THE Southern States.
APRIL, 1894.
MALARIA SUPERSTITION AND THE WATER PROBLEM.
By James R. Randall.
My attention for some years has been rural and coastwise, were branded as providentially called to problems relating dangerous to life or health, because of to malaria and the phenomena of water such environment. Never was a country supplies. Pursuing these investigations, more ignorantly characterized, and never from time to time, and in different local- were people, at home and abroad, more ities, I have, without any special pre- sedulously injured. It did not occur, tense scientifically, arrived at certain for an instant, to the large majority of facts that have been deemed important, persons, that the atmosphere was inno- and reached conclusions that, if tenable, cent of blame, that the swamp had no cannot fail to benefit the Southern peo- such noxious vapors, and that it was a ple and incidentally prove a blessing to monstrous paradox to suppose that mankind. coasts and islands swept by the pure The sum of my research and experi- breath of the sea could be malarial. It ence is that the world has long been de- never was suspected, by such persons, ceived with the idea, industriously propa- that the air of the swamp, even if it had gated and credited, that a number of some factors of danger, was not station- diseases which scourge portions of the ary but vagrant, and that arboreal growth globe, were directly traceable to bad air. was one of the best of disinfectants. Physicians, as a class, have made a It never entered the understanding of specialty of what they call "malaria," such individuals that the maladies com- and the masses of men accepted the plained of had their evil origin in the superstition with absolute confidence. wr ater used for human consumption and
Hence it came to pass, especially at the not in the air. In other words, they South, that chill and fever, hcemorrhagic mistook malaqua for malaria—bad fever, and various gastric troubles were water for bad air. It was the polluted attributed to some malific poison in the surface well water that afflicted or killed atmosphere, comprehensively named many thousands of people, and yet the "malarial," and the victims have been blame was authoritatively placed upon and are still heroically dosed with qui- the hurtless air. It was not the air of nine or the numberless prescriptions of Missolonghi, but its swamp water, plus patent medicine venders. A swamp was the quack's lancet, that killed Lord regarded as the seminary of such mala- Byron. dies, and the presence of ponds con- I regard Mr. Fort, of Georgia, as the demned as breeders of pestilence. In greatest material benefactor his common- this way, many of the most attractive wealth has ever known, for to him more and fertile sections of the South, urban, than to any other man, so far as my —
68 MALARIA SUPERSTITION AND THE WATER PROBLEM. knowledge extends, is the State indebted On swamp plantations where, since for the first extensive practical demon- the beginning of the century, disease stration of the great truth I am endea- and death Irom fevers raged, artesian voring to establish. A large part of water performed its usual prodigies for Southwestern Georgia was a pest-hole. It black and white. On one plantation was proverbial lor chill and fever—gen- near Augusta where the white people erically styled "malarial fever" —hcemor- used this water and the negroes insisted rhagic fever, and a variety of choleraic upon drinking from surface wells, the symptoms. Mr. Fort, by experiment, contrast was marked. The whites had disclosed that Southwestern Georgia was uncommon freedom from malady and en- in the artesian basin and that, by boring joyed splendid health, while the negroes about 600 feet below the surface, flow- were constantly sick. It was demon- ing wells or energetic geysers were easily strated on these places that the swamp developed. As these splendid fountains air is as pure as that of the mountain of pure water were commonly utilized, top, and that this region had suffered there was an instant, a magical change continuous and unmerited reproach. of sanitary character in that region. The Had it been known, during the war, diseases hitherto ascribed to the air van- that Andersonville was in the artesian ished, and that section of the State be- basin, the prison pen there would, in came a sanitarium, the healthiest ol spite of the meagre fare of the Confed- localities. The old conditions of envi- erate authorities and lack of medicine, ronment remained, but the mutation was have been a model place for captives. in the water supply. The man who, These unhappy and unfortunate beings with this object lesson before him, still were slain by thousands because they clings to "malaria" may exist, even in were ravaged by polluted water. There the artesian region of Southwestern would have been no traditional or excep- Georgia, but he is a veritable dweller in tional horrors at Andersonville had the the cave of Adullam, and, with some pure fountains just below the surface brethren, an ancient superstition of this about 600 feet— unsealed their living character dies hard and lingeringly. salubrious streams.
At several places in South Carolina, In this connection, somewhat, it may as well as in Georgia, the most wonder- be recited that the Confederate host that ful results have followed from the intro- retreated from Shiloh was decimated duction of artesian water. Yemassee, much more by the contaminated water in the rice country, long regarded as a courses of North Mississippi than by the death-trap became exceptionally salu- bloody combats with Grant and Buell. brious, and its water was in request all There were a few enlightened men at around. Langley, S. C., a manufactur- the South who comprehended this fact, ing village, had an evil repute for "ma- but their voices were as those of chil- larial" fevers. The cotton mill there dren crying in the wilderness. The sometimes closed, on account of sickness celebrated James H. Hammond, of among operatives, and was habitually South Carolina, who had been Senator crippled. So soon as the surface wells and Governor, was one of the wise per- were discarded and water obtained from sons of this character. He compelled a. natural geyser or boiling spring, in the his numerous slaves to drink pure water, vicinity, there was an astonishing meta- which was furnished them in the field, morphosis. The place became noted for and he punished severely all who dis- health, the factory was always full- obeyed this mandate. The consequence nnanned. Its stock improved in price; was that health reigned in his swamp dividends were regularly paid; and out plantations, and there was immunity of reserve funds the capacity of the con- from "malaria." When these negroes cern was nearly doubled. It was with or their descendants were freed from this great difficulty that the managers were salutary control, and recurred to surface convinced that it was surface water and wells, they were habitually smitten with not the atmosphere that had previously chill, fever and other kindred complaints, wrought such disasters. and this is the case todav. MALARIA SUPERSTITION AND THE WATER PROBLEM. 69
When Mr. Disston was draining the erected, but in course of time, fell into Florida lakes near Kissimmee, Italians dilapidation and disuse. Recently there in his employ were required to put aside was an effort made to restore it and the a fund for quinine. He took for granted monks returned. They abandoned it be- that the exposure of vast tracts of ooze cause of distressing fevers. I am satis- to a semi-tropical sun would breed dis- fied from the data given that these springs
it Italians re- had been circumstantially ease ; but did not. The contaminated, belled against the assessment as unneces- and that the monks were diseased, not sary. The explanation is at hand. They by the air they breathed, as was sup- drank artesian water and the air was posed, but by the water they consumed. powerless to hurt them. Investigation would disclose that this is But there is no necessity for multiply- exactly what happened. It may be diffi- ing examples of cumulative proof. cult to convince them of this fact, but it For ages there has been agitation in is absolute. Italy for draining the marshes of the In Africa, it is not the air that slays Campagna, near Rome, to be rid of the explorers there but the water. For ages, dread and fatal fever presumed to rise during the long dry season, wild beasts, from exhalations there. Never was the in myriads, have resorted to the pools to atmosphere more grossly libeled. A drink, and deposited ordure thereabout. biological examination of the Campagna In the rainy season this pollution is
air revealed not a trace of poison ! Two washed into the water sources. Travel- suburbs near this region inhaling the lers and hunters drinking this vile com- same atmosphere had different experi- pound are sickened, and then, in igno- ence. One was free from the disease, rance, anathematize the air. The same the other was afflicted with it. This ap- thing is true ot the well of Mecca—mis- parent paradox has an easy solution. called holy—which is one of the ac- The first mentioned place had pure knowledged producers of cholera, as has water. The second admittedly did not been firmly demonstrated. possess a single unpolluted spring. Just Henry M. Stanley ascribes African as Dr. Ernest Hart has demonstrated fever to sudden check of perspi- that cholera and typhoid fever, the world ration, ardent spirits and licentiousness, over, originate with contaminated water severally or combined. The water phe- or milk, so it may be declared positively nomenon escaped his scrutiny. He does " that "malarial —so-called —disorders state, however, that the healthiest sta- can be traced inevitably to polluted tions or factories, for hundreds of miles water. If Rome secured absolutely along the Congo river, are those pro- pure water, which could be done for a nounced "malarial" by the doctors, while comparatively small expenditure, there the most pernicious to the human body would be no special use for diverting were those the pseudo-scientists declared vast sums in draining the Campagna in to be, because of elevation, the most order to secure freedom from pestilence. naturally salubrious. I have been told
A friend of mine, Hon. W. J. O'Brien, that one shrewd physician of the expe- of Baltimore, by drinking wine exclu- dition noted that the mules used for sively, at Rome, during the summer transportation by Stanley manifested months, maintained unusual health, symptoms of "malarial" fever after wal- although exposing himself to the air, lowing in these waters of Africa, and day and night, to the horror of some very likely drinking them. friends who were afflicted with the In my opinion, leprosy is caused by a "malaria" superstition. taint in drinking water. I come to this The other day, I read, in a religious conclusion by a process of evolution. It periodical, an interesting account of the occurred to me that if water produced three fountains which tradition declares "malarial" fever and other maladies such to have sprung up miraculously at the as I have previously enumerated, lep- execution of St. Paul, whose head made rosy might be similarly deduced. I re-
three bounds on the spot after decapita- member that, when at Rio de Janeiro, I tion. On this spot a monastery was was admonished not to drink the water ;
7o MALARIA SUPERSTITION AND THE WATER PROBLEM.
