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AFRICA. The year 1868 is memorable in the history of Africa for the English-Abyssinian war. (See ABYSSINIA.)

It is now generally conceded that the Suez Canal, the greatest engineering work of history, will be a success. Vessels of light draught already pass it, but it will yet require a very large expenditure of money before the work is thoroughly completed so that a ship drawing twenty-five feet of water can pass from the Mediterranean to the Red Sea. When completed, the work cannot fail to have a powerful influence upon developing the resources of Egypt and promoting civilization in Eastern Africa. (See EGYPT.)

The states of Northern Africa, especially Algeria and Morocco, again suffered from a frightful famine. About Algeria, a letter from the Rev. J. B. Ginsburg, dated Algiers, July 10, 1868, gives the following information:

"The famine brought on by drought and the plague of locusts and cholera has exhausted the native resources, gradually assuming most distressing proportions, and literally decimating the native population. They die, not from any disease, but from starvation. They first fed on the grass of the field and the leaves of trees; the filth collected in dust-carts was a luxury. They then dug out and ate animals which had died from starvation. In travelling, I saw these creatures, shrunk to skin and bone, surrounding the dwarf palms and thistles, which they thought delicious fare. Voracious jackals are deprived of any chance animal lying dead in the country. Men attack carts laden with manure, and pull out the cabbagestalks and turnip-tops. Women grub in the horse-litter for the undigested grains of corn and barley, and wash and eat them with avidity. Children throw themselves upon the sweepings of the house, and dispute with the dogs the bones and other pitiful refuse found upon the heaps of rubbish, smash and gnaw them. This appalling distress at last impelled the famished beings to acts of violence and unheard-of vileness and cannibalism. They attacked men and beasts, and even killed their own children, salted, and ate them. In spite of hundreds of thousands of francs sent over from France, the famished Bedouins perish in incredible numbers. Bodies are still found side by side in the ditches, on the high-roads, or in the brooks, devoured by hyenas or jackals.".

In Morocco the situation was reported to be even worse than in Algeria. According to an account in the Paris Constitutionnel, numbers of persons were constantly dying of hunger. The roads were covered every morning with the dying and the dead. The rich were powerless to save these poor creatures; and the number of those who perished, either of hunger or the epidemic, was estimated at onefourth of the entire population. "It is not, as will be seen," says the Constitutionnel, "Algeria alone which has just passed through a deplorable crisis. In Tunis, as in Morocco, the

populations, ravaged with cholera, ruined by invasions of locusts such as were never before seen in the memory of man, and suffering two years of drought, were, in the summer of 1868, plunged into the deepest suffering. Fortunately, in Algeria a good harvest repaired, so far as it was possible, the losses experienced by those tribes in the earlier months of the year, and it was hoped that the wants of the coming winter might be met by the provisions made for giving employment, by the exercise of charity, and various kinds of assistance judiciously rendered."

The insecurity of foreign residents in Tunis led to strong remonstrances on the part of France and other powers; for a time, the French consul broke off diplomatic relations with the Tunisian government, but in May a new convention was concluded, satisfying the demands of France.

An important change took place in the government of the island of Madagascar. The Queen Raosheima, who, though not a persecutor of Christianity, was opposed to its progress, died, and her successor showed herself at once a zealous patron of the Christian missions. In consequence of. this change of policy, a strong feeling in favor of Christianity has set in among all classes of the population, and a speedy Christianization of the whole country is looked for, Madagascar has now treaties with many of the Christian countries. That with the United States was promulgated by President Johnson in October, 1868. (See MADAGASCAR.)

