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. JOHNSTON'S NOTES ON NORTH •AMERISA.* aft. JOHNSTON, the well-known agricultural writer, was requested by the legislature of New Brunswick to survey their Province and to give his opinion upon its agricultural capabilities ; their faith in which had been shaken by various eireumstancesi—our free trade legislation, the failure of the wheat and 'potato crops, the emigration of unemployed liunberers to the forests of the Southern States, and of dissatisfied farmers to the West and California. In compliance.with this desire, Mr. Johnston left Liverpool for Ha-

in July 1849. From Halifax he drove across Nova Scotia to Annapolis; whence he steamed to St. Sohn, the chief port, and to Frederickton, the capital of New Brunswick. Eventually, Mr. Zohnston may be said to have traversed the confines of the pro- Pvince, and to have surveyed in. -a rapid manner nearly the whole of the settled regions, not always well known to the Provincials themselves. • But this was done at intervals : he made tours through the United States, as far South as Virginia; as far North as Buffalo on Lake Erie, and thence descended the St. Lawrence, WI he reached the neighbourhood of New Brunswick. The time occupied in the tours was about eight months.

The leading fault of the book of Notes is its length. This in part arises from the author's lecturing habit of prolixity, and a prone- ness to digressive discussion on topics of policy, which though sug- gested by the occasion are so general that they might be discussed anywhere. A main source of the length, however, is the great va- riety of subjects which engage the traveller's attention. Agricul- ture in a -wide sense, embracing the system of husbandry, with the appearance of the country and the crops, is of course Mr. Johnston's first object. Geology and mineralogy, as well as the inevitable agri- cultural conclusions to which they lead, come next ; and with all these things are mingled the history of particular settlers and the prospects of emigrants from the Old Country. There is besides the usual matter of a book of travels, the story of the day's journey, the persons encountered, the observations on manners and customs, and the little incidents that give life and interest to a tour. The most important and attractive feature of the work just now, how- ever, is the comparison between British and American agriculture, the inquiry into the effect of the American system upon the soils of the New World, and the speculation as to whether America can long continne its present supplies of bread-stuffs to Europe. These topics are continually turning up, and are oftener than once formally discussed; with negative conclusions. From the ignorance of the cultivators, the want Of capital, the scarcity of labour, and probably, as_Mr. Johnston seems inclined to think, from Wing the. process. most natural to a new country, the system of agriculture is slovenly and scourging. As soon as the land is cleared, it is exhausted by crop upon crop without proper rotation or manuring, till cultiva- tion. ceases tube profitable. . There is not the skill or the will to attempt to restore the virtue of the soil : in thinly-settled dis- tricts, indeed, it is more profitable to clear new land than to restore the old, especially with the knowledge and means of the actual cultivators. The time requisite for this exhaustion- of the soil depends upon circumstances. In poor lands it is quickly, done ; in rich bottom lands it is astonishing how long the soil will answer the most scourging demands upon it; but sooner or later the exhaustion is complete. Hence, cultivation for more than home consumption, is continually receding further West ; even now some of the Atlantic districts (New York, for example) do not, grow wheat enough' for themselves, but have to import it. Every successive year adds to the further exhaustion of the sea- board soils, while it witnesses an increase of the population. In the new Western States the growing demand conduces to both these results ; removing the wheat-producing districts still further and further from the countries to be supplied, and liroiting, though not as yet perceptibly, the fertile land that can yield the aupplies. Of course the exhausted lands of the old States can be rendered productive by time and treatment ; but this - is a process which requires capital and skill It is also an expensive and a slow, process. Before it can be practically accomplished— that is, under existing circumstances—the population of America Will greatly increase to eat up the wheat ; while the wheat itself can only be preduced in the older States at a cost similar to that of Great Britain. Mr. Johnston frequently intimates his opinion, that we have seen the best (or, as Protectionists would say, the worst) of American importation. The following is, his formal con- clusion, after an elaborate review of his experience and the statistics. "I doubt very much if the United States can in ordinary years, spare even so large an export of wheat as this to' meet the united demands of New ltrunswick, Nova Scotia, Newfoundland, the West Indies, and their many her markets besides that of England ; and, as I have elsewhere stated, 1 lclieve the exportable wheat of the North American continent as a whale is already a dimininhing quantity."