there as it superinduced elephantiasis other case, there was endorsement, but Gr ing this hypothesis, I once encountered offspring of another horrible infection, the most eminent leper expert in this which I do not care to name, and so the country and perhaps in the world. He mere hypothesis of a water taint is met had charge of such diseases in a re- with incredulity. nowned hospital, and officially examined The Chinese are apparently more ad- the leper colony of Louisiana. I had anced than Europeans in this matter. read his voluminous reports on this phe- Nothing more astonishes an intelli- nomenon and naturally desired to learn gent Chinaman in this country than our what he had to say specifically as to the reckless use of drinking water from origin of this frightful and mysterious rivers. A Chinaman regards a river as malady. That it was not contagious a big sewer. This is essentially the case there was admission. Many causes for in China, and is relatively so in Europe it were tentatively suggested ; but not and America. The Chinaman does not once was the taint in water hinted or re- drink raw water. He takes it boiled ferred to. Therefore, with some hesita- in tea. Hence I think it happens tion, I said to him : "Doctor, I think that the Chinese quarter of San Francis- that you have hit upon every cause but co, where nearly every hygienic law is the right one." The savant stared violated, can boast, according to vital strangely and, with a polite smile, re- statistics within my knowledge, of being plied : "Indeed ! And what do you the healthiest section of that city. think is the origin?" I quietly answered Good people, alarmed at these revela- that it was some peculiar poison germs tions and some that, from time to time, in water. This seemed to surprise him, crop out in the newspapers, say : "Well, but, a moment later, he added : "You we had better not drink water at all." may be right. I now recollect that my My answer is: "Boil all suspected water." son was seriously afflicted from drinking Some persons object that boiling water the water of that colony." About one is too troublesome. Surely it is a greater year afterward this celebrated doctor, trouble to get sick, to pay a physician's over his own signature, in a public print, bills, to settle with undertakers and fun- stated that, in Egypt, the use of an acid eral directors, etc. But it is again urged in drinking water was considered a de- that the boiling process kills water. fence against leprosy. I called the at- Then, if you think so, revitalize it by tention of the late eminent, Dr. H. H. shaking in a large-mouthed vessel. And Steiner, of Augusta, Ga., to these facts, this brings me to another point— the use and he said : "You have stumbled on a of ice. It is a conceded fact that the great truth. When I was in Mexico, I congealing of water does not purify it had occasion to visit a leper hospital, and that no amount of refrigeration kills nox- inquired as to the cause of this disease. ious germs. Only intense heat can do I was informed that people who drank that, as surgeons now, after years of de- the water of a certain lake were subject lusion, understand when they boil their to the disorder, and that some plant instruments before performing new oper- growing in the lake was thought to be ations. Much of the natural ice consumed the propagating agent." Armed with is cut from sewage rivers. I believe that these statements, I called them to the the Massachusetts Board of Health, on in- attention of two illustrious prelates and vestigation, did not find a single pure begged them to communicate them to the specimem even when cut from rivers of successor of Father Damien, in the Sand- Maine. So, what can be expected of ice wich Islands and to other missionaries, gathered from shallow ponds into which exposed to that kind of martyrdom. In pollution trickles from hillsides, thick one case, I apprehend that my request with stables, pig- pens and manured was looked upon as visionary. In the lawns ? Ice should never come in con- MALARIA SUPERSTITION AND THE HATER PROBLEM. 71 tact with drinking water. The most have been deterred from populating our wholesome water in the world may be richest agricultural regions, by the stigma made dangerous by such conjunction. of "malaria," and hundreds of millions Inasmuch as water of a perilous charac- of dollars have been kept from invest- ter is so generally diffused and breeds ment. Let it be once fixed in the popu- such numerous evils in the human sys- lar mind that the atmosphere is not to tem, I am inclined to believe that it is, blame for zymotic disease, but surface bv such dissemination, one of the princi- well water, and there will soon be a set- pal causes of drunkenness. A deranged tlement ol the immigration question. stomach craves stimulants, and whiskey Let it he known that the swamp region is near at hand in various shapes or dis- of the South— rivalling the Nile valley guises. The collateral proof of this may in agricultural iertility — is atmospheric- be found in the examples of men who, ally as salubrious as the piedmont or when their organs have not been wholly alpine country, and there will be a glori- impaired by intemperance, are restored ious revolution in planting systems and to sanity and health by the use of some results. Let it be a matter of conviction well-known pure thermal beverages. that the South, by pure water, readily Their digestive apparatus becomes sane obtained from artesian boring or by boil- by such treatment, and the devouring ing the drinking fluid, would be, even in thirst for alcohol departs. There is a its swamps, the healthiest country on spring near Spartanburg, South Caro- earth, and there might be a rush of pop- lina, which may be called a natural Kee- ulation and capital such as the West ley cure. No man who partakes of has never known, despite the presence of water there, for forty-eight hours, can, the negro. But, while the North dreads without doing violence to himself, touch this phantom of malaria, which I have ardent spirits. shown to be a delusion and a snare, I am satisfied also that the lesser ani- and while the South meekly or mals, to a pronounced degree, are, like ignorantly succumbs to the verdict man, subject to the same regulations. against her, progress will be retarded. Much, if not all, of the chicken and hog I have, in a few years past, seen this cholera may be ascribed to impure pota- malaria superstition dislodged from tion. The wonder to me is that so many many minds, but I have also seen only hogs escape, when we reflect to what too many otherwise intelligent persons vile and filthy incarceration they are con- hug the phantom to their bosoms and demned. If animals and fowls were de- refuse to break with their idol, which, fended from contaminated water, mil- unfortunately, was more pernicious than lions of them would avoid disease, and an image of stock and stone. On the millions of human beings would not have whole, however, this cause is advancing to eat suspected carcasses. But, if hu- rapidly and prosperously, and it only man beings are so regardless of their needs more men, like Mr. Fort, Colonel own welfare, through ignorance or ne- Phinizy, Mr. Plant, Mr. Flagler, Mr. glect, how can we expect them to have Walters and the like of them, to this saving care for beasts that perish ? push it to ultimate triumph. I regret It is so easy for them to curse the air that my knowledge, training and means and resort to quinine and patent nostrums. are incommensurate with my ardor in What would many doctors do for a liv- this propaganda ; but, even at the ex- ing, if quinine and "malaria" were not pense of being denominated a crank, in vogue ? enthusiast or visionary, I have done my Let us contemplate, for an instant, as best —would it were worthier ! —to re- a practical summing up of all these state- move an undeserved stigma from the ments and proofs, what an injury has South and to extirpate a slander of the been inflicted upon the South by the atmosphere. malaria superstition. Our section of Away then with the malaria supersti- the Union is branded abroad, and our tion, and let us restore, as far as possi- own people have assisted in the brand- ble, the waters that God made pure and ing. Hundreds of thousands of settlers man has polluted. The day that sees 72 MALARIA SUPERSTITION AND THE WATER PROBLEM. the utter downfall of the malaria super- mon purpose for the preservation of the stition will witness ths genesis of a Na- people from the ravages of the worst ene- tional Board of Health, in conjunction my of their health—contaminated water, with State Boards, animated by a com- SOME OF THE INDUCEMENTS THE SOUTH OFFERS TO IMMIGRANTS. By C. B. Warrand. Probably ninety per cent, of the im- large bodies of excellent land, which migration for the past thirty or thirty- bring little or no revenue and are prac- five years has gone to the Northern, tically worthless to them for want of Middle and Western States, leaving the population. Southern States to grow from the in- Can the immigrant want a better crease of their own population, or from argument or guarantee that he can find the immigration of Northern and West- employment and own his own farm ern native born Americans. As a con- within a few years ? sequence, the Southern States are beyond While North and West he has only a doubt today more exclusively Ameri- one crop in a year to depend on, in the can than any other part of the United South he can take two or three oft the States. same land each year, while in the ex- So long and so persistently have the treme North and West he has to save Southern States been neglected by the for six months to keep warm the other immigrant that now the South offers half of the year and, while he may earn immeasurably the most favorable oppor- more in a given time, this time is limited tunities to the immigrant of any part of by the climate. In the South he can the Union. work uninteruptedly the year round. The erroneous idea that the white Socially, the South knows but two immigrant would have to compete with classes, white and colored. North, the the cheap negro labor and would be poor man's children are compelled to treated as such, and that therefore noth- share their studies with colored children. ing but starvation wages could be South, this would never be tolerated for expected, has had, no doubt, much to a moment. Poverty is looked upon as do with the drift of immigration. If a misfortune and not as a crime ; the the only ambition of the newcomer is poorest white person will always be to work for wages all his life, if he has treated with politeness, and an insult to no hope to ever have his own house or the poorest and most humble white wo- his own farm or to become his own man will be resented and revenged as master, this, perhaps, may be true, and quickly as to the wealthiest. there is no room for that class of immi- The South is probably the only part grant ; but for a man with ambition, of the United States where both beggars knowledge or a good trade, there is no and millionaires are so lew and far be- better place on the face of the earth tween as to be practically unknown. than the South, where industry, frugality, This equalization of wealth is the very energy and perseverance have ten best guarantee of success to the thrifty chances to one of receiving their reward. and worthy immigrant. The strange condition is presented in The character of the Southern man many parts of the South of thousands is also much in favor of the immi- individuals will find a welcome any- of who are termed land-poor, grant ; he warm for want of a better word, who own where, provided he does not meddle INDUCEMENTS THE SOUTH OFFERS TO IMMIGRANTS. 