m,
combined with the clay of a lighter hue. The adhesive nature of the
clay retains moisture in an eminent degree, and the fertilising
qualities of the loam are well known to every bottom land farmer.

Plants put out three weeks ago, after a long voyage from China, are
now taking root, and look fresh and vigorous, notwithstanding the
recent heat and dryness of the atmosphere. But I have taken
unwearied pains in the cultivation. Every plant is sheltered from
the scorching influence of the sun, now from 70 deg. to 86 deg. of
temperature. Although the soil is naturally moist and clayey, and
half bottom land, from the work of gentle acclivities, rising on
either hand, yet I have given the plants a liberal watering in the
evening. By last summer's drought of fifty-seven days, I was taught
the absolute necessity of deep digging and deep planting. None of my
plants, of this season's planting, are more than two or three inches
above the surface of the ground.

If any of the plants have leaves, as most of them have, below that
height, they are planted with the leaves retained; none are removed.
Some of the older plants have no leaves remaining, and looked like
dry sticks. Many of these are now beginning to break, and put forth
fresh leaves."

In 1851, Mr. Frank Bonynge set on foot a subscription list of fifty
dollars each, to procure tea and various Indian plants for culture in
America. That tea can be grown successfully in Carolina, Georgia, and
Florida, is almost certain, because the experiment has been pretty
fairly tried, as above shown, by Dr. Smith. The thermometer at
Shanghai indicates the cold as more severe by thirteen degrees than at
Charleston, South Carolina. The cold winter of 1834-5, which destroyed
the oranges in Mr. Middleton's plantation, in Charleston, left his tea
plants uninjured.

The question of cultivating tea in California has been seriously
discussed, and will no doubt be gone into when the gold digging mania
has a little subsided. There is the necessary labor and experience on
the spot, in some 12,000 or 14,000 Chinese, most of whom doubtless
understand the culture and manufacture. The climate, soil and surface
of California exactly answer the requirements for the growth of this
plant. The time may yet come when the vast ranges of hills that
traverse this State shall present terraces of tea gardens, cultivated
by the la