To put an end to the war between the Orange Free State and the Basutos, Governor Wodehouse, of the Cape colony, at the beginning of the year, declared the Basutos to be taken under the British protectorate. In defiance of this notice, President Brand, of the Orange Free State, continued the war, and met with marked success. The Basuto strongholds Tandjesberg and Treine were captured. At the former, Bushuli, the brother of Moshesh (chief of the Basutos), was killed. On February 22d, the Free State burghers captured, with the loss of only three men, the native stronghold Kilme, with 1,500 horses, 8,000 sheep and goats, and 11,000 head of cattle. In March Governor Wodehouse issued a proclamation, declaring the Basutos British subjects, and the country inhabited by them British territory. The commander of the English frontier police in Basuto-land, Sir Walter Currie, wrote to Commandant Joubert (of the Orange Free State), requesting him to abstain from any acts of aggression against the Basutos, and informing him that if any such were attempted he should feel bound to aid the Basutos in resisting them. To this the commandant replied that he had no instructions to acknowledge Sir Walter's authority, and requested that he would restrain the Basutos, and clear them out of the conquered territory. An offer of the governor of the Free State of three hundred farms in the Basuto territory,

to be held under British title, was submitted by the president to the Volkwasd of the Free State, and rejected by them. The Volkrand decided to send a deputation to the British Government to represent their case; and they requested Governor Wodehouse to stay all proceeding till the reaalt should be known. The governor said he would consent if the president would give guarantees for the preservation of peace in the mean time. The president's reply did not lead to a perfect understanding, but entwegnently the Free State relinquished the boste position it had assumed in reference to the British protection of Basutoland, and a depotation waited upon Governor Wodehouse to inquire if there was any possibility of the Free State joining the Federal Union with the Honth-African colonies, and annexing it to the British crown, to which the governor returned a very guarded reply.

The President of the Transvaal Republic, Pratorins, has annexed, by proclamation, a territory about three times the size of the present repablic. It has become known that, in the northern districts of this republic, debased Europeans, taking advantage of the distance of the district from the centres of population and power, have revived the slavetrade in its worst form. A strong movement for putting down this new slave-trade has begun in the towns. The discovery of rich gold-fields in the republic and in the neighboring districts has, of late, called special attention to this republic (see TRANSVAAL REPUBLIC). The expedition which the Portuguese, in Mozambique, undertook into the exterior, had a fatal issue, the larger portion of the expedition being massacred by the natives.

The following table exhibits the area and population of the principal divisions of Africa.*

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Among the most important of the native states belonz, besides Morocco, Tunis, Tripoli, and Egypt, the area and population of which have been given in the above list, the following: Liberia, 9.567 square miles, 717,500 inhabitants: Abyssinia 158.392 square miles, 3,000,000 inhabitants; the Orange Free State, 48.049 square miles, 50.000 inhabitants; the Transvaal Republic, 77.964 square miles, 120,000 inhabitants: Madagascar, 232,315 square miles, 5.000,000 inhabitants.

Christianity is steadily advancing in Africa. It is the ruling religion in the large possessions and dependencies of England, France, Spain, Portugal, Netherlands, in Abyssinia, Liberia, the Orange Free State, and the Transvaal Republic. To these states Madagascar will soon be added, as the new Queen favors Christianity, and the Christianization of the country makes rapid progress. The population which is in connection with or under the influence of the Protestant Church is estimated as follows: British possessions, 500,000; Algeria, 10,000; Egypt, 10.000; Liberia, 40,000; Madagascar, 50.000; Orange Free State, 15,000; Transvaal Republic, 30,000; Kaffraria, and Basuto Territory, 30,000; total 685,000. The Roman Catholic population is estimated at 1,106,200: embracing 140,000 in the British possessions; 133,000 in the French; 439,000 in the Portuguese; 12,000 in the Spanish; 100,000 in Angola, Benguela, and Mozambique; 190,000 in Algeria; 50,000 in Egypt; 30,000 in Abyssinia; 200 in Morocco; 10,000 in Tunis and Tripoli; and 2,000 in Madagascar. About 3,000,000 in Abyssinia, and 200,000 in Egypt, are connected with Eastern Churches; making the total Christian population of Africa about 5,000,000.