Besides its direct bearing on the leartburning question of pro- tection or free trade, which may possibly turn up again, the in- quiries into the exhaustion of soils is connected with another topic of interest—the failure of crops. In addition to the potato, the wheat- has- failed in several countries along the seaboard. Mr. johnston attributes this to degeneracy in the plant. When the Boil is exhausted, of its nutritive qualities by continual cropping with t particular plant, the plant itself degenerates, like an animal sup-

* NOtes on North America, Agricultural. Um:mica& and Social. By James F. ". Johnston, MA., Sex., Reader in Chemistry and Mineralogy in the University of chain.. In two volumes. Published by Blackwood and Sons. plied with insufficient food; and the longer the evil influence is at work, the more of course the constitution of the plant is enfeebled, till at last it becomes like a bad-conditioned patient, obnoxious to all outward evil influences, and even creating them internally. Some remedy for this may be found in change -of seed, but the true -remedy is in improved cultivation improving the soil. These two ample volumes are a proof of the advantage of a pur- suit, and skill in it, to a traveller who writes a book. Mr. John- ston was only occupied eight months in his journey ; a portion of that time was not spent in travel, and a great part of that travel was rapid journeying. But he brought to his task a thorough knowledge of his subject, and a practically trained eye, which knew what to look for, and recognized it as soon as it was seen. His cliaraeter and purpose brought him into connexion with men who gave him the results of their experience, in order to elicit a judgment; and not, as is often the case with royal and noble tra- vellers, to disguise the truth ; or they threw him among men who bad their stories to tell of struggle and success in a new country. Besides a vast mass of information oonnected with the-agriculture of America, the volumes contain much useful advice respecting emigration. The conclusion of Mr. Johnston, confirmed by the opinion of almost everybody he imet, is, "If, you are comfortable at home, stay there." Yf you go out with a moderate capital and a knowledge of agriculture, buy a' partially-cleared farm in a settled district, which to the ignorance of its owner seems exhausted, or which he is impatient to leave for some other field of exertion. If you have small means or none, engage yourself to a farmer till you have earned money and made yourself acquainted with the country and its capabilities. In all cases, make up your mind to hard work and the absence of " agremens " as well as of home comforts. After all, the main success, except with the mere la- bourer, is a provision for . children. Money cannot be made by farming in America ; and for speculation—whose very term implies its risk—we suspect that a congregation of men, money, and dupes, is essential. It may be questioned whether more has been made by " land-sales " in America than by railways in England ; whether the increased value of that belt of land, scarcely two miles wide, which surrounds the London of fifty years ago, is not more remarkable than any other the world can show.

One good. source of profitable speculation in a small way, if you are lucky enough to fall in with it, is the purchase of farms, The tie of home, or early association, has no influence in America, ex- eept in some of the alder States, and in connexion with educated and wealthy men. The farm where he was born, or the land which he has cleared, is to an American nothing more than a bale of goods : he will sell at any time for a price, and for a low one if he is in hopes of a profit elsewhere. The doubts already alluded ot touching the prospects of New Brunswick, with the disposition to emigrate, sometimes brought farms into the market "dirt cheap" when Mr. Johnston was there.