7; with two subjects which the Southern capital than anywhere else, and thousands men understand better from life-long- of opportunities are offered to establish experience, namely, politics and social himself and to make a good living while equality with the colored race. He will he grows up with the country, which find the average Southern man just, has so many advantages and resources hospitable to a fault, willing to help the that their development is only a question stranger, charitable and generous. In of time and immigration of the right France they have the motto "noblesse kind. oblige;" in the South it is "eonlenr There is an abundance of brute oblige." A white man is expected to muscle and labor ready to be guided respect himself, and he will be respected, and willing to work for a pittance ; what no matter how humble his position is. is wanted are skilled mechanics, frugal, With a divine and healthy climate, as experienced larmers, expert factory good land can be had within easv reach hands, who are willing to work hard of railroads, schools and churches for themselves for a time, but with enough $2.00 to $5.00 per acre as can be ambition to become bosses or leaders bought North or West for ten and themselves in time ; for this class of twenty times this amount, offering to the immigrants the South offers so many farmer the greatest variety of products and so varied and exceptionally good he can cultivate. The mill hand or chances as no other part of the United factory worker will get as good wages States or the world can equal. There South as North, while living, rents and are enough waste land, neglected re- clothing expenses are much less; he sources and wasted material to support will be able to soon save himself enough in ease and comfort many times the to own a home of his own. present population. The mechanic can start on much less THE GARDENS OF TAMPA BAY. By Arthur T. Cornwell^ Jr. Beautiiul, tranquil, majestic Tampa Sound steamer leaves Port Tampa each Bay ! If any man desires to taste of morning for the great garden country of perfect peace, let him spread his sail the lower bay. The port is famous, too, upon its placid waters on any sunny day in these days of lotteries and rumors of and as he bowls along over its transpa- lotteries. A half million dollars were rent depths, while the myriad white- collected at its custom house last year, winged gulls wheel over his head and and vessels under sail and steam, flying the lap of the waves upon the white the colors of every maritime nation of beaches of the palm-crowned islands is the day, carried from its docks during wafted to his ears like a lullaby, drink the same time 100,000 tons of phosphate. in the perfect calm which reigns supreme, Regular lines connect it directly with and he will understand why Pamfilo de Mobile and New Orleans, Key West and Harvaez, three hundred and sixty years Havana, Honduras, Kingston and New ago, christened it the bay of the Holy York. A run of twenty miles down the Ghost. bay brings you to its entrance, Egmont After three hundred and fifty six Pass. On the right we see the govern- years Tampa Bay was practically the ment quarantine station and hospital, same as when the Spaniard sailed necessities of a growing commerce, away, except that the Indians, whose while on the left rises the white shaft of hospitality he rewarded by cutting off Egmont Light, which, since years before their chief's nose, had been succeeded by the war, has marked the entrance of the cow-boys and traders, and from the great gulf harbor. Making an angle to primitive fort on a muddy stream at its the southeast, three-quarters east, after a head waters— "Tampa town," Jules run of but nine miles, you enter the Verne called it— Major Dade had headlands of the Manatee river between marched to that terrible massacre, of two shell mounds forty feet high, which which the white shaft at West Point tells scientists conclude were thrown up by the pitiful tale, "the battle of the 28th Indians, who gathered here through of December, 1835, between a detach- ages to feast upon the shell-fish of the ment of United States troops and the shore Marvelous record of a now Seminole Indians, of Florida, in which nearly obliterated people ! all of the detatchment, save three, fell The remarkable agricultural possibili- without an attempt to retreat." Then ties of the Manatee river country, both from the great railroad systems of the in point of fertility and climate, were country the single track Plant road appreciated as early as 1840, when found its way down to Tampa town, prospecting parties found here great the F. C. & P. railroad followed, and areas of richest "hammocks," vast today it is a city of 12,000 inhabitants, deposits of organic matter, which, boasting of forty cigar factories turning through ages, nature had prepared for out $4,000,000 worth of cigars per year. the use of man, and here, where only in It supports twenty-two miles of electric the United States the sugar cane can railway and is the seat of that world- reach maturity without fear of frost, they renowned palace of luxury, the Tampa hewed great plantations out of the Bay Hotel. tropical forests, regular lines of Connecting with the morning train schooners carried their sugar to New from the city, a commodious, well fitted Orleans and brought them the luxuries I AND 2—RUINS OF SUGAR MILLS. 3—HOME OF A SUGAR PLANTER. THE GARDENS OF TAMPA BAY. of civilization. One plantation worked February in this year of our Lord 1894, 200 hands and had 1400 acres of cane are covered with maturing crops of in one field. We may yet visit the grey tomatoes, cabbage, cauliflower, squash, ruins of their palatial mansions and onions, potatoes, beans, peas, beets, cu- wander through the spacious rooms in cumbers, etc. From the twelve substan- which the sons and daughters of the plan- tial wharves which at great expense have TAMPA KAY HOTEL ters held high carnival before the war. been pushed out from the shores of the Then, in the midst of this prosperity Manatee river and the adjoining Terra the signal gun which blazed over Sum- Ceia Bay, over two hundred thousand ter ushered in those terrible days of fire, crates of vegetables will be loaded on blood and carnage, and, when at length the three steamers which carry our pro- the Yankee gunboats sailed out of duce to Tampa and the port, from Tampa bay, they left the river's indus- whence they travel by rail and water to tries ruined, the slaves freed and gone, supply cities of the North and West. and weeds and underbush supplanted Over the same route travel annually the verdant foliage of the cane. over 80,000 crates of oranges and lem- Nearly forty years have passed since ons. Incidentally over three million then and a new prosperity has been fish are caught annually from the bays ushered in. Today you find the river adjoining the county, over 50,000 cattle banks lined for miles with a succession roam over its wide extent and the small of comfortable homes of settlers from farmers ship poultry, sweet potatoes, and every section of the Union, gathered in hogs in great quantities to several mar- towns and settlements surrounded by kets. Manatee county covers 788,215 thriving groves and the wide variety of acres, and thousands of acres of rich tropical and semitropical trees, shrubs hammock lands are yet for sale at fig- and plants which are here possible of ures ranging from 75 cents to $20 an cultivation. The spires of many churches acre according to location, yet so little and school houses which rise on either is this country known that its population side are indexes of an intelligent and is barely 4,000 people. So engrossed prosperous people. Back from these are the people in the production of win- towns stretch the same rich hammocks, ter vegetables and citrus fruits that they but they produce no more sugar for the import their great consumption of hay, later settlers have found a better occupa- grain and pork from the West and even tion, and over 2,000 acres out of this vast beef and mutton to some extent from extent of hammock, in this month of Chicap-o ! THE GARDENS OF TAMPA BAY 77 It is hard to find a trip of richer inter- and see. We mine no phosphate here, but est than to whirl along behind a smart it will convince you that this is a phos- team among these richly productive phate country, when you can pick the farms. You find them in every state, pebbles out of a handful of soil. Or- from the simple lodge in a vast wilder- anges thrive here in a way that is won- ness yet uncleared, to the commodious derful and you can find in the west end home surrounded by rose bushes laden of the plantation hammock a succession with blooms, which nature allows no re- of groves, acre after acre without a fence spite in this land of perpetual summer. in seemingly endless rows. On Terra Then stretching back over many acres Ceia Island is a tree which has been the fields are green. You recognize the known to have 10,000 oranges in one broad leaves of cabbage and cauliflower; year ; it was planted in 1862 by Mrs. the straggling vines of the tomatoes and Julia Atzeroth, or "Madame Joe" as she the yet more sprawling ones of squash, is familiarly known, who has the reputa- cucumber the first coffee and watermelon ; red beets, tion of having grown here yellow squash, white turnips and the in the United States, and a hale and numberless bayonets of a field of onions. hearty old lady of eighty-six, she still At this season you find cabbage in great enjoys the wonderful variety of tropical piles by the roadside being transferred foliage, which has thriven under her care to crates and at intervals along the road about her beautiful home on the south wagon loads of crates of cabbage on bank of the river. their way to the wharves. In every di- Before you turn away, here is a cross- rection it is cabbage, cabbage, cabbage; road leading through the virgin ham- so in a month it will be all tomatoes. mock ; on either side great live-oaks, Interrogate the farmer and he will tell giants of the forest, stretch out their you that succeeding this crop he can mighty limbs fantastically decked with raise another of hay, grain or potatoes grey moss, until the sunlight can barely and yet have time for the land to rest. sift through upon the young growth be- Here are tomato vines which have borne neath; a hoary old age is theirs. And occa- for several years, and cabbage stalks sionally great palmetto trees have pushed which have matured several marketable their smooth, upright trunks up through heads. If any man doubt let him come the branches of the sombre oaks and FRUITS OF THE MANATEE COUNTRY. ! 