Nashville union and American. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1868-1875, 1873-11-20
TIE STUDY OF AGRICULTURE.

A correspondent Of this journal,
writing over the signature of J. j. T.,
said in our issue of the 10Th inst: '"The
soil is the source of all true wealth, and
at least one-third of your space of each
daily should be devoted to agricultural,
horticultural and kindred interests"
As farmers, gardeners and orchardists
constitute some two-thirds or three
fourths of the population of the State,
this is no more than just appreciation
of the great industrial interests of
Tennessee. five compare the price of
this year with the price of the staple
now at the harvest, and apply
the difference to the whole crop, the
loss to the producers and the country
is not less than fifty million dollars.
Such shrinkage in value affects every
branch of Southern industry and trade,
and all within a few months. These
palpable facts show that the study of
agricultural problems and staples may
be very useful to all classes Of business
men. While merchants, manufacturers
and mechanics should read our agricul-
tural news and discussions, farmers
should not overlook the instruc-
ton contained in the commercial
reports of the UNION AND AMERICAN.
In that of the 10Th instant they Will
find the Cotton Circular of Smith, Ed
wards & Co., of Liverpool, of a late
date, in which they say ''there is dan
ger of famine in Bengal, owing to the
failure of food crops; the accounts are
alarming, and no doubt will affect the
Calcutta goods market seriously"
We have heretofore called the attention
of our agricultural readers to the fail
ure of provision, grain and potato crops
of Europe, which must lesson the con-
sumption of cotton Afamine in Ben
gal will operate in the same direction.
These extensive deficiencies in harvests
on two great continents affect directly,
and injuriously, one of our largest
money crops. The agriculture and i'm
poverishment of the soil in the far off
East Indies, tells at once on the plant
ing industry of the Southern States
How curious and interesting the fact
that electricity in the hourly service OF
man, and steam on land and water in
the same service, have placed all ad-
vanced agriculture on every part OF
this planet in one boat! Its
principles and labor must be
studied both as a science and an art.
As we have long tried to impress upon
the public mind, the earth's natural
fruitfulness belongs to no one genera
ton of mankind, but equally to all
generations of all coming times. This
natural fruitfulness in soils where the
same surface has fed from one hundred
to three hundred generations of the hu-
man family, and often been worn out,
as we impoverish our old fields a sec
ond and third time, now approaches IN
Asia the cradle of our species) the
starvation point. Daniel interpreted
the handwriting on the wall. Can we
learn nothing from the experience OF
the Old World?
1t is allowable to look through ma
ture up to natures God" and call at,
teution to His handwriting, not indeed
on tables of stone, as at Mount Sanai
but on the broad fields of cultivated
lands by the one hundred million acres
that the soil of the world loses every
year by the sad misapphcation OF hui
man labor more than it ever lost in any
preceding year since our globe was
mere speck of star-dust, floating as ga:
in infinite space. This annual increase
of the consumption of the things thai
form both bread and meat, followed by
an increase of mouths to be fed
and increasing scarcity, mear
something. What is it? In the
time of Isaac his irrigated sol
produced one hundred bushels OF wheat
for one of seed. In after years CHRIST
speaks of seed falling on "gooC