F 7! 18737 375 Louisiana's Invitation i The Queen State of the South Opens Its Gates to Welcome All Good Home- seekers to Come and Participate in Its Diversified Farming. Where the Average Acreage Production is Greater Than Any State in the Union. WRITE TO HARRY D. WILSON, Commissioner of Agriculture and Immigration BATON ROUGE Class Book_ A Hand-Book of Louisiana GIVING General and Agricultural Features, Together With Crops That Can be Grown AND Description of Each Parish, Climate, Health, Education, Industries, Railroads, Water-Courses, Forestry, Etc. ISSUED BY THE Louisiana State Board of Agriculture and Immigration HARRY D. WILSON, Commissioner, Baton Rouge, La. PREFACE IN THE PREPARATION and compilation of data for the publication of such a book as will give with accuracy and clearness the varied and immense resources of a State which is only yet in the infancy of its development it is necessary to cull from every available source possible. In this book we have taken from our previous hand-books, we have given copious extracts from Hon. Jos. E. Ransdell's "On to Dixie" speech in the House of Representatives in the Sixty-first Congress, almost his entire speech, "The Lure of the Southland," recently delivered in the United States Senate; we have copied from the National Magazine the article of Garnault Agassiz on "The Untold Treasures of Louisiana," and are under obligations to Professors W. R. Dodson, W. H. Dalrymple. E. S. Richardson, E. Pegram Flower and many others for courtesies ex- tended, and to the United States Agricultural and Census Bureaus for valuable data. HARRY D. WILSON, Commissioner. D. of D. JUN 20 1917 INDEX TO ILLUSTRATIONS. Page Map of Louisiana 3 Governor and Lieutenant Governor 4 State Capitol 5 1 1 airy D. Wilson and W. R. Dodson. 6 J. F. Denechaud and Eugene Jas- tremski 7 Howell Carter and Millard S. Per- kins 8 Dr. W. C. Stubbs and Dr. W. H. Dalrymple 9 Steamboat landing on the Missis- sippi River 14 Field of sorghum for silage 18 Field of sugar cane 19 A Louisiana white short horn. ... 23 Herd of Tangipahoa beef cattle. . 24 An inexpensive hog house 25 Sample of Louisiana hogs 26 Flock of sheep in Pointe Coupee. . . 26 One of Louisiana's money makers. 29 Herd of Tangipahoa dairy cattle. 30 A field of soy beans 32 A poultry farm 34 Aberdeen Angus bull 36 Harvesting and threshing rice.... 41 Sample of Louisiana corn 4 3 A good road along the river bank. 45 A corn field in East Louisiana . 59 A corn field near Raceland 61 A lespedeza field 64 A coming beauty. . .• 66 Holstein cattle 69 Sulphur mines of Calcasieu 70 A hardwood forest 73 A sample of Louisiana good roads. 76 A Louisiana plantation home of today 77 Scene near Many, in Sabine Parish 83 Rice in a warehouse 94 The old home of Duncan F. Ken- ner 95 Cotton compress at Lafayette 97 Texas & Pacific bridge across the Atchafalaya 98 School children off for a picnic and going in to dinner on sugar plantation 100 A farmer's bungalow in North Lou- isiana 101 A farmhouse in Bossier Parish and a Bossier Parish exhibit 102 A Louisiana good road 105 The Hereford bull 109 An up-to-date dairy Ill Old-time sugar plantation home. . 113 Page A typical Louisiana ante bellum home.- 115 An ordinary mortgage lifter 118 Hogs running at large 120 A good catch near New Orleans — - Spanish mackerel 122 A plantation home 123 A natural warm water bathing pool 124 Cattle in North Louisiana . 126 A plantation home of the present day 127 Hauling logs in Sabine Parish. . . . 130 Scene on a bayou 134 A cauliflower field 136 The end of two centuries 142 'Possum fat and taters sweet. . . . 142 A good road between Ascension and Assumption. . . 145 Coal barges from Pittsburg on Mis- sissippi River 146 Field of corn in Caddo and black gum or satin walnut 149 Residence in Terrebonne Parish.. 152 Saw mill at Taft 155 Sugar mill in St. Charles 155 Tulane University, New Orleans. . 158 A 12 o'clock scene at a Louisiana sugar house 161 Giant pecan tree, Ascension Par- ish 161 A herd of Polled Angus 164 Hauling seed cotton to Killoden gin 167 La Nana schoolhouse 167 Cultivating corn on Travelers Rest farm 171 Charcoal burning 174 Rapides court house 176 Landing with cotton at New Or- leans 178 Capital Oil Mill, Baton Rouge 180 Home-raised horses and mules in Bossier 182 School for the Deaf and Dumb, Baton Rouge 186 Field of sugar cane 189 A sugar factory 191 A residence in Avoyelles 193 Old race track of 1858 196 Clump of trees is where Zachary Taylor's residence once stood.. 196 Awaiting turn at the gin 199 Second growth, pine 201 A familiar scene of Louisiana coast line 208 INDEX. Page Title page 1 Preface - Louisiana's invitation 10 Banks, assessment, the people.... 11 Area, production, climate and pop- ulation 11 Comparative temperatures 12 Rainfall 13 Rivers and water courses 11 Navigable streams 15 Navigation in each state of Mis- sissippi Valley 16 Railroads 17 What Louisiana lands will grow.. 18 Cotton and cotton factories 21 Stock raising 2 2 Live stock — Cattle, etc. By Dr. W. H. Dalrymple 25 Hogs 26 Sheep, horses and mules 27 Live stock organizations — La. Live Stock Sanitary Board 2 7 Dairying in Louisiana 28 Soy beans 31 Poultry raising 34 Bureau of Marketing 35 Resources and possibilities 35 Animal industry and climate 37 Health 38 Lands of the State 40 Louisiana Queen of the South -14 Come to Dixie 44 Letter from Dr. S. A. Knapp 4 5 A Belgian's opportunities in Lou- isiana 5 7 Ox enings in the South 48 Tiie Lure of the Southland — The South the Nation's Hope 49 The South needs men and money. . 50 The South's varied farm products and other industries 51 Southern climate — the nation's best 52 Health conditions in the South. ... 54 The agricultural heart of the na- tion 57 King Cotton 53 Corn outstripping cotton 59 A record of seven boys' corn pro- duction 60 Superiority of Southern corn 61 Sugar, rice, tobacco, etc 63 Our unequaled forage crops 63 Hogs — the mortgage lifter 65 Rapidly growing cattle industry.. 66 The South a mineral empire 69 Sulphur, Louisiana's monopoly. ... 70 Petroleum and natural gas 70 Golden opportunities 71 South's remarkable manufacturing growth 72 Southern banks 72 Our splendid timber wea'th 73 Excellent transportation facilities.. ?5 Come to the Southland 7 7 Mean temperatures, etc 78 Pain Precipitation SO Percentage of sunshine 81 Mean relative humidity M Average date of first killing frost, Average date of last killing frost and earliest date of kill- ing frost in the autumn and latest date in the spring 82 Length of crop-growing seasons.. 83 Average yield and value of cotton grown by all farmers and by colored farmers S4 Table showing total yield of corn, oats, wheat and hay ami in year average in 15 Southern States, also mineral products.. 85 Letter from Manufacturers' Record 86 Public road mileages, etc 88 The Parishes of Louisiana 89 Total assessment, State of Louisi- ana 90 Population of Parishes in 1910... '.'1 Estimated population for 1916.... 9:; Acadia Parish 9 4 Allen 95 Ascension and Assumption 96 Avoyelles 98 Beauregard and Bienville 99 Bossier i hi Caddo 103 Calcasieu ana Caldwell 104 Cameron and Catahoula 106 Claiborne and Concordia 107 DeSoto and East Baton Rouge. . . . 108 East Carroll Ill East Feliciana 112 Evangeline and Franklin 1 1 :> Grant and Iberia 114 Iberville, Jackson and Jeffers >n. . . 116 Jefferson Davis and Lafayette... 117 Lafourche 118 Lincoln i 19 Livingston 120 Madison and Morehouse 121 Natchitoches 12 2 Orhans and Ouachita 123 Plaquemines and Pointe Coupee. . . J 2.7 Rapides 127 Red River, Richland and Sabine.. 129 St. Bernard and St. Charles 131 St. Helena 132 St. James, St. John and St. Landry 133 St. Martin 134 St. Mary and St. Tammany 135 Tangipahoa 136 Tensas and Terrebonne 137 Union, Vermi'ion and Vernon 138 Washington and Webster 139 West Bator Rouge, West Carroll , and West Feliciana 140 Winn 141 Forces at work in behalf of the farmers — Agricu'tural Depart- ment, La. State University and Vgricultural Experiment Sta- t inns 143 INDEX— Continued Page Parish fairs, fertilizer and feed- stuff laws, and Prof. E. S. Rich- ardson on the moving picture in extension work 144 Oood roads and education 147 Professional and industrial educa- tion 148 Education of the colored and in- dustrial 148 Private and sectarian schools. . . . 150 Two splendid adjuncts to Louisi- ana's ediicational forecs 150 State institutions and Soldiers' Home 153 Insane Asylum and Charity Hos- pital 154 Shreveport Charity Hospital 156 State penitentiary and convict fa rms 156 As others see us 157 Started without a dollar 160 Raises all his supplies 160 The untold treasures of Louisiana. 162 No yellow fever now — The factor system 162 Diversification ; what one farm can do 163 Page What is claimed by a town — Corn raising 165 Wheat and oats — Irish potatoes... 166 Peanuts = 168 Sweet potatoes — Stock raising.... 169 Sugar cane: its planting and pro cess of manufacture 170 Cotton ITS Cotton seed oil industry and rice. . 180 Irrigation 183 Perique tobacco 186 Trucking 187 How foreigners are prospering. ... 188 What an acre can produce — Can- taloupes 1S9 Citrus fruits — Pecans 190 Mineral wealth — Sulphur 190 Oil production 193 Natural gas 195 Rock salt 196 Timber resources 200 Cypress 202 Fisheries — Oysters 204 Shrimp 205 Industrial development 205 New Orleans 206 The South 207- Why you should settle in Lou- isiana 208 IN o ,S« LOUISIANA'S INVITATION THE HOSPITALITY of Louisiana is proverbial, and she now stands with open arms at her borders to welcome the stranger. Nature is exceedingly bountiful within her gates; agriculturist, manufacturer or artisan will find here what all men should seek, "a festival of well requited labor," with a genial climate, an honest, sunny-tempered peo- ple, and all the advantages of Twentieth Century civilization. Those who have come to her in recent years stand ready to testify in her behalf. Her marvelous development of the past ten years is but the forerunner of a more marvelous development in the future. She invites you to come and be a part of this development. The last United States Census Report shows that capital invested in farms yielded, in Louisi- ana, an income of 27.3% annually on the investment, and this, gentle stranger, is 70% higher than the general average for the whole United States. Corn, cotton, sugar-cane, rice, fruits and berries, truck, forage crops, and almost everything grown under the sun, can be raised on her rich and responsive soil. Her advance as a manufacturing State has been marvelous. In 1890 she was the sixth ranking manufacturing State in the South, and in 1900 she had jumped to second place. Large and valuable deposits of coal in the northwestern, and an unlimited sup- ply of fuel oil and gas in the various parts of the State, are the additions to her mineral wealth, discovered during recent years. Situated in the heart of the raw material district, with the richest soil on earth, with cheap fuel, oil, coal and gas, with nearly four thousand miles of naviga- ble streams and three thousand miles of railways, with the Panama Canal now completed, can you have one lingering doubt of her future greatness and imperial splendor? If this material side appeals not to you, examine her aesthetic beauty. She has her throne builded beneath the sunniest sky that lights the globe, and her shores are laved by the waters of the great Gulf. She lives perfumed by the choicest flowers, when bleak winter's chill has enclasped her more northern sisters. Boreas, when most furious, stops in his maddened career, to pet and woo her. She is rich in all and holds out a generous and charitable hand to the children of her poorer sisters. 11 BANKS. Louisiana has hundreds of banks, national and State. They are sound financial institutions, with ample funds to take care of the grow- ing and gathering of her crops, the operating of her manufacturing industries and her commercial industries. For the promotion of new enterprises, outside capital is largely depended upon, but if a Federal Farm Loan Bank can be established every want in that line will be filled. ASSESSMENT. In 1915 the total assessment of the State was $590,568,506.00. THE PEOPLE. "Of the typical population of Louisiana, also, a special mystery seems to be made, but Louisianians have much reason to be proud of their historical descent. They have a history as authentic and as valuable as the annals of the Puritans of Massachusetts, or that of Catholic Mary- land. The rearing of the State's colonial structure by one nation, and its blending into colonial dependence upon another, contains no special mystery. They are a hospitable, brave and generous people, whether tracing their history back to French Bienville or Laussat; to Spanish O'Reilly or Salcedo, or to American Claiborne. "That is the native State autonomy, which, blended with English, Irish and Scotch immigration, and the descendants of the Cavalier and Huguenot settlers from Virginia, Kentucky, Georgia, Alabama, and the Carolinas, make up the population of Louisiana. A people exhibiting all those finer traits which betoken the cultivation of noble traditions and refined associations, evidenced in the generous hospitality, the chivalric spirit, the punctilious courtesy, the knightly hand, the Christian knee, the clean firesides, and the holy altars cherished in the hearts and homes of as proud and pure an aristocracy as the world has ever known." AREA, PRODUCTION, CLIMATE AND POPULATION. Louisiana has nearly 45,000 square miles of territory, containing some 28,000,000 million acres. Of this amount about 13,000,000 acres are of alluvial origin, and the rest good upland. With proper drainage and levee protection there is very little of the alluvial region that cannot be cultivated. Thousands of acres of so-called marsh and swamp are being reclaimed and put into cultivation every year. Capital and brain have converted barren wastes into rich, productive fields. The uplands are almost all susceptible of cultivation. Of her 28, 000,000 acres, only about 5,000,000 are in cultivation. CLIMATE. Its proximity to the Gulf of Mexico secures a prevalence of southern winds, cool and moisture-ladened, which mitigates the extremes of weather experienced by the States of the North. Though our summers are prolonged, the heat is never oppressive, the thermometer rarely reaching 95 degrees. In carefully kept records of the three Experiment Stations for eight years, 98 degrees has been the highest recorded tem- perature at New Orleans, £9 degrees at Baton Rouge, and 100 degrees at 12 Calhoun. These maxima amounts have been rarely reached, not oftener than one or two days in a summer. The winters are usually mild, with an average temperature of about 53 degrees in the southern, and about 45 degrees in the northern part of the State. Above all other requirements for a good climate, the differences between summer heat and winter cold should not be too great. Louisi- ana stands, in this respect, almost at the head of the States. She is blessed with a uniform temperature. Ice appears here but seldom, and the climate of the entire State, from October to May, is an ideal one, attractive alike to the invalid and tour- ist, and thousands of visitors from the North are yearly seeking this State in quest of health or enjoyment. The hotels furnish attractive homes for the opulent and fashionable, while men of moderate means can find cheap and excellent homes in the smaller hostelries and private boarding houses of the city, in the towns and villages scattered over this State. The comparative temperature of New Orleans, and of Jacksonville, and San Francisco, is seen below, for the winter months of November, December, January and February, as compiled from the Weather Bu- reau records, at New Orleans, La.: Average Average Highest Lowest New Orleans, La. Mean. highest lowest on record on record November 61 68 54 85 30 December 56 64 49 81 . 20 January 54 62 47 82 15 February 58 65 51 82 16 Season 57 65 50 85 15 Jacksonville, Fla. November 63 72 52 86 26 December 57 68 47 81 19 January 55 64 44 81 15 February 60 70 50 84 14 Season 59 68 4S S6 14 San Francisco, Cal. November 56 64 50 78 41 December 52 57 47 72 34 January 50 56 44 69 29 February 52 58 45 76 35 Season 52 5S' 46 78 29 Regarding the heat of summer in Louisiana, there prevails in many Darts a totally erroneous opinion. It is believed that it must be warmer here than in other States because Louisiana is located farther South. Such reasoning is utterly false; living in close proximity to the Mexican 13 Gulf, and having during the months of March, April, May, June, July and August, almost constantly south winds, we always have a cooling sea breeze. Another widespread error is the impression that a white man cannot work in this climate during the summer, and that only the negro can stand the heat. As far as the heat is concerned, the truth has been stated above; in regard to labor, it should be said that there are certain people who can never work, because they do not want to— during the summer it is too hot, and during the winter too cold for them, and they are willing to believe that only the negro can stand the heat. Our German gardeners and farmers, as well as thousands of other nationalities, have performed labor in garden and field for many years. They need no negroes, and feel so comfortable that they prefer the summer to the winter. On extremely hot days they work in the field only during the morning and afternoon hours, "laying off" during the midday heat, as they do in other sections under similar conditions. Cases of sunstroke are reported from Northern and Western cities; they occur here but seldom. RAINFALL. The average yearly rainfall at New Orleans is about 70 inches, de- creasing in quantity as one goes northward, with 45 inches as an aver- age in the extreme northern portion. The heaviest showers fall in sum- mer during the growing season. Winter comes next in its quantity of rainfall, while our springs and autumns are our dry seasons, with only occasional showers. Such seasons are conducive to the welfare of our staple crops— corn, cotton, sugar-cane and rice; dry springs permitting a successful planting and cultivation of these crops, and dry autumns, so essential to the rapid and economical harvesting of them. Our regular rains are from the southwest, yet in summer they sometimes come from the northwest, and when they do they are usually accompanied by thun- der and lightning. 14 RIVERS AND WATER COURSES NO STATE IN THE UNION has so much alluvial lands or so many miles of navigable waters. The widest part of the flood plain, as well as the delta of the .Mississippi River lies within its border. The alluvial and marsh lands derivable from this river are over 13,000 square miles. The bottoms of the Red, and its tributaries before it enters this valley, about 1,700, the marsh lands west of the delta, about 4,000; other alluvial and swamp lands, about 600 square miles, making in the aggre- gate a little over 19,000 square miles of alluvial land, or nearly one-half of the State. The Mississippi and the Red are the chief drainage channels of the State, and almost all of the larger streams of these basins diverge from them, and hence, are called bayous. Before the days of the levees they ..i| v '"'*'r-'r^rf 1 " (L\ I *1~T*i'i1f li ' mm A Steamboat Landing on the Mississippi River. formed so many channels, or outlets for the escape of water in floods. Such a network of connection has thus been formed that it is now diffi- cult sometimes to trace the course of an individual stream. As a rule, some large bayou flows along the edge of the bottom plain. Bayou Macon is on the west of the Mississippi flood plain, Ouachita River on the extreme west of the central plain, Bayous Boeuf, Cocodrie and Teche on the west of the flood plain of the Red River. In North Louisiana the rivers follow the trend of the subterranean rocks. In the east they flow southeasterly in the Ouachita, and southward into the Red. In the extreme south those west of the Mississippi flow southward into the Gulf; those east, south- east, into the lakes. 15 NAVIGABLE WATERS IN LOUISIANA. (In all of which boats operate during some season of the year.) Miles of Head of Streams — Navigation Navigation AmJte River 61 Port Vincent. Atchafalaya River 218 Red River. Barataria Bayou ♦Bartholomew Bayou... Bayou Louis Big Creek Bisteneau Lake Black River Bodcau Lake Boeuf River Boeuf Bayou Bunches Bend Calcasieu River Cane River Choctaw Bayou Corney Creek Courtableu Bayou D'Arbonne Bayou DeGlaise Bayou Delarge Bayou Dorchite Bayou Forks of Calcasieu Grand Caillou Bayou. 78 Harvey's Canal. 145 State Line, Arkansas. 25 Florence. 20 Ferry Landing. 30 Minden. 70 Mouth of Ouachita. 10 Bellevue. 300 Lake Lafourche. 11 12 132 60 Grand Ecore. 25 Pinhook. 50 Spearsville. 36' Washington. 75 Farmerville. 75 Evergreen. 20 6 Minden. 32 13 Lafourche Bayou 318 Donaldsonville. Lacombe Bayou Little Rdver (including Catahoula Lake) Louis Bayou Macon Bayou Manchac Bayou , Mermentau Bayou , *Mississippi River Natalbany River •Ouachita River Palmyra Lake *Pearl River Petite Anse Bayou *Red River 510 Fulton, I. T. 15 Bayou Lacombe. 150 St. L„ I. M. & S. R. R. Bridge. 15 Bayou Castor. 200 Floyd. 18 Hope Villa. 81 Lake Arthur. 560 St. Paul, Minn. 12 Springfield. 217 State Line. 25 Palmyra. 103 Carthage, Miss. 8 Salt Mine. Rouge Bayou Sabine Bayou Sabine River Teche Bayou Tensas River Tickfaw River Terrebonne Bayou. Tangipahoa Rdver. Tchefuncta Bayou. Vermilion Bayou.. 15 Shoals, Texas. 75 Catahoula Lake. 3S7 91 St. Martinsville. 150 V., S. & P. Bridge. 16 V.. S. & P. Bridge. 27 15 20 Covington. 49. . Pin Hook Bridge. Other streams 155 Total 4,794 •Portion of navigable streams lying in other States. 16 Miles of Navigation in Each State of the Mississippi Valley. Louisiana 4,794 Arkansas 2,100 Mississippi 1,380 Montana 1,310 Dakota 1,280 Illinois 1,270 Tennessee 1,260 Kentucky 1,027 Indiana 1,230 Iowa 840 Indian Territory 830 Minnestota .. . Wisconsin Ohio Texas Nebraska .... West Virginia. Pennsylvania . Kansas Alabama New York. . . . 720 660 560 550 440 500 380 240 200 70 Comparative Table Showing Total Mileage Branches and Spurs, Operated June 30, for Seventeen Total Miles Years Ending June 30 , Single Track, Main Line, in Louisiana on Years. 1899. 1900. 1901. 1902. 1S03. 1904. 1905. 1906. 1907. 1908. 1909. 1910. 1911. 1912. 1913. 1S14, 1915. Operated Single Track 2,264.32 2,425.40 2,662.00 2,912.73 2,969.67 3,413.70 3,505.33 3,886.74 4,290.25 4,765.78 4,950.65 5,021.18 5,175.47 5,257.05 5,232.83 5,160.33 5,240.15 Increase in Miles 161.08 236.60 250.73 56.94 444.03 191.63 261.41 433.51 475.53 184.87 70.53 154.29 81.58 t24.22 172.50 79.82 Per Cent Increase .066 .097 .094 .019 .150 .056 .073 .110 .095 .037 .014 .030 .015 t.004 t.014 .015 t Decrease. LIST OF RAILROADS IN LOUISIANA AND THEIR TRACK MILE- AGE ON JUNE 30, 1915. Total Miles Main Lines, Name of Road Branches and Spurs Alexandria & Western Railway Comapny 14.70 Arkansas, Louisiana & Gulf Railway Company, The 39.20 ♦Arkansas Southeastern Railway Company 31.00 Brimstone Railroad & Canal Company 7.73 Chicago, Rock Island & Pacific Railroad Company, The 147.73 tChicago, St. Louis & New Orleans Railroad Company *Dorcheat Valley Railroad Company Franklin & Abbeville Railway Co., The 44.16 Glenmora & Western Railway Co 12.00 Gulf, Colorado & Santa Fe Railway Company 63.96 Gulf & Sabine River Railroad Co 28.23 Houston & Shreveport Railroad Company 39.78 Jlberia, St. Mary & Eastern Railroad Company 39.46 Iberia & Vermilion Railroad Company 16.09 17 Total Miles Main Lines, Name of Road Branches and Spurs Illinois Central Railroad Company 188.12 t Jasper & Eastern Railway Company Kansas City, Shreveport & Gulf Terminal Company, The Kansas City Southern Railway Company, The 249.08 Kentwood & Eastern Railway Company 48.03 Kentwood, Greensburg & Southwestern Railroad Company. .. 14.20 Kinder & Northwestern Railroad Company 12.00 Lake Charles & Northern Railroad Company 44.35 Lake Charles Railway & Navigation Company 9.00 Lake Providence, Texarkana & Wn. Railroad Company 8.00 Leesville East & West Railroad, The 2.00 Louisiana & Arkansas Railway Company 222.60 Louisiana & Northwest Railroad Company, The 96.69 Louisiana & Pacific Railway Company 24.60 Louisiana Railway & Navigation Company 342.48 Louisiana Southern 'Railway Oomipany 65.31 Louisiana Western Railroad Company 207.74 Louisville & Nashville Railroad Company (N. O. & M. Div.) . . 44.64 Mansfield Railway & Transportation Company 15.85 *Milliken & Southwestern Railroad Company Missouri, Kansas & Texas Railway Co. of Texas, The 19.29 Monroe & Southwestern Railway Company 10.66 Morgan's Louisiana & Texas Railroad & Steamship Company. 416.34 Neame, Carson & Southern Railroad Company 32.58 Natchez, Urania & Ruston Railway .Company 14.00 New Iberia & Northern Railroad Company 49.35 New Orleans & Northeastern Railroad Company 61. £6 New Orleans Great Northern Railroad Company 136.70 New Orleans, Natalbany & Natchez Railway Company 29.01 New Orleans Southern & Grand Isle Railway Company 59.71 New Orleans Terminal Company 26.08 New Orleans, Texas & Mexico Railroad Company 172.72 North Louisiana & Gulf Railroad Co 25.70 OberlLn, Hampton & Eastern Railroad Co 11.00 Opelousas, Gulf & Northeastern Ry. Co., The 57.03 Ouachita & Northwestern Railroad Co 65.41 Pontchartrain R. R. (Branch L. & N. R. R. Co.) 4.96 Red River & Gulf Railroad Co 14.20 St. Louis, Iron Mountain & Southern Ry. Co 573.68 St. Louis Southwestern Railway Co 37.50 St. Tammany & New Orleans Rys. & Ferry Co 13.60 Sibley, Lake Bistene^u & Southern Ry. Co 28.00 Texas & Pacific Railway Co., The 720. S5 Tioga & Southeastern Railway Co 18.00 Tremont & Gulf Railway Co 66.74 Vicksburg, Shreveport & Pacific Railway Co 183.20 Victoria, Fisher & Western Railroad Co 31.00 Woodworth & Louisiana Central Railroad Co 23.00 Yazoo t appeal alone to the utilitarian. Her aesthetic products are perhaps more wonderful than her useful ones. Flowers of brilliant tints and attractive forms fill her fields, her woods and her swamps. Her climate favors the growth of native flowers as well as the delicate and highly-prized exotics. Roses bloom in great profusion throughout the winter in open air, while japonic/as, hibiscus and poin- settas of beautiful shades and brilliant tints are found in many yards. Tea roses, olives and magnolias (fuscata) and cape jasmines perfume the air with their delicious fragrance, while chrysanthemums and geraniums give brilliancy to every garden. Palms of endless varieties furnish the centerpieces of many private yards, and ornament our parks a,nd public squares. COTTON AND COTTON FACTORIES THE COTTON INDUSTRY in Louisiana is one of tremendous import and significance. The powerful influence it exerts on trade, its ab- sorption of capital, tooth as product and manufacture, places it high in the scale of commercial economics. There is no section of the world more fortunately situated for the production of cotton than Louisiana. In the past it has been of such potent significance that it has been called "King." Its future depends on the establishment of factories in the South. Cotton- producing offers an inviting field for speculative invest- ors, because the lands which grow it can be purchased cheaply; it can be produced at a nominal cost. The first thing to be done is for the raisers of cotton to send less cotton to the East, and manufacture more of it at home. Of all the industries which Louisiana has which offer inducements, that of cotton manufacturing offers supreme attractions. The advan- tages of location of a cotton factory anywhere in the State, on the scene of the production of raw material, is now a trite topic. Fifteen or twenty years ago New England contended that it was preposterous for the South to think of manufacturing any grade of goods from cotton. In a few years the South has practically driven the East out of all lines of •coarser manufacture, and now is demonstrating that this promise was not over-estimated. This subject is receiving a great deal of attention in Louisiana. It has been successfully tried in the Caroli.nas. The in- 22 ducements in this field are tremendous. There are many things which place Louisiana at the head of cotton-producing States, as a field for the erection of factories. First, the cheapness of fuel, oil and coal and natural gas; second, the cost and quality of labor; third, the abundance of raw material; fourth, the facilities for transportation, both rail and water, and the opportunities for export trade furnished by the great port of New Orleans. Free sites can be obtained in many of the smaller towns for the erec- tion of factories; cheap brick and lumber are always plentiful for the erection of the factory; cheap labor is abundant, and is always obtain- able in Louisiana. Shreveport, Monroe and Clinton have tried cotton factories and other cities and towns are moving actively. New Orleans has had a number of successful mills, all turning out a good grade of goods, which have never failed to find a quick and ready market and pay good dividends. The cotton seed oil business has grown to be one of the most impor- tant industries of the Staite. Nearly every town has one or more mills, and there are now fifty-one of these mills located in the State. STOCK RAISING AND DAIRYING NO PORTION OF THE GLOBE is better adapted to stock riasing than the State of Louisiana. Our soils unaided will supply native grasses sufficient to 'maintain cattle and horses through at least nine months in the year. The great variety of grasses, clovers and forage crops which can be grown so successfully upon all of our soils; our short winters, requiring shelter and extra feed for only a few months in the year; our numerous water courses, with their infinite number of tribu- taries, furnishing an abundant supply of water at all seasons, all con- spire to make Louisiana a most desirable location for stock raising. The question may be asked, if these natural advantages exist, why is it that more have not engaged in this industry? The ready reply is found in the fact that heretofore our entire agricultural world has been absorbed in the growing of our leading staples: sugar-cane, rice and cotton. Another potent reason may be found in the absence of packing factories, where a ready market for cattle, sheep and hogs might be found the year round. Both of these reasons are now gradually' melting away. Sugar-ca,ne and cotton no longer afford the handsome profits of the past to the planter, and the latter particularly is now diversifying-his crops and paying more attention to the raising of stock. A large majority of the horses of the State have been raised at home. Mules have been raised in sufficient quantities to demonstrate that, with proper care and attention, the finest and largest can be grown here, but only in a few instances has mule raising been pursued as a profession or special occu- pation. But many farmers are now raising both mules and horses for home demand, and some to sell. This home raised stock shows greater superiority for work than those raised elsewhere. The same natural conditions and advantages apply as to cattle. In addition to ample pasturage and luxurious forage for cattle raising, fattening cattle for market has superior advantages in Louisiana, as is shown in many articles further on. 23 24 Cotton seed meal and hulls from the many cotton seed oil mills, the rice bran, polish and shorts from our rice mills, and cheap molasses from our sugar 'factories provide superior economic feeding- rations for cattle feeders. Annually thousands of head of cattle from this and other States are fattened at our mills and shipped to the Northern and Western markets. Improved breeds of the dairy type, Jersey and Guernsey, and the beef type, Herefords, Durhams, Polled Angus and Devons, are being rapidly adopted, and the State is making great strides now in this direction. Hogs, likewise, are easily raised, and great interest is now being manifested in that line of farming. The "razor back" is fast disappear- ing and in his place comes the Poland China, the Berkshire, Red Jersey and Essex. There are now several breeders in the State with herds as good as any. Hog raising, by the adoption of proper rotation of crops, making the hog gather each crop; can be made exceptionally profitable, provided one can find a ready home market when they are fit for the shambles. With packing houses convenient, hog raising will soon become a leading in- dustry of this State and a most profitable one. By planting an acre or two in February or early March of a variety of early ripening sugar corn, in rows three feet apart and six to twelve inches in drill, it will be ready for the hogs in May. Succeed this with a similar patch of early sorghum, which will be ripe in June. Follow with Spanish peanuts, ripe in July, or early cow peas, ripe at same time. Add to these Chufas and artichokes a late corn field with cow peas, and a good lot of sweet potatoes, and you have the material to grow and fatten mnay hogs. These lots should be arranged so that the hogs could gather theTn all and simultaneously have access to a field of grass or clover, with an abundance of fresh, pure water. This is possible on nearly every farm. By adopting such a plan as the above, some of our best farmers have raised hogs for half a cent a pound. SOME OP TANGIPAHOA'S BEEF CATTLE. 25 LIVE STOCK CAN LIVE STOCK be successfully raised in Louisiana? The most forceful reply to this question would seem to-be that farm animals of the most popular breeds are being successfully raised in the State, and this is doubtless clue to the excellence of the climate and to the superabundance of food crops which Louisiana is capable of producing. CATTLE. Of the breeds and varieties at present in the State, the following may be mentioned: Beef Breeds.— Shorthorn, Polled Durham, Aberdeen -Angus, among the larger breeds, and the Red Poll and Devon, representing the smaller. Within the last few years the prices paid for males of the beef breeds have ranged up into the thousands of dollars, and animals of the choicest families are constantly being introduced. Dairy Breeds. — Jersey, Guernsey and Holstein-Friesian chiefly. Some of the most famous families of these breeds are represented in the State. The main impediment to the cattle industry in Louisiana, like other Southern States, has been the presence of the cattle tick. However, the work of eradication is being vigorously prosecuted by the Federal and State authorities, and a compulsory tick eradication law is now on the statute books, which means that the entire State is to be tick-free within the next very few years. AN INEXPENSIVE HOG HOUSE. 26 SAMPLE OF LOUISIANA HOGS. HOGS. Breeds.— Duroc-Jersey, Berkshire, Poland-China, Hampshire, Tam- worth,. Essex, Yorkshire, and other white breeds. The raising- of hogs is fast becoming a very extensive industry in Louisiana and promises to become one of our chief branches of animal husbandry in almost every section. It may be said of the hogs, as of the animals previously mentioned, that in Louisiana there are represented some of the best strains in the country. 