THE CULTIVATOR. 
271 
NOTES OF TRAVEL IN THE SOUTHWEST—No. VI. 
BY SOLON ROBINSON. 
[Mr. Robinson commences this letter, by informing 
his readers, that on the 12th day of February, the date 
of his letter, the peach and plum trees in the part of 
the country from which he writes, (the north portion of 
Mississippi,) are in full bloom. He states that the region 
is quite new, it being “the much talked of Chickasaw 
purchase,” and that the people live mostly in log cabins. 
The land is described as being generally good for cot¬ 
ton, but in Mr. R.’s opinion, an investment of more than 
37 cents per acre, for a large portion of it, would not 
prove profitable, on account of the extremely low price 
of cotton. The course of cultivation generally practiced, 
is represented as very deteriorating. The land is mostly 
hilly, and by injudicious management, is said to be 
greatly injured by washing. Mr. R. says he passed a 
field in the north part of Yallabusha county, in which he 
saw “ twenty plows, each drawn by a single horse or 
mule, and some of them pretty poor at that.” This land, 
he says, “ was to be planted to corn without any further 
plowing, and this certainly was not two inches deep in 
the average.” The soil is said to have been originally 
about six inchesdeep, butby this mode of barely “scratch¬ 
ing” and loosening the surface, it is in many cases nearly 
all washed away, leaving the fields cut up by deep gul¬ 
lies. But that this wasteful cultivation, which Mr. R. 
so much deplores, is by no means universal, will appear 
from his description of some beautiful and well-managed 
plantations—to one of which he introduces us by a rela¬ 
tion of the following pleasant incident, which, though 
somewhat elongated, we think our readers will be inte¬ 
rested to peruse in his own language—E d.] 
Finding so little of the spirit of improved husbandry, 
and so few with whom I could feel as though I was with 
old acquaintances, the pleasure of a circumstance that 
happened to me on this evening cannot be realized by 
my readers, by any description that I can give; and can 
only be judged of by other travellers who after toiling de- 
spondingly through darkness and difficulty, suddenly find 
themselves by the warm hearthstone of a new found and 
unexpected friend. 
The day had been warm and balmy as a New-England 
mid May day, the roads good from the effect of good 
weather. The blossoms, as I have before remarked, 
making the air fragrant; garden vegetables green grow¬ 
ing in luxuriance; while hundreds of negro laborers, 
busy in the fields, made the world seem gladsome with 
their cheerful laugh and jovial song. Yet amid all, I 
could not feel gladsome myself, for I could not but see 
ruin following in the footsteps of such a system of culti¬ 
vation as I too frequently witnessed. In this mood of 
mind, 1 passed Coffeeville, the county seat of Yallabusha, 
just before sun down, and as the town, which is 
built upon almost as many hills as ancient Rome, offers 
but little inducement to a stranger to spend a night, I 
passed on with the intention of stopping at some rode- 
side house, a mile or two on; but after passing that dis¬ 
tance and seeing no more pleasant prospect ahead, I 
made inquiry of a passing negro, and was assured that I 
should find no stopping place “ this side of Tom Hardi- 
man’s, and dat was six mile mighty bad road,” which I 
was bound to get over or stick fast in, with a tired team 
and in a dark night. On, on, I went, over hills, stumps, 
gulleys, streams, mud, and in the expectancy of a very 
poor supper. How I was at length disappointed! Al¬ 
though I found the house a low log cabin, built after the 
universal, never varying pattern, of two rooms with a 
broad hall between, I was struck with surprise, and at 
once impressed with the idea that I should find something 
out of the common course of things within. Reader, 
would you know why I received this impression in ad¬ 
vance, and that so suddenly, and only from the glimpse I 
caught by candlelight, as the host advanced to answer my 
call. Here it is. From the house, yes, from that rude, 
block log cabin to the front gate, extended a neat arbor 
for the support of twining flowers, climbing vines and 
roses. Did you ever see such an outward sign, without 
feeling at once assured that taste, intelligence, neatness, 
and comfort dwelt within? At all events I found it true 
in this instance. In far less time than usual, when 
waiting upon a negro cook, I was seated at the supper 
table. The neatness and profuse variety of the dishes 
with which it was loaded, were rendered still more 
palatable by the presence of just such a woman as might 
have been expected from the outside sign which I have 
mentioned, and the beauty of whose face was undoubtedly 
improved by the healthful glow that she had acquired 
that very day by her personal superintendence of the 
cultivation of her flowers. But weary as she may have 
been, and late as was the hour, she did not feel herself at 
liberty to neglect the tired and hungry traveller; and I 
ate a far better supper that night in “ Tom Hardiman’s : 
log cabin, than I had before eaten in far better houses, 
where better things might have been looked for, only 
that the lady did not cultivate a flower garden. 