78 THE GARDENS OF TAMPA BAY wave their green plumage in the sun at a this great panorama of vegetation which giddy height. Wonderful contrast nature has conspired with human energy The power and magnificence of the oaks and intelligence to produce, you will rest and the simple elegance of the supple convinced that you have passed through palms ! one of the most remarkable tracts of As you reflect over your winter din- country in the Southern States, in this ner of green peas and new potatoes, on garden country of the Manatee river. THE YAZOO DELTA FOR IMMIGRANTS. By Harry Ball. The Yazoo-Mississippi Delta is com- the Delta from Memphis to Vicksburg, posed of an oblong section of land con- with a loop line running along the Mis- taining 4,500,000 acres. It is bounded sissippi river. The Richmond & Dan- on the west by the Mississippi river, on ville road crosses the country trans- the east by a range of hills, and extends versely from East to West. Until 1885, from the Tennessee line on the North when the first railroad penetrated this to the intersection of the hills with the country, it was practically unknown to Mississippi river at Vicksburg. It com- the world. Its cultivated portion was prises the counties of Tunica, Quitman, limited to the lands lying adjacent to the Coahoma, Bolivar, Sunflower, Washing- Mississippi river. Its business was trans- ton, Sharkey, Le Flore and Issaquena, acted almost entirely with New Orleans, with portions of Tallahatchie, Holmes the means of communication being the and Yazoo. In addition to the Missis- steamboat lines of the Mississippi river. sippi river, which forms its Western The middle and Eastern portions of the boundary, it is traversed by the follow- Delta were a terra incognita—a vast ing navigable streams : Sunflower and unexplored wilderness of giant trees, Yazoo rivers, Deer creek and Bogue impenetrable canebrakes, and delirious Falaya. Innumerable other streams entanglement of vines and undergrowth. make a network of waterways through This wide belt of trackless country the Delta, the most important among separated the cleared strip along the them being the Coldwater river, Hush- river as by a gulf from the more thickly puckana bayou, Quiver river, Steele's settled hill region, while on the West bayou, Black bayou and Cassidy's lay the Mississippi river. Bayou, all of which are of considerable This isolation resulted in making a size, and when full of water are adapted country different in the character of its for rafting purposes or small craft. Many people and its agricultural methods from beautiful lakes of various sizes are any other portion of the South. Such scattered through the country. The of its lands as were cleared were the soil of the entire Delta is alluvial, being property of wealthy New Orleans mer- formed by deposits from the Mississippi chants, or of planters from Virginia, river through countless ages. It is Kentucky and Carolina, attracted by composed of a black clay, mingled with the wonderful fertility of the soil, and sand, and from end to end there is not the unequalled advantages for the pro- a rock nor pebble, except those brought duction of cotton, then the most remun- thither by the hand of man. The coun- erative crop that could be grown. As a try is level, as are all alluvial lands, and consequence, the population of the devoid of hills or natural elevations or Delta at the beginning of the war was depressions, but has a fall of 114 feet composed of two classes only—the from North to South, giving it perfect wealthy and aristocratic planters and drainage through its numerous water- their slaves. The land was owned in courses. The Yazoo & Mississippi great bodies, ranging upward from a Valley Railroad, a branch of the Illinois thousand acres. The habits of life of Central system, traverses the centre of the planters were those of ease and So 7W.fi" YAZOO DELTA FOR IMMIGRANTS. elegance, with an almost complete The result was disaster and disappoint- indifference to the minutiae of farm life. ment. Take the experience of one After the war and under the changed planter as a fair sample. He spent $18,- conditions arising therefrom, the plant- 000 for North Carolina labor, and ers endeavored, as far as practicable, to stocked his place with hundreds of continue their former mode of life. To negro tenants. At the end of the first do this the credit system was resorted year, by his own account, about three in to. The marvellous resources of the twenty of those he had brought out re- lands made this plan feasible and enabled mained with him. Some drifted aim- retain possession lessly to the original owners to Kansas ; others to small towns of their plantations and follow up the to lead an idle and predatory life ; others ruinous system year after year until it had moved to an adjoining plantation on assumed incredible proportions. An which there was a saloon ; others fol- indebtedness of from one to five hun- lowed a favorite preacher on some dred thousand dollars upon these plan- chimerical religious quest. At last the tations was by no means uncommon. owners of the Delta lands have awakened Every effort was made to meet the fully to the knowledge that for the future demands of creditors by the yearly prosperity of their country there is but raising of larger and larger cotton crops one hope—white immigration. This is and the exclusion of every other farm not so much a hope as a resignation to product. Such a course could have but inevitable certainty. The prosperity of one conclusion. It has come. Many the Delta is safe enough. Its lands are of the great plantations are standing too rich and valuable to make that ques- idle and uncultivated, many have tion doubtful. If the planters could become the property of foreign capital- hold their lands no power on earth ists, syndicates or loan agencies, and the would make them let go. If they were credit of the richest section of land not forced by necessity to do so, immi- probably in the world is temporarily gration into the Delta would not be en- ruined. The Delta has no farming class. couraged. No man when he has found It has negroes ad nauseam. They have a vein of gold calls to others to come been tried in every possible way, and and share it with him. This is the their use as laborers or as citizens under reason why there has been no mighty the present conditions has been demon- rush of emigrants to this land, as far strated to be a hopeless delusion. They superior to the wind-swept deserts of are utterly impracticable in any position Oklahoma as the valley of Damascus to of life in which an effort has been made frozen, famine-stricken Scythia. The to place them since the year 1865. This, planters have simply realized at last that then, is the present economic situation their reign is over. They can no longer of the Delta : lands of unequalled fer- hold their princely estates intact, and the tility ; a climate almost perfect during Delta is ready and anxious for the ad- the greater portion of the year ; vast vent of a frugal, industrious and thrifty unopened and unsettled tracts of forest, class of farmers. The gates are down, containing a wealth of timber almost un- and already the tide is beginning to touched, and immense cleared planta- pour through them. tions, supporting a shiftless and nomadic The first colonists under the new population of negroes, and worse than regime are Italian farmers. The prin- unremunerative to their owners because cipal colony established by them is in of the impossibility of cultivating them Coahoma county. There, within the without responsible labor. past year, they have demonstrated that The only organized effort heretofore comfort and plenty will follow even the made to induce immigration into this first year's intelligent effort. They came section was that made for negro labor with nothing— destitute of even the from the Eastern States. Thousands of necessaries of life. They rented land these were poured into the Delta. and mules, to be paid for out of the first Fortunes were spent in stocking the crop, and were furnished with sufficient great vacant plantations with tenants. food to run them for a few months. : THE YAZOO DELTA EOR IMMIGRANTS. They cultivated 200 acres of land. On since been filled to overflowing with it they made, in the face of a most dis- immigrants. The truth is that its owners astrous year, 160 bales of cotton, two were selfish and desirous to hold their crops of corn, the first of which they lands themselves, working them with sold, using the second for winter stock negroes. They can do so no longer. feed ; all the oats and hay they needed ; The outside world has known nothing of two crops of Irish and an abundance of the Delta. No effort has ever been made to make it sweet potatoes, and at present ( January, known. Here are 1894) each man is well supplied with some of the inducements it holds out hogs, chickens and home necessaries, it contains, as before stated, 4,500,000 and has a flourishing garden. They acres.* The traditional yield of cotton have paid every obligation they owe, is a bale to the acre, but under favor- and everyone has saved money. The able conditions and good cultivation it success of this colony has been so strik- will produce two bales. It grows so ing that land owners throughout the luxuriantly that on first-class lands it Delta are now dividing their places into will hide a man on horseback. Corn twenty and forty acre tracts, and even yields from 75 to 125 bushels, and two paying the traveling expenses of the crops can be grown in the year. Wheat Italians to get them into the country. has scarcely been tried, but has been The following extracts from a letter known to yield sixty bushels. Oats and written by a gentleman greatly interested hay and forage crops of all kinds are in the movement will serve to convince unsurpassed. Sweet potatoes will the public of the earnestness and sin- yield 500 bushels per acre. Irish cerity of the eflorts which are being potatoes can be grown the year made : round, the writer having often seen them "We desire, as I understand it, to in- dug new from the ground at Christmas. troduce a thrifty, hard-working and in- Dense brakes of evergreen cane fill the dustrious class of people, who will make woods, on which cattle feed greedily, money by honest toil, and save it by and fatten like stall-fed beeves, with no strict economy. Every planter believes protection and no other food. White the efforts now made to be aimed in the clover makes an evergreen pasture, right direction. We wish to obtain the growing all the winter. The wonderful recommendations of representatives of native Bermuda grass will cover a field foreign nations, who may be in this in an incredibly short time with a thick country, for the introduction of their mat which will last a lifetime. There is people of the farming class, and believe no month in the entire year in which that the efforts and attentions on our profitable out-door occupation may not part to promote and advance their suc- be found and crops of some description cess, and interest in seeing them and grown in the Yazoo Delta. The winter their children provided for spiritually begins about the middle of December. and intellectually will be sufficient It is practically over by the middle of guarantee and advertisement ; and in ten February. Chrysanthemums and violets years I believe we would scarcely know blossom together. Garden vegetables the country. (except the tenderest) flourish from "It is our desire to continue the im- September to August, and tea roses bloom portation of a thrifty, industrious set of in the open air the middle of December. people, regardless of nationality. If the With the exception of January and people you speak of are of the agricul- February, July and August, the climate tural and industrial class, desiring to se- is unsurpassed by that of any country cure homes and farms in this country, on earth. The weather from Christmas making themselves honest and upright until the first of March is apt to be citizens, we will gladly arrange for rainy and unpleasant, with occasional transportation and settlement." frosts and sometimes a light fall of snow. This lengthy expos€ of facts, histori- * These lands can be rented at $5.00 to $7.00 per cal and otherwise, is made in order to acre, or bought for #25. 