1 NHr] f^^^HHj ■ * ! 5 '. 1 A FLOCK OP SHEEP IN POINTE COUPEE PARISH. 27 SHEEP. Breeds.— Shropshire, Southdown, Hampshire, Dorset, and perhaps a few other breeds, including some of the Merinos. The climate of Louisiana seems better suited to the middle-wool, or mutton, breeds than to the heavy, long-wooled sheep, such as the Lin- coln, Cotswold, etc., and there are great possibilities in the raising of mutton sheep and lambs, especially in the hands of those who are familiar with this line of husbandry. Under intelligent management, sheep do well in the State, and there is a profitable and large consuming market for mutton in the city of New Orleans. HORSES AND MULES. The heavy draft breeds of horses have not, as yet, gained a very ex- tensive foothold, on account of the mule having been for so long the chief draft animal; but many farmers are gradually adopting horses of the heavier breeds, and they seem to be giving entire satisfaction. Of the lighter breeds of horses there are to be found the German Coach, French Coach, English Hackney, "Kentucky" saddle horse, and the standard-bred, or light harness horse, besides ponies. Mules are quite a profitable "crop," and with the proper foundation stock are being raised in Louisiana as well as anywhere. LIVE STOCK ORGANIZATIONS. In connection with live stock it may be said that almost every variety has its own special organization or association to look after and stimu- late its development in the State. Among these may be mentioned the Louisiana Beef Breeders' Association, the Louisiana Jersey Breeders Association, the Louisiana Swine Breeders' Association, etc., and in addition, Louisiana has a State Live Stock Sanitary Board, or Health of Animals Department," to control the various infectious and contagious diseases to which live stock may be susceptible. And this State Board also operates a serum plant at Baton Rouge for the benefit of the hog- raisers, where they may secure potent anti hog cholera serum at a minimum of cost. THE LOUISIANA STATE LIVE STOCK SANITARY BOARD. The Louisiana State Live Stock Sanitary Board is to the live stock population of the State what the Louisiana State Board of Health is to the people. It was created for the purpose of preventing, controlling and eradicating the infectious and contagious diseases of animals and thus protect the farmer's property. The State Live Stock Sanitary Board prepares and distributes the serum to protect the farmer's hogs against hog cholera and has already saved thousands of dollars' worth of hogs in the State. The State Live Stock Sanitary Board prevents the fart roduo, -ion of diseased animals from other States and thus protects the State from outbreaks of contagious diseases among our live stock. 28 The State Live Stock Sanitary Board requires that all cattle for breeding or dairy purposes, over six months old, coming into the State of Louisiana, must be accompanied by a certificate from a qualified veterinarian approved by officials of the State from which the shipment is made, showing their absolute freedom from tuberculosis, and in this way prevent the introduction and spread oif that insidious disease among the herds of cattle in the State.' The State Live Stock Sanitary Board is at the head of the tick erad- ication work in the State, and it is through the co-operation of this Board with the Federal Bureau of Animal Industry, at Washing- ton, that this work is being systematically carried on for the benefit of our cattle owners. The State Live Stock Sanitary Board operates under one of the best live stock sanitary laws in the United States and was created solely in the interest of the farmers and stock owners of the State. The State Live Stock Sanitary Board earnestly requests the co-oper- ation of every farmer and stock owner in the State in order to make its work as effective as possible in preventing the introduction of the con- tagious diseases of animals from the outside and in controlling and eradicating them within the State. The State Live Stock Sanitary Board is the friend of the stock owners of the State; it was created solely for their protection and it earnestly requests their hearty support and assistance in carrying out its provi- sions and regulations. The State Live Stock Sanitary Board invites- correspondence from the stock owners of the State regarding infectious and contagious diseases oif their animals, and it urgently requests that all suspicious cases or out- breaks of these diseases be promptly reported to the Secretary and Executive Officer. The prevention, control and', extermination of our animal plagues can be accomplished only iby intelligent sanitation. The office of the Louisiana State Live Stock Sanitary Board is lo- cated in the State Capitol, Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Dr. E. P. Flower is Executive Officer. DAIRYING IN LOUISIANA THE PRODUCTION OF MILK and its products is still in its infancy in [Louisiana, although this State offers the dairyman many advan- tages over other States. Nature affords a splendid climate, native pas- tures and an abundance oif pure water and pjenty of cool shade. Besides these, the Southern dairyman has the advantage over his Northern com- petitor in that our short winters require shelter and extra feed for only a few months in the year. Moreover, the feed for the winter — such as hay, turnips, etc. — can be raised in winter months. Oats and vetch sowed in September and October furnish satisfactory feed for January and February. Cotton seed meal and hulls from the many cotton seed oil mills, the rice bran from our rice mills and the molasses from the sugar factories provide superior economic feed for the cattle. 29 30 Only within the last few years has the attention of the people of New Orleans been pointedly drawn to the matter of its milk supply. Heretofore nearly all the milk used in that city was produced in dairies within the city limits. It is now recognized toy all authorities and scientists that milk should not be produced in thickly populated centers, but in the open country, and the dairies within the city limits were closed by law and compelled to move outside of certain prescribed and safe lines. As a result the supply of milk was still further reduced, though the quality and cleanliness, thanks to the strict supervision of the Board of Health, has been improved. Large dairies have also been established at some distance from the city, in localities that can be reached in one or two hours by rail. Hammond, which is fifty-two miles from New Orleans, furnished a large part of the milk consumed in that city, and a number of farmers at Roseland also ship fresh milk daily to New Orleans, and all along on the Illinois Central and Yazoo & Mississippi Valley railroads hundreds of gallons are being shipped daily. In New Orleans a company with a perfect and sanitary plant and proper facilities for pasteurizing milk is buying and disposing of all the milk it can secure, and will help much to develop the dairy industry of the country adjacent to New Orleans. The net price paid to the producer has been 20 cents a gallon in summer and 22 cents in winter, or 4y 2 cents per degree of butter fat. This company and other responsible parties will make a contract for all the high-grade milk the farmers can produce, and every farmer who delivers his milk at the railway station can collect his payments weekly. It will thus be seen that New Orleans is in need oif thousands of gallons of milk and its need will increase with each year. In the pro- duction of butter, cheese and other milk products, too, a rational man- ^^< i~~ '.'.'. iK^'3r?i- : ..3r W 1 K«SsS ^^ 1 ?P2 ^^^^H§jiip«fl ' !'• I ~ *' i A W rm - : . -1M.. jam " u Wmfo*- j ' ill I ■■■ '-'■'■ ..; . _ A HERD OP TANGIPAHOA DAIRY CATTLE. 31 agement can introduce many improvements and no better opportunity can offer itself to those seeking to establish the dairy industry in this vicinity. The selection of the proper dairy cow, improved dairy ma- chinery and appliances and the necessary knowledge to operate the dairy become the only considerations. Otherwise the conditions for success in dairying i,n this vicinity are the most favorable. Cheap land suitable for this purpose in great abundance and conveniently located near the city, on either side of the fourteen railroads entering the city, and which deliver the milk here in one or two hours; a strong demand which assures to the producer a firm price and ready sale of all the milk he has to offer; and, lastly, climate and agricultural conditions which fur- nish the dairyman advantages such as he will not find in regions further North. Under these circumstances the dairy business in Louisiana prop- erly handled offers rare opportunities to any one with the necessary experience and small capital required, and there is not the least doubt that the time will come when it will be one of the most important indus- tries of the State. SOY BEANS IX THIS AGE OF PROGRESS, where opportunities are constantly flashed upon us, we must be on the alert to seize always the best in sight. In 1798 indigo was the chief crop of this section of the country, selling at 75 cents per pound, but cotton made its appearance among the farm- ers and at four dollars per hundred (no gins at that time being thought of) was considered more remunerative, and it slowly increased until the gin was invented, and then it became the great crop of the South, over- shadowing all others to such an extent that the one-crop system became baneful, and it is now a recognized fact > a i-s t/3 o 3 — g n o A Edmonton, British Northwest Prince Albert, Sas- katchewan Swift Current, Sas- katchewan . . Winnipeg, Manito- bia White River, Onta- rio Ottawa, Ontario. . . Bismarck, N. Dak. St. Paul, Minn .... Des Moines, Iowa. Boston, Mass Albany, N. Y Buffalo, N. Y Chicago, 111 Little Rock, Ark. . Atlanta, Ga Shreveport, La. . . . Charleston, S. C. . . Jacksonville, Fla. . Mobile, Ala New Orleans, La. . Galveston, Tex. . . . San Antonio, Tex. . 1.8 -8.4 3.1 —6.8 —0.4 9.6 6.7 11.6 20.4 27.0 22.5 24.7 23.7 40.6 42.2 46.2 49.3 53.9 49.8 53.0 52.7 51.1 8. 3124. 2 1 39. 9 50.8 1 56.9 1 60.6 5 S .8 I I I I I — 3.0|12. 0|36.1| 47.6(57. 7 61.9 58.9 8.0 22.0 41.3|50. I I -1.6 12. 0.2|12 11.7121 8.3|22 15.0|28 24.1|35 28.0135 23.6132 24.0|31 25.4|34 44.1|52 45.2|52 50.0|58 51.7|57 56.9161 53.2159 56.3162 55.6|62 54.4|62 I 3|35.9'51 I I 2!33.0|45 ,5|40.0|54 1)42. 6|55 2145.7158 7150.6161 0|45.3I56 1 C.n 58 2|42.3!54. 4 15.9 56. 7|62.7|70 4|61.1|69 2I65.SI73 2|63.8|72, 9|67.6|74. H66.0I73. 0167.9174, 3J6S.7I75. 1169.0174. 7|60.0 6 62.2 7|58. 9|65. 2 64. 2167. 6!70. 6 6 5. 9 6,7. 5|65. 5!66. 4177. 5175. 2179. 4J7S. 2179. 6 7 9. 5179. 4180. 8 80. 49.3 48.4 41.1122.9 37.1 15.4 13.1135.6 2.SI30.5 66.5^64.0 53.1142.1 23.2 10.0 37.5 66.0 63.4 52.5 39.1 18.0 4.1 33.1 7 59 3 69 2170, 4|72. 4|75. 8|71. 9172. 1|70. 3172. 2|80. 6177. 6 X2. 5,81. II Ml. 1 Ml. 6181. 9|83. 4|82. 5|56.4|50. 5.64.'8 57. 2[6S.1|57. 1!69.5|60. 5 J 7 3 . j 6 5 . 3I68.9|62. 0|69.5|62. 2)68. S|62. 4|71.2|64. 6|79. 2|73. 6|76.1 72. H81. 4l75. 3|80.3|76. 9180.1177. 5179. 7J76. 3[S1.0|7S. 0I82.6|79. 4182.0177. 37.1 43.8 44.1 48.1 52.5 52.3|41 50.4 3S 51.5 53.2 62.9 62.4 65.6 67.1158 69.6161 67.1157 69.5160 4|72.4|62 1 69.2 59 9.7 32.1 17.0 4o.6 15.0 19.3 25.7 31.6 27.5 40.0 43.9 49.3 48.8 47.6 30.1147.0 39 39.2 29.3|48.5 51 51 55 5 43.5 9144.6 3|4S.9 1151.3 3|55.2 5 51.5 6|54.4 9156.3169.4 2!53.l|67.9 61.5 60.9 65.2 65.6 6S.2 66.1 68.2 DAILY MEAN MAXIMUM TEMPERATURE. Stations. >-. s- d s- .c E3 .Q ri P. fe S <\ Edmonton | Prince Albert | Swift Current | Winnipeg j Montreal, Provincel of Quebec ] Toronto, Ontario..! Bismarck j St. Paul I Des Moines j Boston I Albany | Buffalo j Chicago I Little Rock Atlanta Shreveport Charleston | Jacksonville [ Mobile I New Orleans | Galveston | San Antonio 23| 22| 12| 121 23) 191 13| 121 21| 23 29| 30| 18| 20| 211 24] 29| 32] 36| 36| 31| 32| 31| 311 :; 1 33| 50] 53| 50| 53[ 56| 59 58| 59| 64| 66| 59| 62| 62| 64| 59| 611 63| 66! 1 34| 56] 65 69 27 51| 641 69 33| 56| 65 71 28| 54| 68 73 311 36| 34| 37| 45] 43| 411 38| 421 63| 621 69| 66! 72| 68| 711 68| 74 49| 64! 74 49| 61| 72 66 68 71 66 69 62 6,1 74 71 73 71 78 77 78 76 77 75 77 76 82 80 N2 80 85 83 72 79 70| 79 76| 83| 72! 801 78| 84| 75 82 j 76| 74! 80| 85| 92| 94 S3] 8S| S01 86| 78 80 7 6, 78 89 S5 92 87! 901 891 891 88 94 49 44 50 48 50 52 51 53 59 57 57 54 56 71 70 75 73 78 75 76 75 79 79 APPENDIX A — Continued. DAILY MEAN MINIMUM TEMPERATURE. Stations. '~ >. > - ci 3 3 o S c < > d o 1-5 EC 3 b£ 3 p, 1 W 0) o o O = > O 5 o CD Q Edmonton | Prince Albert [ Swift Current | Winnipeg | Montreal, Province| of Quebec I Toronto, Ontario . . I Bismarck | St. Paul | Des Moines. | Boston | Albany I Buffalo | Chicago Little Rock | Atlanta Shreveport Charleston Jacksonville .... Mobile New Orleans. . . . Galveston San Antonio. . . . 4 -in - 9| I 41 15| - 3| 3| HI 20| 15| 19| 17! 34| 35| 39| 43| 46| 43| 47| 48| 421 II —HI — H —11| I 71 14| - 11 71 141 201 161 171 18| 35| 37| 411 44| 49| »46| 49| 50| 441 101 41 14 I I 31 1 39 26| 35 ::.» 7| 29| I 33| :::: 31 201 36| 27| 40| 28| 381 25| 38| 24| 35| 531 41 40 46 43 42 481 51| 48 501 46| 49] 61| 45 50 46| 50 59| 52 49 54 56 61 53 5S 52 1 57 58 62 60| 65| 581 641 28 45 44| 51| 60| 49| 56| 64] 50| 57' 66 54| 59| 66| 52| 59| 66| 56| 61 1 68| 58| 65| 711 521 591 66| 63| 63| 65| 72| 701 70| 731 721 721 72| 74 77| 711 17 9 12 —3 19 L0 161—2 27 22 29 3 4 36 29 35 40 41 40 40 42 53 52 56 59 61 59 62 65 44| 59 HIGHEST TEMPERATURE OF RECORD. Stations. u '~ >> d> >> i- ^ & cd a a CO o - p. >> - i-a 1-3 W isi < C CO a 02 o o o > O E c o 0) p Edmonton Prince Albert Swift Current Winnipeg Montreal, Province of Quebec Toronto, Ontario. . Bismarck St. Paul Des Moines Boston Albany Buffalo Chicago Little Rock Atlanta Shreveport Charleston Jacksonville Mobile New Orleans Galveston San Antonio .48| 53| 59| 52| 58| 60| 511 641 70| 64 70| 65| 78| 75| 83| 80| 811 78| 82| 75| 871 561 52| 58| 44| I 61| 84| 62| 79 70| 86| 581 81| 50| 57| 54| 701 64| 81| 61| 83| 70| 881 641 781 631 79| 67| 79| 63| 81| 80! 89| 78| 87| 82! 901 80| 94| 86| 91| 80| 91| 82! 86| 76| S5| 901 97| 77 90 90 87 92| 96 87| 97 91| 97 84| 94 88| 94 941 94 89! 97 96! 101 90| 98 92| 98 901 9S 85 991 104 861 94| 92 93| 87| 8S 104 102 101 100 94 93 9S 94 93 103 103 98 101 98 99 93 99 102 100 104 101 101 101 102 97 105 107 104 109 104 104 95| 1031 106| 100| 107| 104| 104| 102 102| 99( 106! 90 99 105 ioo( 103| 99 97' ln2 98! 97 84 90 99 91 94 102 96 95| '.IN 105 101 98 110 LOO 101 L01 100 98 97 101 100 99 97 98 94 103 94 91! :v.» 95| 86 95 83 94 93 104 100 98 103 107 104 109 104 104 95 103 106 100 110 781104 82] 104 102 102 99 108 80 APPENDIX A — Continued. LOWEST TEMPERATURE OF RECORD. Stations. >> >> d d 2 a ,Q d O >~i fa Edmonton Prince Albert. . . . Swift Current. . . . Winnipeg Montreal, Quebec Toronto, Ontario. Bismarck St. Paul Des Moines Boston Albany Buffalo Chicago Little Rock Atlanta Shreveport Charleston Jacksonville .... Mobile New Orleans Galveston San Antonio -50|- -50|- -41|- -45|- -26|- -26 - -44|- -411- -30|- -13- -24|- -141- -20|- - 5|- - 2- H- 10 15| ni- ls n| 61 -43- -48| -41 -39|- -24—15 -2 5 1 — 16 -4 3 1 — 46 -331—22 -26 — 8| -ll|— S| -18|— 81 -13|— 4| -211—121 -12| 161 - 5| 71 101 - 1| 7 15 12 11 25 25 13 23 26 31| 42 29 40 28| 39 17| 27| 40 28| 39| 51 8| 25 38| 39 22| 32 42 53 24| 32 45| 51 261 34 461 54 25| 32 46| 50 301 38 52| 5S 30| 43 52J 57 21| 35 44| 53 36[ 29 36| 32 64j 57 66| 63 66 j 68 58 57 —27 — 28 — 22 —29 — 1 — 5 —28 — 24 —10 — 2 —10 2 — 2 10 14 18 26 26 25 29 26 21 50 50 —41 45 26 26 44 —41 — 30 —13 —24 — 14 —23 — 12 — 8 — 5 7 10 — 1 7 MEAN MONTHLY PRECIPITATION (INCHES). Stations. >-. >, 5 3 o _ 1-5 fa d 3 < .O ,Q 01 r- 0) 3 P, o O *j CO O 'A Edmonton Prince Albert. Swift Current. Winnipeg White River. . Ottawa Bismarck St. Paul Des Moines. . . Boston., , Albany Buffalo Chicago Little Rock. . . Atlanta Shreveport Charleston . . . Jacksonville . . Mobile New Orleans.. Galveston San Antonio. . 0.68(0 .97| .64| .88| 1.69|1 2.99|2 .541 .90 1.21 1 3.S2|3 2.5 li 2 3.30|2 2.0012 4.79 5.31 4.42 3.45 3.12 4.85)5 4.63|4 3.62|3 1.6SI1 .67 0.72|0. .69| .77 . .741 .81 1 . -9S|l.03|l. .52|1.38|1. .69 2.72 1. .50|1.04|1. .S4|l.60|2. .0811.6512. .44|4. 0813. .5212.7412. S5|2.62|2, 16|2.55|2. .1814.9414, .65|5.78|3, .61|4.52|4. .4113.72)2. .43|3.52|2, .3617.1714, 4715.3014, .10[2.90|3 7811.6812 8811 S3|l 93il 3313 9814 55|3 391-2 45|3 ss :; 51|5 6313 58 1 4 99|3 724 3514 91 3 13|3 94:2 55 2.S6 26 2.51 7612.67 2S|3.29 95J2. 59 2.92|3 50|3.54|2 62|4.41|3 .5614.9613 51|3.03|3 9813.7613 3.14 3.66 4.09 0913.88)4 16|3.5SJ3 47|5.39]7 .2515.5316 0015.9517 .SS|6.16'6 .23 4.7513 9613.1112 0312. 5 1 2 . 4411. 0S|2. 8013. 47|3. 1411. 4013. 86 3. 36|4. 90|3. 40|2. 64]2. 9913. 7314. i:: !.:;•: o 1511.281 91 1.22 67 2.03J1 30|2.77 2 0312.6912 98J1.19I1 46J3.42I2 til 3.07 2 0313. 19|3 9613.18|2 3.18 3 3.02 3.26 .. ., 4S|3.53 2616 L'n r, 0416 4 7 5 9S'5 22 2 3.22 5.46 8.03 S115.02 6114.81 01)5.41 69(2.94 70 0.58 S3 .83 88 .69 70 1.08 35 1.85 55 2.54 03 .68 34 1.30 68 1.48 86 4.10 99 2. SO 53 3.35| 55 2.50 55 4.59 34 3.4(1 18 4.08 93 2.87 06 2.19 18 3.74 93 3.7'.» 18 4.02 49 1.78 1 0.70 .74 .78 .91 1.71 2.91 .62 1.06 1.31 3,41 2.57 3.37 2.07 4.24 4.54 4.37 3.15 2.99 4.57 4.46 3.73 1.56 15.83 14.91 15.47 20.98 24.79 32.60 17.64 2S.68 32.45 43.38 36.38 37.28 33.28 49. S9 49.36 45.68 52.07 53.25 62.04 57.42 47.06 26.83 81 APPENDIX A — Continued. PERCENTAGES OP SUNSHINE. Stations. Battleford, Saskatch- wan "Winnipeg, Manitoba. Toronto, Ontario.... Ottawa, Ontario Quebec, Province of Quebec Bismarck St. Paul Des Moines Boston Albany Buffalo Chicago Little Rock Atlanta Shreveport f Charleston Jacksonville Mobile New Orleans Galveston San Antonio 40 49 50[ 41 48 491 2T 37 40| 30 38 40| 30 36 41 56 62 56 50 62 62 46 47 59 4-1 57 60 3x 47 51 23 40 48 37 47 55| 4N 55 57| 4 6 51 60 4N 51 57 61 62 69 56 58 69 5 4 60 63| 52 51 60 60 59 63 48 50 49 63| 59 58! 60 62 51 49 58 57 59| 53 70 68 671 56| 631 61 49 55 65 64 62 65 69 69 75 62 71 48| 54 47 52 54 44 44 34 52 59 59 47 37 34 56 60 60 55 44 29 50 53 56 45 39 28 44 46 50 42 37 24 60 71 66 59 59 50 66 75 70 62 58 48 65 70 70 60 62 54 69 72 67 58 60 48 56 59 54 47 48 34 61 67 62 57 49 30 73 71 69 65 61 52 69 68 70 74 71 61 66 58 60 62 63 62 71 66 75 79 70 56 69 63 67 68 68 70 68 64 63 61 60 59 70 59 62 63 70 69 63 54 58 53 61 56 83 74 73 71 71 61 68 67 67 68 60 45 45 47 44 41 38 59 60 59 59 47 46 58 62 58 63 66 62 63 56 67 56 Interpolated percentages of sunshine. MEAN RELATIVE HUMIDITY (PERCENTAGES). (8 a. m. and 8 p. m., 75th meridian time.) Stations. >. u a 3 a >> U 3 u ,a o P. < >> CD c 3 3 b£ 3 < S-i V s CD ft CD m u CD f$ o o O CD s CD > C 0) CD O CD Q Bismarck . . . St. Paul Des Moines.. Boston Albany Buffalo Chicago Little Rock.. Atlanta Shreveport . Charleston. . . Jacksonville Mobile New Orleans. Galveston . .. San Antonio. a. m. p. m. . a. m. , p. m. . a. m. , p. m. , a. m. , p. m. . a. m. . p. m. a. m. . p. m. , a. m. p. m. a. m. p. m. a. m. p. m. a. m. p. m. a. m. p. m. a. m. p. m. a. m. p. m. a. m . p. m. a. m. p. m. a. m. p. m. 80 80 80 69 69 65 83 84 80 75 74 66 82 82 79 76 73 65 73 71 70 70 67 68 82 81 79 | 78 SO | 7S I 84 I 79 80 66 81 7u 81 | 65 I 81 | 76 | 86 | 77 | 85 I 75 | 85 | 73 | 86 | 83 | 76 I 56 76 53 74 54 76 551 6n 671 73 72| 64| 77| 731 75| 7l| 79| 75| 75| 701 77 77 59| 58| 78| 74| 62 591 80| 8l| 58 59! 8l| 75 76| 741 ■83| 78) 72| 69( 85| 82| 75] 721 851 83| 71| 68 88| 86| 83| 81 77| 8l| 501 541 771 81 53] 58 74| 78 52] 56 76| 79 56| 59 70| 72 70j 71 721 74 64| 67 741 76 7l| 71 75| 75 681 69 8l| 81 62| 64 74] 78 59| 63 84| 84 62] 63 76! 78 76| 78 791 81 73' 78 Sl| SI 71( 73 81| 81 68j 71 82| 82 781 76 S4| 84 56| 51 Slj 811 50 53 83| 83 56! 60 69 73 75 77 69| 72 781 76 691 68 85 84 65| 65 85 82 72| 60 861 86 64 63 82 83 80 80 85| 86j 81| 82 86 85| 78' 75 84| 84| 751 74| S2J 81] 75 73 85 84' 491 53 81 ■ 81 80 60 69 69 80 80 83 6 2 69 75 80 79 S2 59 65 74 75 75 73 72 71 69 82 82 82 7 3 75 75 76 77 79 72 75 77 77 79 82 6 7 73 78 83 80 80 60 59 64 77 77 80 61 63 70 85 83 82 59 60 64 80 80 80 76 75 75 84 85 87 79 78 77 83 84 85 70 73 76 SI 83 84 691 73 80 83 72 7S SO! 79] 52 56 80 61 80 63 80 63 73 70 78 72 77 73 78 71 81 63 79 65 83 62 79 77 83 77 84 74 83 74| 72 85 84 80 78 77| 81 57! 53 82 AVERAGE DATE OF FIRST KILLING FROST IN AUTUMN. Edmonton, September 9. (Not much data available.) Prince Albert, September 9. (Not much data available.) Swift Current, September 11. (Not much data available.) Winnipeg, September 14. (Not much data available.) Bismarck, September 19. St. Paul, October 3. Des Moines, October 11. Boston, October 22. Albany, October 17. Buffalo, October 16. Chicago, October 18. Little Rock, November 13. Atlanta, November 3. Shreveport, November 11. Charleston, December 11. Jacksonville, December 6. Mobile, December 4. New Orleans, December 10. Galveston, December 24. San Antonio, November 26. AVERAGE DATE OF LAST KILLING FROST IN SPRING. Edmonton, May 17. (Not much data available.) Prince Albert, May 17. (Not much data available.) Swift Current, May 15. (Not much data available.) Winnipeg, May 15. (Not much data available.) Bismarck, May 12. St. Paul, April 27. Des Moines, April 22. Boston, April 20. Albany, April 23. Buffalo, April 26. Chicago, April 18. Little Rock, March IS. Atlanta, March 23. Shreveport, March 4. Charleston, February 19. Jacksonville, February 11. Mobile, February 16. New Orleans, February 3. Galveston, January 27. San Antonio, February 23. EARLIEST DATE OF KILLING FROST IN AUTUMN. Edmonton, August 25. (Not much data available.) Prince Albert, August 2 5. (Not much data available.) Bismarck, August 23. St. Paul, September S. Des Moines, September 13. Boston, September 21. Albany, September 15. Buffalo, September 23. Chicago, September 20. Little Rock, October 22. Atlanta, October 11. Shreveport, October 2S. Charleston, November 17. Jacksonville, November 12. Mobile, October 31. New <>;■;< ans, November 11. Galveston, November 30. San Antonio, November 9. LATEST DATE OF KILLING FROST IN SPRING. Edmonton, May 31. (Not much data available.) Prince Albert, May 31. (Not much data available.) Bismarck, June 7. St. Paul, May 23. 8S Des Moines, May 31. Boston, May 16. Albany, May 30. Buffalo, May 25. Chicago, May 29. Little Rock, April 26. Atlanta. April IT. Shreveport, March 2 7. Charleston, April 2. Jacksonville. April 6. Mobile, April 6. New Orleans, March 27. Galveston, March 1. San Antonio, March 2 7. LENGTH OF THE CROP-GROWING SEASON. Days. Edmonton (approximately) 114 Prince Albert (approximately) 114 Swift Current ( approximately) 118 Winnipeg (approximately) 121 Bismarck 130 St. Paul 159 Des Moines 172 Boston 18o Albany 177 Buffalo 173 Chicago 183 Little Rock 24m Atlanta 225 Shreveport 2 52 Charleston 295 Jacksonville 298 Mobile 291 New Orleans 310 Galveston 331 San Antonio 276 SCENE NEAR MANY, SABIXE PARISH. 8i X a M Q S) 2 ^ £ £ % ° co o fa JUr>0 J9J aniBA £.0 Z ? p in t* ^ JI130 JSd I'RLl o a E CO fa 1U30 -iad aST33Joy 7~Z. : ~ o '" 0) O CO lueo jsj aaqtunx IfllOLO rr ■*r eg ■*LCN 00 CM Tf 10 00 o C5 US c- co* of 00" CO -»> rH (OtOM O US O CM "* ■* •* rH O COt-[» C\f tP'so rH CM US o us o ■*" eg" if CO 05 to t- CO CM 0- CO 10 t-O CO «tot-" O N 1-1 O OS O CS t- US co o us 00 us CO CM ■* CS co"co*-rf US CO CO CM CM r-i if US 00 O CO CM c c:' (c c; ci 10 CJ W CO « CO Ol T-* 00 o "tOCt-VM ■*lH00 USrH CO US if C 00 MlOMr-Cl IO CO t- LO ^^ C1COCOC1-* CO O CO CO 00 00 US t™ CO CO if CO if Tf *^< LO CI N t^ 00 CO 1-1 CM CM CM CO CS CO CM t-i t- CS CO CO OS C CM CM ^ t- CO US WHMO OLtNOO co" co" US 00 CM CO O if O] OS CM iH 00 "f IO CO C- C-- CO CS if CO -^ OS HCOOt-" i-i i-t eg HU5t- o eg co 00 co 00 CO CO o uo ^HOOTf o o wef; d ifl HCO t'OlCO co eg os en eg t- co co co eg us if US US rH t-h co if us co CO t- CO O CO co eg co co co 00 co eg o CO if if" CO 1-4 rH t- CO CO CM if CO if tH E— t- OS CO CO CM O CO OlOt-H ClV"o"p3 CO CO CO CO CS CM if O CO O IO rH ^ ^* CO if lO*it COCO CO eg c— no 00 co 01 10 00 eg 00 us -f eg 00 CO o c- c- ■* CM CO *f US CS O US O rH O HNCiHCl US O CO CS US f O if rH t- US O CO -f C- CO t- 00 O CO t- [- eg t- rH co co C- Hi OS co eg eg eg eg CO rH N US CO O rH US eg eg co o CO if CD rH OOIO* IO 00 CO o cs -*" en us us eg cs co US CO CO c- uo eg 00 f co 00 co 00 co 00 t- 00 os cs 03 if CO CS C~ rH CO* O0 US US C- CD US US 1> CM US Tf OS *-f t— 00 if H rH US os us eg co co t- co o us us c- co CM rH OS co t- o eg OS O C- rH eg co eg co rH CO O --f rit-KO CO OS rH t- r- a a 6 Z -p -2 « •P C - I _ > Z x " fa p a s P> .. cd : P, c X % d S 1 M o k p m Eh 3 « cd .2 W "P P ,Q M ,° o tp r-i a fl I r S to CO C C 03 CO o te >- oil 3 85 APPENDIX C. Table showing total yield of corn, oats, wheat, and hay in the 11 cotton States of Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Texas, for the years 1909-1915, inclusive. 1909 | 461,536,000 1910 | 664,752,000 1911 | 539,136,000 1912 | 685,333,000 1913 | 658,252,000 1914 | 610,851,000 1915 | 812,SS3,000 291,755,000 432,912,000 I 432,898,000 | 430,155,000 | 442,802,000 | 436,051,000 | 513,908,000 | 51,847, ) 9(7,577,000 65,506,000 | 90,659,000 | 97,237,000 | 102,685,000 | 157,714,000 1 28,622.1100 55,120,000 34.619,000 46.S29.000 51,009,000 85,188,000 88,S42,000 3,108,000 3,428,000 2,611,000 4.205. 4,2] 1,000 4,577,000 6,269,000 f Total production of corn for States named above, other than Texas and Oklahoma. APPENDIX D. Yieid per acre in bushels and 10-year averages for 15 Southern States. TO -year average. State. (1870- I 1879 1880- 1889 1890- 1S99 ;1909 1900-| 19091 1910 Alabama Arkansas Florida Georgia Kentucky Louisiana Maryland Mississippi North Carolina. Oklahoma South Carolina. Tennessee Texas Virginia West Virginia. . 13.9 24.4 10.2 11.2 29.7 17.2 2d. 2 15.4 14.7 12.6 19.8 9.6 10.4 23.8 16.0 24.2 14.3 12.8 IS. 2 9.7 11.1 25.7 16.3 27.0 15.0 12.2 I 13.0 9.4 24.2 21.7 | 20.1 | 28.3 | 9.4 20.5 18.1 16.8 23.4 9.9 22.0 19.0 19.1 24.4 13.5 1S.7 I 10.2 I 11.5 26.7 I 17.5 | 32.7 I 15.2 I 14.8 | 24.2 | 11.6 ! 23.0 I 19.0 22.7 | 27.5 11.9 14.8 11.6 11.6 24.3 16.4 27.7 1911 1912 191311914 19151 18.0 24.0 13.0 14.5| 29.0 23.6 33.5 13.1| 20.5 13.8| 18.6 15.9 13.3 21.5 14.7 16.0 IS. 5 2 5.9 20.6 20.6 25.5 25.31 26.0 18.0 20. S 14.6 16.0 26.0 18.5 36.5 19.0 18.4 6.5 18.2 26.8 9.5 24.0 25.7 17.2 17.3 17.0 20.4 19.0| 17.5 13.0 15.0 16.0 13.8 15.5 14.0 30.4 20.5 25.0 IS. II 22.0 19.3 3 6.5 33.0 37.0 18.3 20.0 18.5 18.2 19.5 20.3 18.7 11.0 12.5 17.9 19.5 18.5 26.5 20.5 24.01 21.0 24.0 19.5| | 24.0 26.0 20.5 33.8 31.0 31.0] 17.0 23.0 15.0 15.0 30,0 20.5 35.0 19.0 21.0 29.5 16.5 2 7.0 23.5 2S.5 31.5 f December, 1915, "Crop Reporter." APPENDIX E. Table I. — Mineral products of Southern States compared with United States, 1913-1915. 1913 1914 1915 Southern States $505,363,082 $467,044,946 $490,600, United States $2, 439, 159,72S|$2,114,946,024|$2. 373, 280,000 Southern States, per cent of Unitedl States I -1 22 20 In the above totals pig iron is used as the basis of iron valuation. (United States Geological Survey.) S6 Table II. — Mineral products of Southern States and United States, 1914 and 1915. Product. 1914 1915 Southern States. United States. Southern States. United States. ,434 S5.464 L4.852 2,524 833 03 6 ii47 017 T.252, r,398, i5,633, )4,051. 9,592, L3.416, !5,530, 338 597 268 228 55d 185 229 SSI,, 4 9 3. \\ 152, 533,20 300,24 334.21 968,24 I !ement i $1^ Coal (bituminous) t- ■•• | 15; Coke % I U Copper | Iron : Ore % ■ Pig I Lead | IE Petroleum j 104 Phosphate rock I Zinc I i; All other minerals | 12 1 | Total | 467,044,946| 2,114,946,024| 490,600.000| 2,373,280,000 I I 71 298 39 214 9 ,3 3 790 905,07 777,42 997,93 125,21 608,04 028,63 598.07 512,796, L55.860, 15,737, 3.245, £308, 36,970, 20,529, 88,000, 5,400, 42,734. L25.064, 395 000 403 039 $75, 504, 10 5. 242 548 059 619 000 836 129 000 101, 401, 47, 172, 5, 113, 810, 155,102 500,000 503,868 900,000 288,984 409,604 660,000 000,000 413,449 617,500 624,000 j Exclusive of Pennsylvania anthracite. J Value not included in total value, as such inc'.usion would duplicate coal and pig iron values. Table III. — Mineral- products of Southern States by States, 1913 to 1915. 1913 1914 1915 Alabama Arkansas. Florida Georgia Kentucky Louisiana Maryland Mississippi Missouri North Carolina. Oklahoma South Caroana . Tennessee Texas Virginia West Virginia. . $34, c ;o,5 1 i 530,879,288, 529,500,000 6,7S0,76i 5,785,199| 6,580,000 L0, 508, 016 8, Ui;,68S| 4,863,0U0 6,525,792 5,695.o s4 5,354,000 20, 845,57 9 26,638,474 27,460,000 21,011,828 21,89 ',025 18,6 ..0,0 11. -'92, 723 10,587,531 HI, old, imp) 1,143,472 1,104,197| 6 62,0i 54,001,088 48,597,593| ; :../ ii. -ii 3,739,693 3,519,2451 3,458, 80,168,820 78,744,447 72.4m:, 1,464,150 1,414,294 1,010,00 i 21,008,938 19,615.213 22,1 , 31,666,910 30,363,426| 29,137. nil 17,178,580 16,400,347| 16,895,00 i 143,591,272 134,071,803 134,100, mi In the above States totals iron ore is used as the basis of iron valuation. (United States Geo.ogical Survey.) APPENDIX F. Manufacturers' Record, Baltimore, June 28, 1916. Hon. Joseph E. Ransdell, United States Senate, Washington, D. C. My Dear Senator Ransdell: As I understand you intend to make an address shortly touching on the agricultural development of the South, permit me to call your attention to a few facts that bear directly on the agricultural prosperity of this section and the general prosperity of the Nation. 87 Until the people of the whole country come to realize that the South is the Nation's greatest undeveloped asset they will never fully realize how its development will enrich the Nation and how everything that helps to advance the progress of the South safeguards the business interests as well as the actual life of the Nation. In this section, where iron ore and coal are in vast abundance, fur- nishing unsurpassed advantages for the production of iron and steel, and all of the products of iron and steel, which produces three-fourths of the sulphur of the world, and which has many other natural advantages un- equaled in this or in any other country, industrial development is limited as compared with that of other sections. There are many reasons for this, and one of them is that the Nation as a whole has concentrated its thought and energy, through Government circles and in other ways, upon the development of the North and the West to the exclusion of the South. Let me illustrate: Over 90 per cent of the steel made in the United States is made out of ores that are mined in the Lake Superior district, immediately contiguous to Canada, a region which could easily be overrun and captured at any moment by an enemy assailing us through Canada. But more than that, these ores to the extent of more than 50,000,000 tons a year pass through the Soo Canal, only about one and one-quarter miles long. I am reliably informed by some of the best engineers in the country that two or three sticks of dynamite could be exploded in such a way as to completely block this canal. Instantaneously, the entire iron and steel industry of the country to the extent of 90 per cent of our output would collapse. A few million tons of foreign ores are imported,- and, of course, all importa- tions of ore would be instantaneously shut off by war unless we had the complete command of the sea, and that is hardly possible any time in the near future. We are thus staking the business interests of the country and national life itself upon one ore supply, the capture of which or the blocking of the canal through which the ore passes, would make impossible the pro- duction of armor plate or of munitions of war. Along the Atlantic coast, say from Boston to Newport News, stretching back anywhere from 10 to 100 miles, but covering in the aggregate probably not over 2 per cent or 3 per cent of the Nation's area, is centered the entire munition-making business of the United States. All of this munition-making business would have to be instantaneously stopped if the Lake Superior ore sup- ply were cut off iby capture of the district or by the blocking of the Soo Canal. In such an event any effort to oppose invasion would be useless, and any army or naval officer familiar with the situation will confirm this statement. This mighty Nation — mighty in population and in wealth — would under such conditions be as helpless as an infant against a giant. The South is the only section of the country which can possibly provide a remedy for this situation. In the South and Southwest, back of the mountain ranges which would afford protection against invasion, there are vast stores of iron ore and coal and manganese, lead, and zinc, and all other materials needed for the making of war supplies, explosives in- cluded. The South has about three-fifths of the Nation's coast line; it produces all of the Nation's cotton and more than one-fourth of the Nation's grain; but neither the Government nor the great financial and metallurgical leaders of the country have given heed to the supreme necessity of utilizing this situation by the development of great iron and steel and munition-making interests in the South and Southwest, far away from the coast and from the Lakes, and not dependent upon Lake Superior or foreign ores. Until this is done all talk of preparedness is largely a visionary dream. I suggest, therefore, that you bring to the attention of the Senate and of the country this danger, which is so vital, and which can ibe removed in no other possible way than by the prompt development on a large scale of munition-making and kindred industries in the South and Southwest. To permit existing conditions in iron and steel and munition making to last any longer would be as criminal on the part of national legislation and on the part of our business men as would be the failure to enlarge our Navy and Army. The South supplies every possible material for the making of explo- sives, the building of ships, the construction of armor, and the creation of great steel industries, all far from the dangers which confront these interests along the Atlantic coast or on the Lakes, dependent as they are upon supplies which could be cut off without a moment's warning. I trust you will appeal to the patriotism of the Senate to study this situation and realize its danger before it is too late. Sincerely yours, RICHARD H. EDMONDS, Editor. APPENDIX G. Public road mileages and cash expenditures in the Southern States, 1904, Office of Public Roads and Rural Engineering. State. Total mileage. Improved mileage. Total cash road and bridge ex- penditures in 1904. Alabama Arkansas Florida Georgia Kentucky Louisiana Maryland Mississippi Missouri North Carolina. Oklahoma South Carolina. Tennessee Texas Virginia West Virginia. . Total. 50,089 36,445 17,374 57,203 57,137 24,897 16,773 38,698 108,133 49,763 43,554 41,830 48,989 121,409 51,812 26,178 790,284 1,720 236 886 1,634 9,486 34 1,570 149 2,733 1,259 1,878 4,285 2,128 1,600 255 29,85c $378,040 681,934 437,184 894,936 1,161,194 ::45,432 873,470 339,699 1,570,801 624,381 447,320 334,0S2 729,232 2,543,613 6S7,751 5S7.870 12,636,959 Per cent improved Cash expenditure per mile of road. . . . For the entire United States : Per cent improved Cash expenditure per mile of road. 3. 