THE SOUTHERN CULTIVATOR. 
109 
has b-ieu kept; our credit has been preserved; our 
cotton bags and our barrels of rice have annu- 
ally met the demands upon us! This compar- 
atively happy and blessed condition demands 
unceasing gratitude to the Great Giver of every 
good, who has blessed us with plenty, and put 
it into the hearts of our rulers to rule with hon- 
esty and govern with wisdom! This has b*n 
especially and signally the case with your mo- 
neyeu institutions, ymer banks. While in all 
other quarters explosion has followed explosion, 
fraud has succeeded fraud, here bills have main- 
tained a specie value, and no one has supposed 
that mismanagement or fraud mingled in the 
management of a single l)ank in South Caroli- 
na. That much of our prosperity is to be as- 
cribed to this fact, cannot be denied; and if 
South Carolinians ought to be prouder of one 
thing than another, it is that her sons have pass- 
ed the ordeal of bank temptations, unsuspected, 
uncorrupted. 
This contemplation, this reflection, this com- 
parison of ourselves with our neighbors, is 
surely enough to prevent the further spread of 
the spirit of emigration. Let each citizen ol the 
State come to this conclusion, “South Carolina 
is my home, I will do her and mysell all the 
good I can,” and he will find, in the language ol 
an early settler of the State, “South Carolina is 
the garden spot of the world.” This may be 
said to be an extravagant view of the matter. — 
Test it in any way you please, and it will be 
found to have no romance in it. 
There is an old proverb, that “a rolling stone 
gathers no moss.” Just so it is with the emi- 
grant. He is rolling on to his fancied treasury 
of abundance, but all is nakedness around him, 
and in his track. He may at last rest, and gath- 
er together, in a country to which he is a stran- 
ger, great abundance. He still looks back to 
the land out of which he came, and remembers 
it with regret. He who is content to remain in 
permanent and useful fixtures, establishes his 
comfort, and in constant attention to his land, 
in crops, and by the judicious application of 
manures, overcomes even barrenness, and in the 
increased product, he finds at home that abun- 
dance which the richer fields of the southwest 
promised him. That this could be proved by 
many instances, I may refer to each member’s 
knowle ge of the events which have transpired 
around him within the lost twelve years. 
_ Are not, fellow members, these considera- 
tions, to which your attention has been turned, 
enough to make you redouble the interest which, 
as agriculturists, you feel in the State in which 
you live? Improvement is our motive and ob- 
ject. Therefore it is we meet here annually, 
that by a free intercourse from the mountains to 
the seaboard we may gather the lessons of ex- 
perience, and bind them upon our hearts, and 
go forth to test them in the labors of the coming 
year. In this way, much good is done, and we 
may begin soon to flatter ourselves that we will 
have something like an agriculture of our own. 
This, however, demands what we have not, 
in all parts of the State, an ed^ucaUd class of hus- 
bandmen. When I say educated, I do not 
mean ^^book-learned jarmers;" I mean men thor- 
oughly trained to their business. The great fault 
of education in South Carolina is, that it has no 
•particular application. The clergyman, the law- 
yer, the physician, the merchant, the mechanic, 
and the farmer, are all educated alike. The 
mere statement of the fact shows the defect. — 
How is it to be remedied? We have not schools 
arranged for every department of life, and per- 
haps such are not always desirable. But with 
suitable attention on the part of parents and 
guardians, education might be so directed as to 
fit a man for his business, instead of making 
him a prodigy of learning, xoithovi one particle 
of common sense. The future farmer and plant- 
er needs but the careful and judicious training 
of home, to be prepared for his station . In ear- 
ly life, in the intervals of his scholastic educa- 
tion, if his mind was turned to the acquisition 
of useful knowledge in the management of the 
farm, and his hands were trained to the use of 
tools, he would insensibly become fit to be the 
head of a well ordered plantation. The vices 
and diseases resulting from idleness, would be 
thus prevented, and the young men of South 
Carolina, instead of growing up in the shade, 
and liable to be withered by the blighting influ- 
ence of a burning summer’s sun, would grow up 
with nerves strung by moderate toil, and fee men 
capable of facing and performing their duty. — 
This preparation will not unfit the young mind 
for the acquisition of knowledge; indeed, it will 
increase its capabilities. Exercise, with an ob- 
ject to be attained, blesses with the '•^mens Sana 
in sano corporeT To such an one, education 
will not open out her blooms in vain; he will 
pass from flower to flower, and from each ex- 
tract that which is good or pleasant, and return 
to his post in society, laden with the rich and 
varied treasures of useful learning. 
We need, too, the lessons of patience. — 
Promptness is a part of our Southern character; 
Ave must add to it endurance, before we can suc- 
ceed as agriculturists. Whatever is attempted 
should be thoroughly tried before it is abandon- 
ed. Many of the schemes to which our atten- 
tion has been of late turned, are no doubt mere 
humbugs. Still this is to be said — every thing 
may be called a humbug until its utility is test- 
ed. It is the part of wisdom to try every thing 
which bids fair to profit us; and one trial per- 
haps is never enough — it is at least entitled to 
an Irishman’s privilege, of being twice heard. 
This is particularly the case when we are look- 
ing around, on the right hand and on the left, 
for the substitute lor our great failing staple, 
cotton. Many things must be tried; but it Avill 
be in vain to expect any to take its place at 
once. 
Indeed, it seems to me, that there is one rem- 
edy, and only one, for the state of things result- 
ing from the low prices of cotton; it consists of 
economy at home and abroad. If we could 
bring ourselves doAA’n to the standard which the 
present price of cotton presents, all would soon 
be well. Buy neither pork, mules nor horses. 