00 to $30.00 for the best cleared land in the country, on time and terms to suit pur- explain why the Delta has not long chasers; uncleared land $5.00 to $10.00. ; 82 THE YAZOO DELTA FOR IMMIGRANTS. From March to June it is magnificent. the levee system and the building of the The most exacting could not find a railways, the overflows were frequent fault. July and August are warm, it is and destructive. This danger is now true, but never with the sudden, scorch- happily minimized, if not entirely ob- ing heat that sends the thermometer up viated by the work of the Local above ioo in the North and West. The Levee Board, aided by the appro- climate is too moist for such tempera- priations of Congress. The result ture. The end of September is usually is a system of dykes from one end marked by a breaking up of the summer of the Delta to the other, practically heats and by heavy rains, after which impregnable and being continually all vegetation starts afresh with the life strengthened. This line of levee has and growth of a second spring. This successfully withstood the greatest floods autumn season is the glory of the ever known since the settlement of the country. It lasts with an absolutely country, and little or no fear is now felt perfect temperature and almost constant from this source. The negro is not so sunshine far into December. The ca- black as he is painted, either by art or pacities of this country for fruit-raising nature. He is idle, shiftless, perfectly are almost limitless. Every fruit that irresponsible, and unstable as water, but grows in the Union, except apples, he is docile, peaceable and naturally oranges and cranberries, can be pro- inoffensive. When he is troublesome it duced with less care and in as great is usually the fault of vicious and turbu- perfection as in Southern California, or lent whites. He owns no moral obliga- anywhere else on the earth's surface. tions. As a race, his capacity for virtue On the 20th December the writer ate and honesty is dormant or wanting figs and watermelon grown in the open entirely. He must go. The advent of air. This is a startling statement, per- a white laboring class will have that in- haps, but its author is fortified in the evitable result. He is picturesque (at a strength of truth. Being truthful, he distance) and so is the Southern planter will endeavor to show the reverse of but like the even more picturesque and the medal. The two great drawbacks profitless Red Man, both must fade to the country are the possibility of before the coming of the bees and the overflow and the presence of the negroes. white man's foot. In former days, before the completion of : THE SOUTH BEFORE THE WAR. By Richard H. Edmonds. II. For some years prior to 1850 while nitude of the products of Southern farms New England, having no soil to make in i860. In order to rightly value all of profitable agriculture a possibility, was these comparisons it should be remem- engaged almost wholly in manufactur- bered that the total population of the ing pursuits, all the energies of the sec- United States in i860 was 31,000,000, tion being directed to industrial develop- of which the South had 6,800,000 whites ment, the South, reaping great profits and 4,100,000 negroes or an aggregate from its planting interests, was with of 10,900,000, just a little more than one- equal energy and success and continued third of the total. With only one-third expansion giving itself to the cultivation of the aggregate population and less of cotton, sugar, rice and tobacco. In than one-fourth of the white population the growth of these staples it was pro- the South raised more than one-half of ducing great wealth, and it probably the total agricultural products of the reached a higher degree of agricultural country. Comparing the crops of the prosperity than any section of this coun- South and of the remainder of the coun- try has enjoyed since that time. It is try as given in the census of i860, we difficult to comprehend the magnitude have following table of Southern farm products during the decade ending with i860, and the won- Yield in Re- Crops in i860. Yield in South. mainder derful in of advance that was made that the Country. period. The energy and enterprise dis- played by the South in the extension of 358,153,000 472,297,000 44,800,000 125,200,000 its agricultural interests was fully as great 5,196,000 as the energy displayed in the develop- 351,500,000 77,800,000 187,100,000 ment of New England manufactures or Sweet potatoes, bush.. 38,000,000 3,600,000 302,000,000 that of pioneers the who opened up the Value of live stock #467,498,364 $639,991,852 West to civilization. The South has 16,314,818 22,232 Beeswax & honey, lbs. I3.55i,i5i 12,835,704 been less given to vaunting its own Value of animals $84,447,110 $128,424,543 achievements, and the world has there- Value of home-made fore heard less about it. But this agri- £16,585,281 $7,672,941 Peas and beans, bush. 11,878,452 3,309,661 cultural development and prosperity 12,565,337 47,946,006 Cash value of farms... were the outgrowth of the same energy $2,308,409,352 $4,330,004,869 that built the first railroads in the coun- try, that constructed more mileage be- It would be hard to set forth more tween 1850 and i860 than the New Eng- convincingly than these census figures land and Middle States combined, that do, the strong position held by the was rapidly at the beginning of the war South agriculturally as compared with building up manufactures that gave to a the rest of the country. The world Southern port the distinction of sending generally credits the South of i860 with over the first steamship that ever crossed having been only a producer of cotton, the Atlantic. But to return to statistics. rice and sugar, but as previously pointed More interesting than the record of out the industrial and railroad interests Southern industrial advancement from were building up with great rapidity 1850 to i860 is the really marvelous when the war came, and these figures agricultural advancement and the mag- exhibit a condition of agricultural pros- 83 —; ; 3 4 THE SOUTH BEFORE THE WAR. perity that must amaze those who have $1,300,000,000 over 1850. With only 33 regarded the old South as a country per cent.of the country's population, inclu- lacking in energy. With one-third of ding slaves, it had $95,000,000 invested the country's population and only one- in agricultural implements out of a total fourth of the white population, the South of $246,000,000 or nearly 40 per cent. not only produced all the cotton, rice The increase in the value of its agricul- and sugar raised in the United States tural implements from 1850 to i860 was these were all practically surplus cash nearly $35,000,000 or about 60 per cent. crops— but also raised 358,000,000 bush- Such is the truly marvelous record of els of corn or 44 per cent, of the total agricultural activity, an activity that crop of the country in i860; 351,500,- would put beyond the possibility of a 000 pounds of tobacco against 77,800,- doubt the remarkable energy of the peo- 000 pounds in the rest of the country ; ple of the South, even if under the con- 38,600,000 bushels of sweet potatoes out centration of capital and work in agri- of a total crop of 41,600,000 bushels ; it culture there had been little or no prog- had over 40 per cent, of the total value ress in manufactures and railroads. of livestock of the country, or $467, 498,- But examine other statistics and the 000 out of $1,100,000,000; it made South's position bears the comparison 16,000,000 gallons of molasses against fully as well as in those just given. In 22,000 gallons made by other sections 1 S60 thirty per cent, of the entire bank- it produced beeswax and honey to the ing capital of the country or $117,400,- extent of 13,500,000 pounds, or over 000 was in the South. When the cen- one-half of all made in the country, the sus of i860 was taken the South ranked value of the animals slaughtered was very high in wealth as compared with $84,400,000 against $128,000,000 in all the rest of the country, showing its peo- other sections combined, and out of a ple were not slothful in the business of total value of what were classed as money-making. In that year the as- "home-made manufactures" of $24,300,- sessed value of property in Georgia was 000 the South had $16,500,000. One greater than the combined wealth of of the most interesting features of this Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont and exhibit is the production of beans and Rhode Island. South Carolina was pears. Some months ago Mr. Edward $68,000,000 richer than Rhode Island Atkinson wrote a magazine article to and New Jersey. Mississippi outranked show that the South "needed beans," Connecticut by $160,000,000. In the claiming that its lack of knowledge of assessed value of property per capita, beans was one of the serious hindrances Connecticut stood first in rank ; Rhode to its agricultural advancement. A Mis- Island, second ; South Carolina, third ; sissippi editor, S. A. of Aberdeen, Mississippi, fourth ; Massachusetts, fifth Jones, ; 1 believe it was, reminded Mr. Atkinson Louisiana, sixth ; Georgia, seventh that he had failed to study Southern District of Columbia, eighth ; Florida, agricultural history— that Boston's intel- ninth ; Kentucky, tenth ; Alabama, lectuality might be due to eating beans, eleventh ; Texas, twelfth ; New Jersey, but that even before the war, Mississippi thirteenth ; Maryland, fourteenth ; Ar- alone raised .more beans than all of New kansas, fifteenth ; Virginia, sixteenth England, and he might have added, of and Ohio, seventeenth. New York and the Middle States included. In i860 Pennsylvania were also far behind the the whole country raised 15,000,000 South in the amount of wealth in pro- bushels of beans and peas, and of this portion to population, the former State quantity 1 1 ,800,000 bushels were pro- ranking twenty-second, and the latter duced south of Mason and Dixon's line. thirtieth. In i860 the total assessed The cash value of farms in the whole value of property in the United States country in i860 was $6,638,000,000, and was $12,000,000,000, and of this the though the South had only one-fourth South had $5,200,000,000, or 44 per of the white population the value of its cent. farms was $2,300,000,000, more than The business world knows in a gen- one-third of the whole, and an increase of eral way something of the progress of THE SOUTH BEFORE THE WAR. 85 the South since 1880 ; it gives that the whole State governments with the section credit for a wonderful advance, most unscrupulous white adventurers but it takes for granted that as a result using ignorant negroes as their tools to of this recent prosperity the South is enable them to carry out every gigantic wealthier now than at any former time. swindling operation which fertile brains Wonderful indeed has been the South's could invent. increase in values in the last ten years, The census of 1870 showed a decline but with all this growth, the assessed in the assessed value of property in the value of property in the South to-day is South since i860 of $2,100,000,000, and a little less than it was in i860, or thirty- the reign of terror or reconstruction three years ago. period made another decrease of $300,- Only by such a comparison as this 000,000 between 1870 and 1880. This, can the loss of the South by the war be however, was but a moderate part of measured. Even then we cannot fully the loss. The cost of the war, the des- realize the degree of poverty which it truction everywhere visible, the hun- entailed. Contrast the South of i860 dreds of thousands of the most vigorous and the South of 1865. In one case we men in their graves or permanently dis- see a country increasing in wealth enor- abled, the South's share of national mously, adding over $1,300,000,000 to indebtedness, all summed up would the cash value of its farms in ten years, mean an aggregate loss of over $5,000,- spending $220,000,000 in the same time 000,000. How can