8 $16 7. 1 $28 89 Public road mileage and cash expenditures in the Southern States, 1914. (Data approximate.) OFFICE OF PUBLIC ROADS AND RURAL ENGINEERING. State. Total mileage. Surfaced mileage. Total cash road and bridge ex- penditures in 1914. Alabama Arkansas Florida Georgia Kentucky Louisiana Maryland Mississippi .... Missouri North Carolina. Oklahoma .... South Carolina. Tennessee .... Texas Virginia "West Virginia . . 57,895 47,485 17,607 95,926 63,510 24,962 16,459 44,072 120,000 50,958 107,736 47,787 45,913 128,971 53,366 32,024 6,295 5,095 3,246 12,657 12,063 1,000 2,482 1,800 8,000 6,223 500 4,513 5,554 9,790 3.56S 1,369 Total. 954,671 84,155 $3,125,925 2,447,368 3,450,000 2,500,000 1,718,000 4,461,506 6,997,458 2,850,000 8,277,253 3,925,000 3,375,000 1,000,000 2,500,000 8,750,000 3,915,446 2,388,000 61,6S0,956 Per cent improved Cash expenditures per mile of road. For the entire United States : Per cent improved Cash expenditure per mile. . 8.9 $64 10.9 $100 THE PARISHES OF LOUISIANA THE STATE OF LOUISIANA is divided into sixty-four parishes, or counties, the word "parishes" being strictly a localism and has exactly the same meaning as county. Of these sixty-four parishes, fifty-five are»reached by navigalble streams, which are open nearly all of the year, and furnish means of transportation 'by this cheapest of all methods. They also create great competition among the railroad lines, and thus it is that Louisiana enjoys unusually low freight rates. These parishes are naturally divided into certain classes, which classification is based on the character of soil found in different sections of the State. Starting with the north Louisiana parishes, we find the first great agri- cultural division known as the Good Uplands. These lands are from 300 to 500 feet above the level of the sea. The soil is gray or yellow sandy loam, and very fertile. It washes easily, however, unless cultivated by horizontal plowing or embankments. The subsoil is a deep, sandy clay, and retains fertilizers well. Under this classification we find the par- ishes of Caddo, DeSoto, Sabine, Bossier, Webster, iRed River, Claiborne, Bienville, Union, Jackson, Ouachita, Morehouse, and parts of Caldwell and East and West Feliciana. 90 The red lands are on high ridges, but are very tenacious, and are not easily washed. They are very fine cotton and corn lands, but are espe- cially adapted to small grain. The natural forest growth of these lands are oaks of different varieties, dogwood, beech, sassafras, gum, ash, maple and short-leaf pine. Most of f he parishes placed under this head are of heavy alluvial land bordering on the streams which intersect them. The alluvial region comprises the most fertile agricultural lands of the State. They are those parishes which border on the Mississippi River, the Red River, the Ouachita, and their tributaries, the Gulf Coast and lakes. This region occupies about IS',000 square miles, and its vast possibilities are inconceivable. ALL THE PARISHES were requested to write their own descriptions, but only a few responded, and hence a general outline of the loca- tions and characteristics of the others are all that can be presented. Below will be found the assessments for 1910, given in alphabetical order, followed by the populations as given by the United States Census of that year: TOTAL ASSESSMENT STATE OF LOUISIANA FOR THE YEAR 1910. Parishes — ■ Acadia $ 7,419,900 Ascension 4,150,613 Assumption 3,738,250 Avoyelles 4,641,320 Bienville 4,108,2S2 Bossier 3,406,449 Caddo 20,457,065 Calcasieu 29,907,880 Caldwell 1,820,340 Cameron 1,395,640 Catahoula 2,10S,045 Claiborne 2,530,460 Concordia 2,009,540 DeSoto 4,193,570 East Baton Rouge 8,921.161 East Carroll *• • 1,918,620 East Feliciana 2,4£9,908 Franklin ' 2,783,156 Grant 4,148,648 Iberia : 7,669,228 Iberville 4,442,192 Jackson 2,259,036 Jefferson 5,682,378 Lafayette 5,564,105 Lafourche ..' • 4 ' 966 ' 7 ' ° LaSalle 3 > 731 > 926 Lincoln 2 < 656 ' 601 Livingston 3 - 095 - 92 Madison 2 > 779 ^0 Morehouse , 3,944,560 Natchitoches 7,344,o70 Orleans 231,045,937 91 Parishes — Ouachita f 7,811,155 Plaquemines 2,555,235 Pointe Coupee 3,093,523 Rapides 10,695,730 Red River 1,510,491 Richland 2,914.325 Sabine 3,939,580 St. Bernard 3,661,121 St. Charles 2,980,676 St. Helena 1,381,265 St. James 4, £64,790 St. John 3,554,703 St. Landry 11,195,820 St. Martin 3,720,570 St. Mary 7,959,245 St. Tammany 5,985,950 Tangipahoa S, 558, 290 Tensas 2,0S7,590 Terrebonne 4,927,981 Union 2,704.275 Vermilion 4,873,970 Vernon 10,182,820 Washington •. 4,544,870 Webster 3,393,263 West Baton Rouge 2,251,861 West Carroll 1,935,900 West Feliciana 2,044,961 Winn 5,002,360 Grand total $527,773,950 POPULATION OF PARISHES. The population of the State of Louisiana is 1,656,388, as compared with 1,381,625 in 1900, and 1, 118,587 in 1890. The increase from 1900 to 1910, therefore, is 274,763, or 19.9 per cent, as compared with an increase for the preceding decade of 263,038, or 23.5 per cent. The distribution of the population of the State by parishes is shown by the following table: 1910 1900 1890 The State 1,656,388 1,381,625 1,118,587 Parishes — Acadia 31,847 2:1.483 13.231 Ascension 23.8S7 24.142 19,545 Assumption 24,12s 21,620 19,629 Avoyelles 34,102 2£,701 25.112 Bienville 21.776 17.5S8 14,108 Bossier 21,738 24.153 20,330 Caddo 58,200 44,499 31,555 Calcasieu 62,767 30,428 20,176 Caldwell 8,593 6,917 5,814 Cameron 4.2SS 3,952 2,828 92 1910 Catahoula 10,415 Claiborne '. 25,050 Concordia 14,278 DeSoto 27,689 East Baton Rouge 34.5S0 Bast Carroll 11,637 East Feliciana 20,055 Franklin 11,989 Grant 15,958 Iberia 31,262 Iberville 30, £54 Jackson 13,818 Jefferson 18,247 LaSalle 9,402 Lafayette 28,733 Lafourche 33,111 Lincoln 18,485 Livingston 10,627 Madison 10,676 Morehouse 18,786 Natchitoches 36,455 Orleans 339,075 Ouachita 25,830 Plaquemines 12,524 Pointe Coupee ..25,289 Rapides 44,545 Red River 11,402 Richland 15,769 Sabine 19,874 St. Bernard 5,277 St. Charles 11,207 St. Helena ■ 9,172 St. James 23,009 St. John the Baptist 14,338 St. Landry 66,661 St. Martin 23,070 St. Mary 39,368 St. Tammany 18,917 Tangipahoa 29,160 Tensas 17,060 Terrebonne :. 28,320 Union 20,451 Vermilion .' 26,390 Vernon 17,384 Washington 18,886' Webster 19,186 West Baton Rouge 12,636 West Carroll 6.24S' West Feliciana 13,449 Winn 18,357 1900 1890 16,351 12,002 23,029 23,312 13,559 14,871 25,063 19,860 31,153 25,922 11,373 12,362 20,443 17,903 8,890 6,900 12,902 8,270 29,015 20,997 27,006 21,848 9,119 7,453 15,321 13,221 22,825 15,966 28,882 22,095 15,898 14,753 8,100 5,769 12,322 14,135 16,634 16,786 33,216 25,836 87,104 242,039 20,947 17,9S5 13,039 12,541 2-5,777 19,613 39.57S 27,642 11,548 11,318 11,116 10,220 15,421 9,3£0 5,031 4,326 9,072 7,737 8,479 8,062 20,197 15,715 12,330 11,359 52,906 40,250 18,940 14,884 34,145 22,416 13,335 10,160 17,625 12,655 19,070 16,647 24,464 • 20,167 18,520 17,304 20,705 14,234 10,327 5,903 9,628 6,700 15,125 12,466 10,285 8,363 3,685 3,748 15,994 15,062 9,648 7,082 93 ESTIMATED POPULATION FOR 1916. Estimated Population July 1, 1916. Louisiana 1,829,130 Acadia 37,106 tAscension 23,887 Assumption 25,705 Avoyelles 36,869 Bienville 24,409 tBossier 21,738 Caddo 66,812 tCalcasieu 83,098 Caldwell 9,646 Cameron 4,500 flCatahoula 21.S97 Claiborne 26,320 Concordia 14,730 De Soto 29,340 East Baton Rouge 36,735 East Carroll 11,804 tEast Feliciana 20,055 Franklin 13,937 Grant 17,878 Iberia 32,673 Iberville 33,436 Jackson 16,772 Jefferson 20,086 tfLa Salle Lafayette 32,447 Lafourche 35,769 Lincoln 20,113 Livingston 12,215 tMadison 10,676 Morehouse 20,139 Natchitoches 38,492 Orleans 371,747 Ouachita 28,899 • tPlaquemines 12,524 tPointe Coupee 25,289 Rapides 47,669 tRed River 11,402 Richland 18,694 Sabine 22,675 St Bernard '. 5,433 St. Charles 12,549 St. Helena 9,608 St. James 24,776 St. John the Baptist 15,598 §St. Landry 75,309 St. Martin 25,665 St. Mary 42,652 St. Tammany 22,425 Tangipahoa 36,411 fTensas 17,060 Terrebonne 30,742 94 Estimated Population July 1, 1916. Union 21,664 Vermilion 29, £62 Vernon 21,819 Washing-ton 24,705 Webster 21,738 West Baton Rouge 14,114 West Carroll 7,860 tWest Feliciana 13,449 Winn 23,832 t Population April 15, 1910. Decrease since 1900; no estimate made. t Includes population of Allen, Beauregard and Jefferson Davis par- ishes, organized from parts of Calcasieu in 1913. Impossible to estimate. 11 LaSalle Parish organized from part of Catahoula Parish in 1910. Population included with that of Catahoula; no estimate made. § Includes population of Evangeline Parish, organized from part of St. Landry Parish in 1911; no estimate made. RICE IX A WAREHOUSE. ACADIA PARISH. Acadia Parish is situated in the southwestern part of the State, and contains 394,240 acres of land. The formation is prairie; soil fertile and productive. It is drained by Bayou Nezique to the west, and Queue de Tortue on the south, and through its central portions by Bayous Cannes and Plaquemines Brulee. Water is plentiful and good throughout the parish. Oil has been discovered in paying quantities. The Mamou field has furnished several gushers of considerable magnitude. The Southern Pacific Railroad and branches pass through the parish; Crowley, situated on this line, is the parish seat, and one of the most prosperous cities of the State. 95 Rice and sugar are the principal crop productions. The largest rice producing paristi in the State; corn, cotton, hay, oats, sweet and Irish potatoes, and~eowpeas are also produced. The fruits and nuts are the orange, grape, pear, prune, peach, fig, pomegranate and pecan. Timber is found along the bayous and coulees, suitable for building and fencing, embracing the varieties of oak, cypress, Cottonwood, elm, gum, ash, sugarwood, sycamore, persimmon and willow. The raising of live stock is a profitable industry, and sheep, cattle, horses and hogs thrive and increase remarkably well here; many of the farmers being largely interested in wool growing. Game is found, such as rice birds, partridges, plovers, becasine and jacksnipe, and papabot and doves. ALLEN PARISH. A southwestern parish • contains 478,510 acres. Principal agricultural products are rice, cotton, corn and sweet potatoes, etc. Stock is much improved. Dipping vats one of the greatest causes of improvement. Hogs, too, with cholera serum available, are becoming quite an industry. Lumber a great industry; fcur large sawmills at Oakdale. Schools in fine condition; four high schools; one has a commercial and' three domestic science departments; one an agricultural and one a manual training department— between 2,500 and 4,000 pupils, one school with 21 teachers has already enrolled 103. Buildings are nearly all new, three brick and modern. Both Catholic and protestant churches in the parish. One ward just voted $150,000.00 for a gravel road. The fruits are peaches, pears, a few apples and Satsuma oranges. There are corn, pig and poultry clubs. THE OLD HOME OF DUNCAN F. KEXNER. 96 ASCENSION PARISH. This parish, in the southeastern part of Louisiana, about forty miles northwest of New Orleans, with a population of about 28,000, is une- qually bisected by the Mississippi, that section east of the river being larger. Climatic and health conditions are excellent. Its level, incomparably fertile land, protected by a perfect levee system, is intersected by good roads. The railroads of the Yazoo & Mississippi Valley, the Louisiana Rail- way & Navigation Company and the Frisco lines over the same road, on the east bank — on the west the Texas & Pacific, with its two branches, together with the Mississippi and Amite Rivers, transport her products to the great markets. Two privately owned roads enable many farmers of the eastern section to ship cane to the factories of the railroad owners. The chief product is cane, converted by six factories into sugar, which averages 160 pounds to the ton. Rice is extensively grown, yielding about fourteen bags to the acre. The rental system obtains partly. Corn and hay are raised for home use. Cotton, once the principal crop of the New River and Brusle sec- tions, has, because of the boll weevil, given place to cane, corn and hogs. Stock does well, but is not extensively raised. The mild climate and variety of forage plants should promote a large dairy industry. Two crops of many vegetables may be grown the same year. Blackberries and figs abound. Trucking and canning will pay farmers and promoters when organized according to western methods. Loquat and Kumquat oranges, Japanese persimmons and quinces and certain varieties of peaches and pears thrive if tended. Poultry thrives, and the industry is capable of indefinite expansion. Shrimp abound and would justify canneries. One immense sawmill and six smaller ones convert into lumber the hardwoods, cypress, oak, ash and gum. Catfish, buffalo, sardines, trout, bream, bass, perch and sacalait swim in river and stream — deer, quail, plover, snipe, dove, papabotte and poule d'eau run in field and forest. Donaldsonville, fronting the Mississippi, is the parish seat. Her mer- cantile business is large. ASSUMPTION PARISH. This parish is situated in the southern part of the State, and con- tains 227,200 acres of land. The formation is composed of alluvial land and wooded swamp; soil rich and highly productive. It is drained by Bayous Lafourche, Grant and Vincent, and Grand River and Grand Lake. The Southern Pacific (main line) runs through its extreme southern sections, and has a 'branch line, running from Napoleonville, south, con- necting with the main line at Schriever Junction. The Texas and Pa- cific Railway also has a branch line, traversing the parish north and south, along the east bank of Bayou Lafourche, connecting with the main line at Donaldsonville. Napoleonville, cituated on Bayou Lafourche, is the parish seat. 97 98 Sugar is the chief crop, and rice, corn, hay, oats, sweet and Irish potatoes, peas, tobacco and the garden varieties are produced. The fruits and nuts are the orange, fig, pear, plum, peach, persimmon, pom- egranate and grape, pecans and English walnuts. The timber is chiefly cypress, oak, gum and persimmon, with some Cottonwood, willow and sycamore. Some live stock is raised, mostly cattle and hogs. There is such game as partridges, rice birds, plovers, snipe and becasine, coons, opossums, mink and squirrels; also, in sea- son, wild ducks, wild geese and woodcock. The bayous and lakes furnish varieties of fish, among them trout, black bass, and white perch. AVOYELLES PARISH. Avoyelles Parish is situated near the central part of the State, and contains 539,520 acres of land. The formation is of several varieties; alluvial land, prairie, bluff land and wooded swamp, the latter predominating. The soil is fertile and productive. It is drained by the Red, Saline and Atchafalaya Rivers, and Bayous Long, Xatchitoches, Avoyelles, Des Glaizes and Rouge. Water is plentiful and of good quality. The main line of the Texas and Pacific Railroad passes through its southwestern section, and has two branch lines traversing the parish east and west and a portion of the northern central part af the parish. The Louisiana Railway and Navigation Company's line crosses the par- ish from northeast to southwest. Marks ville is the parish seat. The products are chiefly cotton and corn; sugar cane, alfalfa, oats, hay, peas, sweet and Irish potatoes, sorghum and garden varieties are also produced. The fruits and nuts succeed well here, such as peaches, pears, pecans, apples, figs, plums, quinces, grapes, pomegranates, persimmons and the smaller kinds. M13aL I'm |Kf2/ j'JH? M\M TEXAS & PACIFIC BRIDGE ACROSS THE ATCHAFALAYA. 99 The live stock industry is profitable and cattle, sheep, hogs, horses and mules are raised in abundance. Game is plentiful, such as bear, deer, foxes, coons, opossums, squir- rels, rabbits and wild turkeys, partridges, rice birds, robins, snipe, woodcock, wild ducks, wild geese, pheasants and plovers. Fish of excel- lent quality and large quantities abound in the lakes and streams. The timber of this parish is very extensive, comprising oak, ash, cypress, gum, elm, Cottonwood, poplar, pine, locust beech, maple, hickory, holly, magnolia, walnut, hackberry, sycamore, persimmon and willow. BEAUREGARD PARISH. One of the new parishes, in southwestern Louisiana, with 732,000 acres. Corn is the principal agricultural product, but cotton and pota- toes are also produced. Stock raising, that was once upon the old range system, is giving away and high grades are developing much interest. Besides cattle, horses, mules, hogs and sheep are being raised. Lumber is still the greatest industry of the parish. Twelve large sawmills with an output of ifrom 50,000 to 300,000 feet per day are in operation. The experimental farm at Bon Ami is a great aid in the develop- ment of fruit culture. Figs and oranges do well. A farm demonstrator is doing good work, especially in corn and pig clubs, while a lady is developing the home clubs — poultry, canning, etc. There are two high schools with agricultural and domestic science departments, besides four other five-room schools that teach domestic science. Churches of different denominations throughout the parish. Great interest developing in good roads. A recent vote of 3 to 1 ma- jority has ordered a $500,000 bond issue for road purposes. BIENVILLE PARISH. This parish is situated in the northwestern part of the State and contains 547,840 acres of land. Its formation is good upland, red, sandy clays, the soil being fertile and productive. It is drained by Lake Bisteneau on the west, and by Bayous Black- lake, Saline, and the headwaters of the Dugdemona River in other sections. The Vicksburg, Shreveport and Pacific Railroad passes through the northern portion o.f the parish. The Louisiana and Northwestern Rail- road runs north and south, from Gibsland, on the Vicksburg, Shreveport and Pacific Railroad, connecting on the north with the Cctton Belt, and on the south with the Texas & Pacific and the Louisiana Railway and Navigation Company. Water is abundant and good. Many springs, creeks and branches. Arcadia, situated on the Vicksburg", Shreveport and Pacific Railroad, is the parish seat, and has a cotton compress, cotton oil mill, ice factory, electric light plant and other industries. The timber is oak, pine, ash, cypress, persimmon, gum, leech, elm, holly, hickory, sycamore, poplar and Cottonwood. ICO 101 A FARMER'S BUNGALOW IN NORTH LOUISIANA. Cotton is the chief crop product; corn, hay, oars, peas, sugar cane, sweet and Irish potatoes, sorghum and the garden vejeta : ies a i do well. A diversified farming section. The fruits and nuts are apples, pears, peaches, pecans, plun :s, quinces, grapes and figs. Cattle, hogs, sheep and horses are raised and thrive well. Game is found, such as deer, coons, opossums, foxes sq irrels rab- bits, mink, wild turkeys, wild ducks and geese, partridges, snipe, and woodcock. Fish cf gcod quality are found in the lakes ana streams, among them bar fish, trout, bass and perch. There are deposits of salt, fireclay, potters' clay, marl and green sand. BOSSIER PARISH. Bossier parish is located in the northwest corner of the State. Along Red River there is a belt of alluvial bottom lands, consisting of 120,000 acres; back from the river lie the rolling hill lands amounting to 385,000 acres. Good water is found at a depth of from 20 to 80 feet, and there are springs throughout the hills. This section of the country is equal for truck, fruit and other farm- ing to many of the more widely advertised parts of the South: such pasture grasses as Bermuda grass, Carpet grass, Japan clover, etc.. make live stock a profitable industry. The great attraction this section has for the northern farmer is the climate; it is practicable to farm eleven months in the year . freezing weather will not occur more than twenty or thirty days in the winter season, nor last more than a day or two at a time. Good material for the building of roadways, a disintegrated iron rock, is abundant, and some very satisfactory results have been attained. 102 A FARM HOUSE IN BOSSIER PARISH. fetpywfr" 7 ' 't !LJa ^ L ''i^^!^!T*^^^^- w* A BOSSIER PARISH EXHIBIT- 103 Schools consisting' of the usual primary and high school grades are conveniently located throughout the parish. Churches of all the different denominations are represented both in town and country. Agriculture is the main occupation of the people; cotton, corn and hay are the staple crops. Alfalfa grows luxuriantly in the bottom lands, and is a finer quality than that of the North or West, producing about four tons to the acre. Oats are a paying crop in this section, when planted in the fall affording a fine winter pasture, and are ready to harvest the last of May. The early production of truck for the northern markets has been found profitable. All fruits'and nuts of standard and semi-tropical type grow in abund- ance. CADDO PARISH. Caddo is located in the extreme northwest corner of the State. The parish has an area of 545,280 acres of land, which is characterized as upland and alluvial. Shreveport is a city of 30,000 souls. The city as a whole is supported by the surrounding fertile lands and the lumber industry, though the gas and oil business is a rapidly increasing feature of the city's com- mercial life. Comparison of the weather records of Shreveport, Fort Worth and Dallas will show that on unusually cold days it is from 5 to 10 degrees warmer in Shreveport, while during the hot weather the records here show a temperature 5 to 10 degrees cooler. Yet the Texas cities are practically on the same longitude as Shreveport and Caddo Parish. Caddo is equipped with one of the best school systems in the State. Shreveport's school system is unexcelled, while in the country districts the parish is being redistricted and graded schools installed. School vans are furnished by the parish board to haul the children to and from school. A movement is now on foot for better roads throughout the parish, while this will not only better the country schools but will enable the planters to bring their crops to market with much less expense. In addition to its agricultural wealth Caddo also has one of the greatest oil fields in the South, and the greatest gas field in the world. Gas wells making 50,000,000 cubic feet of the best of all heating and illuminating gas are a matter of every day occurrence in the Caddo field. These are the things which Caddo can claim with all truth: Shreve- port, one of the greatest cities of the State, whose death rate is the lowest in the entire nation. A city of excellent schools, of many churches, more paved streets than any other city of the same population in the United States. A city which is the home of the State Fair, a Charity Hospital (State institution), two orphan asylums, one Old Ladies' Home, five col- leges, all church institutions, and two business colleges. Caddo contains excellent cotton-producing soil, makes corn equal to any in the country, produces potatoes and other truck to an extent 104 unexcelled by any other section of the South. Lands are cheap and the new homeseeker will find Caddo one of the best places on earth to which he may bring his family and an ambition to build a new home and a fortune. CALCASIEU PARISH. Its .formation embraces prairie, pine hill, pine flat, coast marsh, and a little alluvial and wooded swamp land. It is drained by Bayous Xezpique and the Sabine, Mermentau, and Calcasieu River, with its many tributary streams. Water is plentiful and of good quality. The Southern Faciflc, the St. Louis, Watkins and G-ulf, and the Kansas City Southern Railroads traverse the parish. Lake Charles, situated on Lake Charles, is the parish seat. The crop productions are principally rice and sugar, corn, cotton, sweet and Irish potatoes, peas, hay and oats; garden crops are also raised. The fruits and nuts are the orange, grape, peach, pear, plum, pecan, guava, pomegranate, prune and fig. The timber is pine, oak, gum, elm, sugarwood, cottonwood, willow, locust and persimmon. The lumber interests, long-leaf yeUow pine, are extensive, and millions are here invested. Live stock raising is a prof- itable industry, and sheep, cattle, hogs and horses are extensively raised. Game is found, such as deer, foxes, coons, rabbits, squirrels, snipe, beca- sine, partridges, rice birds, plovers, robins, wild ducks and geese, wood- cock, pheasants and papabotte. Fishing is good in the streams and lakes; bass, trout and carp are .found. Inexhaustive deposits of sulphur are found, and gypsum exists in great quantities. Petroleum oil of a high grade has been found in pay- ing quantities. CALDWELL PARISH. This parish is situated in the north central part of the State, and contains 348,800 acres of land. Its formation is alluvial, pine hills and good uplands. Its physical outline or topographic features are very rugged and broken in the upland portions of the parish, but the soil is fertile and productive. It is drained by the Ouachita and Boeuf Rivers, and Bayous Castor, Lafourche and Marengo. The St. Louis, Iron Mountain and Southern Railway runs through the parish north and south. Columbia, situated on the Ouachita River, is the parish seat. Water is. plentiful and of good quality. The timber consists of pine, oak, ash, beech, hickory, cottonwood, gum, elm, poplar, magnolia, locust, holly, maple, walnut, persimmon and willow. The principal crop is cotton; corn, oats, hay, peas, sweet and Irish potatoes, sorghum, sugar cane, tobacco and garden products are raised. Live stock are raised, consisting of cattle, hogs and sheep, in large quantity. Game abounds, such as deer, foxes, coons, oppossums, squir- rels, rabbits, wild turkeys, partridges, wild ducks, geese and woodcocks. 105 106 Fish are plentiful in the streams and bayous, where bass, bar flsh and trout are found. There are deposits of chalk, kaolin, fire clay, potters' clay, iron and marl in the parish. CAMERON PARISH. This parish is situated in the southwestern corner of the State, and contains 99S.400 acres of land. The formation is largely coast marsh, with some prairie and alluvial land, the soil being extremely rich and highly productive. It is drained in part by the Mermentau, Calcasieu and Sabine Rivers. Lakes Sabine, Grand and Calcasieu lie in its con- fines. The Kansas City, Watkins & Gulf Railroad passes through the parish. Cameron, situated at the mouth of Calcasieu Pass, is the parish seat. Cistern water is chiefly used. The timber is cypress, oak and willow. The fruits are orange, lemon, olive, fig, grape, banana, guava, prune, plum and mandarin. The crop productions are rice and sugar, while garden truck succeeds well. Game, such as wild duck and geese, becasine, jack snipe, papabot and rice birds are abundant. Fishing is extensive and excellent; Sheeps- head, red fish, pompano, salt water trout, Spanish mackerel, carp, shrimp and crabs abound, and the oyster and diamond-back terrapin exist in extensive quantities. CATAHOULA PARISH. This parish is situated near the central part of the State, and con- tained 864,000 acres of land before LaSalle was taken off. The formation is pine hills, wooded swamp, alluvial land, good upland and bluff land; the alluvial lands being very rich and productive, and the good uplands and bluff lands being of a superior quality and very fertile. The parish is drained by the Ouachita, Tensas, Black and Little Rivers, Bayous Louis, Saline and Castor, and Gastons, Fords, Brushley, Hemp Hill and Funny Louis Creeks. The New Orleans and Northwestern Railroad passes through the eastern portion of the parish, and the St. Louis, Iron Mountain and Southern Railroad through its northwestern corner. Harrisonburg, situated on the Ouachita River, is the parish seat. The water supply throughout the parish is abundant, and generally of good quality. There are valuable mineral waters at the White Sulphur Springs, the Castor Springs, Gaston's Creek, Harrisonburg and other points, of very superior qualities. There are deposits of kaolin, bauxite, limestone, grindstone, Ouachita limestone, flintstone, potters' clay, lig- nite, marl, green sand and iron. The timber is very extensive and various, with pine in the lead; the other varieties being oak, cypress, ash, cottonwood, willow, maple, gum, elm, hickory, locust, mulberry, sassafras, maple, walnut, poplar, syca- more, holly, beech, magnolia and persimmon. The fruits and nuts are peaches, pears, pecans, apples, plums, grapes, figs and quinces. The wild mahaw grows, abundantly throughout the western portion of the parish, and this fruit has no superior, and, in fact, no equal, for jellying purposes, having a peculiar and delicate 107 flavor possessed by no other fruit. A factory for preserving this fruit (which is allowed to waste and rot), in the form of jellies, would be a very paying investment. The bluff lands of Sicily Island are of superior quality. The chief crop product is cotton, while corn, oats, hay, sweet and Irish potatoes, tobacco, sorghum and sugar cane yield abundantly. The live stock are hogs, sheep and horses; a large industry being devel- oped in raising hogs for shipment. Game is found, such as deer, bear, foxes, coons, oppossum, squirrels, rabbits, wild turkeys, wild ducks and geese, partridges, robins, rice birds and woodcock. Fish are plentiful in the creeks, bayous and lakes; among them are found trout, ^ iir igagj iSHI^H I: Oi si- .vj-- V . w .: :■ *-. aBju^ Wpi'ii'Pi : ' ' M %$!>» ^- '£teJM " - *9 A PLANTATION HOME. OUACHITA PARISH Ouachita is in the second tier of parishes from the Arkansas line. It has about 398,720 acres of land. One of the most beautiful rivers, flowing southward, some quarter of a mile wide, now navigable some nine months of the vear. divides the parish, bears the name, and amply justifies its Indian meaning — "Silver- Water." The Ouachita practically never overflows within the parish. 124 The east side is level and alluvial, with a formation of rich, sandy loams. containing heavy growths of hardwood timber of the finest quality and great variety. The west side, heavily timbered with pine, and also hard- woods, consists of "second bottoms," and so-called "hill lands," generally sandy loams, with heavy clay foundations, productive, and very fertile in the valleys along the numerous streams. Numerous artesian wells, with abundant limpid waters, How here as freely as do the multitudinous natural streams, great and small, that a>~e tributary to "the Ouachita." Ouachita's principal towns are Monroe, the second oldest town in the State, and West Monroe, practically one, only the river divides them, but separately incorporated. Together they constitute a growing, flour- ishing and progressive modern city. The other towns of 'the parish are comparatively small — 'Calhoun, some fifteen miles west, and the seat of the North Louisiana Experiment Station being the next largest. Large capital is invested in cotton seed oil mills. Numerous saw- mills, stave factories, shingle factories, etc., work the wonderful growths of timber — oak, pine, cypress, hickory, ash, gum, etc. The best of brick are made by most modern methods, and concrete is largely used, made from the best of gravels and sands, locally obtained. Four large, strong banks in Monroe and one in West Monroe are all prosperous and growing. Many churches of all the usual Protestant denominations abound, and there is a large iCatholic church and a large synagogue in Monroe. The school system in the parish is of the best. Practically all kinds of crops and live stock produced on the North American continent can be successfully grown or raised here. It is an excellent fruit country, and the very land of the pecan and other nut- A NATURAL WARM -WATER BATHING POOL AT MON- ROE. SALT WATER FROM A DEEP WELL AND LIGHTED BY GAS FROM SAME WELL. 125 bearing trees. The walnut grows wild — the hickory abundant. Figs of the finest never fail. Stock raising is of great and growing import- ance. Game and fish are plentiful. This is, pre-eminently, a land of agriculture, and its great partners, live stock and poultry, fruits, nuts and vines. It is a great grass and hay land, and more and more attention is being given to "meadows." Concrete culverts, constructed from the pure sand gravels of the local deposit, are replacing all small bridges, and even some quite large ones, along the roads. Louisiana leads all the States in variety of food products, being unique in her combination of sugar, molasses, rice and tropical fruits; aiso in the amount produced ,per acre of the world's clothing maker — cotton. Also in the combination of variety, quality and quantity of standing timber; also in extent of navigable waterways. She leads the world in deposits of natural gas,, oil, salt and sulphur. She feeds, clothes, houses, lights and fuels, salts and fumigates "the children of men." Of these things, "Ouachita" does her full quota. PLAQUEMINES PARISH. This parish is located in the southeastern part of the State, and is divided by the Mississippi River, which passes through it. The forma- tion is alluvial land and coast marsh; the soil being exceedingly rich and productive. It is drained by the Mississippi River and Bayous Cheniere, Wilkin- son, Long, Terre au Bouef, Vacherie, Dupont and Grand Bayou. The Grand Isle and Gulf Railroad passes down the western coast of the Mis- sissippi, and the Mississippi, Terre au Boeuf and Lake Road down the eastern coast. Pointe-a-laHache, situated on the Mississippi River, is the parish seat. Cistern water is mostly used. The chief crop productions are sugar and rice; corn and truck varieties are grown and shipped ex- tensively. Fruits are oranges, lemons, mandarins, olives, figs, bananas, guavas, grapes and prunes. The finest orange groves and lands in the State aro here. Timber is cypress, willow, elm, oak, and Cottonwood. Some cattle are raised, and a few hogs. Game is becasine, snipe, rice birds, wild ducks, geese and swan, pa- pabots, coon and opossums. Fishing is excellent, and crab, sheepshead, pompano, red fish, floun- der, salt water trout, Spanish mackerel, oysters, terrapin and shrimp abound. The oyster industry is quite extensive in this Darish. POINTE COUPEE PARISH. Pointe Coupee Parish is situated on the west bank of the Mississippi River, about 22 miles above Baton Rouge. It has an area of 368.000 acres, all of alluvial soil, exceedingly fertile. The parish is especially favored by nature, and it has numerous' bayous across and dividing the land into farms of handsome proportions, the bayous affording cheap, efficient and practical drainage. 