I 



I860.] 



THE 



SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



405 



01- less the measure to be obtained, by the 

 people of any country, of these and all other 

 blessings which a community can enjoy. 

 There is, however, one very numerous class 

 of exceptions to this general rule, which is, 

 when an agricultural people, or interest, is 

 tributary to some other people or interest, 

 whether foreign or at home. Such excep- 

 tions are presented in different modes, by 

 the agriculture of Cuba being tributary to 

 Spain, of many other countries to their own 

 despotic and oppressive home governments; 

 and of the southern states of this confede- 

 racy, to greater or less extent, to different 

 pauper and plundering interests of the north- 

 ern states, which, through legislative enact- 

 ments, have been mainly fostered and sup- 

 ported by levying tribute upon southern 

 agriculture and industry. 



The reas on why such woful results of im- 

 poverishment of lands, as have been stated, 

 are not seen to follow the causes, and spee- 

 dily, is that the causes are not all in action 

 at once and in equal progress. The labours 

 of exhausting culture, also, are necessarily 

 suspended, as each of the cultivators' fields 

 is successively worn out. And when tillage 

 so ceases, and any space is thus left at rest, 

 Nature immediately goes to work to recruit 

 and replace as much as possible of the wast- 

 ed fertility, until another destroyer, after 

 many years, shall return again to waste, and 

 in much shorter time than before, the smal- 

 ler stock of fertility so renewed. Thus, the 

 whole territory so scourged, is not destroyed 

 at one operation. But though these changes 

 and partial recoveries are continually, to 

 some extent, counteracting the labours for 

 destruction, still the latter work is in gene- 

 ral progress. It may require (as it did in 

 my native region) more than two hundred 

 years from the first settlement, to reach the 

 lowest degradation. But that final result is 

 not the less certainly to be produced by the 

 continued action of the causes. I have wit- 

 nessed at home, nearly the last btage of de- 

 line. But I have also witnessed, subsequent- 

 1}^, and over large spaces, more than the com- 

 plete resuscitation of the land, and great im- 

 provement in almost every respect, not only 

 to individual, but to public interests; not only I 

 in regard to fertility and wealth, but also' 

 in mental, moral and social improvement. 



Inasmuch as my remarks would seem to 

 ascribe the most exhausting system of cul- 

 tivation especially to the slave-holding 

 states, the enemies of the institution of 



slavery might cite my opinions, if without 

 the explanation which will now be offered, 

 as indicating that slave labour and exhaust- 

 ing tillage were necessarily connected as 

 cause and effect. I readily admit that our 

 slave labour has served greatly to facilitate 

 our exhausting cultivation ; but only be- 

 cause it is a great facility — far superior to 

 any found in the non-slave- holding states — 

 for all agricultural operations. Of course, 

 if our operations are exhausting of fertility, 

 then certainly our command of cheaper and 

 more abundant labour enables us to do the 

 work of exhaustion, as well as all other 

 work, more rapidly and effectually. But if 

 directed to improving, instead of destroying 

 fertility, then this great and valuable aid of 

 slave-labour will as much more advance im- 

 provement, as it has generally heretofore 

 advanced exhaustion. The enunciation of 

 this proposition is perhaps enough. But if 

 any, from prejudice, should deny or doubt 

 its truth, they may see the practical proofs 

 on all the most improved and profitable 

 farms of Lower and Middle Virginia. On 

 the lands of our best improvers and farmers, 

 such as liichard Sampson, Hill Carter, John 

 A. Selden, William B. Harrison, Willough- 

 by Newton, and many others, slave- labour 

 is used not only exclusively and in larger 

 than usual proportion, (because more re- 

 quired on very productive land,) but is 

 deemed indispensable to the greatest profits, 

 and operating to produce more increase of 

 fertility, and more agricultural profit, than 

 can be exhibited- from any purely agricul- 

 tural labours and capital north of Mason 

 and Dixon's line. 



There is another and stronger reason for 

 the gresiter exhausting effects of Southern 

 agriculture, and, therefore, of tillage by 

 slave-labour. The great crops of all the 

 slave-holding States, and especially of the 

 more Southern — corn, tobacco, and cotton 

 — are all tilled crops. The frequent turn- 

 ing and loosening of the earth by the plow 

 and hoe — and far more, when continued 

 without intermission year after year — ad- 

 vance the decomposition and waste of all 

 organic matter, and expose the soil of all 

 but the most level surfaces to destructive 

 washing by rains — and rains the more 

 heavy and destructive in power, in propor- 

 tion as approaching the South, The N( rth- 

 ern farmer is guarded from the worst of 

 these results, not because he uses free-la- 

 bour, but because his labour is so scarce 