we comprehend the in the extension of its railroads, $35,- meaning of such figures ? This vast 000,000 in an increase of agricultural sum is eight times as great as the com- implements, and many millions in new bined capital of all the national banks factories and new banks. In the other, in the United States, and is greater than we find at the close of the most disas- the aggregate capital invested in manu- trous war in the world's history, a degree factures in the United States. Blot out of poverty and woe which no language of existence in one night every manu- can portray. For four, years contending facturing enterprise, with all the capital armies had occupied its territory, and employed, and the loss and chaos would proved that General Sherman was cor- not equal the South's condition in 1865. rect, if profane, when he said, that even With the changed political conditions at its best, "war was hell let loose." after 1876, there came some signs of Desolation had swept over the land, returning prosperity, but it was not leaving only blackened chimneys to until about 1880 that the improvement mark the site where dwellings and facto- was suficiently decided to attract general ries had stood ; fences were gone, farms attention. were in ruins, and the returning soldiers It has been stated already that in who had given four years to battle i860 the assessed value of property in returned only to take up the burden of the South was $5,200,000,000 out of a life faced by conditions more appalling •total of $12,000,000,000 in the entire than the people of any other nation had country, or 44 per cent. In ten years ever met. Over the whole land poverty there was a startling change. In 1870 and worse than poverty, despair the South had only $3,000,000,000 oi brooded. Debts had accumulated and assessed value, while the total for the the outlook for the future was more whole country was $14,170,000,000. gloomy than even a Dante could fully While the South grew poor, the North picture. and West grew rich as never before. Hundreds of thousands of the best In i860 the assessed value of property men of the section had been killed or in Massachusetts was $777,150,000, seriously wounded, while thousands, compared with $5,200,000,000 in the unable to see any hope for improve- South; in 1870 Massachusetts had ment, went West or North to find a $1,590,000,000 of property and the home. Then came the absolute demor- South $3,000,000,000. Such was the alization of the labor system, followed poverty of the South that the one State by political misrule and debauchery of of Massachusetts listed for taxes more 86 THE SOUTH BEFORE THE WAR. than one- half as much property as the $421,000,000, or $68,000,000 less than fourteen States of that section could South Carolina's ; of course the true show. The assessed value of property value is always greater than the assessed in New York and Pennsylvania alone in value. In 1870 the combined values in 1870 was greater than in the whole Rhode Island and New Jersey amounted South. South Carolina, which in i860 had to $868,000,000, and the value in South been third in rank in wealth in proportion Carolina was $183,000,000. Thus, to the number of her inhabitants, had while South Carolina had $68,000,000 dropped to be the thirtieth ; Georgia more assessed property in i860 than had dropped from the seventh to the these two States, in 1870 their wealth thirty- ninth ; Mississippi, from fourth exceeded South Carolina's by $685,- place to the thirty-fourth ; Alabama, 000,000. Notwithstanding the mighty from the eleventh the forty-fourth industrial advance in the South during to ; Kentucky, from tenth to twenty-eighth, the last ten years, the building of nearly and the other States had gone down in 25,000 miles of railroad, and the increase the same way, while the Northern and in agricultural production, the assessed Western States had steadily increased value of property is not yet quite as in wealth. In i860 the assessed value great as it was thirtv years ago, and of property in South Carolina, accord- Maryland—a border State—and Florida, ing to the census, was $498,000,000, and Texas are the only States which while the combined values in Rhode have as much wealth now as in i860. Island and New Jersey aggregated ( To be continued.') — LETTERS FROM NORTHERN AND WESTERN FARMERS, GIVING THEIR EXPERIENCE IN THE SOUTH— VII. [The letters published in this issue form the seventh instalment in the series commenced in the October number of this magazine. These communications are published in response to numerous inquiries from Northern people who desire to know more about agricultural conditions in the South, and what is being accomplished by settlers from other sections of the country. These letters were written by practical farmers and fruit-growers, chiefly Northern and Western people who have made their homes in the South. The actual experiences of these settlers, as set forth in these letters, are both interesting and instructive to those whose minds are turned Southward. Editor.] Some Facts About Northwest Georgia. surrounding hills rise to a height of thir- C. M. Marshall, Rome, Ga.— Born teen hundred feet. The climate, never and raised among farmers in Prussia, too hot or too cold for outdoor work, and thoroughly familiar with their busi- allows the land to grow two successive ness, I have retained in this country love crops in one season. and interest in agriculture, and, although I sow rye in the fall for winter pasture forced to divide time with commercial and early forage, or early peas in Febu- pursuits, I have the past fifteen years rary and March, each to be followed in made my home on a small farm near the May by cotton ; oats and wheat to be city of Rome, in the State of Georgia. followed in July by corn and turnips. My experience and observation may This country is generally well drained, prove useful to some of your readers. and the heavy red clay can be made to I selected this, the northwestern part yield as good crops as the loam of the of the State, because it combines a river and creek bottom lands, though at greater variety of advantages ; separately greater expense. I have never known each one may be excelled elsewhere, but a real failure of any crop. Corn is in combination I have not seen them sometimes affected by drought in conse- surpassed. Healthful climate and pic- quence of faulty culture. turesque scenery of the Piedmont region, The average yield in my neighborhood together with a more than average fer- is about as follows per acre : Corn, thirty tility of soil ; a variety of agricultural bushels ; wheat, fifteen bushels ; sweet products, including cotton, grass, grain, and Irish potatoes, sixty bushels ; oats, together with diversity of manufacturing thirty five bushels ; turnips, 800 bushels ; in and iron clover industries wood, marble sorghum, 200 gallons ; and grass work, and textile fabrics ; close proximity (timothy and orchard), two to three tons ; to a town of 14,000 inhabitants, with a Bermuda (which needs no re-sowing), large and diversified commerce, and three tons. With more working capital ample railroad and river shipping fa- and larger manuring, this yield would cilities. be doubled. Nowhere have I seen such golden Market gardening and culture of fruit, opportunity for the intelligent and per- peaches, pears, strawberries and grapes, severing farmer. This opinion, formed is being pushed slowly, but successfully. fifteen years ago, I see today no reason The mild climate, the native grass to change. and cane brakes give a continued and The altitude of Rome is about seven cheap sustenance to all kind of stock, hundred feet above the sea level. The and save a large outlay for barns, LETTERS FROM NOR THERN AND WESTERN FARMERS. stables and food during the short winter. feature of modern commerce, have In a country where stock and provi- greater attraction for capital and enter- sions of every kind are regularly imported prise than the steady, slow, silent farm and sold from North to West, the thrifty work. Hence the land is turned over farmer has a market at his own door. to the laborer ; who, be it as owner of a It is the general complaint that mer- small farm, or as renter on large planta- chants buy in preference from a distance, tions, is allowed to work farms and gen- but remember that channels of trade, erally manage as best he can with his like the channel of a river, are estab- limited knowledge and scant means. lished and maintained by the regularity Often he has to buy even provisions for and the volume of supply. Whether man and beast on credit at ruinous in- prices are below cost of production is a terest, and thus burdened from the outset problem every farmer must solve for with debt, he is forced to plant cotton himself. Here is a list of average prices almost exclusively ; for cotton is the at harvest time, when the supply usually crop which requires the least capital, in exceeds the demand : it the laborers of the whole family, Corn, forty-five cents per bushel ; oats, women and children, can be employed it is thirty cents ; wheat, seventy cents ; pota- to greatest advantage ; the simplest toes, fifty cents; turnips, thirty cents; sorg- and easiest crop raised, and best under- hum, thirty cents per gallon; hay, $12 stood by the people ; the cash value of per ton ; cotton, seven to eight cents per the product of an acre in cotton can be pound. more nearly estimated, hence is con- If we hold our produce until spring sidered better security for the loan to and planting time, we can expect prices the merchant and for the rent due to the twenty-five to fifty per cent, higher. owner. Milk sells in town at twenty-five cents Accustomed to the careful business per gallon. Chickens, twenty to thirty methods, high intelligence and indepen- cents ; eggs, twelve to thirty cents per dent position of the German farmers, dozen ; butter, twenty-five to thirty-five usually owners of the land, or else tenants cents. Good plug horses sold at auction in long possession, I wonder, not that last month at $75 to $100, and were farming here proves to many unremu- supposed to be slaughtered ; mules, nerative, but that the majority escape from $80 to $130. These prices com- utter ruin and bankruptcy. pare favorably with market reports from Fortunately, the soil is easily brought the North and West. Labor is more up to a high state of fertility. The de- plentiful than in the rural districts of pression and uncertainty of sales will Germany, and more plentiful than North drive capital and enterprise back to the and West. The negro, as a class, is inviting fields. Strangers of every idle, careless, without moral strength, nationality and creed, political and re- but he is physically strong, enduring, ligious, are received civilly, and social generally good natured, and easily con- adantages and school facilities liberally trolled by men of character. Ten dollars extended to them. per month and board all the year round Prices in this section range from $10 is considered fair wages. to $50 per acre, according to condition "Why, then," you will ask, "is farming of owner, distance from town, extent of in the South in so low a state and pro- improvements. The latter are generallv " fessedly unremunerative ? I answer : limited, but, with moderate outlay, and Farming is unremunerative only to those average character, the farmer can make who engage in it without proper for himself a home, surrounded by com- knowledge ; without ambition, patience, forts and luxuries, and yielding a secure perseverance, and without the necessary and ample income such as is little working capital. Unfortunately, this is dreamed of in less favored climes. the condition of the greater part of the Health and Prosperity in Texas. people who actually "run" or manage the farm. Rev. G. W. Story, Webster, Harris Usury and speculation, the glittering county, Texas.