38 The Pence Question in the South. 



screens and feaders at close run ways, and in smaller pens, to prevent the barb 

 from tearing the fleeces. Sheep breeders agree that with fences of common 

 construction, the sheep huddle in their shade and shelter, at the borders of the 

 field, making them even more a temptation and a prey to the dog. The light, 

 strong Barb Fence has no shelter or shade to offer, and only one suggestion 

 without and within for all animals to keep at a distance from it. 



IN CONCLUSION. 



We have thus sought to review some of the general and particular facts of 

 fencing and of the fence system in this country and the Southern States. 

 The figures are striking in their magnitude, but are as authentic as any sta- 

 tistics of our domestic industries, and have been derived from sources beyond 

 challenge for their accuracy. And yet their presentment is comparatively 

 new, for it is only within a few years that the attention of national and state 

 agricultural authorities has been turned to a careful view of the fence ques- 

 tion. When it is stated that upwards of one hundred and twenty-five thous- 

 and miles of Barb Fencing has passed into use in the last few seasons, it may 

 seem an extravagant assertion ; perhaps to be received with incredulity, as 

 impossible. But the sum representing the total cost of fences in the United 

 States, given in one of our first paragraphs, represents over six MILLION MILES 

 of fences in use in the United States at the time of the government inquiry of 

 1871, and the same form of statement applied to the fence statistics of the 

 Southern States, presented in the same connection, shows that, at that time, 

 Kentucky had nearly THREE HUNDRED THOUSAND MILES of fences, and Tennes- 

 see nearly TWO HUNDRED THOUSAND miles. In the Iowa State Agricultural 

 Report for 1863, a careful computation for that state alone showed nearly 

 FOUR HUNDRED THfcusAND miles of fences. Compared with these substantial 

 and authentic fence exhibits, the reader who may be fresh in this field of 

 inquiry will be better able to appreciate the facts of Barb Fencing, and the 

 era it opens. Let us briefly review some of the more obvious conclusions 

 from what we have presented. 



1. We cannot do without fencing. Old custom, and modern needs sustaining 

 such custom, point to the suitable fencing of land as the only security to the 

 profit, and peace of mind of the land owner. So largely has Barb Fencing 

 been adopted to meet this need, that its statistics of manufacture are to-day 

 among the most solid figures of the Wire industry, and of the hardware 

 trade in farm supplies. 



2 . Fencing is costly. For the Fence, taken in the aggregate , the outlay is heavy , 

 and under the old systems wasteful. What other direction of farm economy 

 promises better and surer saving than Barb Fence, when cost and ease of con- 

 struction and maintenance are considered ? 



3. The South has special needs for fencing. All leading authorities, her 

 own men, earnest to repair and build up her industries, are to day urging it with 

 tongues and pens. How far Barb Fencing comes in naturally among the in- 

 dispensable agencies of this reform, we have tried to show in these pages. 



4. The farmer's enemies are many. He must protect his fields and his flocks. 

 Barb fencing will help him to protect them. 



5. Defective legislation exists in the South, which it is for her law-makers to 

 repair, but the farmer cannot wait on the statute books, while his farm is 

 running to waste, and the dogs are eating his sheep. He cannot take the law 

 into his own hands, but he can stretch the impregnable line of law and order 

 about his own premises, and no caucus or clique can make his Barb Fence 

 otherwise than secure to everything within its protection. 



6. It is no experiment. Barb Fence has to day a literally broader relation to 

 the developement of American husbandry, and the enjoyment of land owning, 



