3S8 POPULATION. 



States in 1810, more than double that of Scotland, and more than twice 

 the population of Australia, now paying annually ninety millions of 

 dollars interest to England on loans of English capital invested there. 

 Meanwhile, ten thousand square miles of the most fertile region of Caro- 

 lina does not to-day average as many inhabitants to the square mile as 

 are to be found in each house of the old town of Edinburg. Practically, 

 therefore, in these regards, the natural advantages and capacities of South 

 Carolina may be said to be unlimited. "Whatever her future increase 

 may be, it will suffer no let or hindrance on these accounts, but will de- 

 pend upon the degree in which she can succeed in establishing and 

 maintaining cordial relations with the other States and nations ol Chris- 

 tendom. Freed finally and forever from all that in the past has so 

 heavil}" shackled their intercourse with outsiders, the polity of her people 

 has taken a new and vigorous departure ; they have thrown their gates 

 wide open to all comers ; aid and welcome is extended to immigrants ; 

 manufacturers are encouraged b}^ relieving the capital invested in them 

 from taxation, and their traditional doctrines of free trade would admit 

 all people to their commerce. 



MOVEMENT OF THE POPULATION. 



The first settlements took place along the seacoast, thence, slowly mov- 

 ing inland, they followed the rivers. There were settlers in the 

 upper-countr}^ as early as 1736, but no great progress was made there 

 until the middle of the eighteenth century. Meanwhile there remained, 

 as there is now and has been during all the movements of population in 

 the State, a vacant or thinly-settled belt between the upper and the lower 

 country. The State is this day traversed by two such belts of thinly- 

 settled country, the sand hill region and the flat lands of the lower pine 

 belt. The first is comparatively narrow, and is due to the dry and sandy 

 soil which unfits it, in large measure, for the present methods of agricul- 

 ture. The other is due to the want of drainage, which, with the accession 

 of wealth, will be remedied, and an extensive and fertile region will be 

 opened to settlers. 



The Indians were, perhaps the most mobile of all the populations that 

 have inhabited South Carolina. Nevertheless, there is everywhere and 

 always a continual movement of the population in progress. Even in 

 England and Scotland, where the populati^jn might be considered " to 

 the manor born," it has been found that only a little over seventy-five 

 per cent, were living in the counties where they were b orn. If for coun- 

 ties, States are substituted, about the same percentage obtains for the 

 United States, a little more than seventy -six per cent, of the native popu- 



