--------- --------- --------- ---------
Cwts. 3,891,195 5,323,370 3,838,008 3,511,840

Before the famine in Ireland the imports seldom reached 20 millions of
bushels of grain and meal of all kinds. In 1848 our imports were
about 60 millions; in 1849, 85 millions; in 1850, 68 millions; in
1851, 751/2 millions; in 1852, 69 millions, with good wheat harvests;
showing the great shock received and the slowness of recovery.

With a rapidly increasing population in all parts of the civilized
world, the production of bread is obviously the first object to be
sought after, alike by the statesman and the peasant. I scarcely dare
give the calculation of the immense amount which would be realised in
any great country, by the single saving of a bushel to an acre, in the
quantity of seed ordinarily sown. The same result would follow if an
additional bushel could be produced in the annual average yield of the
wheat crop.

According to Mr. H. Colman, the annual amount of seed for wheat sown
in France is estimated at 32,491,978 bushels. If we could suppose a
third of this saved, the saving would amount to 10,863,959 bushels per
year. Suppose an annual increase of the crops of five bushels per
acre, this would give an increase of production of 54,319,795 bushels.
Add this, under improved cultivation, to the amount of seed saved, and
the result would be 65,183,754 bushels--I believe under an improved
agriculture this is quite practicable.

An eminent agricultural writer placed the average yield in England at
eighteen bushels per acre; some years since a man of sanguine
temperament rated it at over thirty bushels. In France it is stated,
in the best districts, to average twenty-two bushels. These evidently
are wholly conjectural estimates. In England Mr. Colman states that
fifty bushels per acre were reported to him on the best authority, as
the yield upon a large farm in a very favorable season. More than
eighty bushels have been returned, upon what is deemed ample
testimony, to the Royal Agricultural Society of England, as the
product of a single acre. In France Mr. Colman had, upon credible
authority, reports of forty, forty-four and seventy-two bushels. It
would be of immense importance to any government to know the exact
produce grown in any county, or district, or in the whole country; and
this might be obtained by compelling, on the part of the owner or
cultivator, an actual return of his crop; but it is