126 CATTLE IN NORTH LOUISIANA. The public roads (3.25 miles in length) which traverse the parish are all in splendid condition, they having a natural drainage, thus keeping them in fine condition. False River, once a branch of the Mississippi, is now a beautiful lake, one mile wide by 24 miles long. As a fishing ground it is surpassed by no stream. It abounds with black bass, saca- lait or crappie, perch, catfish, spoonbill catfish, gaspergou, buffalo and numerous other species of the finny tribe. The lands of Pointe 'Coupee, exceedingly fertile, can produce all of the various crops possible in the Southern States, such as corn, cotton, cane, peanuts, peas, alfalfa, flax, Irish and sweet potatoes. Cabbage, truck, onions, etc., can 'be raised in abundance. Another very easy and handsomely paying crop is that of the pecan tree, which thrives splendidly in this parish. These trees can be found on every farm. The crop is seldom a failure and always finds a ready market. Several thousands of sacks are shipped annually to New Or- leans, St. Louis and Chicago markets. Wood is to be found in abund- ance, the varieties mainly consisting of cypress, oak, persimmon, ash, and gum. Pointe Coupee is belted with two parallel lines of the Texas and Pacific Railroad, and its western section by the Frisco system, and which has just completed an extension to Lakeland, in the southwestern portion of the parish. Taxation is reasonable and consistent with the needs of the develop- ment and management of the parish. There are several towns — New Roads, Morganza, Torras — and other are in course of establishment along the Frisco system. 127 New Roads, the parish seat, has two banks, and among its industries are several cotton gins, cotton oil mills, sugar mills, an ice plant, a brick- making plant, sawmills, and room for many more. Nearly all religious denominations are represented in the parish. Among the churches are Catholic, Episcopalian, Methodist, Baptist and Presbyterian, and all show the liberal and progressive spirit which ex- ists. In no section of the State is the cause of education more assid- uously fos-tered than in Pointe Coupee. In New Roads is located the famous Poydras Academy, endowed by the great philanthropist, Julien Poydras, and which is open to every child in the parish, the tuition being absolutely free. The higher academic branches are taught in this institution. It is under the supervision of a Board of Trustees, appointed annually by the Police Jury. Cattle raising can be made the source of a profitable income. Poultry of all kinds are raised in abundance and thrive to the fullest extent. Fresh eggs can be had every day of the year on any farm in the parish. RAPIDES PARISH. ' Rapides is the central parish of the State, and contains 975,440 acres of land. The formation is pine flats and alluvial land, with some bluff land and prairie. In the alluvial, bluff and prairie sections the soil is very fertile and productive, the chocolate formation being very rich. / * '-.£-■■ I '^IffBI > Clg A PLANTATION HOME OF THE PRESENT DAY. 128 It is drained by Red and Calcasieu Rivers, the Bayous Saline, Rapides, Boeuf, Falcon and Cocoderie. The Texas and Pacific, the Kansas City, Watkins and Gulf, the Lou- isiana Railway and Navigation Company, the Iron Mountain and the Southern Pacific Railroads pass through the parish, all centering at Alexandria, which is the parish seat. Cotton and sugar are the chief crop productions for export; corn, oats, hay, peas, sweet and Irish potatoes, rice, tobacco, and garden truck are produced. The fruits and nuts are peaches, pears, plums, pecans, figs, pomegranates, grapes, apples, and the smaller varieties. The wild mayhaw grows abundantly throughout the parish; this fruit has no superior for jellying purposes. The timber is pine, oak, cypress, cotton- wood, hickory, willow, locust, sycamore and gum; large areas of long- leaf pine. Cattle, sheep, hogs and horses are raised. Game is found, consisting of squirrels, rabbits, coons, opossums, foxes, deer, wild turkeys, wild ducks, snipe, woodcock, partridges and rice birds. Fishing is good in the streams. The hot wells at Boyce deserve particular mention. See analysis below: ANALYSIS EXPRESSED IN PARTS. Per 1,000,000. Condition Cloudy and heavy sediment in bottom Odor when heated to 100 Fahr None Odor when heated to boiling Brackish Reaction Alkaline Nitrogen as free ammonia 0.022 Nitrogen as albuminoid ammonia 0.060 Nitrogen as nitrites None Nitrogen as nitrates 2.100 Phosphates Trace Oxygen consuming power 5.000 Total hardness 60 - 00 Temporary hardness 27.50 Permanent hardness 32.50 GASES. Carbon dioxide (free) 3 - 50 Bicarbonates 32.20 Hydrogen sulphide ^ one Remarks. — The chemico-sanitary analysis shows this water to be of excellent Quality. Very respectfully, (Signed) DR. A. L. METZ, What has been done at Hot Springs, Arkansas, West Baden, Indiana, Mineral Wells, Texas, and Hot Springs, San Antonio, can and will be done at these wonderful hot wells at Boyce. Louisiana. 129 RED RIVER PARISH. This parish is situated in the northwestern part of the State, and contains 256,000 acres of land. The formation is good upland and alluvial land, the soil being rich and productive. It is drained by Red River the Grand and Blacklake Bayous. Water is plentiful and generally good. The Louisiana Railway and Navigation Company's line traverses the parish along 1 the east bank of Red River. Coushatta, situated on the Red River, is the parish seat. Cotton is the chief product; sugar cane and alfalfa, corn, oats, hay. peas, sweet and Irish potatoes, and the garden varieties all yield good returns. The fruits and nuts are peaches, pears, pecans, plums, apples, pomegranates, grapes, quinces and figs. The timber is oak, pine, cypress, gum, elm, beech, maple, holly, cottonwood, sycamore, poplar, hickory, willow and persimmon. The live stock raised are cattle, hogs and sheep. Game is abundant, such as squirrels, coons, opossums, rabbits, deer, wild turkeys, part- ridges, robins, wild ducks and woodcock. Fish are found in the streams, among which are the trout, bass, pike and bar lish. Great oil wells have been developed and the parish now boasts of an output of millions of barrels. RICHLAND PARISH. This parish is situated in the northeastern part of the State, and con- tains 369,920 acres of land. The formation is bluff land, alluvial land, and a little wooded swamp: soil fertile and productive. It is drained by Boeuf River and Bayous Macon, Lafourche and Big Creek. Water is abundant and generally good. The Vicksburg, Shreveport and Pacific, and the New Orleans and Northwestern Railroads pass through the parish. Rayville, situated on these lines of railroad, is the parish seat. Cotton is the chief crop produced for export; corn, oats, hay, sor- ghum, peas, sweet and Irish potatoes and garden varieties are grown. The fruits and nuts are peaches, apples, pears, pecans, plums, grapes, figs, pomegranate's and quinces. Live stock raised are mostly cattle and hogs. Game is found, con- sisting of deer, bear, coons, opossums, rabbits, squirrels, wild turkeys, wild ducks, partridges, rice birds, woodcock, and snipe. Fish of good quality are abundant in the streams and lakes. The timber is oak. gum. cynress. cottonwood. willow, hickory, poplar and persimmon. SABINE PARISH. Sabine Parish includes 1029 square miles of territory, lying in the middle of the western border of the State; undulating hammock, hill and valley lands, watered by six creeks which rise near its eastern bor- der on the divide between the Red and Sabine Rivers and flow swiftly in deep channels southwestwardly to the Sabine River, its western boundary. 130 Soils. — In the highlands the surface is usually red clay, containing sand; in the hammocks and bottoms a rich sandy loam. Some spots are deep sand. Almost the whole is susceptible of cultivation, and is free and productive. Ninety thousand acres are cleared for farming, of which 171 acres are devoted to truck farming. Climate and Water. — The climate is salubrious, owing to mild tem- peratures summer and winter, and the rarity of stagnant water. Good freestone water can be had generally by the sinking of wells. Industries. — Probably three-fourths of the inhabitants are engaged in agriculture; others in sawmill work, in stave making, or tie making. Farm Products. — Cotton, corn, sugar cane, sorghum, peanuts, peas and potatoes, both Irish and sweet, are the chief products. Cattle, hogs, sheep, horses and mules thrive and are cheaply raised on wild clover, Bermuda and other nutritious grasses on the open range. Figs, plums, dewberries and blackberries, beside garden vegetables usual to latitude 32, east of this, do well. Strawberries, grapes, peaches, pears and apri- cots are remunerative if given proper attention. Hickory nuts, walnuts, pecans and chinquepins grow spontaneously. Population. — 1'he population consist? of natives, settlers from other parts of the Union and from foreign countries. Of the last. Belgians predominate. Of natives, 10 per cent are of Spanish extraction. About, one-fifth of the whole are negroes. Schools. — The public schools, numbering 104, are in a flourishing con- dition. The average term is six months, and the average salary of white teachers is $60. For school purposes during the past year $60,000 has been expended. 131 ST. BERNARD PARISH. This parish is situated in the extreme southeastern part of the State, and contains 435,205 acres. The formation is coast marsh and alluvial land. It is drained by the Mississippi River, Lake Borgne, and Bayous Terre au Boeuf, Loutre and Biloxi, and also Lake Borgne Canal. The Mississippi, Terre au Boeuf and Lake Railroad, having a line extending to Shell Beach, on Lake Borgne, passes through the parish. St. Bernard, situated on the Mississippi River, is the parish seat. The parish adjoins Orleans. Sugar is the chief crop product; but rice, jute and the garden and truck varieties are extensively raised and shipped. Sea Island cotton also does well. The fruits and nuts are oranges, lemons, mandarins, figs, pecans, bananas, grapes, guavas, olives and prunes. Some few cattle and hogs are raised here. Game consists of becasine, snipe, rice birds, papabots, wild ducks, coons, opossums, squirrels, rabbits and deer. Fish of fine quality are plentiful; oysters, crabs and terrapin are also found. The timber is oak, cypress, willow, elm, pine and gum. The settlement of this parish commenced With the hardy pioneers who came with De Bienville when he removed the seat of government from Mobile to New Orleans. Plantations of indigo and later on sugar cane were introduced, and to two citizens of the parish, Mendes and Solis, must be given the credit of having first planted sugar cane in the State, and to another, Mr. Coiron, the distinction of first cultivating ribbon cane. Judge Gayarre says that Mr. Etienne de Bore borrowed from Mendes and Solis the cane from which he succeeded in making sugar of satisfactory quality. The parish has still another claim to fame: it was on her plains of Chalmette that the Battle of New Orleans was fought and won; it was in the then "Palace of Versailles," a beau- tiful home in all its glory of fine Italian marble, that General Packen- ham had his headquarters. It was under four oaks of St. Bernard, back of the Mercier place, that the English General, from his horse, directed the batle, and thence, desperately wounded, was taken back to the "Palace" (from whose floors trees now spring) and then on down to the Villere home, near which, under a pecan tree, the heart and entrails of the General were buried. The lower part of this old house still stands in fair preservation, one hundred and seventy- five years old. ST. CHARLES PARISH. St. Charles Parish, incorporated March 31, 1807, is in the southeastern part of Louisiana, and has an area of 251,520 acres. It is bounded on the north by Lake Pontchartrain and the Parish of St. John the Baptist, south by Lafourche Parish and Lake Salvador, east by Lake Salvador and Jefferson Parish, west by the Parishes of Lafourche and St. John the Baptist and Lake Des Allemands. The population is approximately 15,000, of which 9,000 are negroes and 500 Italians. The number of acres in cultivation and outlying is 28,000; about 23,000 in cultivation, and nearly 5,000 lying out and not in cultivation. The land consists of a rich alluvial soil, having much organic matter and being exceptionally fertile. The drainage takes place from natural causes, water running from the bluff on each side of the Mississippi 132 River to bayous and swamps in the rear. With the exception of these bluffs, the land is practically level, and the drainage is hastened by ditches. The Mississippi River runs through the parish. There are numerous small bayous, the most important being Bayou Des Allemands and Bayou La Branche. Lake Pontchartrain, Lake Salvador and Lake Des Alle- mands all border on the parish. There are six railroads running through the parish; The Texas and Pacific Railroad and the Morgan's Louisiana & Texas Railroad, on the west side of the river, and the Yazoo & Mississippi Valley Railroad, the Louisiana Railway & Navigation Company, the Frisco Lines and the Illinois Central Railroad on the east side of the river. The Yazoo and Mississippi Valley Railroad and the Texas & Pacific Railroad both run along the river. In the parish are nine sugar-houses, and there is a large sawmill at Taft, which saws cypress timber. The reclamation of swamp lands is beginning to be done on a large scale, and several thousand acres have already been reclaimed at La Branche a*nd at Paradis. The seining and shipping of fish at Des Allemands has grown into an important industry. The buffalo fish is caught and packed into bar- rels for shipment to northern packeries. Large quantities of minks, rac- coons and muskrats are caught yearly during the trapping season, and large quantities of game are killed. Sugar cane, rice, corn, all kinds of vegetables and some tropical fruits are produced. The principal crops are sugar and rice. Large quantities of corn are also produced. The raising of vegetables at St. Rose, where unusually large cabbages are produced and shipped to northern markets in refrigerator cars, is an important feature, and vegetables can be successfully raised during the entire year. Little attention is given to planting fruit trees, and cattle- raising is not given the attention it deserves. Farmers are beginning to raise hogs more abundantly. Cattle find good grazing nine months a year, and poultry raising can be carried on successfully throughout the year. Almost every kind of game is found in the woods, almost every species of fish in the river, lakes and bayous. The rainfall is abundant. The dirt roads are as good as any other roads of a similar character. ST. HELENA PARISH. This parish is situated in the southeastern part of the State, and con- tains 264.320 acres of land. The formation is pine hills, flats and bluff land; soil fertile and productive. It is drained by the Amite and Tick- faw Rivers and their branches. Water is abundant and of good quality. A logging steam tramroad connects Greensburg, the parish seat, with Lhe main line of the Illinois Central Railroad. Cotton is the chief crop production; corn, oats, hay, peas, sweet and Irish potatoes, sorghum, tobacco and sugar cane are raised. The fruits and nuts are pears, grapes, plums, pecans, apples, peaches, quinces and the smaller varieties. Live stock are cattle, sheep, hogs and horses. 133 The timber is pine, oak, beech, magnolia, holly, gum, hickory, poplar and persimmon. Long-leaf pine is extensive. Game is found, such as deer, coons, opossums, foxes, squirrels, rabbits, wild turkeys, wild ducks, partridges, woodcock and robins. Fish are found in the rivers and other streams, the Tickfaw being noted for its fine quality and quantity of trout. ST. JAMES PARISH. The parish is situated in the southeastern part of the State, and is divided by the Mississippi River. It contains 219,520 acres of land, the soil being very fertile and productive. The formation is alluvial land, wooded swamp, and a little coast marsh. It is drained by the Mississippi River, Bayou Des Acadians and several small bayous. Water is plentiful .and good. The Y. & M. V., L. R. & N., Frisco, and Texas and Pacific Railroads pass through the parish. Convent, situated on the east bank of the Mississippi River, is the parish seat. Sugar is the chief crop product; rice, corn, tobacco, hay, oats, 'beans and sweet and Irish potatoes are raised. The famous Perique tobacco is almost exclusively raised in this parish. Figs, oranges, lemons, mandarins, guavas, plums, peaches, pears, pecans, grapes and pomegranates are grown. Game consists of becasine, snipe, rice birds, squirrels, coons, opos- sums, rabbits, and some few deer and bear. Fish are found in the bayous and lagoons, of good quality, among them bass and pike. The timber is cypress, oak, gum, elm, willow and cottonwood. ST. JOHN THE BAPTIST PARISH. This parish is situated in the southeastern part of v the State, and is divided toy the Mississippi River. It contains 147,200 acres, and the for- mation is alluvial land, wooded swamp and coast marsh. The soil is rich and productive. It is drained by the Mississippi River and Lakes Pont- chartrain, Maurepas and Des Allemands. Water is abundant and fairly good. The Yazoo and Mississippi Valley, the Illinois Central, L. R. & N., Frisco and the Texas and Pacific Railroads extend through the parish. Edgard, situated on the west bank of the Mississippi River, is the parish seat. Sugar is the chief product; rice, oats, corn, hay, sweet and Irish potatoes and peas are produced. Oranges, figs, grapes, plums, pecans, guavas and pomegranates are grown. Some cattle and hogs are raised. Game consists of squirrels, coons, opossums, rabbits, wild ducks, beca- sine, snipe and rice birds. Some few deer and bear are found. Fish, of good quality, abound in the lakes and bayous. The timber is cypress, oak, gum, elm, cottonwood, and willow. ST. LANDRY PARISH. St. Landry is situated in the south-central part of the State and con- tains 562,500 acres of land. The formation is prairie, alluvial land, pine flats, wooded swamp, and bluff land. The soil is very fertile and pro- ductive. It is drained by the Atchafalaya River, and Bayous Rouge, 134 Courtableu, Teche, Boeuf, Cocodrie, and Nezique. Water is plentiful and of good quality. The Texas and Pacific Railroad passes through .the northeastern por- tion, and the branch road of the Southern Pacific, extending from Lafay- ette to Cheneyville, runs through the parish. Opelousas, situated on Bellevue Bayou, is the parish seat. - Cotton, rice and sugar are the chief crops produced for export; and corn, oats, hay. sweet and Irish potatoes, beans, sorghum, and the garden varieties and truck are extensively raised. The fruits are peaches, pears, plums, apples, grapes, quinces, figs, pomegranates, per- simmons and the smaller varieties. Live stock is extensively raised; sheep, cattle, horses and hugs all do remarkablj well here and are a very profitable investment. Game is found, consisting of squirrels, opossums, rabbits, beavers, deer, wild turkeys, wild ducks and geese, woodcocks, becasi partridges, pheas- ants, snipe and rice birds. Fish abound in the streams, such as ass, trout and pike. The timber embraces pine, oak, beech, magnolia, holly, gum, elm, persimmon, hickory, pecan, walnut, willow and sycamore. ST. MARTIN PARISH. This parish is situated in the southern part of the Stale, and con- tains 395,520 acres. The formation is wooded, swamp, prairie, ail J vial land, and a small area of bluff land; soil fertile and productive. It is SCENE ON A BAYOU. 135 drained by the Atchafalaya River, Bayou Teche, Tortue, La Rose. L'Em- barras and Catahoula Coulee. St. Martinville, situated on the Teche, is the parish seat, and is con- nected with the Southern Pacific Railroad at Cade Station. Sugar is the chief crop production; rice, corn, cats, hay, sweet and Irish potatoes, tobacco, cotton and the garden varieties are also grown. The fruits are oranges, lemons, mandarins, guavas, grapes, plums, prunes, pomegranates, peaches, pears, fi;s, apples, persimmons and quinces. Cattle, sheep, hogs and horses are raised. Game, such as partridges, rice birds, pheasants, wild turkeys, squirrels, rabbits, conns, opossums, deer and bear are fmind. Fish are plentiful in the bayous, lakes and lagoons. The Anse la Butte oil field lies just within the borders of this parish. Good results have already been obtained in this field, and much greater ones are expected when it is fully developed. The timber embraces cypress, oak, gum, elm, willow, cottonwood. sugarwood and sycamore. ST. MARY PARISH. This parish is situated in the southern part of the State, and con- tains 414,720 acres. Its formation is coast marsh, alluvial land, prairie, wooded swamp, and a small amount of bluff land. The soil is exceed- ingly rich and productive. It is drained by the Atchafalaya River, Grand Lake and Bayous Teche, Sale and Cypremont. The Southern Pacific Railroad extends through the parish. Franklin, situated on the Teche, is the parish seat. Water is plentiful and good. Sugar is the chief crop product; rice, corn, oats, hay, peas, sweet and Irish potatoes and garden varieties are extensively raised. The fruits and nuts are the orange, lemon, mandarin, fig, grape, persimmon, pome- granate, guava, plum, peach, pear, pecan, olive, banana and prune. Cattle, hogs and some horses are raised. Game consists of snipe, becasine, pheasants, rice birds, partridges, squirrels, rabbits, coons, opossums and deer. Fish are plentiful in the bayous, lakes, lagoons and inlets, and oysters, crabs and terrapin are taken in the brackish waters. The timber is cypress, oak, cottonwood, gum, elm and willow. ST. TAMMANY PARISH. This parish is situated in the southeastern part of the State, and con- tains 590.720 acres of land. The formation is pine hills, pine flats, allu- vial land and wooded swamp; soil, fertile and productive. It is drained by Pearl River, West Pearl, Chefuncta Cor Tchefuncta) River, and Bogue Chitto, Bogue Falia and other streams. The New I udeans and Northeastern Railroad, belonging to the Queen and Crescent system, passes through the parish. Covington, situated on the Bogue Falia, is the parish seat. It is con- nected with the New Orleans and Northeastern Railroad at West Pearl Station. Sugar, rice, cotton, corn, hay, oats, beans, sweet and Irish potatoes and truck garden varieties are extensively raised. So famous has this parish become as a health resort, that it is known everywhere now as the "Ozone Belt." Thousands of cases of lung com- 136 plaints have been successfully cured by this salubrious climate. Beau- tiful springs, whcse waters are recognized as of great medicinal value, abound through the parish. The most famous >of these is the Abita Spring, which has a capacity of 40,000 gallons daily. The fruits and nuts are peaches, plums, pears, pecans, apples, tigs, prunes, grapes, pomegranates, quinces and persimmons. Cattle, hogs, sheep and a few horses are raised. Game consists of squirrels, rabbits, coons, opossums, deer, wild turkeys, wild ducks, papa- bots, bacasine, snipe, partridges and rice birds. Fish are plentiful in the streams and lakes; fine trout, bass and pike are taken. The timber is pine, oak, cypress, gum, elm and hickorv. [.A-.. 4 '$jfc}&j^?£$Si$i i$$m ^C##l^^^ ^^^^^^ I * i£dtit '***>. ** ^Jmrtl V > y w& . r ~ mrnm 1 C 'V g^,-. "•.'.#^jW|L r v - ■*3 >>* * 5 • A CAULIFLOWER FIELD. TANGIPAHOA PARISH. This parish is situated in the southeastern part of the State, and con- tains 505,600 acres of land. The formation is pine hills, pine flats, wooded swamps, and a small amount of alluvial land. The soil is fertile and productive. It. is drained by the Tangipahoa, Ohefuncta. Natalbany and Ponchatoula Rivers, Ohappapeela Creek and numerous smaller streams. "Water is abundant and of good quality. The Illinois Central Railroad extends through the parish, north and ■south. Amite City, situated on this line of road and near the Tangi- pahoa River, is the parish seat. Hammond has become very popular as :a. winter resort. Cotton, corn, oats, nay, sugar cane, rice, tobacco, sorghum, sweet and Irish potatoes, peas and truck and garden varieties are grown. Along the line of the Illinois Central truck and strawberries are extensively -grown and shipped. Fruits are peaches, pears, apples, plums, grapes, 137 quinces, figs, pomegranates, persimmons and a variety of smaller kinds. Cattle, hogs, sheep and horses are raised. The timher is pine, oak, ash, gum, elm. hickory, poplar, cucumber, cottonwood. willow, beech and sycamore. Game is found, such as squirrels, coons, opossums, foxes, rabbits, deer, wild turkeys, wild ducks, woodcock, snipe, becasine, rice birds, part- ridges and robins. Fish of excellent aualitv are taken from the streams; trout, bass, pike and blue cat are found. TENSAS PARISH. This parish is situated in the northeastern part of the State, and con- tains 410.240 acres of land. The formation is alluvial lands and wooded swarm); soil very rich and productive. It is drained by the Mississippi and Tensas Rivers, and Bayous Vidal, Durossett, Choctaw and Clark's. Water is plentiful and good. St. Joseph, situated on the Mississippi River, is the parish seat. The new Gould line traverses the parish from north to south, furnish- ing direct communication with New Orleans and St. Louis. Cotton is the chief crop product for export; corn, hay, oats, sweet and Irish potatoes, peas and garden varieties are grown. The fruits are peaches, plums, pears and apples. Cattle, ho.srs and some sheep and horses are raised. The timber is oak, gum, cypress, cottonwood, pecan, persimmon, mag- nolia, elm, sycamore and willow. Game is found, such as squirrels, rabbits, deer, bear, wild turkeys, wild ducks and geese, woodcock, snipe, partridges, plover, rice birds and robins. Pish, in quantity, are taken from the lakes and bayous; bass, trout, white perch and pike are found. TERREBONNE PARISH. This parish is situated in the southern part of the State, and contains 1,265,280 acres. The formation is largely composed of coast marsh with a considerable area of alluvial lands and wooded swamp. The soil is exceedingly rich and productive. It is drained partially by Black, De Large, Grand and Petit Caillou Bayous, and Blue and Blue Hammock Bayous. Houma, situated on Bayou Terrebonne, is the parish seat. It is con- nected with the Southern Pacific Railroad at Schriever Station. Sugar and rice are the chief crop productions; jute, peas, hay and Irish pota- toes are grown. The fruits are oranges, lemons, mandarins, olives, ba- nanas, prunes, figs, pomegranates, guavas and plums. The timber is oak, cypress, gum, elm and willow. Some cattle and hogs are raised. Game is found, such as wild ducks and geese, papabots, jack snipe, becasine, pheasants, rice birds, squir- rels, deer and bear. Fish of fine quality are found; sheepshead, pom- pano, salt water trout, Spanish mackerel, pike and crabs. Oyster and shrimp canning is quite an important industry. 138 UNION PARISH. This parish is situated in the northern part of the State, and con- tains 582,700 acres of lands. The formation is good upland, red, sandy clay, and some alluvial lands. The soil is very fertile and productive. It is drained by the Ouachita River, Bayou D'Arbonne, and affluents of these streams. The Arkansas Southern and the Little Rock and Monroe Railroads run through the parish, north and south. The Farmerville and Southern Railroad runs from the main line of the Little Rock and Monroe to Farmerville, which is the parish seat. Water is abundant and of good quality, good springs and wells, and numerous branches and creeks. Cotton is the chief crop product, and corn, oats, hay, wheat, sor- ghum, peas, sweet and Irish potatoes, tobacco and sugar cane are raised. Diversified farming is practiced. The fruits are peaches, apples, pears, plums, grapes, pomegranates, figs and quinces. Excellent fruit is raised. The timber is pine, oak, beech, hickory, maple, walnut, holly, gum, elm and poplar. Live stock raised on the farms comprise cattle, sheep, hogs and horses. Game consists of squirrels, rabbits, coons, opossums, foxes, deer, wild turkeys, wild ducks, woodcock and partridges. Trout, bar fish and speckled and blue cat are found among the fish in the streams. VERMILION PARISH. Vermilion Parish is situated in the southwestern part of the State, and contains 800,000 acres of land. The formation is coast marsh, prai- rie, alluvial and bluff lands; soil rich and productive. It is drained by the Vermilion River and Bayous Queue de Tortue and Fresh Water. Abbeville, situated on the Vermilion River, is the parish seat. A branch of the Southern Pacific Railroad runs through the parish. Rice is the chief crop product; sugar, corn, oats, hay, peas, sweet and Irish potatoes, and truck varieties are raised. The fruits and nuts are oranges, lemons, mandarins, plums, pecans, guavas, figs, peaches, prunes, pomegranates and grapes. The timber varieties are oak, gum, elm, cypress, cotton wood a,nd willow. Live stock raised are cattle, hogs, sheep and horses. Game consists of rice birds, pheasants, becasine, snipe, partridges, papabots and wild ducks and deer. Fish are taken from the streams and inlets, and crabs, oysters, diamond-back terrapins and salt water varieties of fish are found. VERNON PARISH. • This parish is situated in the western part of the State, and contains 986,600 acres of land. The formation is chiefly pine hills, with a little prairie and alluvial lands. The Kansas City Southern Railroad runs from north to south through this parish. It is drained by the Sabine and Calcasieu Rivers and Bayous, Comrade, Castor, Anacoco, and numerous small streams. Water is abundant and of good quality. The soil is fairly' productive. 139 Leesville, on the Kansas City Southern Railroad, is the parish seat. Cotton is the chief crop product, and corn, hay, oats, peas, sweet and Irish potatoes, and sorghum are grown. The fruits and nuts are- peaches, pears, pecans, apples, figs, pome- granates, plums and grapes. Live stock comprises cattle, sheep, hogs and horses. Game consists of deer, squirrels, coons, opossums, rabbits, beaver, wild turkeys, wild ducks, partridges, woodcock, pheasant, beca- sine, snipe, plover and rice birds. There are fine varieties of fish found in the streams, among them trout, pike, bar fish and bass. The timber is pine, oak, elm, gum, willow, hickory and cottonwood. Extensive areas of long-leaf pine exist. WASHINGTON PARISH. This parish is situated in the northeast corner of the southeast por- tion of the State, and contains 427,520 acres of land. The formation is pine hills and flats, with a little alluvial land along its eastern border. The soil is fairly good. It is drained by Pearl River, Bogue Chitto and Chefuncta Creek. Water is abundant and good. The Kentwood and Eastern Railway runs through the northern part of the parish. Franklinton, situated on the Bogue Chitto, is the parish seat. Cotton is the chief product; hay, oats, corn, sweet and Irish potatoes, tobacco, sorghum, peas and the truck varieties are grown. The fruits are peaches, pears, plums, apples, figs, quinces, pomegranates and grapes. Live stock are cattle, horses, hogs and sheep. Game is found, such as deer, foxes, coons, opossums, squirrels, rabbits, beaver, wild turkeys, wild ducks, partridges, woodcock and rice birds. Fish abound in the creeks, and among the varieties are trout, bar fish, bass and pike. The timber is pine, long-leaf, beech, holly, poplar, gum, elm, mag- nolia, oak and maple. In this parish is the great little city of Bogalusa, which boasts of the largest sawmill in the United States, its capacity being one million feet per day. WEBSTER PARISH. This parish is situated in the northwestern part of the State, and contains 393,600 acres of land. The formation is good uplands and some alluvial lands. The soil is very good and fertile. It is drained by I>or- chite, Crows and Black Lake Bayous and Lake Bisteneau. Minden is the parish seat. The water is plentiful and good; springs, wells and small streams abound. The Vicksburg, Shreveport and Pacific Railroad extends east and West, and the Louisiana and Arkansas Railroad north and south through the parish. Cotton is the chief crop product, and corn, hay, oats, peas, sorghum, sugar cane, sweet and Irish potatoes and tobacco are grown. The fruits are peaches, pears, apples, plums, figs, grapes, pomegran- ates and quinces. Salt deposits exist, and beds of potters' clay, fire clay, lignite and marl are found. Timber is pine, oak, gum, hickory, beech, holly, elm, poplar, walnut and maple. 140 Live stock raised are cattle, hogs, sheep, and a few horses. Game consists of squirrels, deer, foxes, rabbits, coons, opossums, wild tur- keys, wild ducks, woodcock, robins and partridges. Fish of good aualitv are found in the streams. WEST BATON ROUGE. This parish is situated in the south-central part of the State, and lies west of the Mississippi River. In area it is the smallest parish, ex- cept Orleans, in the State, and contains 134,400 acres of land. The for- mation is alluvial land and wooded swamp, very fertile and productive. The Mississippi River drains the eastern borders, and Bayous Grosse Tete, Poydras and Stumpy the other sections. Drinking water is good. The Texas and Pacific Railroad passes through the southern part of the parish, and has a branch road leading from Baton Rouge Junction to Ferriday. This branch line will form part of the main line of the new Gould line, St. Louis to New Orleans. Also the Frisco and Southern Pacific branch to Lafayette pass through the parish. Port Allen, situated on the west bank of the Mississippi River, is the parish seat. The timber consists of oak, cypress, pecan, persimmon, gum, poplar, Cottonwood, haekberry and willow. The general crop of the parish is sugar; rice, corn, hay, oats, sweet and Irish potatoes, peas, cotton and the garden varieties are produced. Fruits are pears, peaches, plums, apples, figs and grapes. Some live stock are raised, such as cattle, hogs, sheep and horses. Game and fish abound; deer, bear, squirrels, coons, opossums, wild turkeys, wild geese and ducks, becasine, jack snipe, partridges, rice birds and robins are found. WEST CARROLL PARISH. This parish is situated in the northeastern part of the State, and contains 243,200 acres of land. It is of bluff formation chiefly, with some wooded swamp and alluvial land, the soil of •which is rich and pro- ductive. It is drained by Bayou Macon on the eastern and Boeuf River on its western borders. Floyd, situated on Bayou Macon, is the parish seat. Water is abundant and of good quality. Gotton is the chief crop product, and corn, hay, oats, sugar cane, sweet and Irish potatoes, sorghum, peas and the garden varieties are raised. The timber varieties are oak, cypress, ash, beech, elm, gum, cotton- wood, pecan, locust, hickory, magnolia, holly, mulberry and persimmon. Live stock, such as cattle, sheep, hogs and horses, are raised. Game a,bounds. among which are deer, bear, squirrels, rabbits, coons, opossums, foxes, wild turkeys, wild ducks and geese, robins and wood- cock. Fishins: is good in the streams, and bass, bar fish, white perch and trout are found. WEST FELICIANA PARISH. This parish is situated in the southeastern part of the State, and contains 246.400 acres of land. The formation is bluff and alluvial land, with some wooded swamp. It is drained bv the Mississippi River, Bayous Tunica and Sara, and Thompson's Creek. A branch line of the Mississippi Valley Railroad, from Slaughter Station to Woodville, Miss., 141 extends through the parish. The Louisiana Railway and Navigation .Company traverses the parish. St. Francisville, situated on the Mississippi River, is the parish seat. The water throughout the parish is abundant and of good quality. The chief crop product is cotton; corn, hay, oats, peas, sweet and Irish potatoes, sorghum, sugar cane and tobacco are raised. The timber is cypress, cottonwood, willow, oak, pine, beech, gum, elm, magnolia, holly, hackberry, hickory, poplar, sycamore, walnut and persimmon. The fruits and nuts are peaches, pears, pecans, apples, prunes, pomegranates, figs, quinces and grapes. Live stock thrives remarkably well, and this par- ish has long been noted for its superior breeds of blooded cattle. Hogs, sheep and horses do well here. Game abounds, such as deer, coons, opossums, .foxes, rabbits, squirrels, beavers, wild turkeys, wild ducks and geese, partridges, snipe, rice birds and woodcock. Excellent varie- ties of fish are taken from the lakes, bayous and creeks, among which are trout, bass, white perch and bar fish. The Tunica hills are most suitable for grape culture and horticul- ture, the soil being a rich marl loam. WINN PARISH. Winn Parish is situated near the central part of the State, and con- tains 610,560 acres of land. The formation is pine hills, with a small amount of good uplands. The soil is fair, and the creek bottoms very good. It is drained by the Dugdemona River, Saline Bayou, Flat Creek, Bayou Jatt and other streams. The water is abundant and good. The Louisiana Railway and Navigation Company and the Arkansas Southern Railroads run through the parish. Winnfield, situated near the center, is the parish seat. Cotton is the chief product; corn, hay, oats, peas, sweet and Irish potatoes, sorghum, sugar cane and tobacco are grown. The fruits and nuts are peaches, pears, plums, apples, figs, pecans, English walnuts, quinces, grapes and pomegranates. The timber comprises pine, oak, elm, hickory and gum. There are extensive aeras of long-leaf pine. Live stock are cattle, sheep and hogs. Game consists of deer, coons, opossums, foxes, squirrels, rab- bits, wild turkeys, robins, woodcock and partridges. Fish of good va- rieties are found in the streams. There are deposits of salt, marble, lignite, kaolin, gypsum, limestone, iron, fire clay and potters' clay. ]42 THE END OF TWO CENTURIES. 