<JI)c iTarincr's itlcintl)lij iHsitor. 



185 



rich, luxuriant, nay, almost excessive crop of 

 iliis inosl valualile proiluct never hefore bur- 

 dened llic alluvian of tlie I\li!<6i!isi|ipi, and sent 

 gladness into llie hearts oC the planters. So 

 stiirily, so thirk, tangled, end towerinjr, seemed 

 the stiillis, that \ve envied not tlie poor negroes 

 who had to cut them down. 15ut still the hiippy 

 blacks seemed to enjoy I he lun:they ' went al 

 it' with much more ardor and zeal than at any 

 other lahnr. Althotigh the necessities of thi; 

 crop denjaiid almost incessant exertion, nn<l al- 

 low no time for lest or rei-realion, the nefjroes 

 prefer it to any other employment, and always 

 look forward to the grinding seuson as a pleas- 

 ant and excitinj] holiday. 



'I'he heuuiifiil liuht f;rcen, the regular and uni- 

 fortn color and growth of the cane, extending, 

 in an iiiihroken sea of verdure, as far as the 

 eye can reach, aided, no doidit, by the su'ee/ as- 

 sociations of the product, can render a cane 

 field the most deliiihlful si^ht which ran be 

 opened to the view of him who has an eye for 

 scenes for rural and agricnltiuid beauty. Hut 

 the beauty of our coast is not confMied to the 

 cane fields Our planters, w hose happy lot has 

 been cast in this highly favored country, have 

 not abused or mi-<applic(l the favors and wealth 

 which have been so richly showered upon them. 

 They have grown neither miserly nor enervate 

 in their habits, from the possession of so nmch 

 wealth. Nor have they from either cause falter- 

 ed or retrograded in the improvement and cul- 

 tivation of their lands. They have gone on in- 

 creasing and extending their resources, and de- 

 veloping the capacities of their soil, as their 

 means augmented ; at the same time, too, en- 

 larging the circle of their pleasures and whole- 

 some enjoyments, and cultivating the elegant 

 tastes and hospitable usages which become their 

 station and means. 



To this liberality and good taste, backed by 

 adequate resources, we owe the view of some 

 of the most magnificent country residences 

 which can be seen in any part of the world. — • 

 Along the whole distance liom New Orleans to 

 Baton Koiige, is a succession of most elegant 

 villas, most in the Freticb and Italian style of 

 architecture — many of them on a scale of great 

 (nagifiticence. Our planteis always have large 

 fanjilies, and the Creoles especially havinjf large 

 domestic circles, and living so much at home, it 

 is necessary for them to have very commodious 

 houses. A peculiarity of our planters' houses, 

 and, by-tbe-by, a great advaniage l.hey have over 

 the houses of our farmers at the North, is the 

 continuous gallery viliich runs around the four 

 sides of tiie house, and which, es|)ecially in this 

 climate, is a good substitute for the little, cramped 

 up, classically pr'.'tentious porches or porticoes 

 which project from the centre of the houses at 

 the North. These galleries constitute the most 

 delightful part of tlie house, where, in the eve- 

 ning, the whole tamily can sit anil enjoy the 

 scene and the breeze, iind where the little ones 

 can play all the day long, and during any weath- 

 er. 



The yards in front of our planters, houses usu- 

 ally run from the house to tlie river, or to the 

 levee or common road, and are planted with 

 rich and various shrubbery. The walks are 

 hedged with jessamhies and little groves of myr- 

 tles and cedars, oi'arbor viite and arbor ctrti, with 

 lines of rose and pomegranaie bushes marking 

 oft the squares, anfl now nndtlicu a huge stalked 

 banana plant, and brisilin^; cactus or Agave 

 Americana, starting up and belrajing our vicini- 

 ty to the tropics. Towering above all this vari- 

 ous shrubbery are some half a dozen wide 

 spreading, lofty and well shaped pecan trees, or 

 perhaps the jagged, twisted and unruly arms of 

 that Spartan of the firest, the live oak. Com- 

 pletely encircling the whole bouse yard and gar- 

 den is a rich, dark hedge of oiangR trees, which 

 are at this time of the year nearly weighed down 

 with the burthen of their abundant fruit. 



A Newr Orleans letter writer in the N. Y. 

 Commercial Advertiser, speaking of the Lotfis- 

 iana sugar crop of the late season, says : 



' I think we shall receive full 2.50,000 hogs- 

 beads of sugar against 120,000 last year. The 

 new sugar received thus far is as good quality as 

 we received last year t») months later, and 

 prices range from 34 to 6| cl^. and will go low- 



er. Molasses will be eipially abundant and 

 cheaiu Prices now rule at 20 a 21 els, but I ex- 

 pect to sei; it down In J4c. in bbls. and 10 to lie. 

 on |ilantation before (be season is over.' 



How important, how foitunale for the crea- 

 tion of wealth to our whole country and for the 

 stability of 'that Union which we so highly 

 prize,' was the acipiisition of that portion of the 

 country now consiituling the States west of the 

 great iMississippi including the shores cf both 

 sides of the great father of waters, by Mr. Jef- 

 ferson. Although that great event occurred 

 more than forty years ago, the youthful enthusi- 

 asm with which wo then regarded ' the man and 

 the measure ' seems but to make it to us as the 

 work of yesterday. Divine Providence seems 

 then lo have interposed, as the benefits of the 

 ensanguined wars of the great belligerent pow- 

 ers of Europe, a necessity which gave then to 

 Young America the peaceful conquest of the 

 greatest boon ever granted to any nation. For 

 what could have been this Republic, had New 

 Orleans and the country above it, the great val- 

 ley of the world, continued to be shut up under 

 the despotism of Spanish rule.' What would 

 now be the commerce and trade which has 

 opened to tlie States of the North greater than 

 all the commerce and trade of Europe? At 

 this day the acquisition of Louisiana can no 

 where be reganled as a party question — on its 

 necessity and its value all parlies are agreed. 



