The daily dispatch. [volume] (Richmond [Va.]) 1850-1884, 1881-01-22
A Reason for not Planting the White
BurIey-COttOn a Paying Crop. &c.
NOTTOwAY COUNTY. VA, !
January 20, 1881. I

OdUuilN ~, lOCls
Editors Dispatch have read with deep
concern the letter of Major X. +. Gaines to
the Western Tobacco journal, and copied
in the Dispatch of the 18th instant. Major
Gaines is a large tobaccO-grower, and has
had much experience in raising and selling
tobacco, and ought TO be taken as good au-
thority on this subject.
1t is an indisputabe fact that no money
has been made by raising dark tobacco III
SOuthside Virginia for the last three years.
Indeed, were It not for the Austrian order
the producers Of this class OF tobacco would
be to-day bankrupt The Austrian agent
has been buying the best types OF dark ana
mahogany tobaccos for export at fair prices,
with scarcely competitor. But II the to-
bacco fell below his particular type. al
though pretty fair tobacco. it became at
once a dreg on the market, and had to be
sold at a price ruinous to the producer.
Under this anomalous condition OF our
Virginia market there is no wonder that the
laborer has been forced 10 go TO the railroads
and TO the peanut farms. Indeed, some 81
the whites have gone 10 the West. Our
people are growing poorer each year; and
our dark tobacco for manufacturing and
exporting purposes has seen its best
day long since. We cannot afford
TO hire labor to grow it at the
present prices, and no one with common
| sense will again attempt il. But the great
question. What can we cultivate in the place
OF our dark tobacco? is now being discuss
| ed in every grange and at every meeting
| OF farmers. | see, Messr>. Editors, that you
have suggested the White Burnley" as the
| :" golden Eureka In this think you are
mistaken, and may unintentionally mislead
the planter. II | am correctly informed,
the White Burley, as grown III the west
ern States, is not heavy tobacco,
but light and exceedingly porous; it,
chief merit with the manufacturer being
its spOnge-like capacity for absorbing
| licorice and other sweetenings. The puDllc
taste has been educated for sweet navy ana
sweet plug-tobacco. We cannot afford TO
grow a light, chaffy tobacco, even at the pre-
sent price of the BurIey. We have to pur-
chase fertilizers, and cannot compete with
the rich original soils OF the West. 1t costs
but few cents more per hundred weight
to place hogshead OF tobacco in Richmond
from Kentucky than it does from Nottoway.
Local freghts are high, and through freights
are correspOndingly low. And, too, the
Burley will be universally cultivated in the
Wet, and, II grown 10 large extent,
will soon be burden on the mar
ket. In my honest judgment, the only
remedy we have Ia Southside Virginia
IS TO abandon the cultivation OF non
descrtpt dark tobacco in toto, and
TO make cotton in Its stead. The great
scarcity OF plants last spring caused many
Of our best planters to try cotton, and
although planted late, with little experience
10 its cultivation, yet have not seen one
who IL not entirely pleased and will plant
largely this season. The yield has been
good and the prices remuuerative. friend
OF mine, very successful In the practice OF
medicine, but never successful In making
tobacco--au amateur farmer-has been very
successful In growing cotton the past sea-
son. He reports quite bonanza In making
cotton. There Is q gentleman now living In
this county who has made fortune In Mis-
sissippi BY making cotton. He reports that,
Judging from the past season, cotton
viii psy rs well here as In that State.