94 



MONTHLY JOURNAL OF AGRICULTURE. 



farming, planting and horticultui-al collection of 

 books, should adorn, and ^vould enrich every 

 cultivator's mansion. An intimacy with a few 

 such works during the five years preceding the 

 time of lawful age, would alone be enough to 

 make a respectable man, of honorable acquire- 

 ments, out of a raw and simple youth of sixteen 

 years. The human mind is as susceptible of 

 being ti*aiued, quickened, strengthened and led 

 to a right end in the gi'eat business of the Planter 

 and the Farmer, as in aiii/ oilier profession in 

 the whole round of human life. Every thing is 

 done with more tlian a jnedium profit, which is 

 done by a skilful mind, added to mere animal 

 strength. Education not only forms the com- 

 mon mind ; it forms those minds also which 

 are uncommon. To be taught the habits of ob- 

 servation, examination, and reflection, and to 

 attend to causes, consequences, effects and re- 

 sults, is to be a man of better sense however 

 good the mind may have been by nature- The 

 Farmer or Planter ought to he that man, that 

 vnaster, of his art — sub arte peritus — as well 

 as his neighbors in other professions. Aflected 

 by the seasons and the weather, he should be a 

 careful and judicious ob.server of them." 



" The cold nips his productions in the germ 

 and bud : the heat prevents their succulent 

 nourisliment : the wet occasions injurious fer- 

 mentations, or retards maturity till the season is 

 lost. The instructed and experienced farmer 

 best applies the proper means of prevention, 

 preservation, and cure, which the various trials 

 of the day require from his vigilance and versa- 

 tility. Warned and empowered bi/knoirledge, 

 he saves by the ability to act instantly with in- 

 telligence, while a half bred fanner loses the 

 quality or quantity of his crop from delay to 

 consider or inquire. From the moment when 

 an able cultivator sets apart his fields for tlie 

 several purposes of tlie year, till his crops are 

 delivered to the purchasers, he is engaged in 

 a round of observation, cai'e, management, and 

 an acquaintance with his profession by a regu- 

 lar and well governed education, must give him 

 an incalculable advantage over an industrious 

 but untutored neighbor in the quantity, quality, 

 and value of his crop." 



Bear in mind, my deai" Sir, that these thoughts 

 were presented to the patrons of my old Amer- 

 ican Farmer in 1821 — and here, after a lapse of 

 twenty-four years, what progress has been made 

 in jiractical education in the Southern States? 

 Is not their course of education the same now 

 as then — the same old books and methods ? 

 Compare their products and exports — their po- 

 pulation and general condition and prospects 

 now with what they were then, and wherein 

 have they advanced 1 Is there, then, as some 

 w^ould persuade us, some resistless enei-vating 

 influence in the air of Southern climes that un- 

 fits men to struggle contintiously, and at last 

 turn back those adverse tides that occa.sionally 

 threaten to break over the prosperity of every 



comiuanitv ? 



(V02) 



Unmanly thought ! what seasons can control. 

 What fancied zone can circumscribe the soul ? 



And here let us say, by way of parenthesis, 

 when we speak of defective education in the 

 South, we are not to be understood as mean 

 ing that sort of education which makes men 

 classical scholars and orators, and passionate 

 and powerful declaimers — we forget not and 

 can never cease to admire her Pinkneys and 

 her Randolphs — her Madison and her Henry. 

 " Thoughts that breathe and words that bum" 

 are spontaneous growths of Southern soil, nor 

 can we too highly estimate their value, when 

 the flame of patriotism is to be kindled, and 

 grave Senators to be animated in the cause of 

 liberty, by a Calhoun or a Preston, a Rives or a 

 McDuflSe, or a Bcmen — but is there not a time 

 for all things — a time and subjects for action 

 as well as for speaking ? 



As to the causes which seem to have suddenly 

 arrested the growth of the Southern States — the 

 grain growing States more especially ; bring- 

 ing them to a stand still, as tlie noblest buck 

 of the forest sinks in his tracks at the crack 



of a Hampton rifle some attribute their 



unimproving social and J)ecuniary circum- 

 stances to some baleful political influence, 

 under which labor-saving machinery has 

 been introduced, to increase proportionably the 

 productive capacity of the North. Prior to the 

 great improvements in machinery for the maa- 

 ufacture of textile fabrics, Virginia had, prob- 

 ably a larger number of hand-looms at work 

 than any equal population, but what natural 

 facilities for manufactures does the old Bay 

 State possess, that the Old Dominion does not 

 enjoy ? With this advantage in favor of the 

 latter, that she might supply from her own soil, 

 under its genial skies, what Massachusetts buys 

 from other States of the necessai'ies of life, and 

 chiefly from the South ; amounting to a quantity, 

 in the article of wheat flour, for example, to 

 nearly, very nearly all our exports to all the 

 world besides. Instead, then, of struggling 

 against destiny, is it not better to control and 

 meliorate it ? And is it not of the greatest im- 

 portance to all who have agricultural surpluses 

 to sell, that their customers should be as near as 

 po.ssible to the place of production, lessening 

 in that proportion the expense of trau.sportation 

 which is levied on the produce ; for, as Mr. Ste- 

 venson has put it, with clearness and force — 



" Our produce, until it reaches the market of 

 exportation, does not change its character of in- 

 terest. It is still the planter's, and oidy becomes 

 an article of commerce, when it touches the 

 hand of the merchant. The transportation, 

 tlicrefore, to market is as intimately connected 

 with its value as any process of its previous 

 preparation." 



But let me not be led away, in this letter, from 

 the subject of the sort of education best adapt- 



