48 AGRICULTURE IN THE UNITED STATES. 



ment, show that those surpassingly fertile regions ara by no 

 means inexhaustible. Texas, an empire in the extent of her 

 territory and her boundless prospective wealth, will do well to 

 heed the warning voices of her elder sisters. 



Among the original thirteen States, South Carolina took the 

 lead in the initiation of new cultures. Her most eminent fam 

 ily possessed in Eliza Lucas Pinckney, a gentlewoman, fitter 

 than almost any other to have reigned over the Eepublicaii 

 Court, or to be the Ceres of a national grange, a matron pro 

 foundly interested in the development of the State. She intro 

 duced the culture of rice and indigo into Carolina. She made 

 silk culture the fashion, and carried to England sufficient spun 

 silk, grown and manufactured by herself, to make three dresses, 

 &quot;remarkable for beauty, fineness and strength.&quot; One of these 

 gowns was presented to the Princess Dowager, another to Lord 

 Chesterfield, and the third was handed down in the Pinckney 

 family for many generations. 



lu an address before the South Carolina Institute, in 1849, 

 Gov. Hammond said: &quot; But a small portion of the land of this 

 State will now produce two thousand pounds of ginned cotton 

 to the hand. It is thought our average production cannot ex 

 ceed twelve hundred pounds, and a great many planters do not 

 grow over a thousand, that is about two per cent, in cash on the 

 capital invested, after paying current plantation expenses. 

 Our State must soon become utterly impoverished, and in con 

 sequence wholly degraded. Depopulation to the utmost pos 

 sible extent must take place rapidly. This process has been 

 going on year by year, at first hardly noticed, but illustrated so 

 constantly now as to be within the knowledge of every one of 

 us. The most fatal loss which exemplifies the decline of our 

 agriculture and the decay of our slave system, has been owing 

 to emigration. No war, famine or pestilence has checked the 

 natural increase of population, but our census shows that it is 

 diminishing at the rate of eight thousand per annum, our slaves 

 being carried off by their owners from a soil that has yielded 

 twelve hundred pounds to one that will produce eighteen hun 

 dred. &quot;While the fertile regions of the south-west are open to 

 cotton planters, it is in vain to expect any improvement. If a 

 people would flourish, their industrial system must embrace not 

 only agriculture but manufactures and commerce, and cherish 

 each in due proportion.&quot; 