'Possum fat and 'taters sweet. 143 FORCES AT WORK IN BEHALF OF THE FARMER BOARD OF AGRICULTURE AND IMMIGRATION. THE DEPARTMENT endeavors to get as close to the farmers as possible. Periodically, crop reports, setting forth the prospects, conditions and variety of crops in Louisiana, accompanied with one or more papers relating to some particular question of importance in agri- culture hy some distinguished agriculturist, are distributed free to the farmers of the State. As a Bureau of Information, the Department in- vites, receives and answers thousands of letters annually, seeking agri- cultural information. It issues, from time to time, other agricultural literature for distribution, including the Market Report Bulletins every week. THE LOUISIANA STATE UNIVERSITY AND AGRICULTURAL AND MECHANICAL COLLEGE is doing a grand work in the education of young men of the State in Agriculture and its underlying sciences. Special courses are provided in Agriculture, the Mechanics, Chemistry, and the culture of sugar cane, Veterinary Science, Entomology, Horticulture, Geology and Biology, which fully equip many young men to engage in agricultural pursuits, where they become teachers and leaders in their respective communities throughout the State. The foundation is here being laid for an advanced and modern system of agriculture, which a great agricultural State like Louisiana stands in need of. AGRICULTURAL EXPERIMENT STATIONS. The Agricultural Experiment Stations of the Louisiana State Uni- versity, created by an Act of Congress, known as the "Hatch Bill," passed in 1887, appropriates $15,000 annually for the establishment of Experiment Stations in connection with the State Agricultural Colleges. The Legislature of Louisiana appropriates annually a like amount for the maintenance of these Stations. The Board of Supervisors of the State University divided these funds equally between three Stations. One is located on the College grounds at Baton Rouge, Louisiana, known as the "State Experiment Station," and deals with general agriculture upon the bluff lands of the State. One is located at Audubon Park, New Orleans, Louisiana, known as "The Sugar Experiment Station." and deals especially with sugar cane and its manufacture and, incidentally, with oranges and semi-tropical crops. It is located upon alluvial lands. One located in north Louisiana, at Calhoun, known as "The North Lou- isiana Experiment Station," in the Parish of Ouachita, on the line of the Vicksburg, Shreveport and Pacific Railroad, deals with general diversified agriculture, dairying, live stock and poultry. It is situated on the oak, hickory, and short-leaf pine lands of the State, geologically known as "good uplands." Thus, it is seen, Louisiana has three Expe- riment Stations, located upon the different types of soils, each studying and solving the problems that concern education of the farmers of the State, and one at Crowley, which deals with the rice industry of the State. 144 PARISH AGRICULTURAL FAIRS. are being: organized and conducted in a great many of the parishes of Louisiana, the Department of Agriculture taking a leading part in this work. Quite a number of these fairs have already bee'n organized, and a great many more are planned for organizing during the fall of 1911. The Farmers' Institutes, Agricultural Clubs and Parish Fairs form a trinity of educational forces at work in the several parishes of the State that cannot be equaled. FERTILIZER AND FEED STUFF LAWS. The Department of Agriculture has the enforcement and control of the Fertilizer, Feed Stuff and Paris Green Laws, which secure to the farmer unadulterated fertilizers, cotton seed meal, feed stuff and Paris green, and protects him against fraud in their purchase. This is a most important work in behalf of agriculture. THE MOVING PICTURE IN EXTENSION AND EDUCATIONAL WORK. The most popular of all pleasures, the moving picture, has been brought forth as a great motive power in disseminating agricultural work and knowledge by Professor E. S. Richardson. By using an automobile equipped with a small dynamo for produc- ing current for lights, the Junior Extension Division of the Louisiana State University has been able to show educational moving pictures and lantern slides to more than 50,000 people during the past twenty- two months. During this time the Junior Extension staff have traveled 14,000 miles and visited 33 parishes. The remotest country districts were included in the itineraries. The pictures were shown usually at the schoolhouses and the programs attended by boys and girls belonging to the agricultural schools, by their parents, and farmers generally. Thousands of rural people, most of whom had never before seen moving pictures, have been entertained and instructed by this means. This machine is the only one of its kind in successful operation, and it is believed to have great possibilities in extension and educational work. The auto-stereoDticon and moving picture machine, as it has been termed, is the invention of Prof. E. S. Richardson, who is in charge of the boys' and girls' club work of Louisiana. For the past two months it has been operated by the Junior Extension Department of the State University, cooperating with the State Department of Agriculture. The State Department has furnished the services of an expert chauffeur. This cooperation has added much to the efficiency of the work of the picture machine. Parish school superintendents and other rural school workers are very enthusiastic over the results of the visits that have been made to their parishes with this educational moving picture machine. In every instance there has been an increased interest in agricultural club and extension work. The parents, as well as the boys and girls, have been awakened to its practical value. All the parishes in which these educa- tional pictures have been shown have requested return visits, and at 145 the present time Professor Richardson has more requests for return engagements than he can comply with. The following letter from Superintendent F. M. Hamilton of Calca- sieu Parish is one of many received by President Thos. D. Boyd of the Louisiana State University in commendation of the work of the auto- stereopticon and moving picture machine: "Mr. E. S. Richardson and his assistants, Mr. Balis and Mr. Guilbeau, have just completed a tour of Calcasieu Parish with the moving picture outfit. I wish to express to you and your department our appreciation for this work. I attended all the meetings held in this parish with one exception. At practically all points we had more people than antici- pated, and a conservative estimate of the total number attending is twenty-three hundred. At no place did the machine fail to work, and at practically all places leading people of the community express them- selves as highly gratified with the pictures and lectures. In my opin- ion, this work marks a new era in the extension movement." Harry D. Wilson, State Commissioner of Agriculture, was highly im- pressed from the beginning with this machine, and believes it to be one of the most effective methods of reaching the rural Deople with edu- cational and agricultural propaganda. A GOOD ROAD BETWEEN ASCENSION AND ASSUMPTION 146 147 GOOD ROADS THE LEGISLATURE, at its session of 1910. enacted laws on this subject that can and will redound in great benefit to the entire people. In substance, they are as follows: The State employs a High- way Engineer, who will supervise the construction of all roads, the ex- penses for building the roads to be borne one-half by the State and one- half by the parish or town. The roads shall be built as far as practica- ble in the order of the date of receipt of the applications from Pres- idents of the Police Juries of the respective parishes. In order to further carry out the provisions of the act and provide sufficient labor to con- struct and maintain the public roads as provided for. the convicts of the State may be worked as authorized by the Constitution. The labor furnished by the convicts shall be secured by the State Highway En- gineer making application to the Board of Control of the State Peni- tentiary, who shall furnish such convicts in case they are available, and free of charge; provided, however, that the cost of maintenance and operation shall be borne by the parish, municipality or road district having the work perforem.d The Board of Control of the State Peni- tentiary shall at all times retain control and supervision over said con- victs EDUCATION MANY YEARS AGO the peoDle of Louisiana, realizing the vast im- portance of education, determined to aim high in this grand work, and. step by step, as the years rolled 'round, the onward and upward march has continued. The Legislators have always shown a liberality in appropriations commensurate with a great State's great cause. The Police Juries and City or Town Councils have kept an even pace with the State, and a combination of all the various elements is a motive power so potent that no fears are now apprehended as to Louisiana's place among her sister States. I.— SCHOOL SYSTEMS. (1) A State system of public schools supported partly by State tax- ation, partly by police jury, and other local appropriations, and super- vised by a State Superintendent of Public Instruction, a State Board of Education, and Parish School Boards. (2) The city school systems separate in organization and supervision from the State system, but partially supported by the prorated school revenues of the State. II.— HIGHER EDUCATION. (1) High schools officially recognized by the State Board of Educa- tions as pursuing an approved curriculum. (2) The State University and Agricultural & Machanical College. (3) Tulane University of Louisiana, which, although exacting tui- tion fees, may be considered a semi-public institution, owing to its scholarship system, and the fact that the State contributes indirectly largely to its support by exempting its investments from taxation. 148 III.— PROFESSIONAL EDUCATIONAL TRAINING (1) The State Normal School at Natchitoches. (2) The New Orleans Normal School. Both of these institutions are preparing- for the public school service of the State a corps of fully equipped and professionally trained teachers. (3) State Teachers' Institutes and Summer Normal Schools. These give the opportunity of one month's training and professional study to teachers who are unable to take the more extended courses of the State Normal School, and are supported largely by annual appropriations from the Peabody fund. (4) Parish Teachers' Institutes of one week's duration required by law to be held under the auspices of parish superintendents of education. (5) Educational Associations, such as the annual convention of par- ish superintendents of education; the annual meeting of the State Teachers' Association; the monthly meetings of parish and city teach- ers' associations, all of which exert an influence in the direction of pro- fessionalizing the business of education. IV.— INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION. (1) The State Industrial Institute at Ruston, giving, free of charge, admirable instruction in English, science, mechanics, trades, occupations and industries to both sexes. (2) The Southwestern Industrial Institute, at Lafayette, is an insti- tution doing good work along the same lines. V.— PRIVATE AND SECTARIAN SCHOOLS. There are many of these for both sexes distributed through the State. VI.— EDUCATION OF THE COLORED. (1) Public schools in every town, city and parish. (2) Southern University for the higher and industrial training of negro youth. Much of what the State might do for negro education Is rendered unnecessary, owing to the large number of prosperous special institutions in our midst that are supported by endowment. INDUSTRIAL. The Southern Industrial University, located at Baton Rouge, under the management of Professor J. S. Clark, is doing splendid work. The president's courtesy under all circumstances has won for him and his in- stitution universal esteem and kindly consideration. Besides the good work of this university, there are several colored farm demonstrators, who seem to be greatly aiding their people along agricultural and in- dustrial lines. HO FIELD OF CORN IN CADDO PARISH III BLACK GUM OR SATIN WALNUT 150 PRIVATE AND SECTARIAN SCHOOLS BESIDES the various school systems enumerated, the different de- nominations of the State have splendid schools and colleges. The Methodists have a male college, "Centenary," at Shreveport, and a female college at Mansfield. The Baptists have a male college at Mt. Lebanon and a female college at Keatchie. The Catholics have a university and several colleges in New Orleans, Jefferson College at Convent, and St. Charles ollege at Grand Coteau. They have numerous convents in New Orleans and convents in other cities and towns of the State. The Silliman Female College at Clinton has long been a famous girls' school. Private schools are successfully conducted in New Orleans, Shreveport, Baton Rouge and other cities and towns of the State. TWO SPLENDID ADJUNCTS TO LOUISIANA'S EDUCATIONAL FORCES ATTENTION is called to Memorial Hall and the State Museum. The stranger, as he strolls up Camp street, New Orleans, is at- tracted by a peculiarly shaped building, whose inviting appearance bids him enter. He soon discovers that he is in the midst of historical re- minders that tell him of the glories of Louisiana, that point out a chiv- alry so transcendantly brilliant that it has left a glow that sheds a brightness over the State's entire after-life, impressing upon the younger generations the sublime principles of virtue and manhood, a combination which practically is the bulwark of every country's safety and happiness. From these relics or reminders of a superb inheritance housed by the generosity of a progressive citizen of New Orleans and cared for by State appropriations, he can cross Canal street, stroll among the quaint but interesting reminders of the French and Spanish domination and enter the historic Cabildo and Presbytere. To Curator Robert Glenk we are indebted for the following: "The Cabildo and the Presbytere both belong to the City of New Orleans, but have been transferred to the Board of Curators for all time by act of the City Council in 1908." The following is a description of the museum and its workings, given by Mr. Glenk to the Shreveport Times: One of the youngest of the State's institutions devoted to the advance- ment of Louisiana along educational and commercial' lines is the Lou- isiana State Museum at New Orleans. The Museum owes its origin to the splendid collection of exhibits made at the World's Fair in St. Louis in 1904, which at the close of the Fair were brought back and temporarily housed in the Washington Artillery Hall. Since then the collections have grown prodigiously, numbering at the present day over 15,000 items and occupying 14,000 square feet of floor space. Within the past year, the City Council of New Orleans has transferred to the Board of Curators of the State Museum the historic Cabildo and the Civil Dis- trict Court buildings, facing Jackson Square, to permanently house the rapidly growing and valuable collections of the museum. The Cabildo 151 will contain the precious historical matter relating to Louisiana. In this building the transfer ceremonies itook place when Louisiana was ceded to the United States in 1S03 and during the visit of General La- fayette to New Orleans it was the home of the distinguished soldier. Being itself the most historical in the Mississippi Valley, it is eminently fitted to he the repository of the State's rich historical treasures. The Antommarchie bronze of Napoleon, presented to New Orleans in 1834 by the physician of the distinguished Corsican, is one of the valuable relics. Recently the museum has acquired extremely valuable documents, letters, commissions, edicts and imprints of French and Spanish colo- nial Louisiana belonging to the Gaspar Cusacks, Major Robinson, T. P. Thompson, H. Gibbs Morgan, Jr., collections and to the Louisiana His- torical Society, U. S. Daughters of 1776-1812, and Dr. Joseph Jones. The museum also contains many maps of Louisiana, relics from the battlefield of Chalmette and Eugene Lami's famous picture of the Battle of New Orleans. The Art Department contains numerous paintings in oil and water, color, engravings, sculpture and ceramics by some of the best of Lou- isiana's artists. One of the most noteworthy of the museum's exhibits is the large and comprehensive collection of relics of the mound'- builders of Louisiana, embracing arrow points, axes, celts, ceremonial and game implements and pottery collected and loaned by Professor George Wil- liamson of Natchitoches. The Natural History Department contains specimens of the common and many rare varieties of the animals, birds, fishes, reptiles, insects, shells, fossils and minerals, and of the plants, trees and cultivated crops. The Commercial Department contains manufactured articles made in Louisiana, together with numerous working models, statistics and lit- erature and a complete model of a cane sugar factory, rice mill and pumping plant and a cotton oil mill. The museum contains one of the best libraries in the South on science, technology, commercial and trade statistics, and the Bureau of Infor- mation is at all times at the service of the public. During the winter months a series of free lectures are given by prom- inent lecturers at the museum on subjects dealing with the various activities of the several departments. A series of publications based upon a natural history survey of the State is contemplated by the Museum Board. The first number, by Pro- fessor R. S. Cocks, has been issued and will be mailed to applicants in the State free. 152 T ev 153 STATE INSTITUTIONS INSTITUTE FOR THE DEAF AND DUMB. HIS INSTITUTION is located at Baton Rouge. The grounds and buildings are in excellent condition. Its financial showing, and verything pertaining to its management are all that could be desired. Its class departments, oral teaching and industrial instructions are con- ducted on both scientific and practical methods, and it has already sent out a number of expert and highly intelligent instructors and teachers from among its pupils. Its chief aim is to prepare its pupils for the af- fairs of life, and make them industrious and self-supporting citizens. Several industrial trades, such as furniture-making and wood-working, shoe-making and printing and typesetting, are taught with marked suc- cess, and it is hoped to further enlarge and extend these departments. INSTITUTE FOR THE BLIND. Situated at Baton Rouge, th's institution does a great work in edu- cating and fitting for various walks in life the unfortunate ones whose sight is gone. Like the other institution referred to above, one of the chief aims of the Institute for the Blind is, and should be, not only to educate but to fit pupils for the ordinary affairs of life, and make them self-sustaining. When there is any aptitude whatever, music is taught, and many of the pupils have attained great proficiency upon several musical instruments Wicker and cane work are taught; also sewing, embroidery, etc., and the manufacture of brooms has become quite a factor in the industrial department. SOLDIERS' HOME. This institution is situated in New Orleans, and provides a home for the disabled veterans of the Civil War who fought on the Confederate side, and whose homes were in Louisiana. A commodious two-story building has been erected, which has added much to the comfort of the inmates. As time moves on, the lines of those who followed Lee, Johnston and Jackson are growing thinner, and from the active walks of life the number of those disabled and infirm, and without the means of support, is gradually increasing. These veterans of the Lost Cause appeal not only to our charity, love and benevolence, but also to our sense of jus- tice, and the State should always liberally provide for them, as care and want overtake them in their declining years. Article 302 of the present Constitution recognizes this Home as a State institution, and provides that it shall be maintained by the State by an annual appropriation which is to be based upon the number of inmates in the Home on the first day of April of the year in which the appropriation is made, of $130 per capita, for the maintenance and cloth- ing of such inmates. 154 INSANE ASYLUM. This institution, located at Jackson, La., stands preeminently as a monument to the true charity and benevolence and exalted humanity of our people. Its 1400 or more inmates are provided with a home, furnished with every modern convenience, presided over and directed by a superintendent and corps of assistants and attendants, who exercise kindly and even paternal supervision over them. They are supplied with abundant pure water for all purposes, ample baths, electric lights, arti- ficial heat, ice manufactured 'by the asylum, wholesome and abundant food, and healthful grounds and surroundings. Each individual inmate is made the object of investigation and study by the resident physician and his assistants, and as a result of skillful and painstaking treatment and attention, a very large percentage of the inmates are, from time to time, discharged as completely restored. If our people throughout the State could become more intimately acquainted with the details and management of this institution, the usual prejudice against it as a gloomy madhouse would be dispelled, and it would be seen to be what it is — a sanitarium and home for those suffering from disordered and diseased minds. It would be a revelation to those who have never vis- ited it, to observe the extent of its grounds, and the style and number of its handsome buildings, the completeness of its equipment, its scru- pulous cleanliness, and its picturesque and beautiful situation and sur- roundings. The Legislature, at its session in 1902, passed an act providing for the building and establishing of another Hospital for the Insane, near Alexandria, funds were appropriated and the work begun at once. At the extra session of the Legislature in 1903, another appropriation was made to complete the buildings, and, like the Hospital for the Insane at Jack- son, it is doing thorough work and is an institution that all Louisianians are proud of. CHARITY HOSPITAL, NEW ORLEANS. This hospital was situated in the City of New Orleans, and was estab- lished in 1832, being among the first free hospitals ever established in the United States. How well its obligation to humanity is performed is attested by the records of this institution. The hospital grounds embrace two squares, with ambulance house situated in a third square. The Richard Milliken Memorial Annex for Children has been recently built, and is thorough and modern in every appointment. The Pasteur Department, which is also free, was added in 1903. Year by year, through the State's bounty, and with the assistance of donations from her philanthropic citizens, modern new buildings and equipments have been added, until our hospital stands among those at the head of the list of such institutions upon this continent. Its able board of administrators and officers, and skilled and ex- perienced surgeons and physicians have for years past maintained its well-established reputation, and more deeply rooted this institution in the hearts of all our people. 155 SAWMILL AT TAFT, ST. CHARLES PARISH A SUGAR MILL IN ST. CHARLES PARISH 156 SHREVEPORT CHARITY HOSPITAL. Situated at Shreveport, Louisiana, is another hospital, whose char- ita'ble and benevolent work has spread wide all over Louisiana. A very modern four-room brick aseptic operating building- has been erected and furnished with the latest and most approved parapnernalia and appurtenances. This has grown to be one of the fixed State institu- tions of north Louisiana, and its successful conduct, and the humane, skillful and scientific treatment of the indigent sick, and those requiring surgical attention, have grounded it deep in the affections" of our people. It also affords the opportunity of splendid training and practical ex- pedience to young men pursuing the study of medicine and surgery. STATE PENITENTIARY AND CONVICT FARMS. The Legislature, at its session of 1890, passed an act carrying into effect the provision of the new Constitution, which prohibited any form of leasing State prisoners and directed that they be employed under absolute State control. It was determined to continue the work of State building only in so far as it could be furnished for such work, first-class men, graded physically, and employ the rest in agriculture. For this latter purpose, Angola plantation, embracing 8,000 acres of splendid alluvial land, on the Mississippi River, in West Feliciana Parish, and Hope plantation, a sugar estate of some 2,800 acres, on Bayou Teche, Iberia Parish, were purchased. These farms have now been in operation for several years, and the results are most gratifying. Cotton is the money crop raised on Angola and sugar on Hope. Another farm, Oak- ley, has been purchased in Iberville Parish, and is now equipped as a penal farm. The crops sold and proceeds of levee work have brought in good revenues, besides the agricultural product such as corn, potatoes, onions, etc., preserved for prison use, which aggregate a large value. The sys- tem now pays its own expenses of operation, and affords a surplus to complete payments on property purchased. The small factory at the Baton Rouge Penitentiary supplies the force with shoes and clothing. There have been constructed on these farms permanent quarters on the most approved sanitary lines. The prisoners are compelled to work, according to their strength, but they are provided with the best quality t)f food, all they can eat, including an abundance of vegetables, and are well clothed and humanely treated. The late lamented Hon. S. M. Jones, at that time Mayor of Toledo, Ohio, known over the United States as "Golden Rule" Jones, after a recent visit to Hope convict farm, wrote an article for one of the leading journals of the East, and among other things said: "I have felt, because a great mass of the convicts of the South have been worked at outdoor employment, that if they were badly treated they were not in the long run as badly off as our convicts in the North, who are contracted out to work in dingy, ill-ventilated and disease- breeding shops, where they are doomed to breathe poisoned air and almost entirely shut out from eyer seeing a ray of sunshine. I was, however, quite unprepared to find that the State of Louisiana has taken a step in the matter of dealing with convicted human beings that easily places her a century ahead of the methods in common practice in the ordinary prisons North and South." AS OTHERS SEE US PROFESSOR HILGARD. in his preliminary report of a Geological Survey of Western Louisiana, remarks: "Few sections of the United States, indeed, can offer such inducements to settlers as the prairie region between the Mississippi Bottoms, the Nez Pique and Mer- mentau. Healthier -by far than the prairies of the Northwest, fanned by the sea breeze, well watered — the scarcity of wood rendered of less moment by the blandness of the climate, and the extraordinary rapidity with which natural hedges can be grown for fences, while the exuber- antly fertile soil produces both sugar cane and cotton in profusion, con- tinuing to do so in many cases after seventy years' exhaustive cultiva- tion. Well may the Teche country be styled, by its enthusiastic inhab- itants, the 'Garden of L-ouisiana.' " One of the largest and most intelligent farmers in central Illinois, after a careful examination of the Teche and Attakapas country, said: "I have heretofore thought that central Illinois was the finest farming country in the world. I own a large farm there, with improvements equal to any in the country. I cultivate about two thousand acres in small grain, besides other crops; but since I have seen the Teche and Attakapas country, I do not see how any man who has seen this country can be satisfied to live in Illinois. "I find that I can raise everything in Louisiana that can be raised in Illinois, and that I can raise a hundred things there which cannot be raised in Illinois. I find the lands easier worked in Louisiana, infin- itely richer and yielding far more, and with the fairest climate on earth, and no trouble to get to market. I shall return to Illinois, sell out, and persuade my neighbors to do the same, and return to Louisiana to spend the remainder of my days." The editor of the Chicago Tribune, after visiting the Teche country, said to his 50,000 subscribers: "If, by some supreme effort of Nature, Western Louisiana, with its soil, climate and production, could be taken up and transported north to the latitude of Illinois and Indiana, and be there set down in the pathway of Eastern travel, it would create a commotion that would throw the discovery of gold in California in the shade at the time of the greatest excitement. The people would rush to it in countless thousands. Every man would be intent on securing a few acres of these wonderfully .productive and profitable sugar plains. These Teche lands, if in Illinois, would bring from three to five hundred dollars per acre." Robert Ridgeway, formerly of Indiana, now of Louisiana, said: "Too much cannot be said in praise of Louisiana. I And, at least, from per- sonal observation, that Louisiana possesses to a most wonderful degree, great opportunities for making money, and a young man with any get- up about him, with only a little money, or even nothing but his energy, can, in a few years, make a fortune as an agriculturist alone. There is no country on earth that has any greater advantage than Louisiana. "We have twelve months working season, and products for the year round. In the North and West we can labor only part of the year, and during the other three months they have to consume or eat up what they have laid by — not so here — Louisiana offers most wonderful advantages for the enterprising man to come and take hold of. There has been l.'.s 159 much said of Louisiana, of her 'benefits and advantages, by tongues more flowery than mine, but I will say that the whole has not been told." J. H. Keyser, of Bellevue, Bossier, Parish, La., formerly of Pennsyl- vania, said: "I traveled, years ago, portions of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Iowa and Michigan, and spent my early life in Pennsylvania, and have been living since 1870 in Bossier Parish, La., and, taking everything into consideration, I believe a man can live with as much comfort and enjoyment in Louisiana as in any other State of the Union. The people are kind, generous and hospitable, and rarely intermeddle with the po- litical or religious opinions of any one. The great need of the State is immigrants to fill up her waste places, that only need proper culture to produce in abundance. "And the State and its capabilities only need to be made known gen- erally to attract immigration, and the time is not far distant when Lou- isiana will be recognized as among the first States of the Union." J. M. Howell, of Lafourche, La., formerly of Mississippi, says: "Dur- ing my residence in Louisiana of twenty-five years, from personal obser- vation, I find that the laws are as fairly and impartially administered here as in any other State in the Union. My observations lead me to believe that, without regard to race, sex or former conditions, that no- where in the United States are the laws more impartially administered than here in this State." W. J. Ornett, formerly of Michigan, said: "I left Michigan on March IS', 1888, for the South, and landed in the city of -Natchitoches 'one week later. When I left Michigan there was plenty of snow and ice, and when I arrived in Natchitoches I found things altogether different. There was plenty of grass for stock, the fruit trees had bloomed, and garden vegetables of all kinds were growing, and flowers all ready to bloom, and, if I remember right, some had bloomed. "Ladies, why stay at the North and burn fifty dollars' worth of wood to keep a few flowers from freezing, when you can come South and have them bloom nine months in the year, and have them outdoors, and then you can have your early vegetables all through April. Just think of it! And, let me tell you, I ate some as fine dewberries as I ever ate in my life in the last week in April, and you people that were in the North were shivering around the fire. I think fruit of most any kind will grow here in abundance. There is soil to be found adapted to most everything, and excellent soil, too; and the climate, so far as I have experienced it, is very nice. It did not affect me disagreeably so far. I think, if any- thing, it has benefited me, as I have gained several pounds in weight; and in regard to the reception I received from the people, I must say that it was better than I expected. I find them pleasant and hospitable in every way. There is a variety of openings, plenty for all classes; plenty of fine farming lands, both improved and unimproved, to be had cheap, and plenty of timber of all kinds; fine chance for stock raising as you need to feed for so short a time during the year that the ex • pense is small compared to where you feed six months in the year. There is opening for a cotton factory, oil mill, furniture factory, grist mill, banks, hotels, photographers, and other too numerous to mention." 