564 SHEEP HUSBANDRY IN THE SOUTH. 



ritory, of 14,000,000 of acres, to be appropriated ? Are we forever to be supplied with stock 

 from the West, bread-stuffs from the Middle States, and manufactures from the North ? Is 

 all that we can reahze from our labor to be expended abroad ? Nothing to be left for our 

 own improvements or our luxury ? As one means of correcting this evil, your Committee 

 propose an Agricultural Survey of the State, to determine our natural advantages, develop 

 our facilities of improvement, exhibit our profits and expenditures, and awaken our citizens 

 to the hnportance of vying with the rest of the human family in all the improvements of 

 which our location is susceptible 



" The exposition which your Committee has given, showing the great competition of for- 

 eign rice with our own, and that South Carolina cannot compete with the West in the cheap 

 production of cotton, and that she must, ere long, be driven from the market, demonstrates 

 the necessity of looking abroad and around us for other sources of advancement and profits 

 than those we possess. 



" We cannot expect that accident is continually to supply new staples suited to our soil 

 and climate, and place us beyond the reach of contmgent circumstances. We must resort 

 to science to improve our Agriculture, and to machinery to enlarge and prepare present arti- 

 cles of culture, or trajisplant and acclimate new products, which will again, Uke those we 

 have lost and will lose, lead off for a period hi the employment of capital, amassing of wealth 

 and diffusion of human happiness." 



The House and Senate agfeed with the Report, the same day, and its 

 principal recommendation, an Agriciiktiral Survey of the State, was 

 adopted. 



The Committee appointed by the South Carolina State Agricultural So- 

 ciety to consider the scheme of Col. Davie to reduce the quantity of cotton 

 grown, made a Report, through their Chairman, Judge Seabrook, at the 

 winter meeting of the Society, 1845-6, from which the following are ex- 

 tracts :* 



'• Another cause of our distress is that, in a large portion of the southern country, cotton is 

 cultivated, when its production does not now, and never can, at all compensate the planter 

 for the labor bestowed. There it is desirable for every one that other branches of iiidusfry 

 Bhould be pursued. . . . We do not intend to encourage the cultivation of cotton to the 

 neglect of the other products necessaiy to support or comfort. Eveiy planter should prompt- 

 ly render himself independent in reference to those articles ichich could be produced on his 

 plantation. In this way he would profitably curtail the quantity of land devoted to the cot- 

 ton crop. An abandonment of the present extremely defective mode of culture, and the sub- 

 stitution of a better, would insure a larger quantity of cotton than would be lost by diversify- 

 ing the products of industry. In other words, his cotton crop would be larger ; his corn, 

 wheat, rice, oats, barley, horses, mules, hogs, cattle, sheep, butter and vegetables, would be 

 tlie produce of his farm. 



" If, however, the cotton crop is to be given up one-half, after all the reductions of it which 

 we have sanctioned, to what else can the planter of the South so profitably turn his attention ? 

 To grain ? He already, in ordinary years, produces twice as much as the Middle States, and 

 about one-eighth more than the West. In Indian corn alone, the produce of the South, by 

 her last census, was 300 million bushels. If the planter of cotton is engaged in an unprofit- 

 able business, much more is the grain raised. . . . Millions of acres in So7dh Carolina, 

 ■including the lower country, arc admirably adapted to the raising of rich grasses. Tiiis 

 might be added as another branch of industry, from wliich reasonable jirofits might be real- 

 ized, and might very well be added to the cotton planter's income. The business of tanning 

 and the mannfictures of leather might be and ought to be enlarged. In this State, all the 

 means of a successful pursuit of this branch of industry are at hand and within the reach of 

 ■every one. Hides, lime, bark and mechanics (slaves) are abundant." 



The remarks in both of the above extracts, though made exclusively in 

 reference to South ('arolina, will apply equally well, in many obvious par- 

 ticulars, to all the old cotton and tobacco growing States. 



To a Northern man, accustomed from his cliildhood to see sheep hus- 

 bandry blended, to a greater or less extent, in the operations of nearly 

 ever}/ farm, and to live among farmers who regard it just as indispensable, 

 and as much a matter of course, as the production of bread-stufts, it seems 

 singular enough that neither of the above able Committees, in looking for 



* Ab has been before stated, the other members of the Commiitee were Juilgc 0"Ncall and W. J. Allslon, 

 Esq. Mr. A. did not concur with his colleairues in the proposition tliat there was not ah-eady an absolute 

 overproduction of cotton. He believed there was. In all other particulars, and consequently in all em- 

 traced in the extracts jjiven, be concurred in the Report. 