AGRICULTURE. In the article AGRICULTURE, in the ANNUAL CYCLOPÆDIA for the year 1867, it was found impossible to obtain accurate statistics of the crops of that year, owing to an unusual delay in making the returns to the Agricultural Department of the Government. They were not, in fact, collated and published in full till about the first of June, 1868. The estimates given were, however, a very close approximation to the actual figures, as a comparison of the following tables with the estimates of that volume will demonstrate. For further comparison, and as indicating the advance in the quantity of agricultural products, we give the aggregates of 1850 and of 1860 also:

Morocco......

259,593

Algeria,

258,317

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45,710

Square miles. Inhabitants. 2,750,000 2,921,246 950,000

Tripoll (inclusive of Barca and fezzan).

844,423

Egyptian Territory..

659,081

Hahara.....

2,436,473

Mohammedan empires of the

Middle Soudan..

631,017

The Western Soudan, inclusive

British, Portuguese,

and

Dutch possessions..

Eastern Africa (including Abys-|

minin)..

818,536 1,594,550

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Following the same order in regard to crops, we give our usual brief notes of the crops of 1868:

The MAIZE, or INDIAN CORN, crop, though much better than that of 1867, and of larger amount than the crop of 1859-'60 (specified above), is yet a decrease in proportion to the increase of population. The Pacific States and Territories are unsuited to the production of Indian corn, and the amount raised there is very slight. Leaving these States and Territories out of the account, the corn crop of 1868 was, in round numbers, 905,178,000 bushels. Its quality was generally very good, though in Iowa, Southern Illinois, and some other low lands, there was more smut than usual.

The WHEAT crop is slightly larger than last year, though it will not probably exceed 225,000,000 bushels. The promise of the early summer was not realized at the harvest. The acreage devoted to wheat was considerably greater than the previous year, but it is a fact which ought to excite alarm, that the yield to the acre in the older wheat-fields is rapidly decreasing. Land which, twenty years ago, yielded twenty-eight to thirty bushels to the acre, and ten years ago from eighteen to twenty-two bushels, now produces only from nine to twelve bushels, and wheat is ceasing to be a paying crop. The whole wheat-growing region east of the Mississippi has, within ten years past, barely held its own-Wisconsin, Illinois, Michigan, Indiana, and Ohio, but just making up the deficiency in New York, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, Kentucky, and the other States of the Atlantic slope. The production of even the most fertile of these States, to the acre, is decreasing year by year, and their aggregates are only kept up or increased by the enlarged area devoted to this crop. On the other hand, the territory lying between the Mississippi River and the Pacific Ocean, which, in 1859, produced but 25,000,000 bushels, harvested, in 1868, above 65,000,000. bushels, more than one-fourth of the whole being yielded by California. The yield to the acre in that State is between thirty and forty bushels. The cause of this decreased production in the States east of the Mississippi is the abstraction, by continued cropping, of those constituents of the soil which go to the making of the wheat culm and berry. If these can be restored to the soil in full, the old yield per acre ought to be regained.

RYE, never a large crop, differs but little in amount from last year, with possibly a small gain from the greater plumpness of the berry. It may safely be put down at 24,000,000 bushels.

OATS are a very important crop. The yield was light in most of the Atlantic States; not a full average in Michigan, Wisconsin, and Iowa, but west of the Mississippi above the average. In California, oats are extensively mowed for hay before the grain is ripe, the ordinary grasses not enduring the long dry

season. The crop was not far from 272,000,000 bushels.

BARLEY is one of the smaller cereal crops, except on the Pacific, where it takes the place to a great extent of Indian corn. In the Atlantic and central States it is mainly grown for malt. The crop east of the Mississippi was smaller than last year; west of that river, and especially on the Pacific cost, it was somewhat larger. It did not probably exceed 25,000,000 bushels.

BUCKWHEAT was deficient in several of the States where it is grown. In Connecticut, New Jersey, Minnesota, and California it was quite up to the average. The yield in the aggregate was nearly 21,000,000 bushels.