1G0 Professor S. A. Knapp, says: "It would be necessary to take the prairies of Iowa, the rugged timber lands of Maine, and the entire delta of the Nile, twist them together, and thrust through them the Amazon to produce another Louisiana." Started Without a Dollar. "I came to the United States from Germany, landing in the City of New Orleans, State of Louisiana, in the month of September, 1S69. I came to Clinton, East Feliciana Parish, La., from there same year; re- mained here one year and worked on the farm; then left and went to Illinois, traveling over three Northern States. I was gone from her© about ten months. I soon came to the conclusion thai this country offered better opportunity for men in the financial condition I was in than the North or Northwest. I returned here and commenced railroad- ing, following that for five or six years. I then purchased me a home, where I now live; first bought 75 acres. I now own 378 acres, for which I would not accept $6,000 cash. I live on what I make on my place, ex- cept flour and rice This I could grow. I have made one bale of cotton per acre, and from 40 to 50 bushels of corn per acre. This* land will grow as fine grapes as can be grown anywhere. All kinds of garden stuff grows here, and some of them can be grown two crops in a year. I can grow two fine crops of sweet potatoes. Any person can come and locate here and make a living at home and pay for the house at. the same time. I commenced here without a dollar, and I have raised a large family and have plenty around me, such as horses, mules, cattle and hogs, and such othe'- things as belong to a "farm. I can recommend these lands to any person wanting to gain for him- self a home. I know of many other Germans who have come here in the same condition I was in and today own good houses. The same things any person can do here who will come and try. THOMAS AQLL. Raises All His Supplies. This is to certify that I came to the Parish of East Feliciana in the year 1866 and have lived here and have been engaged in farming since that time. I have raised all of my work stock and everything needed to supply my farm. During this entire time I have never had to incur any debt, as there was always a demand for my surplus of corn, molasses, hay, chickens and eggs, to settle in cash for what my family needed, leaving my cotton crop each year as a surplus. One year my family made and gathered 30 bales of cotton, 750 bushels of corn, 200 gallons of molasses, 75 bushels of potatoes, and house all the hay needed for my stock, and sold $75.00 worth of hay. Besides making all of my lard, bacon and hams, I sold $75.00 worth of fresh meat, and my boys made, after my crop was harvested, $250.00 on the sugar farm, which they now have on hand. This is a healthy country and offers fine inducement to any man willing to work and who has any idea of management. GEORGE ANDERSON. lfn 162 THE UNTOLD TREASURES OF LOUISIANA (From the National Magazine) BY GARNAULT AGASSIZ. BEFORE THE WAR, Louisiana, from an agricultural standpoint, was in many respects the banner state of the" Union. Her great plantations were the pride of the nation. Rich beyond her needs in her resources of cotton and sugar, secure in her feudal system of labor, prosperous to a degree, she neither invited nor needed to invite capital or labor to her shores. Some idea of her prosperity can be gained from the fact that many of her alluvial lands, valued today at from twenty-five to fifty dollars an acre, were then held in reserve for from a hundred to two hundred; indeed, it is estimated that sixty per cent more lands in the alluvial parishes were under cultivation then than now. NO YELLOW FEVER NOW. Fifteen years ago yellow fever might have been a legitimate factor in keeping people from Louisiana, for it is an incontrovertible fact that New Orleans, as a port of entry for tropical Central America, was sub- ject to intermittent epidemics of this disease, just as New York or Bos- ton, without rigid quarantine measures, would be subject to outbreaks of cholera or the bubonic plague. Sanitary conditions in New Orleans, however, have changed radically in the past ten years; the old open sewers have been superseded by a modern drainage system, adequate quarantine laws have been introduced, and general health conditions have been materially improved. New Orleans has not had a single case of yellow fever for more than seven years — and scientists say she will never have another, for in the past decade, from an unknown dreaded disease, this ailment has become a treatable and preventable malady, easily confined to certain limits. The medical conquest of the tropics constitutes one of the most remarkable .scientific accomplish- ments of all time. THE FACTOR SYSTEM. But the one factor more than any other that was responsible for Louisiana's slow growth was the pernicious factor system, with its at- tendant negro-tenant and one-crop features. The war freed the Lou- isiana bondsman, it is true, but it made a veritable slave of many of the free men, slaves to a system of monetary servitude that prevented Louisiana from occupying- her merited position in the vanguard of the world's agriculture for nearly half a century. Under the obnoxious factor system, the factor asrreed to advance a planter enough money to rcake his crop on condition that he would devote so many acres of his farm to the cultivation of cotton, sugar or rice, as the case might be, and designate him as his broker in the marketing of the crop. This sounded all very well. The money was turned over, the.cmp was irr.de. the harvest was abundant — for a time the factor seemed to be a philanthropist indeed. Then came the day of reckoning. The New York bank said to the New Orleans bank, "Pay"; the New Orleans bank said to the country bank. "Pay"; the country 163 bank said to the factor, "Pay"; the factor said to the planter, "Pay." And all he could do was to sell his crop, irrespective of market condi- tions or his hopes of the future. A good crop and a bad year, a strange anomaly. But the planter has grown only one crop, perhaps on the negro tenant basis. He has purchased his mules in Missouri or Texas, his corn in Illinois or In- diana, his oats in Kansas or Iowa, his own provisions in almost every state of the Union. The day of settlement finds him literally a bank- rupt — the only hope of the tomorrow, the factor and another year. That hope of the tomorrow, the factor and another year, held good for more than forty years, and it might have held good for forty mbre had not Nature herself intervened — Nature in the shape of the intrepid boll weevil who, in his forced march from Mexico, camped with his legions on the snow-white cotton fields of Louisiana, and, in a single night, as it were, undermined the whole industrial fabric of the state. For a time things looked desperate indeed to the Louisiana cotton planter, but just as water finds its own level, so man, failing in one direction, inevitably courts success in another — and the direction taken by the Louisiana planter was one that spelt not only salvation to him, but pointed him to a greater success than he had ever dared to dream. That road was diversified farming. DIVERSIFICATION. What diversified farming has done for the Louisiana planter needs no recital. It is what it has done for the planter everywhere who de- pended for his success on one staple crop. When the boll weevil made its appearance in Louisiana, the state's corn crop was less than a quar- ter of a million bushels; last year it was fifty-eight million, and next year it promises to reach seventy-five million bushels. And what is true of corn is true also of oats, wheat, rye and every other staple crop. Two or more crops can 'be grown anywhere in Louisiana, and in some sections, under favorable conditions, three and four. The two most widely grown crops are potatoes and peanuts; oats and sweet potatoes, oats and June corn, sweet and Irish potatoes, and in every case cowpeas, velvet beans, or some other self-nitrogenous crop can be sown in the corn. Throughout North and Middle Louisiana there are many large farms that would do credit to Illinois or Indiana, farms that are conducted on the most improved scientific lines, that employ the very latest machinery, and that return a dividend on the investment that to the average Northern farmer would seem incredible. In a majority of instances, these farms are absolutely self-sustaining, raising everything that is required for their maintenance, and breeding their own horses and mules. These large farms raise chiefly oats, corn, cotton, wheat, Irish and sweet potatoes, lespedeza, Bermuda and other hays, truck live stock and poultry. AN ILLUSTRATION OF WHAT ONE FARM CAN DO WITH DIVERSIFIED CROPS. As an illustration of what a Louisiana farm is of under intelligent management and scientific crop rotation might be mentioned the splendid plantation of J. H. and R. W. Boisseau, of Shreveport. This farm has 1100 acres under cultivation. Up to a few years ago it 164 165 was essentially a cotton plantation, over 1100 acres being under cultiva- tion to the cotton plant and 100 acres in corn constituting the factotum of everything else raised. Then came the boll weevil, with its demand for changed conditions. Unlike many other Louisiana planters at the time, the Boisseau brothers were not so discouraged with the future as to neglect their farm entirely or lease it out on a profit-sharing basis to negro tenants. They foresaw that new conditions called for new methods, and with this resolve in view prepared to enter the field of diversified farming on an elaborate scale. And the resuks have been all that could have been desired. Last year this plantation culti- vated: 300 acres of alfalfa, yielding four to six tons an acre, valued at $13 to $25 a ton, conditioned on the season and market; 200 acres of oats, yielding without fertilizer, from 40 to 85 bushels an acre, the yield being conditioned on the time of planting; 25 acres of wheat, yielding 25 bushels to the acre; 300 acres of cotton, averaging nearly a bale to the acre; twenty acres of peanuts, and a large acreage of pas- turage and truck. This farm maintained, in addition to its 200 work animals, nearly all home raised, some 300 head of cattle, 500 graded hogs, a large number of sheep, some poultry, and shipped something every working day in the year. Its gross income was $7S,000, of which $25,000 was clear profit. Not a bad return on the investment! WHAT IS CLAIMED BY A TOWN. The little town of Mansura, in Avoyelles Parish, is another concrete example of the success of diversified farming in Louisiana. In 1908, when this town depended on the one-crop system for its upbuilding, marketing about 4000 bales of cotton a year, its only bank had total deposits of $52,000. In the fall of 1910 only a thousand bales of cotton were sold in the town, but diversified farming had so enriched the sur- rounding country that the deposits of that bank had increased to $102,- 000, in spite of the fact that five other banks had been established in the parish in the interim. * * * * CORN RAISING. "With the farmer beginning to appreciate more and more the great possibilities of intelligent corn culture, Louisiana is fast taking a rank- ing position among the leading corn states of the country. And this is as it should be, for in the general scheme of diversified farming, corn is unquestionably the most important unit. The yield is being steadily increased, not by fertilization alone, but by deep plowing, adequate culti- vation and a systematic rotation of crops. Nothing is more important to the corn grower than the question of deep plowing. Under the old three-inch method of plowing, the yield for the whole state was less than 12 bushels to the acre, while 25 bushels was a splendid average for even the most productive soil. Deep plowing has increased the yield, irrespective of conditions, wherever tried. This has been remarkably demonstrated by a Louisiana farmer, who this year, by plowing to a uniform depth of six inches, raised 70 bushels of corn to the acre on two acres of ground that under the old method of plowing had never been known to yield more than 2 5 bushels 166 to the acre. And he used no fertilizer whatsoever. Next year this farmer intends to plow up ten acres to a depth of one foot, accomplish- ing this with a 6 -inch disc plow and a 6 -inch subsoiler. In speaking of corn-raising in Louisiana, one cannot lose sight of the splendid work being accomplished by the Boys' Corn Clubs, an important branch of the United States Department of Agriculture's Farm Demonstration Bureau, which is doing such a noble work in up- lifting Southern agriculture. There are now 42 individual corn clubs in the state, with a total enrollment of 3,875 members, Louisiana laying claim, by the way, to the boy, in Stephen Henry, of Melrose, near Natchitoches, who, by "making" 139.45 bushels of corn to the acre, at a cost of 13.6 cents a bushel, not only won the Department of Agricul- ture's grand prize, but established beyond dispute the peculiar advan- tages of Louisiana soil for corn culture. WHEAT AND OATS. Wheat and oats are two ether staple crops that are finding each year more favor with the modern Louisiana farmer as integral urits in the scheme of diversification, this being true especially in the northern and middle sections of the state. And with good reason. Either of these grains can be planted from the first of September to the first of No- vember and provide a splendid pasturage for cattle from late autumn until the first of April without any deterioration to the growing grain. Wheat will produce 20 to 30 bushels and oats from 30 to 90 bushels to the acre, and be followed by peas, peanuts, soy or other beans, sweet potatoes, sorghum, kaffir corn, milo maize, or June corn. An Arcadia, Bienville Parish, farmer this year harvested 85 bushels to the acre on fifty contiguous acres. He followed his oats by peanuts, which as a second crop practically represent a clear profit. Louisiana's 50,000 acres of oats yield approximately a million bushels a year. The yield of wheat is inconsiderable at present, hardly com- putable, but the acreage is being increased yearly, due chiefly to the success attained by the Department of Agriculture in the acclimation of a seed well suited to the particular needs of the state. IRISH POTATOES. Irish potatoes constitute another important unit in the general scheme of modern farming, it being quite possible in Louisiana to raise two good crops on the same ground annually, the second at little ex- pense, as additional fertilizer is rarely necessary, and the small pota- toes from the first crop serve as seed for the second. The first crop is planted in January and February and harvested in M"ay; the second in the latter part of July and the beginning of August and harvested in late autumn. Irish potatoes bring from $60 to $175 a car for the spring crop, while the fall crop sells as a rule at from $75 to $200, the higher price being conditioned to some extent on the larger home demand. Hi? HAULING SEED COTTON TO KILLO'DEN GIN LA NANA SCHOOLHOUSE, IN SABINE PARISH 168 The profit in Irish potatoes in conjunction with some other crop is well illustrated bj the experience of Benjamin Gray, an up-to-date farmer in the famous Red River Valley, who last year made more than a hundred dollars an acre on ten acres of land from this source. This was accomplished as follows: He harvested 868 bushels of Irish pota- toes, for which he received $1.10 tc $1.15 a bushel, or about 77 cents net when freight and commissions had been deducted. On the same 10 acres he later harvested 610 bushels of peanuts, for which he received $140 net, and 23 tons of peanut hay, which returned him $12 to $11 a ton. And the potato crop, owing to climatic conditions, was an unusually short one. At the present time Louisiana imports no small proportion of her potato supply, which means that the Louisiana farmer has the local market to fall back upon when conditions in the higher-priced Northern and Western markets are not favorable. PEANUTS. In this scheme of diversification, peanuts also occupy an important role, for no state in the Union, net excepting the greatest of all peanut states, Virginia, combines in a happier manner the peculiar requisite to peanut growth. And as peanuts in Louisiana, as in all the far Southern states, can be grown as a second crop to potatoes, oats or wheat, peanut culture would seem to be a more profitable venture in the Pelican than in the Old Dominion State. And it is a crop that requires no great investment of capital. A man and two mules can cultivate with ease from fifty to sixty acres .of pea- nuts, which should yield from forty to sixty bushels an acre, with an average price of about $1.00 a bushel, not to mention the high-grade hay, which in itself is said to pay for the seed, cultivation and harvest- ing of the crop. The present state average, it is true, is only 15 bushels to the acre, but this is due to poor cultivation, inadequate fertilization, and a lack of diversification, for crop rotation is one of the chief essen- tials in successful paying culture. Peanut hay will yield from a ton to a ton and a half an acre, worth according to the conditions of market from $15 to $18 a ton. Most farmers think it more advisable to make the hay with the pea still on the vine, feeling that the increase in the value of hay will more than counterbalance the attendant loss, just as many of the more up-to-date consider it wiser if the peanut itself is harvested, to plough the vines under for the enrichment of the soil. The Louisiana peanut, which at present is the Spanish variety ex- clusively, although all varieties, with the exception of the Virginia, will do well, finds its chief uses today in the peculiarly high-grade oil which is extracted from it, in the manufacture of peanut butter and salted peanuts, and as a staple article of diet for the stock farm. Peanut fac- tories, controlled for the most part by Virginia corporations, are now- located at Ruston, the seat of Lincoln Parish, the largest peanut-raising parish in the state, Shreveport and other points in north Louisiana, so that the farmer who wants to grow peanuts on a commercial scale has a good market at his very door. There is no peanut oil factory in the 169 state at the present time, 'but as the Spanish peanut will average more than a gallon of high-grade oil to the bushel, there would seem to be no reason why an oil factory would not be a paying investment. But it will be more for a food for live stock, especially hogs, that the progressive Louisiana farmer will cultivate the peanut. In this con- nection it may be said that there is no 'better or more economical diet for hogs, for not only does the peanut produce a meat of a peculiarly distinctive flavor, as witness the famous Smithfield ham, hut the ex- pense of feeding the hogs in the regular way is almost done away with, as they are allowed to root for their own living. In a recent experiment, indeed, the State Department of Agriculture cleared $50 an acre from hogs raised in this way. As a rule, however, the farmer finds it better to give a ten-day diet of corn before slaughtering, as the corn imparts a tenacity to the flesh that it would not otherwise have. SWEET POTATOES. In the hill country of middle north Louisiana, that portion of the state which is embraced by the Red and Ouachita Rivers, an area ap- proximately of ten thousand square miles, sweet potatoes can be grown to better advantage, perhaps, than in any other portion of the United States, for not only are these sweet potatoes of an especially good variety, 'but they will yield from $200 to $500 an acre, depending on the methods of cultivation and crop conditions. And as with peanuts, sweet potatoes are a second crop. STOCK RAISING. Still another industry that is rapidly becoming an important unit in this new era of diversified farming is the raising of live stock. Lou- isiana has been a great cattle-raising country since the day of her set- tlement, her vast prairies, which until the coming of the white man, were black with buffalo, having been the home of as picturesque and as unique a cattle industry as can be found in the United States. But it is to the stock farm more than the range that Louisiana will have to look for the future upbuilding of this industry. In this con- nection it can be said that no state in the Union is better adapted to the raising of high-grade stock. The natural pasturage to be found anywhere in the state alone will provide for the yearly sustenance of from one to five head of stock to the acre, while on cultivated pastur- ages, such as oats, wheat, velvet beans, cow peas and other legumes, from five to ten head can be fed. Nothing is more important to the stockgrower than good pasturage. In this respect Louisiana is especially well endowed. Her native grasses embrace white and red clover, timothy, beggarweed, Bermuda and other of the chief domestic varieties, while such exotics as alfalfa and lespe- deza grow to splendid advantage in every section of the state. Cow- peas and velvet 'beans also grow luxuriously, and, both being nitroge- nous plants, assist materially in enriching the soil. Cowpeas are planted principally for hay, although every farmer retains enough seed for the following year's planting, as they are an annual crop and grow only from the seed. 170 Lespedeza, a member of the legume family, and a native of Japan, is finding greater favor in Louisiana than alfalfa, and alfalfa will grow in Louisiana as well as anywhere, and it will not only yield from two to three cuttings a year with an average of a ton to an acre, but one planting will last from three to four years. It might last very much longer were it not for the fact that after the fourth year volunteer grasses and weeds as a rule spring up to such an extent as to preclude its sale as a high-grade hay. Lespedeza, too, is a nitrogenous self- fertilizer, and is said to bring the land in the three or four years of its life up to a high state of fertility for the cultivation of staple crops. Lespedeza is sown broadcast in oats or wheat when they are 12 to 14 inches high, this time being selected as all danger of a killing frost has passed, young lespedeza being very susceptible to cold. Oats are har- vested May 25, and the first cutting of lespedeza occurs a month later. Lespedeza, like cowpeas and velvet beans, is also a nitrogenous self- fertilizer. Another branch of the live stock industry that is annually receiving more attention from the progressive Louisiana planter is the raising of mules. This is almost a departure for Louisiana, but it is a departure of tremendous importance not only to the planter himself, but to the state at large. A 3-year-old mule is worth anywhere from $200 to $300; it can be raised for $25. This means a saving to the farmer and to the state of at least $200 on every home-bred mule employed on the farm, and some of t'he larger planters utilize from 300 to 500 head. The mare that is used for raising mules on the larger Louisiana plantations is a common working mare. This represents a great saving, also, as she can be worked within a few days of foaling time and ten days after and raise a colt every year. Sheep, too, can be raised very profitably throughout Louisiana, par- ticularly in the cutover pine lands, which afford splendid ranges — ranges that on account of Louisiana's equable climate are available all the year round. While all breeds do well, the native sheep thrive better than any other kind, for being acclimated they require less attention, and consequently are more profitable to raise. At Lake Providence, in East Carroll Parish, a beautiful old trading post on the Mississippi, sheep-raising is a very important and profitable industry, as it is also in Calcasieu, Cameron, Winn, Ouachita, and a number of other parishes. SUGAR CANE: ITS PLANTING AND VARIOUS PROCESSES THROUGH WHICH ITS MANUFACTURE IN SUGAR IS ACCOM PLIH ED. Sugar was first made in Louisiana in 1795, though sugar cane had been grown in various parts of the state before the Revolution for the manufacture of syrup and rum, the sugar cane having been introduced into Louisiana in 1751 by the Jesuit Fathers from San Domingo, where their confreres had built up quite a considerable industry. The cane grew well, but all attempts to manufacture sugar from it were abortive, and it was not until 1791 that Don Antonio Mendez 171 172 succeeded in extracting' sugar from cane. Three years later Etienne de Bore made such a large crop of sugar that many were induced to go into the industry, and it is to him that the real credit of being the father of the industry belongs. In common with all industries in the experimental stage, the sugar cane industry of Louisiana was at its inception a very crude and unim- portant one, both as to its cultural and manufacturing methods and the insignificance of its annual output, but as the progressive planter, real- izing its future possibilities, abandoned indigo entirely and to some ex- tent cotton to sugar cane, it commenced to enjoy a period of steady growth, until in 1820 the crop approximated some 20,000,000 pounds of sugar. From 1820 the industry developed rapidly, due entirely to the fore- sight and intelligence of the planter, who by the application of im- proved cultural and manufacturing methods placed himself in a position to compete successfully with his great tropical rivals, Barbados and Cuba. The Louisiana planter has always been a potent factor in the devel- opment of the state, distinctive in his type and representative of her best class of citizenship, and he has been ever ready to introduce any innovation, no matter how expensive, that would promote the welfare of the industry and the welfare of the state. This is well illustrated by the fact that while the steam mill was a rarity in the United States up to 1840, steam began to supersede the horse in the larger Louisiana sugar plants nearly twenty years before, in 1830 no less than half the mills in the state being operated by it. From the first year or two of its adoption, steam was used only as the source of power in the grinding of the cane, but about 1824 the planters commenced to use it in the actual boiling of the syrup. This marked the invention of the vacuum pan, which is the technical term for boiling the syrup in vacuo, i. e., below the normal pressure of the air. This new method of boiling the syrup was a great improvement over the old open kettle method, as the heat could be regulated, thus causing a great deal of loss from inversion, inversion being the chemical change from sucrose to glucose. Under the old method, a large proportion of the saccharine content of the juice was inverted into glucose, and although a superior molasses was obtained — known as open kettle molasses, and commanding a great premium over the molasses obtained under the now method of boiling — the increase of sugar, calculated at 156 pounds for the vacuum pan as against 92 pounds for the open kettle, more than counterbalanced the difference. The revolutionizing discovery of Isaac Watts having been applied with success to the industry, the enterprising planter, not content to derive only the one-eighth power value from his steam that comes from a single effect, now turned his attention to the problem of how to secure a larger proportion of the theoretical value of his fuel — a problem which the engineers of the world were lending their best efforts to solve. Various solutions, such as heating the water with the exhaust steam, heating rooms with it. and utilizing it in devious directions, were suggested, but it remained for a Louisiana cane operative to find, 173 in what is Known the world over as the multiple effect, the real solu- tion to this all-important problem. This Louisianian was an octoroon by the name of Robert Rilleux, a free man of color, who had been edu- cated by his sponsor as an engineer in one of the greatest educational institutions of France, and who had ability far beyond his day and race. Rilleux's invention was introduced in 1830. The multiple effect consists of the utilization of the vapor of the same steam in concurrent effects, the vacuum and temperature being lower on each effect, the latter falling from 200 to as low as 120 degrees Fahrenheit. From 1S30 to 1844, when the annual output was more than double that of the year previous, the industry enjoyed a regular growth, and from then until the Civil War, when in common with other Southern industries it was entirely obliterated, an era of prosperity that even in these days would have been considered remarkable, in 1854, nearly 500,- 000,000 pounds of sugar being produced, an output that was not sur- passed until 1906. The war dealt a stunning blow to the sugar industry, and it was many years before economic conditions had so adjusted themselves as to war- rant a comprehensive rehabilitation. The real dawn of the present industry may be said to date from 1882, the year that gave birth to the centralized plant. Up to this time the industry had been prosecuted in a crude way, both as to its agricultural and manufacturing methods, the planter seldom knowing the actual cost of his operations. The centralized plant changed all this. Its operator was as a rule a big planter of the old school, who recognized that sugar could be manu- factured successfully only by the most improved methods, and the prac- tice of the most rigid economy. Thus he not only improved his lands by an intelligent rotation of crops, but he cultivated and fertilized them more thoroughly than had been the custom, and eliminated every possi- ble source of waste. He began, too, to compute the amount of sugar that could be manufactured from a ton of cane, something never before attempted in the sugar industry, the effect of this being that in the last thirty years he has increased the yield of sugar to the ton by over 50 per cent. Very few people have even the remotest idea of the great investment that a sugar plantation represents. The average large sugar planter pays out in wages alone from $100,000 to $250,000 annually, and labor is not by any means the only factor of expense in the operation of a sugar plan- tation. There is the machinery bill, fertilizer bill, the maintenance of the railroad — a cardinal requisite to every up-to-date plantation — and last but not least the sugar factory. A good sugar factory will cost any- where from $150,000 to $600,000, and will have to be almost entirely re- newed every ten to fifteen years. More than three-quarters of the year idle, the depreciation of the ma- chinery and the plant is greater when idle than when in active opera- tion. Then there is the repairing of the machinery— $8,000 to $15,000 a year is no uncommon figure for this. One ten thousand acre plantation in Lafourche Parish might be cited. This plantation, which has 3,400 acres in cultivation to sugar, has an annual payroll of $150,000. Its immense sugar house is valued at over 174 CHARCOAL BURNING $300,000. It has 35 miles of 36-inch gauge railroad, with three 17-ton engines and 262 cars of from 5 to 10 tons capacity. Its mill will grind, on the average, 1200 tons of cane a day. Over 15 miles from end to end, this great farm employs from 800 to 1000 people all the year and 30 per cent more during the planting and harvesting seasons, and maintains a population of nearly 20C0 souls. It has its own public school, with an eleven months term, as against six months for the ordinary parish in- stitution. And this is not by any means the largest single sugar interest in the state. One great holding corporation, for instance, operates four great plants under such a unique and comprehensive system as to make the four integral units constitute to all intents and purposes one single plan- tation, with no less than IS, 000 acres under cultivation to sugar cane, and employing 3000 people throughout the year — 8000 during the har- vesting season — maintaining a stable population of 5000 'people, and paying out a million and a half dollars in wages. The original invest- ment in these properties represents no less than $7,000,000, which, con- sidering the extraordinary increase in their efficiency, due to improve- ments in agricultural methods, centralization of manufacture, and sci- entific disposal of the crop, is worth today at least $15,000,000. These large plantations are conducted in much the same way as are the great railroad systems of the country. Records of all kinds are kept showing the daily cost of plowing, hoeing, ditching, and cultivating an acre to each unit as compared with the same undertaking on each of the other units, effecting an economy in the cost of annual mainten- ance that would be impossible under ordinary conditions. The advantages of the centralization of effort can be realized very readily when it is said that the four great factories of this corporation are today manufacturing more sugar and at cheaper rate than the fig- ures represented by the output of the twenty-odd factories, before this centralization was effected. This great plantation uses 1200 mules, 75 miles of railroad, 650 cars of 6 to 10 tons capacity each, and produces 80,000,000 pounds of sugar — a figure that twenty years ago would have been the aggregate product 175 of over seventy sugar houses — and has an annual gross income of three to three and a half million dollars. The first operation in the growing of sugar, as in the growing of any staple crop, is the proper preparation of the land. A sugar planta- tion is divided into and operated as three integral units in order to per- mit the regular and systematic rotation. Each year finds one of these units growing plant cane, one growing second and third year cane, and the third corn and peas. The peas are planted after the corn and are plowed under to bring the land into condition for the planting of the new cane crop. This system of rotation is followed with little devia- tion year after year. The ground that is to be planted in sugar cane is plowed twice, once in the fall and once just before planting time, which for two-thirds of the crop is in the latter part of February or the beginning of March, the vicissitudes of season sometimes prolonging it until the middle of April. The fall planting season ranges from the middle of October until the middle of November. Plowing over, the land is tilled up in 6 -foot rows which are opened up and the cane placed in them by hand; three stalks side by side ensure a stand, as very frequently cane is de- fective, the ulterior appearance of the stock not being indicative of its ability to germinate. The cane is then covered with 3 to 5 inches of soil, this operation being performed by a light plow. A heavy roller is then passed over the field, and the cane left to grow. After the cane sprouts, or shortly before, the season of active cultivation commenced. A plow is first passed on either side of each row and all surplus soil removed from the cane by hoe, an operation which, requiring manual labor, is very tedious and expensive. As the cane grows, the dirt is continually stirred around it with standard riding cultivators; is continually fer- tilized with tankage, cotton seed meal, and various commercial fertil- izers, and every weed is religiously kept down. From then on until the cane has attained a height and density as to make it impracticable, the growing cane is regularly cultivated with plows and discs, the soil being completely hilled up around it. The last period of cultivation com- mences as a rule about July 1, at which time the middle of the rows is plowed to a depth of 15 inches, and the drainage perfected by the cutting of quarter drains, which run perpendicular to the rows and empty into the regular drainage ditches. The cane is then left until harvest time, the yield depending on the bounty of nature and the extent of the rav- ages of the cane-borer. The cane-borer, a worm three-quarters of an inch in length, is to the sugar cane what the boll weevil is to cotton — a vital, unrelenting, ever-active destructionist. It is estimated by those in authority to know that its relative damage to the growirg crop is from ten to twelve per cent, sometimes more. In the past few years strenuous elTorts have been made to eradicate it by both federal and state governments, as well as by the larger planters, and although the annual loss occasioned by it has been some- what reduced, no effective measure of relief has been devised. Fall planting, the burning of the corn stalks where the borer propagates to especial advantage, the destruction of all other waste, and the cut- ting out and burning of the cane killed by the borer, are some of the 176 WWW* $ & <• jr - ♦-"/•*■.