Although I am no great believer in clairvoyance, I cer¬ 
tainly witnessed here a wonderful case of “ guessing,” 
considering the guesser was a Tennesseean instead of one 
of the “ guessing nation.” 
During supper I observed that I was undergoing a 
most rigid scrutiny by Mr. Hardiman, who on observing 
that I noticed him, began to excuse himself by saying 
that he was struck by a very singular impression which 
he could not account for, and he had been examining my 
face to see if he could not recognize the features of “an 
old acquaintance,” whom he had never seen or known, 
except as he had seen his features in his letters to the 
Cultivator and other agricultural papers; and though he 
had never received any intimation that the person he 
alluded to was in that part of the U. S., he was irresisti¬ 
bly impressed with the idea that I was the man. 
My curiosity was excited; my toilsome evening’s ride 
was not forgotten, but looked back upon with pleasure. 
I had at length found an “ old acquaintance,” and I did not 
hesitate to ask him “ who he took me for?” And when 
I assured him that I was the very individual he had 
guessed I was, I have never met with a warmer reception 
or apparently given more pleasure by a visit to any real 
old acquaintance in my life. Somewhere along toward 
the last end of the night I laid down to take a nap, and 
in the morning afier breakfast, saddle horses were brought 
to the door, upon one of which I spent the forenoon in 
looking over the plantation and examining the first speci¬ 
mens I had seen of “ side hill ditching,” and “ horizontal 
plowing,” of which I shall speak further hereafer. 
Mr. Hardiman has discovered a fact that the former 
proprietor of the place was not aware of, and I speak of 
it here because there are a great many others who have 
not yet discovered it. And that is, that land lying at the 
foot of the hills, that receives all the soil that is worked 
down from them, if once cleared of timber and brush 
and brought into cultivation, will actually produce cot¬ 
ton. True, it does require a little more labor to clear 
it than it does the thin timbered and thinner soiled hills; 
and another thing, it wont wear out, and give the owner 
an excuse to migrate. When Mr. Hardiman first com¬ 
menced, he was laughed at by some ofhis neighbors for try. 
ingto cultivate a swamp. But a few ditches to straighten 
the branches and lead off the standing water, poor proved 
how much more valuable this kind of neglected land is, 
than the poor washing hills. Here I saw mother curi¬ 
osity. Hands employed scraping every hole and corner 
around the buildings and yards for manure. 
The food for the field hands is all cooked at the kitchen, 
and dealt out without weight or measure,, and they have 
all the bacon, corn bread, and vegetables that they need. 
At dinner to-day, Feb. 15, I feasted upon some of the 
largest and best heads of lettuce I nv?r saw, grown in the 
open air, and a greater variety of f ogetables than I have 
s,een since I left St. Louis, one of which was the Jeru¬ 
salem artichoke, which, boiled as i. mashed up like tur- 
neps, makes an excellent dish. 1/ presume many of your 
eastern readers do not understand that the Jerusalem arti¬ 
choke is a kind of vegetable that they have long been ac¬ 
quainted with, and which can be found in some by-cor¬ 
ner on half the New England fauns. They are a valua¬ 
ble crop, being raised for hogs. Mr. Hardiman has 
raised Irish potatoes from the same seed, for eight years, 
and thereby proved that it is not necessary to get new 