The POTATO crop has favorably disappointed the farmers. It was thought early in the season that it would prove seriously deficient in Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, New York, and Pennsylvania, and that these great deficiencies would reduce the aggregate below that of last year, though Southern New England, New Jersey, Delaware, the Gulf States, and California reported a more than average crop. The aggregate production, however, proves to be about 11 per cent. in advance of last year, and though it does not approach to the enormous crop of 1859, it will probably not fall below 75,000,000 bushels. The sweet-potato crop is also larger than last year.

TOBACCO is an uncertain crop, though, when successful, a profitable one. The returns are incomplete, even from the States where it is most largely grown, but, so far as can be determined, indicate a crop of about 332,000,000 of pounds.

The HAY crop was almost uniformly good, Florida and Kansas being the only marked exceptions, and in neither State is the hay crop of prime importance. The returns indicate a yield of about 32,500,000 tons.

COTTON, Concerning which there were serious apprehensions during the summer from the depredations of the army worm, proves to have somewhat exceeded the aggregate of. last year, though upon fewer acres. The following is the estimate of the Commissioner of Agriculture in December, which, as he himself acknowledges, was undoubtedly below the truth. Later reports bring up the aggregate to fully 2,500,000 bales of 400 lbs. each.

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sion in woollen manufactures, which has caused many wool-growers to sell both lambs and ewes to the butchers, as the most profitable method of disposing of them. The markets have been throughout the year glutted with carcasses of mutton; and the number of sheep, which had increased with great rapidity during the past seven or eight years, must have diminished during the year 1868. The wool-clip is stated at 104,000,000 pounds.

Of other crops less universally cultivated, SORGHUM seems to have been about the same in quality as last year; the SUGAR from the CANE, which is made in only five States to any extent, viz., Georgia, Florida, Louisiana, Texas, and Arkansas, was a much larger crop than in any previous year since 1860, in Louisiana the production being more than twice that of 1867, and in the other States from 15 to 30 per cent. more. The production of SUGAR from the SUGAR BEET, though it has not yet attained to any considerable prominence, is increasing, not only in Illinois, but also in California, where it bids fair to become an important branch of agricultural labor, and in several other States.

The Hop crop, in 1868, has been for the most part a failure; the blight and aphis have both seriously injured the crop, and the importation has been so large as to depress the price to about the cost of production. The hop-growers of the Wisconsin hop district, who in 1867 found hop-growing so profitable, were in 1868 completely in despair; many of them have abandoned their hop-yards or destroyed the vines.

FLAX has received in several States a new impulse from the new machinery for dressing and breaking it. In Michigan, Minnesota, Nebraska, and California, as well as in several of the Eastern States, a much greater breadth of land has been devoted to this crop than for many years past. The leguminous plants, BEANS and PEAS, have yielded a better crop than usual, though the demand is not so great for them as it was during the war.

Of FRUITS, the apple crop in Maine, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, North Carolina, Georgia, most of the Gulf States, Minnesota, Kansas, and California, was above the average, in all the other States far below. In Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Indiana, and Illinois, it was an entire failure, and in several other States where it was usually one of the most staple crops the product was not one-half that of the previous year. The PEAR crop was also deficient in most of the States, North Carolina, Georgia, Louisiana, Texas, Arkansas, and California being the only exceptions.

The PEACH crop was deficient, except in Michigan, Illinois, Missouri, and the Gulf States.

