146 Revieiv of Essays on Calcareous Manures. 



support this increasing expense, and also furnish the necessary sup- 

 plies to the family of the owner — whence, very many owners of 

 large estates, in lands and negroes, are throughout their lives too 

 poor to enjoy the comforts of life, or to incur the expenses necessary 

 to improve their unprofitable farming. A man so situated may be 

 said to be a slave to his own slaves. If the owner is industrious 

 and frugal, he may be able to support the increasing number of his 

 slaves, and to bequeath them undiminished to his children. But the 

 income of kw persons increases as fast as their slaves, and if not, 

 the consequence must be, that some of them will be sold that the 

 others may be supported ; and the sale of more is perhaps after- 

 wards compelled, to pay debts incurred in striving to put off that 

 dreaded alternative. The slave at first almost starves his master, 

 and at last is eaten by him — at least, he is exchanged for his value 

 in food." 



The waste of productive capital due to the use of slave labor, 

 does not appear in this statement. By the estimate of Mr. Ruffin 

 himself, the annual wages incurred by the employment of a slave 

 amount to ^38; the whole of the expenses to ^86 50. By the 

 account of one of his southern correspondents, in the Farmer's Re- 

 gister, an agricultural hired laborer in the state of Rhode Island does 

 the work of 2J slaves, and his wages and food we presume will not 

 cost his employer more than ^'173. The northern farmer, there- 

 fore, saves one fifth ; but it is, in addition, to be recollected, that the 

 southern planter must support the children, the aged, and females 

 who can do no work. We therefore think we are safely warranted 

 in saying, that every piece of agricultural labor performed by a slave 

 in a southern state, costs one half more than if performed in an east- 

 ern state by a freeman. The difference, indeed, would not be per- 

 ceptible, if they labored side by side, for the freed negro or white 

 hireling would disdain to work in such a case ; but as the compara- 

 tive result between different portions of our countr}^, it is unques- 

 tionable. The effect upon the general prosperity is, however, far 

 greater than would appear from the comparison, for every laborer in 

 the eastern states saves a part of his wages, to add to the national 

 wealth ; the children, the women, find profitable occupations, and 

 thus a barren county of New England, in which there may not be a 

 single wealthy individual, may notwithstanding possess a far greater 

 collective wealth than an equal surface of the richest cotton region 

 in the southern states. 



