Tobacco, as already stated, is not allowed to be grown in England. The acts prohibiting its cultivation did not apply to Ireland till about 1840. Tobacco is extensively cultivated in France, Prussia, Holland, and Belgium, also in the southern provinces of Russia, and in Turkey and Syria. It has as yet made little progress in the British West Indies, and still less in Upper Canada. The tobacco of Cuba holds the highest rank for the excellence of its flavour. Next in favour, perhaps, are the cigars of Manilla. But the cultivation of tobacco is most extensive in the United States. In 1850 the produce in eight states of the Union was estimated at 200,000,000 lbs., of which much more than half was produced in Virginia and Kentucky. About 120,000,000 lbs. of this quantity were exported, and 80,000,000 the. consumed at home, amounting to 34 lbs. per head on a population of 23,000,000. Professor Wilson, in his Report on the New York Indus trial Exhibition, spoke of the so-called Cavendish tobacco as being now in very extensive demand in the United States. " It is known as chewing or plug tobacco, and is put up in boxes of various sizes.
Those exhibited weighed 38 lbs., and were of various qualities to which different names and prices were attached. Indies' Love' sold at 16 dollars' per box,' Ladies Twist' at 13, and Fair America' at 10. Tobacco for chewing undergoes a process of gradual fermentation, and is then sweetened by the addition of molasses, and either done up into rolls or pressed into cakes; the former, is known as twist, the latter as plug. A good chewer, I am informed, would dispose of 4 to 8 ors. per day." The quantity of tobacco imported into this country in 1786 was about 7,000,00011s. ; in 1796 it rose to 10,000,000 lbs. During the first forty years of the present century it rose gradually from 11,000,000 to 18,000,000 lb.s.—a ratio of increase far less than that in the popula tion. A marked advance then took place, and from 1844 to 1660 the import was never less than 33,000,000 lbs. In 1860 the quantity was 49,670,893 lbs., of which 35,412,841 lbs. was retained for home con sumption and paid duty, the rest being re-exported. This quantity is a little more than 1 lb. per head per annum for the whole population.