tobacco cures well, and some of the finer sorts make excellent
cigar wrappers and are much esteemed throughout Europe. The following
account of the cultivation and production of tobacco in the different
German States, will give some idea of the amount cultivated and used
in Germany:--

"The aggregate area of land cultivated with tobacco in
Prussia during the year 1871, amounted to 5.925 hectares (a
hectare being equal to 2.47 English acres). It appears that
the extent of tobacco-growing land has, during the last
fifty years, been gradually diminishing in Prussia, and that
accordingly the expectations entertained in the beginning of
that period of a great future development of this branch of
agriculture, have not been realized; for whilst the area of
land planted with tobacco in the year 1825 was 12.374
hectares, it amounted in 1871 to less than one-half this
amount. The reasons for this gradual decline are considered
to be, on the one hand, the growing competition of the South
German growers, and the increase in the importations of
American tobacco; on the other, the fact that the
cultivation of beet-root (for sugar manufacturing) and of
potatoes (for the distilleries) has proved to be a more
profitable business than the cultivation of tobacco. It has,
moreover, been found by many years' experience, that whilst
the quality of the tobacco cultivated in most parts of
Prussia is not such as to enable the growers to compete
successfully with the importers of foreign (particularly of
North American) sorts, the labor attending its cultivation
and its preparation for the market, as well as the
uncertainty of only an average crop, are out of proportion,
as a rule, to the average profits arising therefrom. The
cultivation of the plant has, consequently, gradually become
restricted, chiefly to those districts of the country where
either the soil is peculiarly adapted for the purpose, or
where it is carried on for the private use of the producer."

With regard to the various provinces of Prussia, it appears
that "In East Prussia the extent of tobacco land is only a
limited one, and is confined to the district around Tilsit,
where about two-thirds of the entire cultivation is in the
hands of peasants, who consume their own produce. In West
Prussia (the wes