— "Where ignorance is : — LETTERS FROM NOR THERN AND WESTERN FARMERS. ;" bliss, 'tis folly to be wise but ignorance Arrived here on Monday ; selected a exists not always from choice, more often tract of land for a home; on Wednes- from necessity. How shall our friends at day following I began my daily toil, a the North, West and East know of the bundle of tired, prostrated nerves, ruined value and comfort to be secured by digestion, its condition aggravated by changing their homes to this land of years of medication. But, touched by the many parts. How many of those at the living rays ol a Texas sun, invigorated North know that while they are enduring by the artesian water of this El Dorado the severities of a long, expensive winter, of America, I have pushed on from my we are enjoying roses of rare beauties, bottles and pills to the present as rugged sweet perfume, and most delicate as I was at twenty-five or thirty. I am tintings ? While they store away in the healthy, happy, hopeful. I can never fall for winter use a cellarful of fruit and be silent concerning the benefits and vegetables, we are gathering peas, beans, privileges of this great State. I have cabbage, turnips, watermelons, and many spoken of only one side of this fruitful other varieties of choice vegetables from subject and only skirted the border of the garden fresh and crisp on up to that. Christmas or New Years. North Carolina. They are ignorant of these facts O. S. Hayes, Maxton, N. C. — I came While they are compelled to wait until from Toledo, Ohio, in 1865, and have April or May to plant their vegetables, resided in the South ever since. Since we see ours in the market by that time, coming to North Carolina I have been nearly. Cucumbers, ripe tomatoes and in very close contact with the people lettuce are on sale in the Houston market in politics, in merchandizing, in farming, today (21st February). Fine, ripe in the turpentine industry, in timber cut- strawberries trom our vines find their ting ; and during all these years of inti- way to Northern markets in the early mate acquaintance with the people of part of February. So I assume that I the South I have uniformly been treated am doing a good work when I develop as well as I would have been anywhere. these facts and lay them before the As to the productions of this part of people. North Carolina, I can say unreservedly People in the more rigid climate of that our soil and climate are suited for this great country, who have been con- almost everything that is grown at the fined in office or shop, suffering from North. the heat of summer and chilled or frozen As an evidence of the healthfulness of by the frosts of winter ; driven to their Robeson county I am willing to make a daily toil and imprisonment by needs wager that there are more middle-aged made more pressing by the extremities men weighing from 185 to 225 pounds of the climate ; these, tired of their ser- than can be found in any other section of vitude, are unable to unyoke themselves America. from their burdens. They know of no There is opportunity here for profita- change for them where they may meet ble investment in various enterprises. all the demands of their loving family, We have no cotton factory in this count}-, and yet not go to their daily task like while we have more than one hundred scourged slaves to their dungeons. desirable mill sites, with an abundance of This country of ours opens its arms to water power. We need a bank at Lum- thousands of unhappy souls, wishing for berton and Maxton. a respite from the lash of daily demand There are in this county at least twenty and the bite and chill of the winter's long town sites on the railroads intersecting blasts. it, at any of which factories could be Let them hear of it ; let them know profitably operated, while operatives in that here is deliverance. Invite them abundance are here anxious for factory to come and make their home in Canaan. work. Good soil, good climate, good water, Several saw mills have been operated good society, cheap homes. I came in this immediate vicinity, on a large here from New York, in August, 1893. scale, but at present, owing to the gen- 9o LETTERS FROM NORTHERN AND WESTERN FARMERS. eral depression in the lumber business, apples grew that took first prize at the are not attempting to do very much. World's Fair. I have raised as good Cotton is largely raised here, as that corn here as we ever did in Ohio ; as is the staple crop and it is readily con- good wheat as we did in South Dakota ; verted into money, without hunting for a as fine vegetables as you could desire. market. I have seen clover heavier than any in The county of Robeson is very large. Ohio. From timothy sown in Sep- To give some idea of its size I would tember I have cut a ton and a half off say that there is more dry land in this an acre the next season. We have the county than in the entire State of Rhode finest cattle and hog range out of doors. Island. Hogs make themselves with one-third the I can assure you that the people here feed required in the Northern country. are awlays glad to see settlers, and extend Another good thing is that a man can to them a cordial welcome. Several fami- work nearly all the year. There has lies from the North are already located been but little time this winter but what here. Schools and churches are quite you could plow. Our schools are above numerous, the laws are observed, and the average, and we have as good peace and prosperity abide with us con- talent here as they have elsewhere. stantly- Our people are God-fearing and God- loving people and you will be hospitably Beats Ohio for Corn and Clover, Dakota entertained. Sectionalism is dead here ; for Wheat, and the World for if you don't bring some with you, you Fruits and Vegetables. won't find any. Our Southern farmers Edward J. French, Mammoth are glad to see you come, and by the Spring, Fulton county, Ark.— I am a improved methods of farming that are "Buckeye" by birth, but in 1884 I took used in the North we can make this Horace Greeley's advice and went country "blossom as the rose." '"West" to South Dakota, and lived there Let me say to you that if you want for seven crop seasons. I feel that I to come to a place where you can gave that country a fair trial, and while double or treble your investment in I came out "whole," it required all the five years and enjoy the finest climate, energy and pluck I possessed to enable eat the finest fruit, enjoy the finest me to do so. I found, however, that streams and springs, catch the finest fish, March 1st every year found me in nearly come to Arkansas while land can be the same circumstances, with no chance secured and build up a home for to build such a home as I desired, viz.: yourself. with fruits, shade trees, lawn, running- The Foregoing Letter Corroborated. water, etc. Besides the winters were intensely cold, and I determined to T. S. Stollinger, Mammoth Spring, move South. I was urged to go to Ark.—The letter of my neighbor, E. J. Arkansas, but my idea had been that French, having been handed to me for Arkansas was a country where mosqui- perusal and corroboration, I am pleased toes were thick, where the waters were to state that I moved from South stagnant and covered with a green scum. Dakota to this locality in the fall of I made inquiry before starting, and my 1889, after having made an extensive investigations proved to me I had been trip through the South down to New laboring under a delusion. Orleans and Houston. The climate of In October, 1890, I landed in Arkan- Northern Arkansas is truly pleasant, sas with my wife and a carload of immi- and, although all of the family are grant movables and just $100. In rather delicate, we did not contract any March, 1891, I traded some of my stock additional sickness here. We have been for an eighty acre piece of land with having vegetables fresh from the garden some improvements, (consideration continuously in the winter and summer S350.) Well I went to work and I now all these four years. Clover and orchard have a fine fruit farm. I am now writing grass, sown in the spring of 1890 in a within two miles of where the famous spot where the cattle and hogs do not LETTERS FROM NORTHERN AND WESTERN FARMERS. 91 come, have been growing and spreading than twenty years in each. I have had ever since, and make the spot green temporary homes in Connecticut and now, March 5. One acre of new Rhode Island. For the past five years breaking gave thirty bushels of corn in my home has been at Pine Bluff, Moore the dry season of 1893. Off one field county, N. C. I have no wish to change I had a crop of millet and a crop of it for any of my former homes. First, corn. The drouth delayed the planting the climate is satisfactory. I believe it of the corn till July 24th ; afterwards it will promote the health and comfort of had but one soaking rain, and the first persons from New York and New Eng- frost killed it in the milk. I need not land more than the climate. of any part say anything about this country for of our land. It is in all respects a good fruit ; everybody knows it. climate for a whole year residence. Second, the business which this section Experienced Truckers Wanted. opens to a newcomer is clean, pleasant H. H. Broome, Aurora, N. C.—I do and profitable, and for a long time to believe we have the finest farming sec- come without limit. tion in the State. Our lands are easy to The business of fruit raising in this clear, drain and cultivate, and will make region has passed beyond the stage of anything to perfection that is raised in experiment. Keen, able and successful the State, and it is easy to keep up by business men are leaving the North and rotation. There is not one acre in one are making large investments in the hundred but that is cultivated every business. Vineyards and orchards are year in this section ; no idle land here. now measured by hundreds of acres. My experience is this : I bought Nature favors the business, and the ever land in the woods and built on it in 1880, hungry stomach of the large cities and commenced clearing, and kept at it within easy reach furnishes the market, until 1888, when I had seventy acres to a market which this section is the first the plow. Since then I have cleared no to reach with some of its products. land, and have been at no expense, The men now engaged in this business except to cultivate and house my crops say they make money. Their actions and keep the farm in repair every year, sustain their words. They are steadily to realize something to pay the purchase expanding their business. New persons money due for my land. come to engage in it, and the price of The hope we have now of ever pay- land has advanced accordingly. In this ing our debts is by trucking. I think immediate vicinity lands can still be we have very superior advantages on bought at a price within the limits of a that line. Our lands are incomparably profitable fruit business, five to ten better than any of many noted trucking dollars per acre for small plats. sections. We have good transportation I have not engaged in fruit raising facilities also, but we greatly need expe- for market sales. As soon as my land rienced truckers to come among us, as was in condition I put out apple, pear, we have only commenced on that line ; plum and peach trees, grape vines, we don't know much about it. strawberries and blackberries. The Our lands are especially adapted to berries for several years have paid for all the growing of potatoes, onions, straw- trouble in caring for them. Last year berries, cabbages, melons, &c. the apple and pear trees gave us a taste. The plum trees bore well ; the peach Fruit Growing in Eastern North trees handsomely ; and the grape vines Carolina. prolifically. The result of my observ- Levi S. Packard, Southern Pines, ation and experience is that apples will N. formerly of Saratoga Springs, N. do something here pears, more plums, C, ; ; Y.