> — V" ? -~cr, **• J-Etessa I. L SBBS OCT' 177 measures in its eradication that are meeting with a certain measure of success. The Georgia plantation, one of the largest sugar plantations in the state, has devised a very unique method of cane-borer destruction. Lamps of 3,000 candle-power are placed on flatcars at defined distances along the plantation railroad, while wood and coal oil fires are burned at convenient points throughout the fields themselves, and the cane- borers, in moth form, are said to fly by thousands into the flames, it being estimated that in the last few months many billions have been destroyed. The harvesting and grinding of the cane is a most strenuous period to the cane grower, who has little time at this season for even his meals. At the present time the cane is stripped and cut by hand, man having not yet devised a machine commercially adapted to the work. Experi- ments, however, are being made, and it is expected that before long a suitable machine will be on the market. Many machines have been introduced to date, but none has embraced the requirements of the suc- cessful harvester. As the cane is cut, it is loaded by mechanical loaders, operated by gas engine, into wagons of from one and a half to two tons capacity each. These are driven to the hoisting derricks, placed at convenient distances throughout the plantation, ominous looking contrivances that bear a striking resemblance to the gibbet. These derricks load the cane on to the cars, which as loaded are run to the sugar house, where the cane is automatically discharged into a patented carrier which conveys it to the corrugated steel crushers. After being crushed the cane is run under six to nine heavy rollers, each exerting a hydraulic pressure of 300 to 400 tons. The consequent juice is then run into what are known as the liming tanks to correct acidity and cause coagulation and the pre- cipitation of all foreign matter. The juice is then pumped into a cylin- drical heater through numberless copper tubes where it is heated to 180 to 230 degrees Fahrenheit, conditioned on the results desired, after which it is run into settlers, or clarifiers, and its impurities allowed to settle. The juice is then subjected to the double, triple, and quadruple effects, where it is concentrated into syrup, the residuum in the bottom of the settlers being caried to the filters. The syrup is then conveyed by pump to the charge tanks, where it is concentrated into sugar by a system of vacuum boiling. It is then passed through the centrifugal machines,- where the coherent grain sugar is separated from the mas- quitte. this being the technical term for the syrup in a highly concen- trated form. The masquitte is then reboiled, and second sugars are ex- tracted from it in the same way. The syrup is then boiled again, and generally allowed several months to concentrate, or grain up, when it is ■ once more run through the centrifugals and a small-grained, low-grade sugar obtained from it. The residuum is sold as common molasses or black strap. According to the successful planter it costs $2.75 to $3.00 a ton to make and harvest a crop of cane. The average yield per acre amounts to 20 tons, although 30 are frequently, and 45 have been made. Aboul one-fifth of the yield, however, is used to make the next crop. 178 As a rule the cane is sold on the sugar basis, the price being condi- tioned on the market value of sugar, the grower being paid 90 cents a ton, for each cent that yellow clarified sugar commands in the open market, which means that if sugar is selling for 4 cents a pound, the grower realizes $3.60 a ton for his cane. At the present time about two-thirds of the annual crop is sold to the refiners, the remainder, comprising the higher-grade sugars, being consigned direct to the trade. * * * * COTTON. Nor must it be supposed for a moment that "King" Cotton has been forced to relinquish entirely his inherent right to a throne in the agri- cultural domain of Louisiana. Agriculturally, Louisiana may be defined as a triumvirate, with "King" Cotton, "King" Sugar, and "King" Rice, the triple monarchs. "King" Cotton, it is true, never again will be the absolute monarch of Louisiana; her arrogant dictator, the usurper of her every preroga- tive, but he will be a limited monarch, contributing more effectively to the wealth of the Commonwealth than when, in the zenith of his power, he enjoyed undisputed homage, secure in the knowledge that no pre- tender threatened his supremacy. When in 1903 the boll weevil camped with his legions on the cotton fields of Louisiana — beyond question the most prolific cotton fields in the world — there were few indeed who did not believe that "King" Cot- ton had met his final Waterloo. And there seemed to be justification for the belief, for from over a million bales the annual production fell to two hundred thousand. Less than a decade has passed since the dawn broke on what was then thought to be the blackest day in all Louisiana's history, but mem- LOADING WITH COTTON AT NEW ORLEANS 17!) ory alone stands monument to that giant struggle in which "King" Cotton went down in defeat to the myriad-legions of the invader from Mexico. True, Louisiana may never regain her proud position as the third largest cotton-producing state in the Union, but there is every reason to believe that cotton will forever remain one of her most potent sources of agricultural wealth. For cotton is tho great money crop, the one crop which has a staple value in every market place of the world, its bill of lading a universally negotiable instrument. "King" Cotton's restoration is already evident. This year Louisiana raised over four hundred thousand bales of cotton, and next year, with an increased acreage and an improved agriculture, she looks forward with confidence to a yield of a half million bales. Where formerly a planter consumed a whole year in making a bale of cotton, he is now, by fall plowing, the planting of an early variety of seed, by more scientific methods of cultivation, by adequate fertiliza- tion, by systematic picking off and burning of the affected bolls, by the destruction of the cotton stalks, and by an intelligent scheme of diversification, making it in from eight to nine months. Ten years ago, when it was the custom to hold Farmer's Independ- ence Day picnics in various parts of the state, a farmer was indeed proud who could exhibit a cotton bloom as evidence of his skill on these occasions; on July the Fourth of this year not only was cotton generally in bloom, but fully matured bolls were not uncommon, some- thing that the most progressive planter would not have considered within the region of the possible even five years ago. For this happy condition, great credit must be given to the Farm Demonstration Bureau of the Department of Agriculture, which is doing such a colossal work in advancing the welfare of Southern agriculture. The Bureau has forty-six experiment stations in the State, which, by constantly advocating fall and winter plowing, the rehabilitation of the soil, diversification, the use of more and better machinery, and proper seed selection, are doing a splendid work in assisting the Lou- isiana planter in his efforts to repulse the invader. The Louisiana planter, perhaps, has not yet seen the day when he will acknowledge that the boll weevil was the saviour of the state, but he has begun to discount its power for evil, and work intelligently for its subjugation. The reign of the boll weevil will be short-lived. Even now, in the height of its power its dominion is threatened. And day and night, sci- entist and expert are endeavoring to find an effective parasite for the destruction of the little pest that has cost the Southern farmer so many millions of dollars. Cotton can be grown in every parish in Louisiana; last year, in- deed, there were only two parishes in which cotton was not raised. In some of these parishes, of course, the output was inappreciable, this being due to the fact that other crops such as sugar and rice could be grown to greater profit. 180 COTTON SEED OiL INDUSTRY. Another source of great wealth to the Louisiana cotton planter is the cotton seed oil industry. While not so great as a few years ago, when the yield of cotton was appreciably larger, the cotton seed oil industry, returning this year over six million dollars to those engaged in it, still occupies an important role in the industrial 'life of the State. More than forty cotton-seed oil mills with an average capacity of 125 tons each are in operation at various strategic points throughout the cotton belt. The cotton seed oil industry is so co-dependent on the cotton industry as to prevent any forecast as to its future other than that which would be reflected from a forecast of the cotton industry itself, for the cotton seed oil industry of every state is governed by the rise and fall of that state's annual production of cotton. The use of cotton seed is entering into the economic life of the people and is utilized more and more for domestic use. The use of cotton seed oil meal in fattening stock, and hundreds of by-products now manu- factured from cotton seed is one of the astonishing economic evolu- tions that has added millions to the productive value of the cotton lands of the South. CAPITAL CITY OIL MILL, BATON ROUGE. RICE. With nearly 400,000 acres under active cultivation at the present time, with an estimated yield this year of some ten million bushels, with a rapidly increasing acreage and a regular and sustained improvement in its agricultural and marketing methods, the rice industry of Louisiana, returning over ten million dollars annually to those engaged in it, and constituting in itself over one-half of the rice industry of the nation, is one of the Pelican State's most important, profitable and growing branches of agriculture. Perhaps no industry in the South has enjoyed a more remarkable or a more romantic growth. First raised in Louisiana on a commercial 181 scale during the Civil War in an attempt to offset the ill effects ex- perienced by the South in the wanton destruction of the Carolina indus- try, and found to be so peculiarly responsive to its fertile soil and genial climate, rice soon 'became a recognized staple in the state, its culture gradually being extended, until in 1880 the harvest aggregated over a hundred thousand bushels. But the real birth of the industry may be said to date from 1884, when a colony of sturdy farmers from the Middle West, disheartened by successive crop failures and tired of the interminable, rigorous win- ters of the North, migrated to the prairies of Southwest Louisiana, where rice-growing had just been commenced in a small way, the indus- try up to this time having been confined to the alluvial and delta lands of the state. Until the arrival of the newcomers, rice culture in the United States had differed only in detail from rice culture in the Orient — the same methods of cultivation and harvesting as had obtained throughout the centuries being in vogue. But the W T estern farmer, fresh from his wheat farm, could not be expected to tolerate a continuation of these conditions — the hand method of sowing must be superseded by the modern drill; t he primitive sicKle by the binder; ancient methods of threshing — such as pounding the grain with a club and whipping it over a barrel, by the modern steam thresher, and such old-time methods of milling as tramping the rice out by horse, by the steam mill. This, indeed, was a revolution, and the native population, strong in its inherent prejudice against conditions that were foreign to it — a common prejudice throughout the world, viewed with pessimism the dawn of the new era in the industry— the drill was a myth; the binder, on such wet soil, an impracticability; the steam thresher as a sub- stitute to the window, a dream: the steam mill, an innovation of a tomorrow far distant. But Western enterprise and Western courage could not be daunted, and they find their vindication today in such prosperous and picturesque communities as Crowley, Jennings and Rayne, which, rising from the surrounding lateral plain, veritable oases in the desert, stand as lasting monuments to those intrepid pioneers from the far-away West, who, by hewing out a new trail in the wilder- ness, made possible the present wonderful development of the rice in- dustry of Louisiana. The next great era— beyond question the most important in the history of the rice industry— dates from 1896, the year in which the irrigation canal was introduced. The canal was built by the Abbott brothers and the Duso,n brothers, who have been potent factors in the development of Western Louisiana. Up to this time the farmer had had to depend entirely upon the rain supply for the irrigation of his crop, the canal, except as it applied to the primitive waterway in which the planter stored his rainfall against a later day, being unknown. What the irrigation canal spelt' to the rice grower of Louisiana needs no emphasis. How many growers had experienced total crop failures through their inability to afford adequate nurture to the growing grain 182 183 can never be calculated. But their number is legion. The irrigation canal changed all this. It made the grower entirely independent of the elements. Jupiter Pluvius was no longer the patron saint of the indus- try — his dethronement had been absolute. A new star has arisen in the firmament. IRRIGATION. The canal method of irrigation was a tremendous success from the day of its inception, and it completely revolutionized the industry, ex- tending the growing area to sections that up to that time had been re- garded as waste lands, wholly unfitted for the growing of any commer- cial crops. Unromantic figures can best relate, perhaps, the story of the mar- velous growth of the industry since the introduction into it of this great new factor. In 1897, the year after the irrigation canal was introduced, there was only one plant with less than ten miles of canal; seven years later t'here were no less than eighty distinct plants in operation, each capable of irrigating from 160 to 20,000 acres, while today 150 individual companies control 2.500 miles of canal and irrigate in the aggregate over 300,000 acres of land. In the same time the number of binders has been increased from 3,000 to 10,000, while the annual crop has grown from 3,000,000 to 10,000,000 bushels, with a value to those engaged in it of over $10,000,000. Most of the big canal companies have for their primary object the irrigation of their own lands or the lands of some other big rice-growing corporation, although every company is willing to sell water to the smaller growers. This is generally arranged on a basis of one-fifth of the crop, which, in case of a poor crop or an unsatisfactory market, materially reduces the obligation of the small grower. In commencing operations the canal company first makes a thorough topographical survey, which makes possible tfie construction of the main canals and laterals in such manner as to allow the water to go on at the higher levels and inundate the lower by gravitation. Some of these canals are enormous propositions, costing anywhere from $50,000 to $300,000 and sometimes more; and all of them represent the investment of a great deal of capital, as not only the work of cut- ting and maintaining the main canal and the lateral ditches must be provided for, but also the erection and operation of power plants ade- quate to the needs of the particular undertaking, for practically all of the rice in Louisiana is irrigated by pump, the exceptions being the alluvial sections, where the water is syphoned from the river — which, too, have to maintain auxiliary power plants for emergency purposes — and the flowing well, of which there are now about 600 in the state. Rice culture, the irrigation feature eliminated, differs very little from the cultivation of wheat or any other of the great staples. The ground is broken in the late fall and again in February or January, being har- rowed and planted from the first of March to the first of June, accord- ing to climatic conditions and the condition of the soil. As a rule the seed is planted by drill, although in the alluvial districts a great many growers cling to the old method of broadcasting. Unless the ground; 184 is sufficiently wet, the water is turned on immediately after seeding, be- ing turned off again until the grain has not only germinated but attained a growth of four or five inches, when it is reflooded to about the same depth until a week or so before harvesting time, which commences from the latter part of July, according to locality, and extends to about the 15th of November. A crop of rice will yield anywhere from 20 to 80 bushels an acre, this remarkable divergency in the figures being attributable to some extent to local weather conditions, but more largely to careless planting and cultivation and the failure of the grower to restore the fertility of his lands by crop diversification. Some farmers have raised only 16 to 20 bushels to the acre, as against a common average for the state of 32 bushels, while more progressive farmers realize an average yield of from 72 to 80 bushels. In the past the average Louisiana rice grower has been extremely improvident. In the early history of the industry, the pioneers coined money. Not infrequently, indeed, a farmer would purchase from 200 to 300 acres of land on time payments, and pay for it out of the net pro- ceeds of his initial crop. Fortunes were made on every hand, and it was only natural that the planter should plant rice to the exclusion of every other crop. This led to a decided deterioration not only in the productivity of the land, but in the quality of the rice, which soon became impreg- nated with a very inferior variety, now known as "red" rice, a seed abso- lutely untrue to its parent Honduran type. The appearance of this "red" rice was the signal of a fall in the yield per acre and the market value of the grain, and sounded the death knell of the one-crop idea. With the dawn of diversification the rice industry of Louisiana is •beginning to assume a stability that would not have been possible under the old order of things. Many rice farms are now absolutely self-sus- taining, raising their own corn, food-stuffs, cattle, mules and poultry, and leaving rice as the money crop. Crop rotation is fast restoring the fertility of the soil, and seed selection, the quality of the grain. After being threshed the rice is either sold in the field to the agent of one or other of the big mills, shipped to the mill direct, or consigned to one of the central rice milling points, such as New Orleans, Beau- mont, or Houston, about one-third of the total crop being disposed of through the factor on the floor of the New Orleans Board of Trade, which organization is a ruling factor in controlling the prices of this com- modity for the entire country. About three-quarters of the annual crop goes direct to the mills, of which there are some fifty in the state, thir- teen of which are located in New Orleans, and the balance distributed at convenient points throughout the rice belt. A visit to a rice mill is a unique experience. The rice is received at the mill warehouse in sacks weighing about 180 pounds each, which .are unloaded from the cars by belt-conveying machinery of a some- what similar character to that employed in the grain elevators of the West, being elevated into bins by regular grain elevator machinery. From the bins the rice is run through separators, which remove all for- eign substances from it. It is then fed into the center of the hulling iMins, where it is revolved at the rate nf 250 revolutions a minute, and 185 through centrifugal action forced through the perforated ends of the upper and lower stones, a process which removes the hull from the grain. From these the rice is passed through what are known as the fanning machines, which remove the hulls by suction. A very ingenious German separator then turns back the unhulled grains to another set of stones, for about 25 per cent of the rice that goes through the initial set of stones comes out unhulled. The rice is then passed through what are technically known as hullers, this really being a misnomer as the hulls have been removed already. The huller is a cylinder within a metal case, the rice going in at one end and out at the other. This re- moves the oily cuticle that covers the grain, this by-product being known as rice bran, and commanding a high value as a cattle food. From here the rice goes to what are known as the brushes. The brushes are upright cylinders covered with leather, which polish the rice against a wire screen, leaving behind a white powder known as rice polish. From the brushes the rice goes to the polishing drum, where, through friction, the highly polished appearance, which is found in nearly all finished rice, is obtained. From there the rice goes to the clean rice separator, where the broken grains are separated from the whole grains and the various commercial grades are separately packed. Rice finds its chief uses today as a staple article of human food and in the manufacture of 'beer, about 10 per cent of all the .Louisiana crop being used for the latter purpose. Approximately one-sixth of the entire American crop is shipped at present to Porto Rico, the balance, with the exception of occasional shipments to Cuba and European ports, being consumed at home. More than a million hags of rice are sold annually on the New Or- leans Board of Trade. Not all of this, however, is Louisiana rice, about one-tenth of it coming from Texas and approximately the same amount from Arkansas. All of this is sold through the medium of the factor, the rice factor being to the rice grower what the cotton factor is to the planter, advancing him the money necessary to grow and harvest his crop at a regular rate of interest, and selling it for him afterward on a commission basis. Most of the rice disposed of on the New Orleans Board of Trade is sold to the local mills, the balance being shipped to the South Atlantic market, such as Savannah, Charleston and More- head City. The future of the rice industry would appear to be very great. The late Dr. S. A. Knapp of the Bureau of Plant Industry of the De- partment of Agriculture, who played a more important role than any other man in the upbuilding of this industry, in speaking of rice, once said: "Rice forms the principal food for one-half the population of the earth. It is more widely and generally used as a food material than any other cereal. Where dense populations are dependent for food on an annual crop, and the climate permits its cultivation, rice has been selected as the staple food. A combination of rice and legumes is a much cheaper complete food ration than wheat and meat, and can be produced on a much smaller area. As a food material rice is nutri- tious and easily digested. Even rice polish, or flour, which is now sold at the mills at about a cent a pound for cattle feed, or exported to 186 SCHOOL FOR THE DEAF AND DUMB, AT BATON ROUGE. Germany, will, when appreciated, be in demand for human food, as it contains 10.95 per cent of protein, in comparison with 7.4 for the clean rice " The consumption of rice in the United States is ridiculously low. As the American people are educated, however, to its real food value and to the many ways it can be prepared, this consumption will no doubt be greatly increased. A per capita increase of Ave pounds alone would represent a most enormous increase in the domestic consumption. Nor is the United States the only market that the Louisiana rice grower has to look for his future. With higher paid labor, more modern agri- cultural machinery, a more comprehensive system of irrigation, the American rice grower should 'be in a position one day to compete suc- cessfully with the rice growers of the world. To the good farmer, the growing of rice would seem to offer a more profitable return than the growing of wheat. The cost of labor is practically the same. Rice, however, under intelligent cultivation, should yield at least sixty bushels to the acre, worth from 65 cents to $1.00 a bushel in the field, according to market conditions. A story of a grocery clerk, who three years ago was working for $50 a month at Crowley, the rice center, well illustrates the profits to be derived from a rice farm by intelligent management. This grocery clerk rented a rice farm in the northern part of Acadia Parish, on what is known as the crop percentage basis. He made no money investment whatsoever. This year, after paying all his family and farm expenses, he netted nearly $5,000. The farm was 235 acres in extent. Any Western farmer who really wants to engage in rice cultivation can buy land in the rice belt on very reasonable terms. * * * * PERIQUE TOBACCO. Forty-odd miles from New Orleans, in the Parish of St. James, is being carried on an historic and picturesque industry, infinitesimal in comparison with many of the other great agricultural industries of the State, but so peculiarly Louisianian as to make a story of her industrial life incomplete without its incorporation. First grown long before the Civil War by an Acadian whose name the tobacco now bears, the cultivation of Perique tobacco has been kept 187 up continuously ever since, the direct lineal descendants of Perique being still engaged in the industry. Perique tobacco culture is confined to a very small area on the 'banks of the Mississippi, where soil and climatic conditions are pecu- liarly adapted to its growth, and is marketed from Lutcher, a great cypress manufacturing center, Convent and Grand Pointe. Altogether there are but 500 acres in cultivation, although about 2,000 acres are available. Perique tobacco is cultivated in much the same manner as any other sun tobacco, the land being plowed over and planted in rows five feet apart. The tobacco is sown in the early part of January and replanted in March or April, the crop being harvested in the latter part of June or the beginning of July. After harvesting, the tobacco is hung in sheds to dry, after which it is stripped and placed in presses until the following March or April, when it is ready for market, although frequently it is not sold until three or four years old, Perique tobacco, like wine, improving with age. Perique tobacco yields about 500 to 600 pounds to the acre, and com- mands a price of from 25 to 50 cents a pound. The present yield is about 275,000 pounds a year. Perique tobacco finds its chief use as a seasoner for mixtures, it being an exceedingly strong tobacco, with a distinct flavor and aroma. It is shipped to all American tobacco markets, to Canada, England and elsewhere. * * * * TRUCKING. Louisiana has been so frequently alluded to as the Holland of America as to need no introduction as a trucking state. From the day of her settlement, indeed, trucking has been one of her most important native industries, New Orleans for more than a century having been the center of an intensive agriculture that has served as a model for truckers in every quarter of the land. Today this industry is valued at more than $10,000,000 annually, and is growing in importance each year. The State of Louisiana could have no better all-the-year-round exhibit than this living monument to the tremendous advantages that the Pelican State offers to the tiller of the soil. Louisiana's trucking industry is not confined to the environs of New Orleans by any means, however. Louisiana, like Florida, has built up in the past few years commercial trucking interests of varying character in different parts of the state. There is the famous strawberry industry of Tangipahoa Parish, the general truck industry of Rapides, the tomato industry of Ouachita, the cabbage industry of Calcasieu, and the potato and cantaloupe industries of Caddo and Bossier. The trucking industry of Tangipahoa Parish has a world-wide fame — especially the strawberry part of it. Six million dollars' worth of strawberries were shipped from Hammond, 'Independence, and Amite, the chief shipping points of the parish, in 1911 — and all from a district that 25 years ago was an indefinable part of the great pine forest. In 18S5, the year of the Cotton Exposition at New Orleans, Hammond, then known as Hammond's Crossing, had only half a dozen families. Not a single family had been added to its population in 20 years. Its lands 188 had only a nominal value; in fact, two years before a wise investor had purchased 5,000 acres of land at a tax sale for the munificent sum of $117. These same lands, by the way, are now held at $30 an acre, or $149,883 more than the investor paid out. But conditions changed ma- terially in 1885, for in that year the Illinois Central Railroad acquired control of the old New Orleans, Jackson & Great Northern, and inaugu- rated a real policy of progression. The direction of this policy was in able hands — in the hands of a man who has done a noble work in the upbuilding of the South — Captain J. F. Merry, of Manchester, Iowa, now retired, hut for a quarter of a century general immigration agent of the Illinois Central System, and a living potent factor in the economic life of the South. Starting its work by bringing in a few families, the Illinois Central gradually extended its policy to include desirable foreign immigration. The wisdom of this movement was seriously questioned by the people of "Louisiana at the time. But it has seen its justification already. The great Tangipahoa strawberry industry is almost wholly in the hands of Italians. But these Italians have nothing in common with their citv r brothers. They are agrarians, pure and simple. Crime is practically unknown to them. They are orderly in the extreme, industrious, provi- dent. And best of all, their children are growing up to be real Ameri- cans, just as good Americans as the Germans and Scandinavians have become in the West. * * * * HOW FOREIGNERS ARE PROSPERING. This is true also of every foreign colony in Louisiana. Take the Bel- gian colony at Alexandria, for instance. "When the Rock Island Rail- road brought out these immigrants from the Province of Bragant, Bel- gium, some ten years ago, none of them had aught but the clothes he wore; most were ill-clad. For a time they sought employment in the sawmills. But they were farmers by nature and calling, and after a while, with their meagre savings, they bought on time payments some of the rich bottom lands that are to be found anywhere around Alexan- dria, which lies in the famous Red River Valley. Their success belongs really to the category of the marvelous. There are approximately a hundred farmers in the colony, and they are rated on an average at over $10,000 each — some, indeed, are said to be worth nearly $100,000. And all in the space of a decade. Some of the younger members of this colony, too, are beginning to sell their valuable bottom lands and locate on the lower-priced upland, or cut-over pine land, as they are more usually called. They find them just as good as the bottom lands for most purposes, and for strawberries and some vegetables, better. A farmer and son are making between two and three thousand dollars net every year on less than 25 acres of cut-over land, while a northern settler this year made $1,400 clear profit on nine acres of strawberries. The Rock Island has recently established a new French colony on the cut-over pine land region of Alexandria. The members of this colony do not come direct from their native soil, but from Saskatchewan, Canada, where for the past two or three years they have found an indifferent success. This colony will devote itself to the growing of 189 truck for the present, but ultimately it hopes to establish a wine indus- try in Louisiana, such as the Italian Colony established with such suc- cess in California. And their efforts should not be in vain, for the v\ me grape grows luxuriantly in Louisiana, and Louisiana is much closer to the great consuming centers of the country. Tomatoes, cabbage, cauliflower, celery, lettuce, radishes, onions, egg- plants, parsley and all the other chief vegetables of the temperate -^oie will grow as well in Louisiana as anywhere in the United States. * * * # WHAT AN ACRE CAN PRODUCE. Three hundred and fifty-three dollars net to the acre on 4C> acres of tomatoes sounds large, tout that is what one enterprising farmer, Mr. L. P. Alexander, of Monroe, did this year. And that did not represent the sum total of his year's work, either. On the same land he raised 40 bushels of potatoes to the acre as a second crop, for which he received $1.40 a bushel. And this was an exceptionally poor year for~ potatoes, for he has made 225 bushels to the acre as a second crop. Mr. Alexan- der raises peas, various varieties of beans, carrots and other vegetables, following them by cowpeas, potatoes, or peanuts as he deems best. This year he cultivated 175 acres and cleared $17,000. Next year he expects to do even better. FIELD OF SUGAR CANE IN EAST BATON ROUGE PARISH. CANTELOUPES. Louisiana also is coming to the front in the raising of canteloupes. Louisiana raises the famous Rocky Ford exclusively, and it is said to produce a fruit that is absolutely true to the parent seed. The Lou- isiana melon is marketed about the same time as that of South Georgia, so reaches the market at a time when conditions are, as a rule, very favorable, and the price is a great deal higher than the most successful Colorado growers can realize. At least $75 to $100 net can be maCe from canteloupes, subject, of course, to climatic and market conditions. 