The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1888-09-10
A Talk to Farmers.

Congressman Samuel Dlbble of South
Carolina recently made speech to farmers
and said, among other things, that every
owner and tenant of farm is the possessor
OF a thousand articles whose value is 10 him
absolutely unknown. The plants that
spring up voluntarily all about his fields and
forests, of which he does not know the
names, have their uses, and to be useful is TO
be OF value We need the spirit OF inquiry
concerning them. We need to adopt some
means whereby their virtues may be dis
closed Many of them possess curative prop
critics, unknown to those who tranple them
under their feet; and oftentimes a human
being dies, who by being acquainted with
The heruswhich he could gather at random on
his farm, might have been healed or mortal
maady. Tue gathering and marketing of
our wild plants might we'll be developed
into an extensive and very profitable in
dustry; and they might furnish the raw
material, out OF which we could manufacut-
ure in labora eories and factories many
compounds, which would bring high prices
for use i'll medicines and the arts. When we
consider that organic chemistry has become
one of the exact sciences, and the fibre
and leaves and juices of every one of these
Indigenous plants may be subjected to
qualitative and cumulative analysis,
and when naturallsts, botanists and
students of mateiia medica have
already collected valuable data con-
corning them, the question arises, shall they
still be allowed to 20 to waste, year after
year, And, when this question is answered
IN the negative, then comes the further queS-
ton: what class of our people is TO explore
and utilize this fertile field for research ALI
for profit: leave this question to be an
swered by the owners of the soil where
these plants grow, and | feel satisfied that
there are fortunes to be made, and benefits
to be conferred on mankind besides in Civ
ing to the question a practical answer.
Then consider also our forest trees Take,
for instance, the cypress, which is probably
the best material for the manufacture of
wood-pulp in the United States. l know
personally man who has made fortune in
making wood-pulp out of poplar. He tells
me that it requires only a moderate outlay
of capital, and SO pro titable is it, in a sec
ton where the wood costs three times as
much as with US, that he is now building his
third mill. Why should we not utilize our
wood in this and other ways; make our own
paper of all kinds from the wood-pulp, and
keep the money at home to enrich our own
citizens that we send abroad to make wood
pulp millionairess
l could go or without limit in the lines of
these suggestions, but to this intelligent au-
dience it is only necessary to outline the
proposition which your own practical COM
mon sense can fill out ad libitum.
The same principles which apply to agri-
culture in seeking for diversity of indus
tries are to be regarded of equal force in re-
lation to manufacturing industries If you
are going to take part in starting factory.
don't take it for granted that it must be a
cotton factory. We need wagons and bug
gies, and we can make them with improved
machinery such as they use in other places,
where they pay more for the raw material
and for the labor, and we ought to be able
to undersell all competitors. The same is
true of many articles of household furni-
ture; in fact, every town in the south might
have factory of kind differing from
every other, and the list of available and
protit-promising enterprises would not be
exhausted