and crops. Distant markets have been brought near, and hence both lands and their products have advanced in value beyond the amount of improved acres and of stock and crops. Nothing so clearly demonstrates the value of railroads to the farming community as these statistics. No investments could have been more advantageous to it, although it may never pay a direct dividend.

That the value of farms and their products is generally much influenced by the currency is conceded, but the returns of banks in the census report show conclusively that it had no agency in giving value to lands or crops. The circulation in 1850 was $155,012,881, and in 1860, $207,102,477—an increase of but 333 per cent.

The advanced value of farming implements and machinery is sixty-two per cent. This is gratifying, for it points to an important fact, that agriculture is availing itself of those agents—labor-saving powers—which have so rapidly advanced our manufactures. Mowers, reapers, and threshers have made our country known at every industrial exhibition, and they have gone on so many farms, that in the absence of a large part of agricultural labor, estimated at from twenty to twenty-two per cent., the usual harvests have been gathered and threshed, not only without loss to the crops, but at a less cost.

The view that has been taken of the progress of our agricultural industry would be incomplete if the causes influencing it were not briefly considered.

There are but two causes that can legitimately promote agriculture—exportation abroad, and consumption of its products at home. So far as our exports affect the industry of agriculture, it is admitted to be advantageous in removing a surplus which, if it remained at home, would depress the home markets. But when the amounts exported are compared with those produced, they will be found small indeed. This home consumption rests chiefly on the diversity of civilized pursuits, and these pursuits age divided into agricultural, manufacturing, and commercial.

The tables reveal the fact that our agriculture is not only largely increasing its products, but that it is changing many of them. At first, agriculture seems to be the exclusive purstit of a people, until they have attained to a certain population, when local advantages induce attention to manufactures, and mining, resulting in the building up of towns and cities, having influences and connexions which scatter these pursuits in various other portions of a State.  Thus the increase of towns and cities in population indicates the progress of manufactures and mining.

To exhibit the changes which these make on our agricultural products, we need but look at the States of Connecticut, Massachusetts, New York, Ohio, and Pennsylvania. Their products of a perishable nature, such as butter, the produce of market gardens and orchards, and the heavy ones, in proportion to their market value, such as Irish potatos, have largely increased, whilst the staple crops, such as wheat and corn, have either not increased, or have been greatly diminished.

This is an increase of seventy-five per cent. Perishable and heavy agricultural products in proportion to their value find a near home market, which makes their cultivation profitable, whilst meats and breadstuffs are drawn from the remoter States. Hence the fact that wheat production has decreased in several of these States, and even in Ohio its acme has been reached. These facts show the value of manufactures to the agriculture of the country. To the nearer farmer, for perishable and heavy products, they create a profitable market; and to the remoter, for meats and breadstuffs, which may be transported greater distances. It is in this way that manufactures in Massachusetts and Connecticut and Rhode Island sustain, not only the home farmers, but those, too, living in the western States. No investigation would be more interesting or profitable than to trace out in all their details the commerce which different industrial pursuits create between remote States of the Union, and the mutual benefit which such States are to one another. The limits of this article will permit but a general yet comprehensive glance at the magnitude of our industrial pursuits.

According to estimates based on the census returns for 1850 and 1860, the number of persons engaged in and-directly supported by agricultural pursuits is about seventcen millions. The value of the capital invested in lands and implements is $6,897,900,006, yielding an annual product, in value, about $2,598,393,364.  The number of persons engaged in and directly supported by manufactures is about five millions. The manufacturing capital invested in real and personal property is $1,050,000,000; in raw ma,teriafl, $1,012,000,000; and the value of the annual product is $1,900,000,000.

These diversified pursuits create a commerce, chiefly internal, that makes us at the same time the admiration and the envy of the world. This commerce has invested in railroads about $1,166,422,729; in canals and river improvements, $1,377,743,789, and uses a tonnage valued at $221,592,480.

The loftiest figures of rhetoric would fail to impress on our minds such a clear impression of the vastness of American industry as do these statistics.  No patriot can contemplate them without being the more impressed with the magnitude of the interests involved in the issue of our present struggle to sustain a Union on which this industry is based, and of that Constitution under which these interests have found protection and support.

In connexion with the general statistics we have presented, there arises a question of much interest, because it relates to the probable future direction labor will take. It is the relative profit of our agricultural and manufacturing labor.  "In England,” says Mr. Mansfield in his report on Ohio statistics for 1862, "the value of a day’s farm labor is not over a third of a bushel of wheat; but in Ohio it is fully worth a bushel of wheat, and generally more.”  He fixes such labor at eighty-three cents per day, and of manufacturing labor in clothing, cotton and woollen goods and boots and: shoes at eighty cents per day. But other branches of manufactures and mechanism, requiring greater skill, are better paid, and raises the average much above this.

