158 
THE SOUTHERN CULTIVATOR. 
Bul .ougDeluiv* ihe sau decay ot alike Grecian 
and Roman glory, republicans had begun, at a 
self same hour, as if by mutual consent, to 
abandon agricub ure, so far as regards personal 
practice or inspection, and to make men com- 
bined in armies the fearful crop of rapacity ! 
The hour that saw the generation of the Cin- 
cinnatuses and the Catos depart from living 
Rome, and agriculture became confided to 
slaves,— the same attitude of events too that 
transpired in Greece— was the hour for the 
final departure of liberty from those regions. 
For when man as an o'' ner has no tenure on 
the soil— what can be his motive for desiring 
the continuance of prevailing things, and of 
course by parity of reasoning, of liberty'? Or 
when he does own, but makes the improvement 
of his tracts no favorite pleasure, leaves them 
to tenants, or forgets them, what guaranty has 
the State in his continued faiihfulness ? 
Had the days of Cato continued to Rome— 
and had consecutively all design of conquests 
been given over, — the Roman Commonwealth 
had lasted to this day. But ambition disdains 
agriculture: it turns the plowshare into the 
sword; it transforms pruning hooks into 
spears ; to this day its dreams, when balmiest, 
are of culverins and cannons, of gigantic 
calibre. 
In giving its history, I would call attention 
to the peaceful tendency and patriotic quality 
of agiiculture. 
Nurna Pompilius was the only one of the 
primitive monarchs of Rome, who would have 
imparted a peaceful tenor to ihe Roman spirit, 
and it w as said landed cultivation was /t?s de- 
1' But the martial policy of Romulus, the 
loui; !er, was too potential for the example of 
Numa. Rome was destined for a career of 
blood, and agriculture to be abandoned in its 
course. 
The sinew of controversy inhered in the Pa- 
tricians. Descended from the ravished Dam- 
sels of Sabina, they would be conspimous, even 
over Cato, amid his eight acres. The more 
ancient a nobility, the more in veierate. 
To give some cessation to these turmoils be- 
tween Patricians and Plebeians and to avert 
civil commotion, the several consuls in their 
acute forecast, sent both parties, or the flower 
of them, to distant wars, and by the excitement 
of a spirit of conquest, directed, thus continu- 
ally, the danger.)Lis arms of the Romans from 
themselves and their city, upon contiguous, 
and, at length, upon distant kingdoms. 
As these conquests grew into a habit and a 
passion, and from the introduction of oriental 
luxuries, the hardy Romaiis became enervaied ; 
forgot the primeval principle of eight acres to 
every family ; enacted that five hundred become 
the policy; and, at Iasi, that wealth may hold 
both land and slaves, the subjugated, without 
number, or restriction, until a Patrician had 
broad domains, and, in one instance, twenty 
thousand slaves. 
But mark the sequel. If Ca‘o was kept at 
home, and as Cincinnatus evinced by an appli- 
cation of mind upon his narrow, but to his 
simplicity sufficient estate, the ambition of 
Sylla had no such motive : nor did he perhaps 
ever finger an axe, hoe, or plow, or even 
oversee his laborers. And the destruction of 
the Gracchi, previously, those jewels of Corne- 
lia, for attempting to restore the pristine purity 
of the commonwealth by deductions on estates, 
led the way to the alternate triumphs ot Marius 
and Sylla, which introduced those ot Csssar, 
and then intervened the well known iraperiaiity 
of Rome and its consequent “ decline and fall,” 
Mav not all this disaster be traced to th^ Patri- 
archal abandonment of agriculiure? And 
does it not premonish Americans never to be- 
come weaned from a hold of afiection to the 
soil ! 
The effort of Augustus to restore the cultiva- 
tion of the soil to respectability, when Virgil 
at his command wrote his Georgies, was tem- 
porary. The Empire had already grown great 
and was unwieldy, and as the sw’ord had been 
her marching guerdon lo renown and power. 
so in the mysterious retribution ol Providence, 
thesame signal instrument also worked her de- 
struction ! The same results every where suc- 
ceeded the same operations ! 
