ST. STEPHEN 'S PARISH. J J 



would sometimes destroy the crop in a few days. 

 The best remedy against this enemy was chick- 

 ens. I recollect that my father was in the habit 

 every year of sending into the swamp fields several 

 hundred chickens ; movable coops were furnished 

 for their accommodation at night, but no food ; nor 

 did they require any so long as the grasshopper in- 

 fested the fields. Those who could not use chickens 

 suffered the margins of their fields to grow up in 

 grass ; the grasshoppers, driven from the fields with 

 whipping brushes, would alight in the grass, which 

 was then fired in several places at once. The price 

 of indigo varied at from a dollar to two dollars and 

 a half per pound. Few planters ever realized more 

 than one hundred and twenty dollars to the hand. 

 The bounty allowed by the British government was 

 sixpence sterling per pound. 



The culture of indigo and its manufacture is said 

 to be attended in the West Indies and in other 

 parts of the world with diseases, violent, severe, 

 and at times fatal. If this was ever the case in 

 South Carolina my memory furnishes me with no 

 instances of it. I have every reason to believe the 

 contrary, having known instances of indigo planters 

 who were by no means successful planters, who never- 

 theless acquired fortunes by the natural increase of 

 their negroes. 



Before the revolution Monck's Corner was a 

 place of some commercial importance. There were 