As there are three and two-fifths more persons engaged in agriculture than in manufactures, to make the products relatively equal we must reduce the latter amount three and two-fifths times.  This makes the relative product as follows:

Something more than the gregariousness of mankind draws our industry to towns rather than to the country. Although Mr. Mansfield places the wages of manufacturing labor below those of agricultural labor, he nevertheless admits that "the profits of manufacturing in Ohio are evidently large.” This is evidently true, and the only rational cause for it lies in our estimate of its greater profits.

This inequality in the value of the labor of these industrial occupations ought to exist, because the expense of living in towns is greater than in the country. The farmer should rejoice over every inducement leading to an increase of manufactures and mining, for in them he will find his best and most permanent market.

The want of a statistical bureau in our general government has caused our internal trade to be overlooked, and hence the people of the various sections of the Union remain ignorant of that mutual dependence on each other which a knowledge of its details would have indelibly fixed on their minds.

The cotton-producing States need the western, to supply them with meats and breadstuffs, hay, apples, potatos, horses, and mules. They cannot do without the eastern, for from them they derive the manufactures they consume: their bale rope and bagging; their engines, sugar mills, and cotton gins; much of the material for their house-building, and mechanics to erect them; their paper, their books, their teachers, their shipping, their capital; in a word, almost everything. In return the west and east consume the cotton, sugar, and rice crops of the south. The western States need the southern, as consumers of pork, bacon, lard, butter, beef, and hay; as purchasers of their horses and mules, of much of their wheat and corn. They want the eastern States also, because they consume large quantities of these provisions; they are the exporters for the west to foreign nations, and furnish much of the capital that makes the highways over which these exports pass to the ocean. The eastern States need both the southern and western, to buy their manufactures, to supply them with textile materials, to feed them, to return them a profit on all their investments of capital in commercial and travelling highways. The Atlantic States need the Pacific, for their gold and wool; while the Pacific States consume all kinds of their manufactures in return.

The mutual supply of these mutual needs created that commerce which has united all by its vast and still greatly increasing railways and canals, its steamboats and ships, its telegraphs, its expresses, its postal facilities. It is this mutual dependence that has called into existence that industry embodied in the agricultural, manufacturing, mining, and commercial statistics we have given. The political union of all is not less essential to all and every part.  The broken-up fragments of such industry cannot be united in harmony by treaties and commercial regulations. Nothing but a united government can preserve this harmony.

No one can examine the tables of statistics without making a comparison between the progress of the sections of our country now known as the loyal and disloyal States, that he may see the causes, if any exist, which have led to a rebellion now desolating so many portions of the south, and consigning to unknown and premature graves so many American citizens.

   I notice in the comptroller general's report that the taxable property of Georgia is $670,000,000 and upwards, an amount not far from double what it was in 1850. I think I may venture to say that for the last ten years the material wealth of the people of Georgia has been nearly if not quite doubled. The same may be said of our advance in education, and everything that makes our civilization.

   "Have we not at the south, as well as at the north, grown great, prosperous, and happy under the operation of the general government? Has any part of the world ever shown such rapid progress in the development of wealth, and all of the material resources of national power and greatness, as the southern States have under the general government, notwithstanding all its defects?"

   “In no part of Christendom, enjoying a good government and settled by an intelligent population, does land sell for so contemptible a price as in the plantation States. In Georgia, for instance, land does not command an average price of five dollars per acre.”

The great increase in the value of farming lands which the tables exhibit, against this social obstacle, shows how favorable have been all other agencies acting on the prosperity of the south.

Will the world believe it, will history credit the fact, that in the midst of such unexampled and undreamed-of progress these southern States sought to overthrow that government upon which all this prosperity rested? The world would not believe it, history would not credit it, were not the fact attested by nations as well as by individuals, that high prosperity but hastens the downfall of those who put their trust in these things.

   "Can chance and time, the wisdom and the experience of public men, suggest no new remedy against the evils which vices and ambition are perpetually apt to cause?  May they not hope, without presumption, to preserve a greater zeal for piety and public devotion than we have done? For sure it can hardly happen to them, as if has to us, that when religion is best understood and rendered most pure and reasonable, that then should be the precise time when many cease to believe and practice it, and all in general become most indifferent to it! May they not possibly be more successful than their mother country has been in preserving that reverence and authority which is due to the laws?"