Let these be the product of the farm, and one 
branch of our present difficulties will be cut off. 
Carry this spirit of retrenchment into the house- 
hold, and let home furnish all the usua' supplies 
of clothing for the laborers, and hard times will 
begin to be good times. Real independence, 
that which is above want, will occupy every 
farm. I often go back to the period from 1808 
to 1815, when legislators were not ashamed to 
meet in homespun, w'hen ladies vied with each 
other, not in the luxury of foreign dresses, but 
in those made at home, and ask when was South 
Carolina more happy? NeA’^er, within my 
knowledge. Does this time demand similar 
sacrifices? Your OAvn sense of the necessity 
around you must answer the question. 
Of one thing there is no doubt, the capabili- 
ties of the State are hardly known. Her agri- 
culture is in its infancy. She is just pluming 
herself for a loftier flight than an}'^ she has ever 
before attempted. Our fields are to be cultiva- 
ted with more skill; better and more numerous 
stocks are to be reared; South Carolina is to be- 
come less a planting and more a farming State. 
That this Avfll add to her greatness and her hap- 
piness cannot be denied. In this effort she has, 
it is true, one peculiar difficulty to encounter, in 
the carelessness of her operatives. Still, our 
slaves are capable of more, much more, than 
we have hitherto had credit for. It is only ne- 
cessary that they should be taught habits of re- 
gularity, economy and thrift, to make them the 
most effective laborers in the Avorld. This is 
what we are attempting. Let the oAvmer be re- 
sident, as far as practicable, on his plantation; 
and let him understand well that which he is 
about carrying out. Let his slaves be taught 
that his interests are their interests. Begin with 
small things, and teach them the necessity of at- 
tention. For instance, teach them the absolute 
necessity of shutting a gate, or putting up a rail 
when out of its place; of carefully feeding and 
watering the stock under their care; and there 
will not be much complaint about negro careless- 
7iess. When this much is accomplished, the 
whole difficulty is overcome, and there is noth- 
ing to prevent a South Carolina farmer from 
competing with any one in any of the adjoining 
States. To my brother-farmers, intelligent and 
experienced as you are, I need not add, you can- 
not succeed with negroes, as operatives, as you 
desire to do, U7iless you feed and clothe •well . — 
Make them contented, and then “Massa” Avill 
be, as he ought to be, the Avhole Avorld to them. 
In our climate, health is supposed to be un- 
certain, and that this fact Avill always stand very' 
much in the way of agricultural improvement. 
The difficulty exists, and in the lower part of 
the State is, beyond all doubt, a great obstacle 
to improvement. Still, it is not insuperable, 
eve'll there. For Nature, kind and provident as 
she always is, has provided pine lands in the 
neighborhood of the rich swamp lands, where 
the owners can reside in comparative safety. In 
the interior of late years, Ave have been scourg- 
ed with disease, even to the fool of our majestic 
mountains. That it has visited us as a pesti- 
lence, and as a chastisement for our sins, is be- 
yond all doubt, the true Christian vieiv of the 
matter. Still it is our duty, as far as we have 
the knowledge or the means, to remoA^e the se- 
condary causes. In a country like ours, under- 
going the process of having the forest annually 
cleared aAvay, it is to be expected that many 
causes of disease will thus be produced. The 
hill-sides cleared, and the ravines filled up with 
the timber cut down from above, and afterAvards 
Avith the alluvial from the cultivated hill sides, 
cannot do otherAvise than produce disease. So, 
too, where streams or springs are choked or co- 
vered up, the neighborhood must expect the fall 
fever. These causes may easily be removed, 
by ditching, draining and cutting away the 
drifts. But the annual decomposition of the 
leaves in oak and hickory land, with the decay- 
ing limber allowed to lie and rot upon the ground, 
Avill pioduce disease, especially in Avet sum- 
mers. The remedy for this was suggested by 
the intelligent foreman of the Grand Jury of 
York District, at the last Fall Term, (Mr. John 
Springs,) '■'■burn the icoods.” Let this be done 
early in the season, before the sap begins to run, 
and no injury avlII occur to the timber. But 
some suppose the soil will be injured; intefli- 
gent, observing men, on the contrary, believe 
that the ashes of the leaves are worth more to 
the land than their natural decomposition; and, 
so far as 1 have had experience, I am satisfied 
their views are correct. If, how'ever, there was 
a doubt about it, health is of too much impor- 
tance to be weighed against such a considera- 
tion. In York District, during the last season, 
from 300 to 400 of the inhabitants were gather- 
ed to their fathers. What an awful mortality! 
Hoav important, if practicable, to counteract it, 
and prevent its recurrence! A country visited 
annually Avith fever never can improA'e in that 
ratio in Avhich it AAmuld Avithout it. It is our 
duty, therefore, to make every effort we can to 
restore the State to health. 
Much will depend upon habits of regularity 
in every thing; and temperance in eating and 
drinking is essential to health. To farmers, 
men wffio are exposed to the A^ertical rays of our 
summer’s sun, this advice cannot be too often 
repeated. Good, pure cold w^ater, I regard as 
essential to the health of laborers. If the water 
which they crink is impure, it is in vain to ex- 
pect health; Avith a little, very little attention, 
this first and best gift to man can in all places 
be secured. 
At this time, much depends upon properly de- 
A^eloping the resources of every district. If 
marl can be found above Orangeburgh, what in- 
calculable benefits would flow from the disco- 
very to every place w'here it might be, or to 
which it might be accessible. So, too, if the 
vein of limestone which is seen in York, Spar- 
tanburgh and Laurens, could be traced and 
made available throughout its whole course, 
great good might result therefrom. So, too, a 
careful analysis of our soils, and the sugges- 
tions of science, pointing out that which was 
