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American Eloquence, Volume 4 - Studies In American Political History (1897) by Various
page 144 of 262 (54%)
On passing from that article to others of our agricultural productions,
we shall find not less gratifying facts. The total quantity of flour
imported into Boston, during the same year, was 284,504 barrels, and
3,955 half barrels; of which, there were from Virginia, Georgetown, and
Alexandria, 114,222 barrels; of Indian corn, 681,131 bushels; of oats,
239,809 bushels; of rye, about 50,000 bushels; and of shorts, 63,489
bushels; into the port of Providence, 71,369 barrels of flour; 216,662
bushels of Indian corn, and 7,772 bushels of rye. And there were
discharged at the port of Philadelphia, 420,353 bushels of Indian corn,
201,878 bushels of wheat, and 110,557 bushels of rye and barley.
There were slaughtered in Boston during the same year, 1831, (the only
Northern city from which I have obtained returns,) 33,922 beef cattle;
15,400 calves; 84,453 sheep, and 26,871 swine. It is confidently
believed that there is not a less quantity of Southern flour consumed
at the North than eight hundred thousand barrels, a greater amount,
probably, than is shipped to all the foreign markets of the world
together.

What would be the condition of the farming country of the United
States--of all that portion which lies north, east, and west of James
River, including a large part of North Carolina--if a home market did
not exist for this immense amount of agricultural produce. Without that
market, where could it be sold? In foreign markets? If their restrictive
laws did not exist, their capacity would not enable them to purchase
and consume this vast addition to their present supplies, which must
be thrown in, or thrown away, but for the home market. But their laws
exclude us from their markets. I shall content myself by calling the
attention of the Senate to Great Britain only. The duties in the ports
of the united kingdom on bread-stuffs are prohibitory, except in times
of dearth. On rice, the duty is fifteen shillings sterling per hundred
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