The prodigal son demanded his inheritance from a father that loved him, and went afar off to spend it in riotous living. But the hour followed when want threatened starvation, and then “he came to himself,” and with self-reproach came also repentance.

Summary of the preceding tables.  [These tables just re-compile the numbers of the preceding tables. I didn't re-create them here, but if someone asks, I can. -ASC]

In creating the Department of Agriculture, Congress specified as one of its leading objects the collection of agricultural statistics. One of the greatest agriculturists of Scotland, Sir John Sinclair, and one of those who were pre-eminent for their vast influence in the advancement of agriculture, regarded such statistics as of the highest utility, and, under his direction, a great expense was incurred and great labor bestowed in the collection, arrangement, and publication of the agricultural statistics of Scotland. In alluding to these statistics, the Duke of Argyle, President of the Highland Agricultural Society of Scotland, at a recent banquet of that society, said:

"And here I cannot help expressing very great regret—a regret in which I am sure that the scientific and intelligent tenant farmers of Scotland will share—that it has been found necessary to give up the system of agricultural statistics in this country. I do not mean to express a decided opinion whether the Highland Society was or was not the fitting organization for gathering that information; but this I do say, that the years during which that statistical information was collected by your secretary, Mr. Maxwell, and freely given by the tenant farmers, were years of great interest in their result, and that the exertions then made reflected the highest credit upon him and upon the farmers of Scotland who supplied him with the information. I say so, because you probably all know that, in England at least, there is & very great prejudice against statistical information; and I believe that there is a sense of the comparative inutility of collecting it in one part of the country when it is not done over the whole country, and the impossibility which every government has hitherto found in insisting upon that information being collected in England, has been one of the causes which have led this society to drop the collection of these statistics. I do not wonder at it. It was a circumstance of very great discouragement, because the value of statistics depends. upon their completeness, and if you bave not statistics for the whole island, undoubtedly the utility of the statistics you have gathered is very much impaired. Nevertheless, 1 cannot help expressing the hope that the time is not very far distant when these prejudices to which I have referred, which do mnot exist in Scotland, will be overcome in England, and that, under the guardianship of the law, a complete system of agricultural statistics will be organized for the whole kingdom.”

The prejudices here referred to exist in this country; and under the plans in operation in several of the States for taking some agricultural statistics, the imperfect returns but strengthen these prejudices. The State of Ohio is an exception, and California exhibits a juster regard for statistical information than any other State.

A portion of the agricultural statistics of the whole country is taken every ten years by the general government; but it has reference less to the improvement of agriculture than to the assistance of commerce. It is simply an inventory of the leading cross and of the chief items of agricultural investment.

It does not aim to unfold our vast internal commerce, by showing the cost of market transportation and in what sections the crops are consumed.  The relation of the different parfs of agriculture to each other, to manufactures and commerce, is but imperfectly and very generally exhibited. A political consequence of this was the attempted usurpation of cotton. At what expense to the farmer these crops are produced; at what cost to the soil; what are the errors of our agriculture, its difficulties, its hardships, its wrongs—all such matters are neither directly nor indirectly a purpose or an accomplishment of our decennial statistics.

With means totally inadequate for the collection of statistics by which any of these important purposes might be accomplished, the Commissioner of Agriculture, nevertheless, sought to obtain those within his power; and for useful objects. During last winter he issued circulars to every county in the loyal States, making inquiries relative to the prices of agricultural products in them and the average yield per acre of the leading crops. He issued others, during the summer and fall months, to make known the monthly condition of the crops, their amounts, &c. The medium, for communicating the knowledge obtained through the latter to the public, was monthly reports, and the following tables will show the statistics obtained in answer to the first circular.

Could the several States and the general government be induced to adopt a uniform and thorough system of taking agricultural statistics but once in ten years—the States every fifth year of this period and the general government every tenth year—the basis thus furnished would be sufficient for this Department, through its regular correspondents, to derive correct, information of all matters embodied in this system for the remainder of the years of the decade.

From these general observations concerning the necessity of a thorough system for collecting agricultural statistics, I proceed to the consideration of matters more directly connected with the following tables.

They are designed to show the amount of our principal crops; their yield per acre; the acreage sown or planted; the average prices in each State; and the total value of these crops in each of the loyal States, Kentucky and Oregon excepted, from which no sufficient returns had been received.