"I have alluded in the commencement of this chapter to the emigration from the province, which to some had been the cause of much anxiety. I heard at this place of the first striking example of the height to which the emigration fever will run. About eight miles from the mouth of the Eel river lies the Howard settlement, situated on a tract ef good sccend-rate up- land, in the township of Dumfries. In this settlement a farm is at present offered for sale, consisting of two hundred acres, of which sixty acres are cleared. Four acres are in wheat, two in Indian corn, 24 bushels of oats have been sown, of buckwheat and 20 of potatoes. There are also four cows' ' two ‘xen two horses, two heifers, fifteen sheep, 20 tops of hay, with a house 20 feet by 30, and a barn 30 feet by 40. The whole offered for 140/. currency (1121. ster- ling). The only condition is that of ready mbuey. The owner is said to be Mad to vo to Wisconsin. It ought not to surprise us that some of those who have shifted once—breaking loose from all ties of place and blood—should after a time have another access of the roving fit, and, right or wrong, in- sist on moving a second or ,a third time. Changing their country is to many like a change in their religion--they don't know when or where they ought to to " The following is an example of another kind, where an exhausted farm has been sold, and purchased at "less than half price,"' by a man who seemingly knew- how to use it. "23d August.—On leaving Woodstock this morning for Frederiekton, we drove along a rich internale, four miles in length, to'the ferry, where we crossed the river and proceeded down the left bank. While waiting for the boat, I made some inquiries regarding the ferry farm, on which I saw beau- , tiful crops of oats and Indian corn. This farm consists of eight hundred acres, of which from sixty to seventy are rich upper intervale land, pro- ducing forty bushels of oats and fifty of Indian corn, and valued by the owner at 101, an acre. The rest is upland. The owner tlught the whole two years ago for 700/. currency. It used to be valued at 1500/., but it has been long rented to an exhausting tenant, and the enitivated part has had no manure for thirty years. The selling-everything-off system was followed, and the rent in consequence had gradually fallen from 100/. to 401. a veer, when it was sold. This exhausting system has been, and indeed still is, as I have already remarked,. the almost universally followed one in North Ame- rica. Ultimate poverty is the consequence of it to the farmer's family, and finally a sale of the farm itself to some one who knows how to restore it. The old occupants then trudge farther West, buy cheaply in a new country, and again inflict the consequences of evil management on some still virgin spot. "This farm is a very promising one still, to judge by the crops of Indian corn oats, potatoes, and turnips I saw upon it. For money-returns in this quarter the farmer looks to his butter, cheese, and pork."

Agriculture, emigration, science, statistics, &c. are not the only topies of Mr. Johnston's tour. Manners and character are often described. In common with many other writers, Mr. Johnston notices the independence of children and of women; making some

obscure allusions upon the latter " evil " in great towns. cal!

"An anecdote told me by a friend at Dalhousie illustrates ve one of the most important of the social and domestic differences own homes, and those of most of our colonies, are distinguis the United States. A settler of many years at Dalhousie, a

trade, had saved 500/. in money, and had five or six boys gro

he took it in his head to go off to Wisconsin. Six months after his depar- ture, a small vessel from Quebec entered the harbour of Dalhousie, and, when evening came on, a depressed-looking man in shabby clothing landed from the vessel, and walked up to my house. When he came in, I was sur- prised to recognize my old neighbour the shoemaker. 'You are surprised,' he said; but though I was a fool to go away, I have had courage enough to come back. When I had got to Wisconsin, my boys—who had been good boys here—began to neglect their work, and disregard me. I durst not correct them, sir, or I should have been mobbed. They soon learned this, and my authority was gone. My heart was sore my money was melting away, my children were a sorrow instead of a comfort to me and talked of starting for themselves. I sold off and came down to Canada. Now, my boys,' says I have got you under the British flag again, and we'll have no more rebellion.' So I kept my boys in hand : but we did'nt get on as we used to do ; and, at last, I determined to come back to Dalhousie. What's the world to me, sir, if my boys are to be a vexation to me ? But I have'nt a penny of money; and our clothing is so scanty that I am ashamed to bring them all ashore in daylight.' " So I gave him,' added my informant, ' the use of a house of mine that happened to be empty; his wife and boys were brought ashore the same night ; and they are again an industrious, if not so united a family as be- fore.' "

Bishop Burnet observes in his Travels, that at Rome an universal civility reigns among all sorts of people; for no man knows what another may grow to, since a simple ecclesiastic may become Pope. The same idea prevails in America, but with a different result: the mass are rude, and the few servile, though in this story the errand- boy comes out the best.

A key to some part at least of this running wild of the children was afforded me by a little circumstance which occurred to me in Albany. A friend of mine had a boy of twelve or thirteen years employed in his office to run messages and do other small affairs. This boy several times brought me notes from his master ; and while waitingfor an answer, he would walk first to one table and examine the books and papers, then to another and do the same, and finally to the mirror, and arrange his hair in the coolest manner imaginable. I was amused with this for one or two visits. At last I said to him, that, in my country, we did not approve of little errand-boys taking such liberties, and showing so much conceit when they came into a gentle- man's rooms; and I requested that, when he came with messages to me in future, he would sit down quietly till I wrote an answer. The boy was amazed, but was very respectful ever after. His master told me nothing had ever mortified him so much, and at the same time done him so much good; but when I asked why he had never set the boy right himself, he gave me no reply. On telling the matter to an American lady of my acquaintance, how- ever, she asked me immediately= Were you not afraid to speak to the boy in that way ? That boy may be President of the United States yet.' And what then?' ' Why, he might do you a great deal of harm.' It was now my turn to look amazed. It is not a persuasion that it is best for the boy which restrains reproof, but a fear that it may be worse for the reprover. This fear of one another, I was assured by various persons, amounts often to a species of tyranny throughout this Union."