The maxims ol Socrates and of Xenophon on 
tillage and the horse, had but little influence 
over their countrymen. Everything was bent 
to war, that too unfortunately natural passion 
of man’s appetite — as in after times, in spite of 
the regulating maxims of LaFayeite, leading 
to steady Liberty, the phrenzied French made 
the wildest license their idolatry. The same 
consequences lollowed alike to Agriculture and 
the State. 
Other arts, and trades, and professions cannot, 
from the portable system of the occupation, be 
so patriotic as the fixedness of farming necessi- 
tates upon the Agricultnrist. Fanners, it is 
proverbial, always wish to let Government a- 
lone. They never essay to pluck one pinion 
from the wing of embodied freedom. With 
such men, untroubled by pragmatic persons 
from the cities, our free Government would last 
forever. This, as 1 have exhibi ed, the Histo- 
ries of past nations confirm — and this our owm 
will . 
Why did Cromwell remain content in Eng- 
land alter the conquest of Ireland; why, unlike 
Buonaparte, did he not attempt the conquest ot 
Holland, &c.'? Because Cromwell was a plow- 
boy! Whereas, the Corsican knew nothing, 
even of horticulture. Will my countrymen 
take the hint? Who and what was Washing- 
ton ? 
In England, from which country, owing to 
our lineage by far, and tc the synonymity ol our 
dialects, we imbibe nearly all our husbandrial 
improvements. Agriculture was at a low ebb 
until the fourteenth century — and ii seems, not 
cultivated as a science until the sixteenth cen- 
tury. [See Hazen’s Panorama of the Arts and 
Trades — article, The Agriculturist.] Jn 1.534, 
the first book on Agriculture there appeared. 
“ It was written by A. Fitzherbert, a Justice of 
the Peace, who studied the Laws of Vegetation 
and the nature of soils with philosophical ac- 
cuiacv.” 
“Very little improvement was made on the 
theory of this author for upwards ot a hundred 
years, when Hugh Platt discovered and brought 
into use several kinds of manures, for improv- 
ing exhausted soils ” 
“ Agriculture again receir ed a new impulse 
about the middle of the I8th century; and in 
1793 a Board of Agriculture was esiablished by 
an act of Parliament, at the suggestion of Sir 
John Sinclair, who was elected its President. 
Through the influence of this board, a great 
number of Agricultural Societies have been 
formed in the kingdom, and much valuable in- 
formation on rural economy communicated to 
the public through the medium of a voluminous 
publication under its superintendence.” 
At present, these associations are numerous 
in the British Isles, an^ adopting theirexampie, 
numerous also in the United Slates. They in- 
spect and instruct their members and the coun- 
try through books, periodicals and lectures on 
every con eivable topic peculiarto Agriculture 
Bul Horticulture is m.l yet so perfected as the 
other branch of husbandry. It existed in Italy, 
Germany, France, and on Continental Europe, 
generally, long before its introduction by 
Charles the If. in 1660. And it is not yet ge- 
nerally diffused here, I think in consequence of 
our social system as to proprietary lands, be- 
ing dissimilar, by virtue ol the absence ot 
Primogeniture, from the civil polity of that 
country; where broad domains, descending to 
first born or eldest son, remain with all ances 
tral improvements, from generation to genera- 
tion, with the superadditions of recent embel 
lishments upon the fruitions of centuries: Con- 
sequently the English Baron or Lord has over 
a hundred acres devoted to picturesque land- 
scape, in the very bed of horticulture and gar- 
denings, alone. 
Let us not repine at this stern policy ot our 
revolutionary ancestors. They were not vi- 
sionaries admiring, like Pygmalion, the ideal 
statue lor the beautiful reality. They would 
have Liberty, in vulgar parlance, and made 
her to be seen and felt! Cld systems, there- 
fore, have crumbled under their Constitution. 
