MOSELLE. This is an interesting depart ment of France, in respect to produce and commercial industry. The valleys and hill sides are covered in general with a rich soil, and are carefully cultivated so as to yield great quantities of wheat, rye, and oats, of which a considerable surplus over the home consumption is sold for exportation in the great corn-market of Metz. Other crops raised are vetches, millet, peas, beans, and lentils. Several Champagne wine merchants, settled at Metz, purchase Moselle wine, and manu facture from it what they call champagne wine for the German and Russian markets. Pears, peaches, and other fruits are grown in large quantities, and exported in the form of dry, liquid, and crystallised conserves from Metz, where preserved fruits form an important article of commerce. Flax is extensively grown, both for the sake of the fibre and of the seed, which is pressed for oil ; rape and tur nips are also grown. The forests consist of oak, beech, hazel, &c. Bees are very nume
rous, and much honey is gathered.
Several iron mines are worked, and the ore is smelted and made into malleable iron. Lead and copper are found, but no mines are worked. Building stone, quartz, gypsum, cru cible and pottery earth are quarried. Marl is found in great masses in the north and north-west of the department, and is exten sively used in manure. Plaster-of-Paris is also much used as a top-dressing for meadow land. The industrial products consist of sheet and bar iron, block-tin, nails, glass, unbleached and table-linen, embroidered muslin, canvar, paper, beer, tobacco, oil, starch, room paper, beet-root sugar, tiles, pipes, pottery, leather, hosiery, and common woollen and cotton stalls. These articles, together with timber, and the products previously mentioned, sup port an active commerce. Metz, the chief town of the department, is a place of consider able manufacturing and commercial enter prise.