The religious freedom of opinion in society rather startled Mr. Johnston; discussions being raised upon topics that are avoided at home, and belief or rather disbelief more freely avowed than here. This is an example with a new sect.

"In an excursion I made on the Old Colony railroad, I had the fortune to meet a young, very amiable, and I have no doubt very sincere Universalist clergyman. He was on his return to his father's house from a preaching tour m Western New York. He described this singular sect as very prosper- ous and increasing : it numbers twelve hundred churches, seven hundred ministers, and sixty thousand communicants in the States. It is particu- larly strong in Massachusetts ; and, as he assured me, many of the Unitarian churches are believed to be tending towards them.

"This Universalist body possesses a very large measure of toleration; but he informed me that no exact statement of their doctrines is to be met with in books. They are not digested as yet ; they are only in fact beginning now to philosophize their opinions. They have among them men of almost all other sects; all agreeing to make their special doctrines non-essential, and to unite on the ground that all go to heaven together. My informant made morality a condition to the attainment of future happiness, by the be- lief that each man goes to heaven with the dispositions and relishes he has about him when he leaves the world, and thus is in a more or less fit state for the enjoyment of heaven, occupies a higher or lower position of happi- ness, according to the life he has led on earth, and takes a longer or shorter time to progress towards the perfect enjoyment of the heavenly life. Thus there are different orders in heaven, different degrees of happiness ; and a man's behaviour here may be said in a sense to determine his condition in heaven through all eternity. One can see how upon a foundation of this sort an argument for moral living may be based, and how men may be no- minally kept together by it, where the charity is so large as to permit them to call by the name of brethren all who hold to their single characteristic opinion. "My accidental acquaintance was of the largest charity. He was well educated, and had studied theology three years at Cambridge, the best theo- logical school in New England, according to his view : he thought different forms of belief were suited to different men to different classes, and to dif- ferent periods : he saw good and found good men among all sects. With this perception of good I perfectly coincided ; but when he took the Mor- mons for his case, and, except polygamy, did not think there was much that was absolutely reprehensible in them, I could not coincide with him. It would have been useless to enter in to controversy, but I could not help asking, in connexion with his notion of different forms of belief being adapted to different times and classes of people, if he did not hold that there was really any such thing as religious truth at all—if everything was non- essential. But the question elicited nothing. "We diverged into a conversation upon the Mormons and their practice of polygamy. I do not know how far the people on the Salt Lake, now asking for admission into the Union, really practise generally or hold polygamy to be legal. It will be difficult, I should think, in a new country like that, for many of them to obtain more than one wife : but supposing it to be de- clared legal among the people of the territory of Utah, and they apply next year, after having adopted a State constitution, for admission to the Union, the curious question arises, will Congress admit into the Union a State which practises and legalizes polygamy ? I subsequently talked this matter over with other friends in Boston and elsewhere ; and there appears little doubt that Congress must admit the State, without any reference to the character of the State laws. The State must profess Republican principles, and that is nearly all the Congress can demand. Every State makes its own laws of ffivorce, and the whole article of marriage is a matter of State regulation. If the Legislature of Kentucky declared polygamy lawful, it would become a domestic institution as slavery now is. Their Senators and Representatives would bring their harems to Washington with impunity ; and if one of the

wives eloped to Boston, the husband could reclaim her without doubt, as he

now does his slave, all the laws of New England against bigamy notwith- standing. An accident of this sort would create as much excitement among the females of the non-polygamous States as the arrest of fugitive Coloured men is now doing among the non-shiveholding States."