The yield of GRAPES on the Atlantic seaboard was very small, and they were of indifferent quality. In the interior, and especially in the Seneca Lake district, New York, in

the vicinity of Lakes Erie and Ontario, in Missouri, and in California, they were abundant and of excellent quality. The culture of the grape, both for the fruit and for wine, has attained such magnitude in our country that it must be regarded as one of the most important of the minor crops. Its annual product in fruit and wine is not less than ten millions of dollars, and it is increasing in a very rapid ratio. In the Southern States, grape-culture has excited less attention, especially with reference to the manufacture of wine. The varieties of the grape most in favor at the North have not generally proved as successful at the South; and though the Catawba, Norton's Virginia, and the Herbemont, were all grapes of Southern origin, neither the Southern Atlantic nor the Gulf States have given any great attention to their development. A native grape of very marked character, and though possessing some faults, yet apparently well adapted to the production of some classes of wines, has recently attained considerable notoriety, though it has long been cultivated rather negligently, in the South. It is called the Scuppernong, and there seem to be three subvarieties of it, the white, the black, and the purple, all possessing similar characteristics, but differing in the degree of acidity, and in some of their qualities for the production of wine. This grape, which can only be cultivated successfully in the long and warm summers of the South, will doubtless greatly improve by careful cultivation. It has a positive character, is very hardy and full of vitality, and is said not to be subject to mildew or blight, to yield plentifully, and to be incapable of propagation except from seeds or layers. It is said also to be the only grape which is free from the attacks of the grapevine borer (Ægeria polistiformis), which gnaws the roots of the grape-vine, and does great mischief in Ohio and Missouri.

The number of bushels, acreage, and value of farm products for the year 1867, and also the average yield per acre of farm products in each State, the same year, was as follows. The value of these statistics in indicating the degeneration of the soil for staple crops, and the importance of the agricultural interest, cannot be overestimated:

Table showing estimated quantities, acreage, and aggregate value of the principal crops of the farm

in 1867.

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TABLE SHOWING THE AVERAGE YIELD OF FARM PRODUCTS PER ACRE FOR THE YEAR 1867.

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The stock-raisers of the country have met with heavy losses during the past year from the splenic or Texan fever, pleuro-pneumonia, and other diseases among horned cattle, for a full account of which see "CATTLE, RECENT EPIDEMIC DISEASES OF," in this volume; the mortality among swine, from Hog Cholera, has also been very great, amounting, according to the statement of the Commissioner of Agriculture, to not less than $15,000,000. There have been also complaints of heavy losses in the flocks of sheep in Illinois, Texas, and some other States from grub, scab, and foot-rot. In Texas and Georgia an epidemic which seems to partake of the character of cerebro-spinal meningitis, has prevailed with very fatal results among the horses.

The new textile fibre, Ramie, is attracting much attention, and is likely to be very thoroughly tested during the coming year. Senator Sprague, of Rhode Island, one of the largest manufacturers of cotton and woollen goods in the United States, has become so fully satisfied of its good qualities, that he has purchased a large estate in Florida to be devoted exclusively to its cultivation. It is said to be very hardy, not liable to be attacked by any of the known insect depredators, to produce a fibre intermediate in character between silk and linen, and to yield somewhat more than three times as large a quantity to the acre as cotton, and in the extreme South to produce three or four crops a year. It is cultivated much in the

same way as sugar-cane. How much of all this is true will probably be known a year hence.

The immense waste of sewage matters, especially in our great cities, and the startling decrease in the fertility of our cultivated lands, after a few years of liberal crops, despite the attempts to renew their productiveness by artificial or carefully-husbanded natural manures, have properly excited the solicitude of largeminded and intelligent agriculturists. The most promising plan for restoring in part to the soil the elements of fertility, which have been drawn from it by the consumption of food, would seem to be the adoption of some method of deodorizing and disinfecting human excrementitious matters, and using them as fertilizers. This is very perfectly and readily accomplished, wherever they can be used, by Rev. Henry Moule's earth-closets. The disinfectant and deodorizer which he uses is simply dried earth, which possesses great power of absorption, and prevents any unpleasant odor. It can be used by his system repeatedly for this purpose by simple drying, and then becomes a more active and perfect fertilizer than the best guano. The fertility of the cultivated lands of China and Japan, which have been for three or four thousand years under cultivation, has been maintained by the use of these manures. Many of the failures of our great staple crops, from rust and blight, from midge and Hessian fly, from army and boll worm, from caterpillars

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