ed. Pears are tolerably plenty in the French settlements, and
quinces are cultivated with success by some Americans. Apples are easily
cultivated, and are very productive. They can be made to bear fruit to
considerable advantage in seven years from the seed. Many varieties are
of fine flavor, and grow to a large size. I have measured apples, the
growth of St. Clair county, that exceeded thirteen inches in
circumference. Some of the early American settlers provided orchards.
They now reap the advantages. But a large proportion of the population
of the frontiers are content without this indispensable article in the
comforts of a Yankee farmer. Cider is made in small quantities in the
old settlements. In a few years, a supply of this beverage can be had in
most parts of Illinois.

Peach trees grow with great rapidity, and decay proportionably soon.
From ten to fifteen years may be considered the life of this tree. Our
peaches are delicious, but they sometimes fail by being destroyed in the
germ by winter frosts. The bud swells prematurely.

_Garden Vegetables_ can be produced here in vast profusion, and of
excellent quality.

That we have few of the elegant and well dressed gardens of gentlemen in
the old states, is admitted; which is not owing to climate, or soil, but
to the want of leisure and means.

Our Irish potatoes, pumpkins and squashes are inferior, but not our
cabbages, peas, beets, or onions.

A cabbage head, two or three feet in diameter including the leaves, is
no wonder on this soil. Beets often exceed twelve inches in
circumference. Parsnips will penetrate our light, porous soil, to the
depth of two or three feet.

The _cultivated vegetable productions in the field_, are maize or Indian
corn, wheat, oats, barley, buckwheat, Irish potatoes, sweet potatoes,
turnips, rye for horse feed and distilleries, tobacco, cotton, hemp,
flax, the castor bean, and every other production common to the Middle
States.

_Maize_ is a staple production. No farmer can live without it, and
hundreds raise little else. This is chiefly owing to the ease with which
it is cultivated. Its average produce is fifty bushels to the acre. I
have oftentimes seen it produce seventy-five bushels to the acre, and in
a few instances, exceed one hundred.

_Wheat_ yields a good and sure crop, especially in the counties
bordering on the Illinois river. It weighs upwards of 60 pounds per
bushel; and flour from this region has preference in