But horticulture onlv suflTers in the scenery. 
Every ‘smart’-minded tanner or planter can de- 
rive all the uses ot a bountiful boiticulture in 
the compass ol a lew acres, by a judicious se- 
lection and management of all its varied items. 
All our standard productions, except Indian 
corn and tobacco, are exotics. These two, like 
the w ild Turkey, are indigenous to our conti- 
nent. Cotton was introduced from some East- 
ern Island, where, as in China, it had long been 
cultivated. It was a lardy plant until a north- 
ern gentleman, Whitney, upon the soil of Geor- 
gia, invented the famous gin. “In 1791 the 
whole export of the Union was only sixty-four 
bales; but in 1834 it amounted to 1,000,617;” 
and now 2,000,000. The sugar cane became al- 
so an East India product, was long cultivated in 
China, and mention is made of its being in use 
among the Greeks and Romans during their 
days of prosperity. Previous to 1466, sugar 
was known in England chiefly as a viedicine, 
into which country it had been sold from Arabia 
Felix, Egypt, Nubia, Ethiopia and Morocco. 
“Now, in point of importance, it ranks next to 
wheat and rice in the vegetable world, and first 
in maritime commerce ” 
Rice is also an Eastern grain. Now a staple 
of South Carolina. Wheat, the staff of New 
England, New York and Pennsylvania — oats, 
barley, and all other grains, excepting the In- 
dian corn, as 1 before intimated, belong, by pri- 
ority ol cultivation, toother and remote lands. 
A Ithough species of them may'a^ found wild 
in the immense pampas ot South America. 
Still our king vegetable, Indian corn, seriously 
carries the palm, from its adaptation for man 
and for every species of live stock he calls 
around his habitation. 
Butler it be borne in mind, that though living 
in this age of the 19th century, when steam and 
its triumphs are supposed everything, and we 
are remembering our plodding ancestors and 
the ancients with contempt, that they knew 
some valuable arts with which we are unac- 
quainted. Not all the ingenuity ot Sir Humph- 
rey Davy could delect \\\^ materiel of the Tyrian 
dye. Few modern if any statuary, have equal- 
led — none have surpassed the statues of a Gre- 
cian Phidias, or Pr-axileles, or Apelles— and on 
the science of husbandry, the countrymen of 
Cato, Brutus or Cassius, of Plato, or Zeno— 
might have known vegetative secrets to us en- 
tirely lost in practice. They boasted several 
writers — Theophrastus, .®lian. Yarn, Pliny, 
Columilla and Palladios, and whom I have al- 
ready iiamed. When have we made a Colos- 
sus of 6r^7ss bestriding over the masts ol huge 
ships? The Rhodian still lives in raemoiy, a 
wonder — while from neglected ancient maxims, 
many a modern might invigorate the productive 
agenev of his lands. Very respectfully, yours, 
J. J. Flournoy. 
^g tkullural illeetings. 
Monroe and Conecuh Agricultural Society, 
Mr. CxMAKtThe citizens of Monroe and 
Conecuh counties had a meeting at the Burnt 
Corn Academy on the second Saturday in July 
last, and formed an Agricultural Society by the 
name of the Monroe and Conecuh Agricultural 
Society. The officers of ihs Society are : Dr. 
John Watkins, President J Dr. Wm. Cunning- 
ham, of Monroe county, and Nicholas Stal- 
'vorlh, of Conecuh county, Vice-Presidents; 
Samuel James Cumming, Recording Secreta- 
ry ; and John Green, senr., Corresponding 
Secretary. David Cannon, Jeremiah Carter 
and Ithiel Lee, Esqrs., were appointed to draft 
a constitution for the Society, to be submitted 
at the next meeting, which took place last 
Saturday. The gentlemen appointed to draft 
the constitution, submitted it to the Society, 
and it was received and adopted. Dr. Watkins 
then addressed the Society in a very appro- 