Slavery existed in Louisiana at the time of its 

 acquisition from old Spain — the great evil had 

 been brought,tbere as it had been spread through- 

 out the whole soutiiern limils of the original 

 thirteen Stales, and as it had been introduced 

 into every West India island by every European 

 power colonizing them. Slavery there in ex- 

 istence, the Congress of the United States liad 

 no more power to prevent it thaii in any of the 

 original thirteen States: the great compromises of 

 the Constitulion foihid such interference. The 

 sugar and cotton raising of the South js now 

 generally the work of slaves — their production 

 is a work probably better adapted to that race 

 than any oilier service. The great European 

 emigration is introilucing into all our cities free 

 white service and labor as a substitute for that 

 of the colored race of slaves. Probably there 

 is a less number of slaves in the city of New 

 Orleans now, than there was ten years ago, 

 since which the popnlalion has become double 

 and the business and trade have been increased 

 fom- fold. Tremendous is the amount of labor 

 done in a year at the cresent city in what has 

 been regarded an unlieallhful and dangerous 

 climate for the whites; yet the whites at bard 

 labor there are perhaps more healthfid ihan the 

 whites in idleness, or in sedentary employmeiiis. 

 Exposure there, of the drayman, the mason and 

 the hod-lifter, are regarded as not more un- 

 bearable than the same exposure in the north- 

 ern villages and cities. 



Ill the cotton and sugar plantations nf the 

 South is slave labor concentrating with a rapid- 

 ity of w liich we can scarcely have any adeipiate 

 conception. A large proportion of ihe increase 

 of the sugar crop in Louisiana, nearly doubled 

 in a single year, is the work of slaves recently 

 migrating with their masters from north to 

 south. The masters in the tobacco, corn and 

 wheat growing countries of Maryland, Virginia 

 and the highlands of the Carolinas, leave theii' 

 worn out plantations on which the colored race 

 might starve, to take up new cotton lands in 

 western Georgia, Alabama and Mississippi ; 



while the worn out planlation lands of lower 

 Carolina, Georgia and Tenncs.see fiirnisli sugar 

 planters and laborers for the lower Mississippi, 

 and Texas. There cannot, so far as these re- 

 movals are concerned, bo a doubt that ilio con- 

 dition of the colored race is greatly improveil, 

 if we regard either their physical or intellectual 

 enjoyment. At the time of tb'3 adoption of 

 the glorious conslilulion of our republican Uuion, 

 slavery to a greater or less extent existed in 

 every Slate of this Union. Willi the wise inhi- 

 bition of Washington and the fathers of that 

 constitulion of the general governintMit to inter- 

 fere with any member of the great family on 

 this subject, gradually have we seen slavery 

 move out from among us: greatly has the con- 

 dition of the slave been midioiateil in all the 

 States. The cruelties practiced on slaves in 

 New England seventy-five and a hundred years 

 ago — for then our ancestors had slaves both of 

 the African and Indian-American races— are 

 every where regarded as disgraceful. Slavery 

 has been moving away from us gradually : not 

 one of the old thirteen States now ontains an 

 many as its old proportion of slaves to free 

 whites. New York and New Jersey bad its 

 slaves after the old fashion within the memory 

 of Ihe writer : Delaware, a few years since, cul- 

 tivated almost exclusively by slaves, the last 

 year declared its intention to become a free 

 Slate. Thus it is, in the course of luimaii 

 events, without the officious interference or ex- 

 tra legislation of the general governinent, af- 

 fecting the rights of projierty, slavery is passing 

 away from the land. As a matter of agitation 

 between different sections of the country, fan- 

 ning the flame of prejudice between the North 

 and the South, it will never be introduced but 

 by the enemies of our olorious U.mo.v. 



How grand is ibe spectacle of 'good out of 

 evil ' in the great productions of slave labor, 

 the cotton for which the whole world of tho 

 east is our Iriluilary, and the sugar of Louisi- 

 ana and Texas, supplying the deficiency from the 

 dilapidated and diminislied production of the 

 European West India colonies I Without our 

 cotton, how could Brilisb manufactures exist, 

 and without her manufactures, where would 

 he the power of Great Britain.' Without this 

 production of slave labor, what would become 

 of New England manufactures, and ihe wealth 

 of her millionaires.' Nay, were not those po- 

 litical men who warred against the acipiisition 

 of Louisiana inimical to the present source of 

 New England's greatest prosperity, the com- 

 merce and trade which comes to her by million?, 

 which takes away from her nearly all the pro- 

 ducts of her indusuy, returning for them the 

 elemeiils of conniless wealth .' 



The fact inenlioiied by llie cdilor of the Del- 

 ta, that the molasses pays all the expenses of 

 the crop, was new to us. This being true, we 

 cannot much wonder there should be a rush in- 

 to the sugar culture of Louisiana, doubling llio 

 (iroduci in a single year. Only reflect ihat there 

 is a gain upon a small territory of laud, not 

 much exceeding in extent the single large comi- 

 ty of Worcester, in Massachusetts, giving to its 

 ciillivators a clear annual income over and above 

 ex|iendiliire, of twelve or fourteen milliTiis of 

 dollars. Such being the result of their l.il.-or, 

 how can the masters of slaves in Louisiana 

 become other than humane and generous to- 

 wards those who ' labor in the earth .-' We have 

 seen the fllaryland and Virginia planter become 

 poor, on his farm of a thousand acres— the more 