For many purposes, it is important to estimate the value of our principal crops, but heretofore no statistics have been collected upon which to base this value.  The census returns give the amount only of the crops, and when an estimate of their value is made, the prices of a seaport, usually of New York, have been selected, and by these the value declared. In this way values have been exhibited far above the real value, having no other existence than in this false mode of estimating them.

The census has never returned the yield per acre, nor the number of acres under cultivation. Whether the comparative number of acres was increasing and the yield per acre decreasing, or the contrary, thus showing whether our agricultural production, represented by immense crops, was at the expense of the soil, or whether an improved system of farming was gradually restoring the exhausted soils of past years, were questions of tie highest magnitude, but of which no one could speak with any certainty.

To supply this defect of the census returns was one of the purposes of the formation of these tables. It is not claimed for them that they are perfect.  On the contrary, to have completely failed in their construction would have been pardonable on account of difficulties on every hand. To have so completely succeeded as to have escaped errors, was not possible.

The plan adopted for the construction of the tables was this:  The yield per acre and the prices in the various counties were obtained through circulars sent into every county.  These were matters familiar to all farmers; but as the correspondents were among the best farmers, their returns of the yield per acre represent more, perhaps, those of good farming than of good and bad together.  The amount of the crops could not be ascertained through these correspondents, because no State, with the exception of Ohio, does this with reliable accuracy; and they, therefore, had no basis on which to make correct estimates. Hence, the amount of the crops for 1862 had to be estimated by the Department, and herein lay the chief difficulty in the construction of the tables. The census returns for 1860 were adopted as a basis; but as the crop of 1859, on which they were taken, was an indifferent one, and that of 1862 the best ever grown, the yield per acre of these crops was very different. To estimate the acreage of a crop by dividing a heavy yield per acre into a light crop, would, obviously, give very erroneous results of the number of acres in cultivation. The crop of 1859 had, therefore, to be brought up to that of 1862. Various means were adopted for this purpose—some general, some affecting certain sections of the country; others more local, and in all cases applied as a personal knowledge and a very general acquaintance of the condition of our agriculture dictated.  The result, it is believed, is an approximation to correctness, more accurate than State statistics would have accomplished, if taken by all of the States in the usual way. As no circulars were sent to California on account of its remoteness, the estimates of its productions are based on its State statistics of the crops for 1861, and their prices in San Francisco; and as Ohio has a much a more perfect system of taking its agricultural statistics, its returns have been chiefly relied upon, though not entirely.

When the amount of the crops had been determined, the calculations of the number of acres of each crop, and the total values of them, were simply arithmetical.

As the census of 1860 did not give any returns of root crops, except potatos, there was no basis to estimate the amounts of these for 1862. But their yield per acre and prices in the various States are not uninteresting, and, therefore, they are given in the tables.

Having stated the manner in which the tables were prepared, it is necessary to refer to an instance or two of seeming contradictions, that their explanation may serve to remove any want of reliance which such contradictions might leave on the mind of the reader.

Contrast the difference of prices between the States of Rhode Island and New Jersey. What the first is to the Boston market in locality, the other is to the New York market. Yet there is a much greater difference in their market prices than exists in these cities. The cause of this will be found in the difference of their industry. Rhode Island is chiefly a manufacturing State, and New Jersey an agricultural one; the one receives and the other supplies, and hence the difference of prices should represent the cost of transportation between them.

Again, there is a striking difference between the price of corn in Ohio and Indiana, which are neighboring States, with nearly equal market facilities in many respects. But large quantities of corn in Ohio are consumed in distilleries, and much shipped eastward. Indiana, although much smaller than her neighbors in square miles, is the largest hog-producing State in the Union.  Its corn is fed chiefly to this stock, and hence its market price represents the value of corn fed to hogs, while in Ohio it exhibits its value when hauled to the nearest railroad depot.

These instances, one of a whole State and the other of a single product, are selected to apprise the reader of the extent of local peculiarities in determining many matters connected with these tables. A great utility of statistics is their embodiment of many facts which too few are acquainted with, and still fewer are disposed to search out. Hence it is that statistical knowledge is not generally appreciated, as is seen in the fact that our general government has no statistical bureau. And hence, too, the fact that so little is known of our vast internal trade, which has created the great tonnage of our commerce, and given to the Union its unexampled prosperity. And to the ignorance of this trade, as much as to any other cause, may be ascribed the attempt to destroy this Union.

The following tables show the amount of the principal crops for 1862, the yield per acre, the acreage sown or planted, the average prices in each State, and the total value of these crops in the States named.