PRODUCTIONS OF THE SOIL
Page 26

That region of Central Illinois-the WESTERN EMPIRE STATE-of which Mason county forms no inconsiderable part, having a vast extent of most fertile lands, must, of course, raise with greatest ease all the articles to which her soil and climate are favorable, to an amount far beyond her consumption. All the grains, fruits and vegetables of the temperate regions of the earth here grow most luxuriantly. The wheat is of an excellent quality, and there is no part of the western continent where corn is grown with greater ease and abundance, nor of equal quality. In the great corn markets of the country, Chicago and Boston, "Mason county yellow" is a standard quotation, and at higher rates than any other in those markets. When the frosts nip the corn on lower and less favored soils, we find men from almost every part of our great State sending to Central Illinois, and to Mason county especially, for their seed corn. When the millers of Northern Illinois desire a dry article for early fall grinding, they send their purchasing agents to Mason county. Garden vegetables of all kinds succeed well. No country can exceed this in its adaptation to rearing the finest fruits and fruit-bearing trees. (We make an exception here of dwarf pears and the quince, and will give the causes in detail in the section on Fruits, in another part of this work.) Wild fruits and berries are, in many places, abundant, and on some of the prairies the strawberries are remarkably fine. In some localities grapevines indigenous to the country are abundant, and yield a fruit from which can be manufactured an excellent wine. Indigenous vines are very prolific, and are found in every variety of soil, interwoven in every thicket, bordering on the prairies, and climbing to the tops of the tallest trees on the bottom lands. The French, in early times, made so much wine from our native grapes in Illinois, as to export a quantity to France, upon which the government of the country, in 1774, passed laws prohibiting the importation of wines from their dependencies in America, lest it might injure the sale of that staple in the French Kingdom. The native plum is produced in great abundance, variety and flavor, color and size; are less subject to curculio than the tenderer varieties. Crab apples are abundant and prolific. Wild cherries are equally productive. The persimmon is abundant, and delicious when the frost has destroyed its astringency. The black mulberry is abundant and productive. The gooseberry, the strawberry and the black berry grow wild and in great profusion, proving from natural causes alone the beautiful adaptation of our soil and climate to the production of the improved and finer varieties of fruits. Of nuts, the hickory, black walnut and pecan deserve notice. The later is an oblong, thin-shelled and delicious nut, that grows on a large tree of the same family as the hickory. (Carya-olive-formis.) The pawpaw grows on the bottoms and rich timbered uplands, and produces a large, pulpy, and luscious fruit. The Kentucky coffee tree is a native of the lands bordering on the Illinois river, and a desirable tree for shade and ornament. Of the domestic fruits, the apple, peach and the pear are principally cultivated, the latter, however, with variable success. Pears were successfully grown as seedling by the early French settlers in the southern part of the State. Many of their earliest plantings still survive. The quince cannot be successfully grown in Central Illinois. Peach trees grow with great rapidity, and decay proportionately soon. Our variable winters render them precarious and uncertain.

History Index

Home