articles. This trade will be more and more valuable as that country fills up with people. Why do our merchants when from home in quest of goods buy in New York, domestic goods, which are produced in Rhode Island and Massachusetts? The New Yorker purchases them at the east and puts his profits on them. Why should Ohio pay these profits? The article of fish, a great amount of which we consume annually, should always be bought in Boston or even farther eastward. The savings in the purchase of these things in Massachusetts and Rhode Island, would in a few years, amount to a million of dollars. Why not add this million to our wealth? Why not go to Montreal and obtain our English cloths, and order them home, and then rapidly proceed to Boston and Providence and procure their productions, and return to Ohio, through New York, Philadelphia and Pittsburgh, and there complete the assortments? Our trade to the south is very important to us, and is daily increasing in amount and value. Our cotton, sugar, coffee and spice are brought to us from the south. When we have more houses established in New Orleans, Tampico, Cuba and St. Domingo, more of our productions will there be sold, consumed and paid for, in the productions of those regions. Steamers, such as navigate lake Erie, rigged with tall masts, carrying sails would best suit the navigation of the Gulf of Mexico. The people of Ohio can build and navigate them from island to island, and from port to port; extending our commerce, and enriching our citizens. Our coffee, our cotton and sugar should be purchased by us on the spot, where they are produced. Our commerce on the upper lakes should be increased an nually, and those seas covered with our sails. The fisheries on those lakes, ought to contribute at least a million of dollars' worth of fish annually to this state. All these extensions of our trade and navigation will increase our manufactures, and open new outlets, for our agri cultural products. They will extend and increase the number of our yards, for building ships. They will demand more iron, more founderies, for making machinery for steamers, and more men to labor in these factories. These men will need clothes to cover them, and food to support them and their families. The trade, navigation and fisheries of the Upper lakes, ought, at no distant day, to support one million of our citizens living on the shore, and near it, of lake Erie. Another million might easily be supported by the trade, navigation and manufactures connected with the western rivers. Ten millions more could easily find a support, and full and profitable employment, in the interior of this state, on their farms, in their shops, offices, stores and factories of all sorts. The valley of the Mississippi, the largest one on the globe, contains ample space in addition to the Upper lakes, for us, in which, to move about and act. In this large theatre, we should be the actors. On these boards the people of the East may be as they please, either the actors or the audience. Laying aside the figure, their productions will be very different from ours, and will not compete with us, in any market. Ours, consisting of food for the planter and his laborers, of hay and horses to eat it, of cotton bagging, and gins to clean his cotton, of boilers and steam engines, with which to manufacture his sugar, will not compete with Maine, with her ice and tripes packed in it, of fishes, either fresh or salted, of lumber, such as boards spars and staves. Massachusetts and Rhode Island may carry their cloths and their fishes, and Connecticut her wooden clocks, but Ohio will not be in their way. ! Name, place, and date. Loans and Due from Specie. Commercial Bank, Cincinnati, Jan. 4, 1836 3,103,461 501,847 666,787 Franklin Bank, Lafayette Bank, do. do. 1,195,414 142,861 204,628 do. 1,987,571 140,033 105,650 Ohio Life and Trust Co., do. January, 1836 1,515,952 357,116 268,984 7,802,398 1,141,857 1,246,049 Oct. 17, 1836 591,742 86,681 119,531 Miami Exporting Co., do, Franklin Bank of Columbus, Columbus, Urbana Banking Co. Urbana, Jan. 5, 1836 On or near Lake Erie: Western Reserve Bank, Warren, Jan. 9, 1836 STATE OF AGRICULTURE, PRICE OF LANDS, PROVISIONS AND LABOR. The state of agriculture has improved greatly within a few years past. There are farms in the vicinity of all our larger towns, in a good state of cultivation, and our farmers every where, either have already, or soon will have good substantial houses, barns and out houses. These are not only commodious and substantial but sometimes even elegant. In New Connecticut, almost every farmer has an elegant dwelling house. In that part of the state, we see more framed than brick houses; in some parts, though, brick houses predominate. In the remainder of the state, brick is preferred as the cheapcst, most durable and best. The materials for brick are near the spot when they are needed; the wood to make fuel, and burn them, needs to be cleared off, and the farmer and his sons can make the brick without hiring any of the work done. Within a very few years, after the farmer had settled down in the woods, we generally see around him a well fenced, well cultivated farm, with good buildings, and a good orchard coming forward. In a few more years his children will be grown up, married and settled on farms of new land like the one on which they were brought up. Thus the forest recedes before us, and a highly cultivated country smiles far and wide around us. Farmers in parts of New Connecticut, in Washington county, and along the upper part of the Scioto country have, during twenty years past, turned their attention to dairies and the manufacture of cheese. The business has been profitable, but enough is not made yet for our own consumption. The apple tree flourishes in all parts of the state, and cider is so abundant some years, as to sell for only one dollar a barrel. Many apples are carried down the Ohio river to New Orleans, and the lower country. The price of land varies from one dollar and twenty-five cents, to one hundred dollars an acre. The price of labor is fifty per cent. higher than in the Atlantic states, and provisions are about fifty per cent. cheaper than there. Mechanics of all sorts get higher wages, and where they settle in towns, as they mostly do, they get rich in few years, if they are industrious, and well understand their business. Laborers by the day, month or job, can always get employment, high wages and prompt payment, in cash, on our public works our roads and canals. It will continue to be so for ages, because this state will never cease to improve the country by canals and roads. Every dollar laid out thus, by the state, will pay an interest that will forever make it the duty of the state, to proceed in her internal improvements. So that any young man in the East, who wishes to become a good substantial farmer, may come to Ohio, get employment, buy a farm, pay for it, own and improve it, and be an independent citizen of this great and growing state. Manures have been but little used yet, in this state. Such is the natural fertility of the soil, that farmers have neglected to make use of their manure. Compost is unknown to our farmers, and plaster of Paris is, as yet, but little used. That many parts of Ohio would be the better for manure we doubt not, nor do we doubt but that when the lands are more worn by cultivation, that manure will be used by farmers. The best soil is doubtless one that contains sand enough in its composition to prevent its baking or becoming hard after a rain, and which also contains clay enough in it, to retain sufficient moisture. That our hilly region, whose soil is composed of such materials as these, possesses within itself a mineral richness, scarcely equaled any where else, is certain; hence, all our hilly region has deceived every one, almost, who saw it covered with a forest. Such lands are coming into high repute for farms; and whole counties, once deemed poor, are settling rapidly, and will continue to do so for a long time to come. Their soil is as good for grain, especially wheat, as any portions of the state, formerly supposed to be preferable. A2* |