The New Orleans daily Democrat. [volume] (New Orleans, La.) 1877-1880, 1878-06-30

arrived at full maturity at the end of the
season 1t deconposes very quickly, and, IL
plowed UNDER is said to furnish, after the first
| year, very large proportion of the manure
| necessary to keep the ground i'm good con-
| dition.
The mode of culture usually adopted In
| this country differs In some particular from
that pursued In Turkey and India, where the
seeds are soWn broadcast. and thinned out to
such distances as best suit the convenience or
| the taste Of the cultlvatOr. It has been found
with us most convenient TO SOW the seeds In
drills about eighteen inches apart and to thin
out to six or eight inches between the plants
In order to get as many plants as possible on
q given area, some prefer to make the first
two rows q foot apart, and then to leave
space of eighteen inches, thus alternating
throughout the field. Three or four ounces OF
seed are said to be sufficient to SOW an acre,
but In order to insure q good stand much
larger quantity Is generally used. The cover
ing should be very slight, not exceeding one
fourth OF an inch. The time for sowing should
be such that the plant may mature it's bios
SONS and the opium be gathered In the dry
season of the year, for II the soil Is wet at the
time of bl0ssoming, opium will not be formed
IN large quantities, nor will It be OF good quail
| ity. The plant natures sufficiently for gath
pring Its opium In ninety to one hundred
days.
QUALITY AND CLIMATE.
The quality of opium Is generally estimated
by the quantity of morphine 1t CONTAINS. A
| certain amount of heat is necessary in the
cultivation of the poppy in order to produce
opium Of the best quality and in the largest
quantity. This requisite 10 commonly sup
posed to be found only in what may be called
warm climates. The poppy e extensively
Egypt and France. Turkey opium, most OF
which Is obtained from Smyrna has the high
est reputation for medicinal purposes, and Is
that which Is principally used by physicians
| In this country.
It is declared, however, on the best author
| ity, that opium Is produced In France fully
equal to the best quality from Smyrna, and
| is less frequently adultefated than that OBJ
tanned from the latter place.
| THE MEAN ANNUAL TEMPERATURE
Of the opium districts Of the foregoing coun-
tries, named n their order, is respectively
| 65o, 800, 75o, 500 There are doubtless other
conditions besides temperature which are es-
| sential TO the production of opium of the first
quality, as soil, equabiity of climate and q
proper proportion Of wet and dry weather,
only by actual trial in the different localities
In which it is proposed to cultivate it, We give
the results OF analyses of dried specimens of
opium from the countries named, recently
made by M. Gu1bourt, in which he gives the
percentage Of morphia found In each as fol.
lows: Turkey opium, from Smyrna, highest
percentage, q 46; lowest, ITO; mean, t47S
India, from Patna, highest, 1921; lowest
591; mean, 9.O1. France, from Amiens, high
mean percentage here given Of each kind Of
opium Is the mean OF all the specimens
| analysed, and, therefore, does not in every
case correspond with the mean of the highest
and lowest. From an examination of the
| mean temperature OF the climates of the
countries named it will be seen that the opium
of India and Africa, which have the hottest
climates, is of the poorest quality, while that
of Turkey and France, which have the cold
est is the best. In India the
AVERAGE YIELD
Of opium per acre Is said, by good authority,
to be from twenty-five TO forty pounds avoir-
dupois. In the department Of SOmme, in
France 10000 acres are cultivated annually
with the poppy, and the good opium sells at
wholesale for So to $40 per pound, according
to the quality At standard of 10 per cent
of morphia it will sell for 81 to 81 80 per
pound. Besides the opium extracted from
the capsules of the plants cultivated on this
| large area Of land, the seeds have some years
been sold for about $Sg6,OeO for the oil which
they contained The average yield of oil from
the seeds Of capsules which have not been
scarified is 25 to 81 per cent, and 1t Is cOnsid-
cred better for salad oil than most olive oils
sues should not be used for planting as their
vitality has been much weakened by this pro-
cess, and the plants which they produce are
correspondingly feeble. They yield only
about twO-thirds as much oil as other seeds.
| The poppy Is also cultivated In Germany on
a large scale, both for opium and for oil. Its
culture commenced only few years ago but
so great has been its success that the opium
produced there has nearly supplanted the
use OF the foreign article From Germany it
passed over to France, and there are now
10000 to 10000 acres under profitable cultiva-
| tion in the latter country.
Why should we not try 1t in Louisiana