A. less lax liberality, though still strange enough to Old World habits, is shown in this story of the three Catechisms.

"The schoolmaster teaches the religious catechism which the parents of his pupils wish their children to learn. Thus, the same master sometimes teaches in the same school the Church of England Catechism, the Assembly's Catechism, and that of the Romish Church. The schoolmaster at Bay du yin was surprised that I should think there was anything remarkable in his being required to teach all the three, though he said he had once before heard some one make remarks regarding it. He was himself a Roman Catholic ; but it was enough for him that he had been ordered to do it."

Some stories are told of Yankee lecturers,—fellows who, having failed in their immediate speculation, undertake to instruct the provincial public on any matter that they think attractive : and such is the simple ignorance of the people, that the impostors con- trive to make this pay.

"At Dixon's, I met with a Yankee phrenologist and a Yankee maker of daguerreotypes, who, after a successful campaign in New Brunswick, were so far on their way to Lower Canada, to experiment on the heads and faces of the habitants along the shore of the St. Lawrence. A certain number of these peripatetic philosophers find the British Provinces a profitable country to explore. I dare not venture to put down the number of dollars I after- wards learned that these men had carried with them from Campbelton, the little town to which I was going. Such men as these not unfrequently hunt in couples; and the French Canadians are capital game for them. To reach this race of men, they rarely come by the remote route which these two were taking. By Lake Champlain the road is shorter from New England, and the heart of the country more easily accessible. While I was on my short visit to St. Hilaire from Montreal, two of these experimenters ap- proached the St. Lawrence through the Eastern counties, by way of St. Hyacinth and the railroad. One of them, for two dollars, taught how to convert a barrel of flour into a barrel of soap in ten minutes ! and the other sold, at a dollar a gallon, a black varnish, which was the best in the world. We are here in England as gullible as any nation on earth; but the gullers generally arise from among ourselves. It may not be, therefore, that a bet- ter education would protect the Lower Canadians much from this class of impostors. They are far out of the world, and simple because they are so; but education is a good thing in many other ways, and it may be fairly tried as a giver of greater practical wisdom too."

Although man, science, and the useful arts, are the principal subjects of Mr. Johnston's book, yet scenery and incidents con- nected with land are not neglected. Here is an account of the descent of the rapids above Montreal, in a steamer.

"September 23.—At four in the morning we were again under weigh, and most of the passengers on deck, to witness the running of the three formi- dable rapids, which occur within the next sixteen miles. The descent was very interesting. The rapid current, the often narrow channel, and the care in steering, all told of difficulty in the passages ; and when one looked at the large ship, dodging as it were among the shallows and headlands, it appeared really wonderful that accidents should so rarely happen. . . . . ...... . . Of the rapids between Lachine and Montreal, the most formidable and dangerous is that of the Sault St. Louis. The descent of this rapid in so large a vessel created in my mind a feeling of surprise. In descending the Tobique, in my bark-canoe, with a single Indian milling and fending off, in quick and narrow and rocky rapids, I could not help admiring the nice tact, the instinctive perception, as it were, with which a gentle touch of the pole on the threatening rock, at the proper moment, kept all safe. Here, on the St. Lawrence, the same tact appeared, but with a greatly superior intellectual skill, in handling and guiding a large boat with a heavy cargo through a crooked channel, where the slightest oversight for a single moment would cast all upon the rocky shallows. "Let the reader fancy to himself a ledge of rocks running across the river, over which the water has a distinct fall, to the eye appearing to be some- where between six and ton feet, into deep water below. Through this ledge is a narrow channel of deep water, where the rock has been torn away, and through which the river rushes with great velocity.. Below this ledge, at a short distance, is a second ledge of rock, over which the water falls, and through which, as in the case of the first, a natural gap or sluice-way exist& Between these two ledges deep water exiats, but the openings of the two are not opposite to each other or in the same line. You must descend the one, then turn sharp in the deep water along the foot of the first ledge, and at the proper time turn sharp again to go through the other. The channel is a true zigzag; and to sail along this letter Z in the face of a strong current and a heavy pressure of water, requires a degree of skill and coolness in the captain and of mobility in the ship, which it requires a little consideration fully to realize. Four men at the wheel, and six at the tiller to guard against accidents, steered us safely down ; and it was beautiful to see with what graceful ease and exactness the prow of the long vessel turned itself to suit the sudden turns of the rocky channel."