42 PROFITABLE STOCK RAISING 



the entire energy in the production of one thing, 

 and depending upon the open markets for the pur- 

 chase of everything else. 



This one-crop system was developed principally 

 by the effects of the civil war and the stern necessity 

 which the South faced in 1865 for establishing at 

 once some form of industry which would afford 

 living conditions to the thousands of people whose 

 property had been devastated by the four years of 

 warfare. Previous to that time, southern agricul- 

 ture had been devoted in considerable measure to 

 the production of various kinds of crops. In the 

 early colonial days, land was about the cheapest 

 imaginable commodity, while labor was the scarcest 

 and most expensive. Crops grew with little or no 

 trouble to the farmer on the rich virgin land, but 

 the main question was how to get these crops cul- 

 tivated and harvested. This imperative necessity 

 for labor developed slavery in the South while with- 

 drawing it from the North, and firmly fastened this 

 institution upon the southern planters. The num- 

 ber of negroes increased very rapidly, much faster 

 in proportion than the southern landowners, so 

 that in the course of years the planters found them- 

 selves with a surplus of labor, more than they 

 needed for the lands under cultivation. If their 

 fields showed any signs of decreasing fertility, as 

 many of them began to do at this time, the simplest 

 and easiest remedy was to move on to new uncul- 

 tivated lands, using slave labor in clearing away 

 the timber and thus subduing rich new areas of 

 fertile soil, and continuing the production of large 

 crops. It was upon this kind of a basis that the 

 settlement of Georgia, Mississippi, Arkansas, Louis- 

 iana and Texas was accomplished. The very nature 

 of the times and conditions required that these 