190 Canteloupes can be followed by peanuts or by California peas, which command $3.00 a bushel in local markets and yield 12 to 15 bushels an acre. Canteloupes are sold for the most part in Cincinnati, Cle /eland, Pittsburg', Detroit, Erie and Wheeling, but next year it is intended to invade the West, where the Louisiana grower will not have to compete with Georgia and Florida. CITRUS FRUITS. In the growing of citrus fruits Louisiana is becoming yearly more prominent, this year raising 400,000 boxes of her famous "sweets," or native seedlings, said to be the highest priced oranges on the market. The chief orange groves in the state are situated along the Mississippi River, south of New Orleans, although there are many fine groves throughout the Gulf Coast country, especially in the Parish of Calca- sieu. In the latter parish at Lake Charles, there has been evolved a system of grove protection from frost by inundation that promises to give the citrus industry of that section a wonderful impetus. The grapefruit also does well in Louisiana, as do Satsuma oranges, and figs. The fig industry around Jennings, built up through the efforts of "'Father" Cary, the town's founder, and one of the chief factors in the development of southwest Louisiana, has become one of the most im- portant fruit industries of the state. PECANS. One of Louisiana's indigenous trees, the pecan, grows to especial ad- vantage in the Pelican State. Louisiana has a larger native pecan area than any state but Texas. The grafted pecan industry is also becom- ing an important one, especially in Ouachita, Rapides, Jefferson and West Baton Rouge parishes. Properly cultivated, a pecan grove is a safe and conservative investment. MINERAL WEALTH— SULPHUR, ETC. Nature has endowed Louisiana with many wonderful natural resources. Within her borders can be found in inexhaustible quantities vast de- posits of sulphur, oil, natural gas, salt, lignite and many fine kaolins and clays; while throughout her tertiary strata there occur in varying quantities, marble, limestone, sandstone, iron, gypsum, Fuller's earth, green sand, and other less important minerals. Of these, sulphur, oil, natural gas, salt, and, to a limited extent, mar- ble, are the only ones that have been commercially developed, and even they have not seen the dawn break on the horizon of the future, for almost every day witnesses an extension of Louisiana's mineralor/ical area; almost every day sees the necessity for a revision of her geolog- ical textbooks; in fact, no other state in the entire Union seems to be experiencing a more remarkable or more striking development in this respect. 191 I — «S A SUGAR FACTORY Four hundred men ^nd American ingenuity to produce the same re- sults in the United States as 21,000 men in Italy — that is the wonderful story of the sulphur industry in Louisiana. The history of this industry is typically American in its vicissitudes. Discovered as long ago as 1858, it is only within the past few years that the deposit has been commercially worked. It must not be supposed, however, that this was due in any measure to a lack of knowledge as to its value. How many millions of dollars were lost, how many hundreds of people financially ruined, how many lives were sacrified in the many vain attempts that were intermit- tently made to utilize this magnificent gift of Nature before success at last came, no man can tell. From the close of the War until 1870, however, when a great French syndicate acquired an option on the property, numerous attempts were made to mine it, all, for one reason or another, unsuccessful, and from that time until the present interests gained control, almost as many more. The operations of the 'French syndicate, being undertaken on the usual elaborate scale of all things French, deserve special mention. How to get at the sulphur no one knew, but the engineers in charge determined to sink an 11-foot shaft to the deposit. This was a gigantic enterprise in itself, for at that time there was no foundry in the United States that could pretend to manufacture the casting required for such a great engineering enterprise. These, therefore, had to be imported from France, an arduous and an expensive task, for each casting was eleven feet in diameter and five feet long and weighed seven and a half tons. At that time there, too, was no railroad to the mines, and the machinery had to be coneveyed thereto by wagon from a point on the Calcasieu River, nine miles away. The cost of transportation on machinery and castings alone amounted, according to the company, to over $300,000. This enormous expenditure of money and time was. however, all to no purpose, for before the engineers in charge had sunk their shaft to 192 a depth necessary to insert even the first ring of the caisson, the com- pany abandoned the project, feeling that, having expended over a million and a half dollars with no tangible results, to invest more money in what appeared, from their long range, a fruitless undertaking, would be in absurdity. The great castings and the magnificent machinery, left to rust in the wilderness, are today the only reminders of France's interest in the sulphur resources of Louisiana! The next 'big attempt to develop the mines was made in 1889 by a New York syndicate, which, in the face of expert advice, proceeded to sink an elaborate shaft to the mines, the only result from this attempt being the loss of a million dollars and a number of lives and the rever- sion of the property to its original owners. But every problem in Nature is bound at last to yield to the ingenuity of man — that has been the law and order of things in the evolution of the ages. Man and the hour must eventually meet — and in the meeting Nature must succumb. Thus it was with the sulphur industry of Louisiana. In 1902 a scien- tist, with the scientist's faculty of delving into the region of the un- known, directed his efforts toward the solution of the one great prob- lem that for so long had thwarted the energies of science and engineer- ing, namely, how to mine the sulphur in some other way than by the shaft method, which could never be successful, owing to the inconsist- ency of tho overlying strata. It took Herman Frasch, the inventor of the process for desulphur- izing Lima oil, some time to find a practical solution to the problem, but that solution not only gave birth to the Louisiana sulphur industry, but it completely revolutionized the sulphur industry of the world. Mr. Frasch's invention consists roughly in melting the sulphur from the sulphur -bearing rock 'by the application of hot water and steam, and the pumping >by compressed air of the 'consequent liquid sulphur to the surface. Here it is run into vats and allowed to congeal, the vat being formed on an eight-inch plank enclosure. As each layer of sul- phur congeals, the operation is repeated, until the sulphur pile has at- tained a height of 60 or 70 feet and becomes to all intents and purposes a solid mountain of sulphur. -Scintillating in the sunshine, these huge masses of sulphur, over 99 per cent pure, constitute one of the most remarkable sights to be found anywhere on this continent. It is said, indeed, that there is over two years' supply of sulphur above ground at the present time. A unique thing about the Frasch method of sulphur mining is that not a single workman ever goes beneath the surface, every operation being carried on above ground; in the Italian government mines in Sicily, on the contrary, the sulphur is all produced on the shaft and tunnel principle, the consequent loss of life being very great. The annual output of the Louisiana sulphur mines is about 200,000 tons, the value of the product being estimated at over $4,000,000. Most of this sulphur is shipped in the company's own steamers from Port Sabine, Texas, to North Atlantic seaports for distribution through- out the United States and Canada, about ten per cent of it going to the Eastern refineries, the largest of 'which are in New York, the National 193 A RESIDENCE IN AVOYELLES Sulphur Company's plan in that city being the largest sulphur refinery in the world. About 70 per cent of the domestic supply of sulphur is now used in the manufacture of paper. The sulphur is burned into gas and passed through a tank containing milk of lime, and then finely chopped-up wood, usually spruce, is mixed with the resultant fluid, which induces a process of decomposition in the wood, and converts it into what is tech- nically known as wood pulp. OIL PRODUCTION. With the production in 1910 of 6,841,395 barrels of crude oil, valued at $3,574,069, Louisiana now stands eighth among the great oil-produc- ing states of the Union, and as almost every week witnesses the bring- ' ing in of new wells, or the finding of oil indications in various parts of the state, there would seem to be every reason to believe that she will have outranked at least four of these states in the next two or three years. Louisiana increased her output in 1910 123 per cent. The year 1911 should record a production of at least 10,000,000 barrels. And the oil industry of Louisiana is yet in its infancy. Oil, it is true, has been prospected for in Louisiana from long before the War, the magnificent sulphur deposits of the state having been uncovered in one of the many unsuccessful attempts to tap the oil deposits of south- west Louisiana. But it is only since 1901, when the famous Spindletop gusher of the Beaumont district turned the attention of the great oil operators to the Gulf Coast country, and the Jennings field, which in point of production has been one of the most remarkable confined oil fields in the world, was discovered, that the petroleum industry has been a factor in the industrial life of Louisiana. 194 The Jennings oil field is said to be the largest single oil pool in the world, having produced 60,000,000 barrels of oil since 1902. This field reached the height of its production in 1906, when it produced 9,025,174 barrels. Since that time it has dropped off appreciably, in 1909 making less than 2,000,000 barrels and in 1910 even a smaller record. The Jennings field has had a number of large gushers, the Wilkins No. — having been, when it came, the greatest oil well in the world. Since that time many great gushers have been brought in, especially in California and Mexico, that have been far greater producers than this pioneer well of the Jennings field, but it is doubtful if many wells can claim a better record, this well having produced over 3,000,000 harrels of oil, or, in other words, over one-twentieth of the total amount of oil taken from the field. Unlike the Jennings field, the Caddo field is sup- posed to be a series of pools, with the first wells in the proven territory getting the bulk of the oil. When oil was discovered in the Caddo district in 1905, it was not thought that the field was an important one, but the production has increased at a tremendous rate, until now, with nearly 500 producing wells, many of them gushers, the production averages over 25,000 barrels a day, and the Caddo field has become by far the most important oil- producing section of the southwest. In the Harrel Number 7, the Caddo field has one of the largest single oil wells in the United States; indeed, it is estimated that when this well was first brought in it made nearly 50,000 barrels of oil a day, a produc- tion that was reduced materially only because the pipe line facilities in the Caddo field were inadequate. This is the oil well that furnished the sensational fire that for so many months defied every engineering effort, and was brought under control only after the engineers had tuaneled below the point of combustion and piped out a large portion of the oil and gas that fed the flames. There are three pipe lines from the Caddo field, namely to Beau- mont, Texas, Baton Rouge, where is located the great three-million- dollar refinery of the Standard Oil Company, and to Port Arthur, Texas, the seaport through which most of the oil produced in Texas and Lou- isiana is shipped to the markets of the world. The Vinton oil field has not lived up to expectations. In its early days it made 22,000 barrels a day, while it now averages less than 5,000. For a new field, however, the Vinton district has a remarkable record, having produced approximately 3,000,000 barrels of oil in less than ten months. When this field first came in, two to ten thousand gushers were quite common, but the gushers appear to have given out entirely, all of the oil now being produced entirely by the pump method. What the future holds forth for the oil industry of Louisiana, no one can foretell. All of Louisiana's oil is at present said to be produced from the pockets, no regular stratum of oil having been found to date. Some geologists hold, however, that oil underlies a great portion of the surface of Louisiana, and that the Louisiana oil field is a continuation of the Texas and Mid-continent oil fields, and that one day Louisiana will be second only to California as an oil-producing state. Out in the Gulf of Mexico, too, there is said to be a veritable oil pool in which ships 195 ride regardless of the storm, and which is said to mark the outlet for this great subterranean stream. Oil is being- prospected for in various parts of Louisiana, and as the prospecting is not of the "wildcat" variety, but is being carried on by close corporations along intelligent lines, there seems to be good reason for conceding a real future to this romantic industry. NATURAL GAS. Another of Louisiana's great natural resources are her wonderful deposits of natural gas. Although she cannot pretend to rank at present with West Virginia and Pennsylvania in point of natural gas production, Louisiana is in possession, in the Caddo gas field, of the largest single natural gas field in the United States. Some idea of the vastness of this field can be gained from the fact that it has no less than 47 huge producing wells in active operation at the present time, although the entire field, as at present defined, is embraced in an area of 10 to 12 square miles. It is believed, however, that this field is a continuation of the Mid-continent field, and that it will one day extend, with interruptions, to the Gulf of Mexico. Gas at Caddo is found at depths of 800, 1,800, and 2,200 feet, varying slightly with the topography. Some wells have made as high as eighty to a hundred million cubic feet every 24 hours from a 6 -inch open pipe, while others, again, have greatly exceeded that figure. Only a small portion of the available gas in the Caddo field is con- sumed at present, hundreds and hundreds of millions of feet being lost daily from the larger oil wells. This, however, is unavoidable, as there is no way of utilizing gas and oil simultaneously. The gas from the Caddo field is of a very superior grade, having very little fume, and being absolutely non-noxious. In theoretical fuel value it is also very high, 60 per cent of this gas being equal to a hundred per cent of gas manufactured from coal. The natural gas flows from the wells at a pressure of from 35 to 300 pounds to the square inch, depending on the amount of gas required. From the well to the pipe or field line, a pressure, regulated to condi- tions, of 150 to 400 pounds is maintained. The natural pressure answers all present purposes, but unless this field differs materially from the older gas fields of the country, compresses eventually will be necessary for long-distance transmission. Caddo natural gas is piped at present to Texarkana, Little Rock and Shreveport, there being a 10-inch main to Texarkana, and three pipe lines, of 4, 6 and 8-inch capacity, respectively, to Shreveport. The Little Rock line is 180 miles long, has two compressor stations, and, besides Little Rock, supplies Arkadelphia, Hope, Garden, Hot Springs, Poplar Bluff, aryi other towns. Ultimately it is hoped that pipe lines will be laid to New Orleans, Memphis and St. Louis. The natural gas field should offer great opportunities to the manu- facturer of all classes of articles in whose manufacture fuel is a consid- 196 OLD RACE TRACK, 1858. CLUMP OF TREES IS WHERE ZACHARY TAY- LOR'S RESIDENCE ONCE STOOD. eration. When natural gas was first utilized in 1900, gas was sold in Shreveport at $3.00 a thousand feet for lighting purposes and $1.75 for 1 fuel, the gas being generated from Oklahoma coal; today gas for domes- tic purposes sells at 18 to 22 cents net and power gas from 4 to 11 cents. The citizens of Chicago, just celebrating their 80-cent gas victory, should regard Shreveport with envy. In Pittsburg, too, where the pro- ducers of natural gas have to compete with the very best class of Pitts- burg-mined coal, the rates for natural gas are 12% cents for power and 27 cents for domestic uses. The highest rate for electricity gen- erated from natural gas, is eight cents per kilowatt hour for domestic purposes and for from 3 to 8 cents for manufactories, large consumers getting an even lower rate. ROCK SALT. Five hundred feet beneath the surface, veritable mammoth caves, cut from the solid transparent rock, seemingly by a master hand, glit- tering with a thousand crystals, reflecting strange colors and weird phantom shapes, converting men and mules into diminutive denizens of a strange world — awful in their magnitude, awe-inspiring in their un- known depths, forever veiled in mystic shades, the great rock salt mines of Louisiana well might be the prototypes of those mystic caverns that inspired the facile pens of such visionary romanticists as Jules Verne and Robert Louis Stevenson. With a visible supply of some twenty billion tons of rock salt, suf- ficient salt to supply the demands of the world for centuries to come, the great rock salt deposits of Louisiana are larger than any yet uncovered on this continent, eminent scientists the world over comparing them to the famous Strassfurt and Sperenberg deposits of Prussia, the Gallicia deposits of Austria, and the world-renowned Trans-Indus salt beds of Hindoostani, most of them admitting that they are at least third, perhaps second, among the great salt deposits of the earth. 197 The only two salt deposits that have reached a greated depth than those of Louisiana are the Gallicia and Sperenberg workings. The former has reached a depth of 4,600 feet, but this does not represent by any means 4,600 feet of solid salt, for there are a number of geological inter- ruptions, various strata of foreign matter occurring at irregular inter- vals. The Sperenberg deposit, however, is 3,769 feet in depth, the salt occurring in a conglomerate mass. The famous Strassfurt deposits are only 685 feet deep, while those cf India average from 300 to 700 feet, and at no point show a greater depth than 1,200 feet. The deepest boring made in Louisiana to date is 2,090 feet, and as at this depth there seemed to be absolutely no change in the character of the salt or' the consistency of the stratum, there is every reason to believe that the Louisiana deposits are equally as deep as any to be found anywhere. From whence these great deposits spring is a mystery — a mystery that geologists from almost the first settlement of this country have attempted in vain to solve. Some scientists, such as Thomassy, have claimed them to be of volcanic origin; others, like Dr. Richard Owen, non-volcanic, tout due to the action of wind and waves; some claim that they are due to alluvion, that is, the imprisoning of an arm of the sea through alluvial deposit, and the consequent evaporation of the salt water so enclosed: while others claim that salt water springs, and not the sea, have figured in their formation. Louisiana's rock salt mines have been confined up to the present to certain islands on the Gulf Coast, but it is the opinion of scientists that rock salt underlies not only the great salt springs at Natchitoches, Bienville, Monroe, and other parts of North Louisiana, but a considera- ble proportion of the entire tertiary strata. At Pine Prairie, a few miles southwest of Alexandria, indeed, a rock salt bed has been uncovered that is thought to be larger than any heretofore unearthed. Hardly islands, in the accepted sense of the term, being separated from the mainland only by a low salt marsh, these remarkable promon- itories, rising to a height of from 125 to 200 feet above the surrounding country, differ so radically in character and formation from the main- land itself, as to be geographically distinct, and fully entitled to the appellation, island. The names of these islands are: Grand Cote, commonly known as Weeks Island; Petite Anse, better known as Avery Island; Cote Carline, known to all Louisiana as Jefferson Island, because it was for many years the beloved home of America's great actor; Belle Isle, the chief rendezvous of the intrepid Lafitte and his piratical band, and Cote Blanche, the last named being the only one of the five on which rock salt has not. been found, due probatory to the fact that few borings have been made there. The production of salt is Louisiana's oldest industry, for not only has it been produced more or less extensively since the day the House of Bourbon unfurled its flag upon her shores, but long, long before the tread of the white man's foot resounded through the noble forests of Louisiana, it had been used as a valuable trading commodity among the Indian aborigines, the very first white settlers of Louisiana having reported meeting with Indian salt traders at various points, one of these being no other than the great Bienville. 198 The salt produced by the aboriginees was all evaporated, a fact that has been borne out by the finding at the salt springs of north Lou- isiana and at least threeof the five Gulf Islands of large accumulations of potsherds, the crude clay vessels fashioned hy the Indians for this purpose. The extensiveness of Louisiana's rock salt deposits does not appear to have been known to the Indians, but certain discoveries have been made that would seem to indicate that prehistoric man both knew of and worked them — either that, or the scientific theory that man and mastadon did not exist on the earth at one and the same time has been successfully refuted, for in the sinking of the shafts mastadon bones have been found intermingled in the same stratum with human bones, pottery and other relics, while at Avery Island a fragment of cane basket work was picked up on the face of the salt itself. The evaporated salt industry was quite an important one from the first settlement of Louisiana until after the war, not only in north Lou- isiana, where were located Price's salt works, King's salt works, and Rayburn's salt works, all known to fame, but also at Petite Anse, where salt had been manufactured from the year 1795, three years from the first attempt to evaporate salt from the great brine springs of New York State. During the war salt sold as high as $15 a barrel, and both Confederates and Federals depended upon Louisiana for a large portion of their supply. With the march of progress, however, with its incident economy of manufacture, its increased transportation facilities, its freight rate differentials — all speaking active competition, the industry, carried on intermittently until 1S94, died out altogether in that year, and has never been revived. The great rock salt deposits of Louisiana were discovered by accident in May, 1862. Salt was very scarce at that time, and the proprietor of the Island's salt works, John Marsh Avery, determined to profit by it. With this end in view he commenced to deepen his wells. One negro workman, after going down 16 feet, came to Mr. Avery with the news that he had struck a sunken log, and could proceed no further. Mr. Avery investigated, and found, not a log, hut the great rock salt deposit that has made Louisiana famous throughout the country. The discovery did not come altogether as a surprise, as Thomassy had predicted that a great rock salt deposit would be one day uncovered in each of the five Gulf Islands, and perhaps in other portions of the state. Since the close of the war, rock salt has heen an important contrib- uting factor in the mineral wealth of the state. Until 1903, when mining operations were commenced by the Myles Salt Company at the great Weeks' Island deposit, Avery Island had the only active salt mine in the state. The deposit at Belle Isle was worked for some time, but the shaft was destroyed by water, with a loss estimated at over a million and a half dollars. Weeks' Island is situated a hundred miles west of New Orleans, and about twenty-five miles from Franklin, on an arm of beautiful Vermilion Bay, being connected to the mainland by a branch of the Southern Pacific Railway. It is a beautiful island, with a topography and an outlook as charming as can be found anywhere on the Gulf 199 Coast, Archaelogically, also, it is interesting, for it is the possessor of one of the largest Indian shell mounds known. This mound is 600 feet long, 3,260 feet broad and 10 feet high, and from it numerous skeletons, arrow heads and other Indian relics have been taken. It is supposed to have been the burial ground of an important Indian tribe. Although salt was not discovered at Weeks' Island until 1897, it had been prospected for at intervals from 1S62, in the excitement following the discovery of the Avery deposit. The discoverer of the Weeks' Island deposit was General P. F. Myles, who with his brother, Mr. Beverly B. Myles, present president of the Myles Salt Company, has done more, perhaps, than any living man to develop the salt resources of the state. A visit to the Myles salt mine is of peculiar interest. Arriving at Weeks' Island, on the company's own train, we ascend the sloping hill to the plant, which stands sentinel above the Gulf. A few minutes later we enter the shaft, and are being carried down to the mine itself, 600 feet below the surface, a unique sensation, especially when we look upward, and watch that ball of light, the last vestige of the outside world, gradually grow smaller and smaller, and ultimately disappear. Arriving at the bottom, we step out on to a floor of solid salt — salt everywhere — no artificial scaffolding as in most mines, just pillars and columns, columns and pillars, of solid salt — six billion tons of it alto- gether, so the scientists say. The depth of this deposit is unknown, as no shaft has been sunk lower than 650 feet, this not having been neces- sary, as the amount of salt available at this depth is more than suffi- cient to meet the demand for many years to come. Having found our bearings, we start out for an inspection of the mine itself, each carrying a tallow candle to light him on his way, and warn the mule trains, which seem to wind like grim octopuses in every conceivable direction. Passing through the first great chamber, which has the appearance and the grim grandeur of sorne ancient cathedral, we arrive at a point where active operations are being carried on. Rock salt is mined in very much the same manner as are all the baser minerals. The first operation is the drilling of the holes for the insertion of the dynamic charges, rock salt having a resisting power AWAITING TURN AT THE GIN 200 of 5,000 pounds to the square inch. This is accomplished by 11-foot drills. The salt is cut out in tunnel form, arched columns being left to prevent a collapse. These tunnels are 750 to 1,000 feet long and SO to 100 feet wide, and of about the same height. The blasting is generally done at night, as well to prevent accident as to allow the atmosphere to clear in time for the following day's work. As blasted, the salt is loaded on regular narrow gauge mule trains, which carry it to the foot of the shaft. The negroes who do this work are all swarthy-looking fellows, with skins as smooth and as shiny as the finest porpoise leather, due to the action of the salt, for salt is unquestionably the greatest skin remedy known. As we stand and look around us, we are indeed inspired and awed — the dusky shovelers clothed only from the waist, the mule trains, some empty, some loaded, fitting here, there and everywhere, the huge piles of salt, 99.84 per cent pure chloride of sodium, the glittering lights, the lurking shadows, and above all the grandeur of the mines themselves, they constitute indeed a scene that will focus itself forever upon our memories. Retracing our steps to the foot of the shaft, we pause for a moment to watch the salt pass through the great 40 horse-power electric-motor- driven crusher, an operation that is accomplished so speedily that we cannot detect even a single detail. After being crushed, the salt is fed by gravitation into the cage and carried to the mill, where it is fed automatically into screens and sepa- rated into the various commercial grades, and, if shipped in bulk, de- posited by gravity into the cars; if the contrary, automatically fed into sacks. Again we are headed for terra firma, glad to be once more in God's own outdoors, but sorry to leave behind us what is undoubtedly one of the most remarkable sights in this state of many wonders. TIMBER RESOURCES. Second only to the much larger state of Washington in the vastness of her timber resources and the value of her annual cut, Louisiana, possessing, in untold quantities, such soft and hard woods as long and short leaf pine, cypress, almost every known variety of oak; hickory, gum, pecan, Cottonwood, ash, magnolia, maple, and the largest known varieties of elm is, by a very large margin, the greatest lum'bering state in the South. With a timber area of over four million acres, with more than five hundred sawmills in constant operation, with an army of at least 25,000 men in active employment, with an annual cut of two and a half billion feet, or one-sixth of the total yellow pine cut of the country, the manu- facture of yellow pine is at present the most important branch of Lou- isiana's great lumber industry. Yellow pine occurs in 31 of Louisiana's 60 parishes, and is said to cut more to the acre than the pine of any other state. In the southern and middle part of the state there are to be found immense forests of 201 SECOND GROWTH PIXE the long-leafed pine that has built up the famous lumber industries of Georgia and Florida, while throughout the northern sections of the state short-leafed pine of a superior character is very plentiful. Scat- tered throughout the state, too, there are hundreds of sawmills that in construction and capacity are the equal of any to be found in the world; in fact it can be said with truth that the Louisiana lumberman has set a new standard in sawmill construction. In Bogalusa, Louisiana boasts the largest lumber town in the United States, if not in the world — and one of the most unique. Not one of those lumber towns that is established today to be abandoned tomorrow, Bogalusa has been built up on the broad and comprehensive lines of permanency that should assure her a continuation of prosperity long after the timber to which she owes her present well-being has become a memory of yesterday. The City of Bogalusa, owned and controlled by the Great Southern Lumber Company — every building in the corporate limits being either leased or rented from it, is a pleasing example of the prosperous American city. Modern in every detail, it has two hotels — one of which, the Great Southern, would be a monument to any town of 50,000 inhab- itants or more — a splendid high and two good common schools, churches of all denominations, a modern hospital, a fine library, one of the most substantial Y. M. C. A.'s in the state, a modern sewerage system, an elaborate electric light plant, a good water system, cement sidewalks, a fire protection service and all the other conveniences of the city of today. The help is entirely segregated, the white, Italian and colored ele- ments all being established in different sections of the town. The houses, of which there are about 700, are rented by the company to the help at a nominal figure, those for the white hands being lighted by electricity and equipped with bath, running water, model washstand, and all other modern conveniences; those for the colored differing very materially from the class of residence that is usually found in a mill town, being fitted with glass windows and running water. Six hundred and fifty thousand to seven hundred and fifty thousand feet a day — that is the capacity of the great Bogalusa sawmill. In 202 other words, this great mill is devastating the pine forests of its terri- tory at the rate of 40 to 50 acres a day. How this is accomplished is an interesting story. The company's own 45-mile standard railroad ex- tends its tentacles into the surrounding woods, where some four hundred and fifty men are constantly employed in felling the trees, cutting them to the desired length and operating the great steam jiggers which load the finished log on to the train. When loaded, the train is run to the mill pond, which is encircled by a track elevated to an angle of 30 degrees, which permits the logs to roll off into the water immediately the supports have been removed. This pond is over 27 acres in extent and has a storage capacity of about 7,000,000 cubic feet of timber. The logs are diverted to the slip by the slip feeders, men who are especially trained to maintain their balance on floating logs. The slip, a chain contrivance, grips the log and auto- matically carries it up to the saw. There are two slips in this mill, each having a capacity of 150 logs an hour. The saw's automatic ma- chinery, controlled by two doggers, men who work the levers of the dogs, the technical name for the vise that grapples the log, grips the log with lightning swiftness; the setter does his work, the sawyer his; the log is sized and cut into the length required in a moment of time that to the uninitiated seems both infinitesimal and marvelous. There are four band saws in the Bogalusa mill, each 44 feet in length and each capable of cutting simultaneously two logs in as many as 32 1-inch boards. As the log is cut, the resultant lumber is carried off automatically to either the shipping platforms or to the drying kilns, of which there are 22. These kilns are heated by 65 miles of steam pip