two acres of
the plant will bring an income of $2,500 to $5,000 a year, planting
100,000 to the acre. The roots take eight years to mature. They weigh
from one and a half to four ounces each, when fresh, and one-third of
this dried. Two acres produce 25,000 roots a year, by progression. The
dried root, at that time, brought five dollars a pound. At present, I
believe, it is higher. Another friend of mine, who is in this business
extensively, tried exporting for himself, but got only $6.50 a pound in
Amoy, when the U. S. consul at that port assured him that the real
market price was from $12.60 to $24.40. The local trader, knowing
American prices, pocketed the difference.

[Illustration: The Author in Camp in the Big Smokies]

In times of scarcity many of our people took to the woods and gathered
commoner medicinal roots, such as bloodroot and wild ginger (there are
scores of others growing wild in great profusion), but made only a
pittance at it, as synthetic drugs have mostly taken the place of herbal
simples in modern medicine. Women and children did better, in the days
before Christmas, by gathering galax, "hemlock" (_leucothoe_), and
mistletoe, selling to the dealers at the railroad, who ship them North
for holiday decorations. One bright lad from town informed me, with
evident pride of geography, that "Some of this goes to London, England."
Nearly everywhere in our woods the beautiful ruddy-bronze galax is
abundant. Along the water-courses, _leucothoe_, which similarly turns
bronze in autumn, and lasts throughout the winter, is so prolific as to
be a nuisance to travelers, being hard to push through.

Most of our farmers had neither horse nor mule. For the rough work of
cultivating the hillsides a single steer hitched to the "bull-tongue"
was better adapted, and the same steer patiently dragged a little sled
to the trading post. On steep declivities the sled is more practical
than a cart or wagon, because it can go where wheels cannot, it does not
require so wide a track, and it "brakes" automatically in going
downhill. Nearly all the farmer's hauling is downhill to his home, or
down farther to the village. A sled can be made quite easily by one man,
out of wood growing on the spot, and with few iron fittings, or none at
all. The runners are usually made of natural sourwood crooks, this
timber being chosen because it wears very smooth and does not fur up nor
splinter.

The hinterland is naturally adapted t