82 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



in the imposing character of a volunteer cham- 

 pion of Virginia husbandry ; and the first speci- 

 men he has given us of his powers in that ca- 

 pacity, is, not only to accuse me of " most 

 grossly misrepresenting" the agriculture of my 

 native State, in a letter addressed to the Corre- 

 sponding Secretary of the New York State 

 Agricultural Society, at his own request ; but 

 to assert, as of his own certain knowledge, that 

 I am a man so fond of my joke, as not to scruple, 

 at any time, to sacrifice the truth to it. These 

 are not his identical words ; but I take it to be 

 the plain English of the expression, "that he 

 will indulge it (his joke) at the expense of 

 things dearest his heart :" in other words, he 

 will tell a falsehood, if he can make people 

 laugh by it. This truly, is a very pretty cha- 

 racter for one whom he calls " confessedly a 

 Virginian, every inch of him !" His argument 

 to disprove what I have stated as facts, is, that 

 he has never seen w T hat J have stated that J 

 have seen; therefore, such things can never 

 have been seen by any body. What I have 

 uttered as mere matters of opinion, and espe- 

 cially in relation to the average produce of corn 

 and wheat per acre, in the tide water portion of 

 Virginia, which latter opinion he styles, "a 

 charge of still greater import," he treats as if 

 equalty demanding a refutation. Such as he 

 attempts to give, if thrown into the form of syl- 

 logism, would stand somewhat thus. All the 

 people in the tide water part of the State must 

 be in a starving condition, if the average pro- 

 duce of corn per acre be only fifteen bushels, 

 and of wheat only five bushels. 



But they are not in a starving condition. 



Ergo, — my opinion as to the average produce 

 of our corn and wheat per acre, must be utterly 

 wrong Quod erat demonstran lum. 



Now, if the character for truthfulness and 

 fair dealing which I have been striving through 

 a long life to attain, can be destroyed by such 

 an attack as Vindicator has made upon it, then 

 is the effort to sustain it no longer worth mak- 

 ing. But I confidently trust that it will remain 

 what it has been for years past, notwithstanding 

 this most unwarrantable assault ; and that none 

 who have any knowledge of me will ever ques- 

 tion my facts, however they may dissent from 

 the opinions I deduce from them. Had Vindi- 

 cator been equally intent upon doing justice 

 both to me, and to the cause which he professes 

 to have espoused, as he seems to have been on 

 defamimr, me, he would have given your readers, 

 at least, the substance of what I said in favor of 

 our agriculture, in the letter which forms the 

 subject of his animadversions. Then, your 

 readers — very few of whom will probably ever 

 see my letter — would have had an opportunity 

 of forming a tolerably just, opinion of it. But 

 as Vindicator has managed the matter, they are 

 all left to suppose, that the whole of this let.er 



contains nothing but ridicule and abuse of Vir* 

 ginia husbandry. Such must be the impression 

 left on the minds of all who have read only Vin- 

 dicator's representation of it. Permit me, there- 

 fore, to quote a short paragraph which, I confi- 

 dently trust will suffice to acquit me fully, with 

 every impartial man, of all the charges which 

 this self-created champion of Virginia husbandry 

 has brought against me. 



In one part of my letter to the Corresponding 

 Secretary of the New York State Agricultural 

 Society there is the following passage: 



"From the low averages which I have given 

 you of the staple crops in middle and lower Vir- 

 ginia, you will probably form but a poor general 

 estimate of the progress of husbandry in our 

 State. Nevertheless, I can assure you, that in 

 the aggregate, it has been very great in the last 

 ten or twelve years ; and that during the last 

 two or three, it has advanced almost at a geo- 

 metrical ratio. But this advancement, where it 

 is most conspicuous, is still so partial and con- 

 fined to particular neighborhoods, and so slight 

 elsewhere, that strangers who have no personal 

 knowledge of our State, cannot form a correct 

 opinion, merely from hearing what is supposed 

 to be the general average of our agricultural 

 products per acre. To judge well of the w hole 

 extent, and amount of our progress in husbandry, 

 they should know the past as well as present 

 condition thereof. They should see the best as 

 well as the worst of our farms ; they should 

 examine those around our towns, on some of 

 our navigable rivers, in the Valley of Virginia, 

 and in several of the counties immediately be- 

 low our first range of mountains. Then, in- 

 deed, they could decide, as our Congressmen 

 say, ' under standingly,'' on the subject ; and such 

 an examination, I am confident, would discover 

 to them man^y farms as well managed, in every 

 respect, as any in the United States; although, 

 in proportion to our whole territory, the number 

 would probably be smaller than in some of the 

 States north of the Susquehannah." 



I will quote no more, but leave it to every 

 impartial man to decide, whether ihere is even 

 a shadow of propriety or justice in calling a 

 letter which conlains such statements, "a most 

 gross misrepresentation of Virginia agriculture." 



After having had so much cause to condemn 

 and to resent the conduct of Vindicator towards 

 myself, I am gratified to find, that there is at 

 least one thing for which I can and will thank 

 him. It is, that he — an entire stranger to my 

 family — not having the most distant connection 

 with them, so far as I know and believe, should 

 have proved himself so much more sensatively 

 alive to the agricultural fame of my paternal 

 Grandfather, thnn J, his naughty grandson, have 

 done. My only excuse — if indeed, such a deed 

 admits of any — is, that I had the story from 

 my own father, who, I presume to say, was 



