SOUTHERN CULTIVATOR. 
291 
moral isolation. While this isolation does not create in 
our minds an instant’s doubt as to the rectitude of the 
Institution, it binds those among whom it exists more 
closely together. In this aspect, the whole South is the 
common home of the Southerner. Yet we have the metes 
and bounds of States. There is one form of State pride 
which is silly ; there is another form which is commen- 
dable. It is akin to that feeling which causes us to con- 
gratulate ourselves upon a virtuous ancestry. It is the 
extension of home feelings beyond the paternal acres to 
the limit of the State which gave us birth. It is natural 
to the noble spirit to feel a reluctance by removal, to with- 
hold from his native soil the aid of his mind and fortune 
in the generous contest of improvement. 
The ties which ought to bind us to the homestead are 
still stronger than those which bind us to the State. Who 
shall take care of our dead when we have abandoned them 
to the stranger I In wandering over deserted plantations 
in the older portions of Georgia and South Carolina, in 
the pitiless desolation which reigns,, no feature causes us 
so to shiver with a moral chill, as the family grave 
yard. It is the embodiment ef a filial impiety. Its walls 
crumbling or thrown down by great tree roots which have 
protruded from within — ^its fallen slabs a cover for the rat- 
tlesnake, or its dense shade a shelter for the uncleanly 
swine; it exhibits the educated Anglo-Saxon, as being 
more deficient in refined reverence, than the untutored 
Indiaft^; 5 ^ho never passes a resting-place of the dead with- 
out if possible, casting another stone upon the pile which 
protects the remains beneath from desecration. 
Besides the violence done to our moral nature by re- 
moval, in separating us from the graves of our fathers and 
our children, it breaks up many of the most endearing 
ties which unite us with the living. We can never re- 
place the friends of our childhood. In new countries and 
amid new scenes, valued and valuable friendships 
may be formed. But the common recollections of the 
school-room and play-ground and river — the battles and 
reconciliations— the innocent entanglements with the 
gentler sex — the hair-breadth ’scapes from the vigilance 
of the lynx-eyed master— the gradual growth to man- 
hood— the struggles mutually encountered-the temptations 
bravely overcome ; all of these give to the friendships of 
our youth an intimacy and a cordiality which we may 
look for in vain among those contracted amid new scenes 
and in later years. 
It should not be forgotten that in removing to a new 
country if our lives have been virtuous, and our character 
for estimable qualities has been well established by years 
of diligent performance of duty, we lose the benefit of 
the past, and as a stranger we must teach strangers slov/ly 
to value us. We begin life in many senses over again. 
These depreciations are legitimate subjects of conside- 
ration, Life has sufficient rough points which we must 
encounter without ourselves needlessly multiplying them. ' 
Our sky will be sufficiently overcast without our putting 1 
out the light of a single star that glimmers in it. Our I 
temptations from v/ithout and within are sufficiently for- j 
midable without our loosening a single restraint which a j 
well ordered and established society imposes. He who 
removes with his family to a new country always does so 
at a moral and mental hazard to* himself and them. But 
these are topics on which we may not longerd well. We 
have but made suggestions. The thoughtful mind will 
readily conceive and elaborate them. 
The inconveniences of emigration with a family and 
negroes are very great. Railroads have diminished, but 
not removed them. If we wish to buy cheap fresh lands 
we must go beyond the hearing of the steam whistle. — 
The humane master will accompany his servants. He 
who has not made such a journey is hardly prepared to 
understand its annoyances : The slowly moving wagon — 
the jaded and sometimes failing horses — the merciless rain 
— the pinching cold — the slashing mud — the surly refusal 
of accommodations from inhospitable men ; these and num- 
berless other vexations render the emigrant’s journey a sad 
chapter in his history. And when he has reached his des- 
tination, the unbroken and formidable forest, the comfortless 
cabin, the sight of his wife and children destitute of those 
things which they have been accustomed to regard as ne- 
cessaries of life, will cause him sorely to regret the old 
Homestead. He must expect serious and sometimes fatal 
sickness. It is immaterial what residents in a rich, new 
country say as to its healthfulness, .^sop’s Fox story 
as to caudal appendages, is as true now as it was in his 
day. It is a law of nature from which we believe there 
is no departure, that rich fresh lands turned up by the 
plow, and deadened trees, erect sponges for the absorp- 
tion and retention of moisture, and both acted upon by 
a fiery Southern sun, will produce sickness among the 
first settlers. In a few years, this sickness may pass 
away ; but with it may also have passed away some dear 
ones with whom it was the breaking of heart-strings to 
part. Some portions of upper Georgia, which prior to 
their settlement, gave every indication of healthfulness, 
in the the third and fourth years after their settlement 
were scourged by disease, scarcely a family escaping. 
Those same sections are now perfectly healthy. During 
the interval of disease, the population was decimated. 
This is the dark side of the picture. To the adventu- 
rous man, a life in a new country has its charms. The 
merry horn — the faithful hound — the bounding deer — the 
open woods— the eager chase— the successful shot, give 
a pleasure to which the staid denizen of the city is a 
stranger. To some natures it is a relief to be freed from 
the onerous restraints v/hich artificial society imposes. 
The pride of the heart is gratified at seeing the sturdy 
oak which had defied the blasts of a century, topple and 
fall before the strokes of the negro’s axe. It is a tribute 
to our manhood, v/hen we reflect that we have caused 
the forest to disappear, and conceal the soil once the hunt- 
ing ground of the idle Indian, or the lair cf the wild 
beast, with the snowy Cotton or the waving Corn. When 
years have elapsed, and the emigrant sits in his afternoon 
porch and looks over the well-ordered farm which smil- 
ingly returns his gaze, it ministers to his self-respect to 
say— ‘'By years of patient fortitude and honest toil, I 
have done it.” This dark cloud has its “silver lining.” 