—The sand hills and long leaf pine still more, while blackberries and grapes region, of North Carolina, have a word are the crops for prompt, sure, and good for Northern people. I have lived in returns. Peaches pay, but are not so Massachusetts and New York, more sure as grapes. — 92 FRUIT-GROWING OF THE SOUTH ATLANI IC SEABOARD. Successful Farming in North Carolina. The farmers have become more or less Fred. P. Latham, Hoslin, N. C. bankrupt, and have either allowed their My experience as a farmer has been farms to grow up, or allowed their negro tenants to poorly cultivate them for a from childhood. I have made a study few years and then abandon them. He of it for a livelihood, and received most of my early instruction from one of the buys at least one-half the meat he con- and about the proportion of best farmers in this section. I have sumes same ot never bought a bushel of corn nor a corn and hay ; this leaves the cause so land being idle and ill cultiva- pound of hay. I raise both for home much plain. In opinion, when consumption, and usually sell from 700 ted very my to 1000 bushels of corn and a few tons the farmers raise on the farm everything for consumption, then the of hay. I also raise cotton, rice and po- possible home of ''hard times" will cease, and a tatoes, but my principal crop is corn. cry The most practical way of keeping more general life of prosperity will be the farm in condition or to retain its fer- ours. no reason the tility is by filling the soil with humus, There seems to me why which can be done most economically man who knows how to cultivate the soil not be as prosperous as any with peas and clover. I give very care- should ful attention to both these crops. With other branch of business, with the same- the climate and soil of this eastern sec- risk and expenses, with the same amount tion agriculture should prosper. of capital. ITEMS ABOUT FARMS AND FARMERS. Creameries in Arkansas. and the product for 1894 will be nearly A new business in Arkansas, that of double that amount. butter- making on a large scale, is, Farming and Jlanufactui ing Combined. through the efforts of Northern capital, being brought to the front. In Talladega county, Ala., the Lewis The Grand Prairie creameries are lo- Brothers have 5,000 acres of land in cated at Carlisle, Hazen and Stuttgart, cultivation. They have eighty-four peo- near Little Rock, with a fourth plant ple employed, even' one white. They now going up at Almyra—taking in the have a cottonseed oil mill on their farm.. entire ninety miles in length of Grand and extract the oil from their own seed. Prairie. They use the hulls for fattening and Each plant is owned and controlled wintering their cattle and return the by a separate incorporated stock com- meal to the soil, thereby enriching the pany, but all under the business manage- land. ment of I. M. Tuller, who operates them They are just about completing a by contract on the co-operative and 5,300 spindle yarn mill and will convert separator plan. The consolidated paid every pound of cotton they raise into up capital of these creameries is about yarns. By this means they save the ex- $20,000. About 125 patrons, represent- pense of packing and marketing cotton ing the product ol 1,500 cows, now and get all the profit of the middle men. furnish pure milk, and the number is They save the enormous freights on rapidly increasing. cotton to the mills of New England and The machinery and methods are the have a market for their yarns in the same as used in the best Northern mills all around them. The coal to run creameries, while Mr. Tuller employs the machinery is laid down to them at only skilled butter-makers. $1.50 a ton and there is hardly any The output for 1893 was about 100,- doubt that their yarn mill, built at a 000 pounds of pure creamery butter, cost of $113,000, will make money from : ITEMS ABOUT FARMS AND FARMERS. 93 the start. White men from the moun- New York, and the freight is only $160 ; tains are seeking work at the farm, and while it takes nine days from California, in one family of nine every member is the freight being $320. Most of the self-sustaining. varieties are marketed before the Mary- land and Jersey fruit is ripened ; there- Prosperous Carolina Farmers. fore, they command the highest prices. Commissioner Robinson, of the North The principal varieties are the Elberta, Carolina Board of Agriculture, in the Alexander, Stump and Early Crawford. last bulletin of the board, calls attention to the prosperous agricultural sections William Reves, who lives in the of the State in these words : "Moultrie neighborhood," a few miles "The condition of farmers in North south of St. Augustine, Fla., makes $500 Carolina is one which gives great assur- a year out of eight Scuppernong grape ance at this time, and should encourage vines. This grape is a native of Florida our people very much. In the North, and grows with little or no care. It and particularly Northwest, the suffering has a thick, tough skin, but a most and destitution among the one- crop delicious pulp. From the fruit of these farmers is such as to cause great appre- eight vines Mr. Reyes gets about 600 hension. So great is the depression gallons ' of wine every year, the wine that many are writing this office in search bringing him from $1.00 to $1.25 per of new homes in a mild climate where a gallon in St. Augustine—or an average variety of farm products may be grown. of $650 for the crop. He raises his The financial depression has affected our own cane and "grinds" his own sugar, farmers but little. They may not have so that the cost of that ingredient is re- much cash, but they have plenty to feed duced to a minimum, and all other items man and beast and a prospect of a good of expense or labor will not aggregate crop before them. The climatic condi- over $150; this leaves a clear profit of tions have never been better for the $500 from the eight vines, not counting furtherance of all farm operations than the many bushels of grapes that are we have enjoyed in this State this year." eaten by the family or given away. Besides the native Scuppernong grape Peaches in Georgia. the growers in lower St. John's county It has been less than five years since cultivate half a dozen other fine varieties the first shipment of peaches was made for the Northern markets and for wine. from Georgia to the Northern mark- There are now nearly three hundred ets, and yet within that time, South- acres in grapes in and around Moultrie, western Georgia has' become one of the and the owners of the vineyards are on most noted peach growing sections in the high road to wealth. the world. There is probably no other crop that pays a better profit on the Here are results from tomato growing investment than Georgia peaches. One in Florida, figured out by the Bartow 200-acre peach orchard has returned to Courier-Informant the owner fully $125,000 in five years; We take at random a certain 60 acre nor is this profit confined to large field. It is estimated that four tomatoes growers, the small growers having done to the vine will yield a hundred crates equally well, if not better. One grower to the acre ; in this field we counted with an orchard of eight acres sold his twelve, fifteen, twenty and twenty-five to crop on the trees for $2500, or more the vine, with many blossoms uncounted, than $300 per acre ; another small grower so that 5000 crates would be a moderate sold his crop on 100 trees for $500, and estimate for the field. As they are the buyer picked and packed them, and netting $2.50 and $3.00 right along, said he made $500 in the transaction. $1.00 would be very fair as an average,, Georgia has several advantages over so that our net result shows $5000. California in the marketing of peaches. This is neither wild nor exaggerated for It takes but two or three days to trans- such an unusually good season as this, port a car of peaches from Georgia to and shows the great possibilities in the 94 ITEMS ABOUT FARMS AND FARMERS. business. The soil is so light that work Mr. H. BiLYEU, a well-known grape is hardly more than play, a light harrow grower at Southern Pines, N. C, gives with wooden teeth being all that's some interesting facts and figures necessary to keep the ground stirred. regarding his profits. He had 2000 Delaware vines, which last summer bore The farming interest throughout this their first fruit eighteen months after section seems to be more and more, year they had been grafted. The sum by year, becoming a certainty so far as realized was $600, after all the freight good independent living is concerned, and commission charges had been and when we look over the fields now deducted. The expenses of picking, being prepared for the coming crop we packing, baskets, interest on investment, see pastures, large corn and ground pea etc., were $100, so Mr. Bilyeu made fields, and the preparation for king cot- $500 clear. To one firm he sold ninety- ton, to a large extent being made on two cases, containing 3208 pounds, for certainty, that is to say regardless of $298.30 net ; that is about twelve cents price; we are sure of a good independent per pound. living. We heard a man say the other The experiment of shipping oranges day he would sell enough meat, lard, in bulk has been tried in Florida with chickens, eggs and butter to defray the very satisfactory results. expenses of a two-horse farm. —Cuth- bert leader. Mr. L. A. Burgamy, of Washington county, Ga., reports that he has three The columns of the Alabama papers years' crops of cotton on hand, of which have furnished a great many evidences not a bale has been sold ; he has plenty in the past few months of the fact that of home-made provisions on hand and the farmers of the State are in a fairly does not owe a dollar. comfortable condition. They have more supplies on hand than for many years The Tifton (Ga.) Gazette tells of a past. According to the Macon Tele- farmer living near Sylvester who has graph, the same conditions exist in sold from a one-horse farm thirteen bales Georgia. It publishes a large number of cotton, $40 worth of oats, $19 worth of newspaper extracts showing that the of sweet potatoes— last year's crop—and country people passed through last has on hand enough meat, corn, fodder, year's depression with less complaint rice and potatoes for his year's supply. than the town people, they are nearer out of debt than at any time since the Mr. L. J. De Shoxg, of Dover, Fla., war, and with economical methods there near Tampa, has shipped $700 worth ol is no reason why most of them should strawberries this season from an acre not become independent.— Montgomery and a quarter. These were mostly sold Advertiser. to the Tampa Bay Hotel. : THE SOUTHERN STATES. increased $S68,ooo,ooo in the South against Southern States. $3,000,000,000 in the rest of the country. The total value was $3,182,000,000 in the AN ILLUSTRATED MONTHLY MAGAZINt DEVOTED TO THE SOUTH. South and $12,797,000,000 in the rest of the Published by the country. The values had been in 1880 Manufacturers' Record Publishing Co. $2,314,000,000 for the South and $9,797,- 000,000 for all other States. The rate of Manufacturers' Record Building, increase, therefore, was per cent, for the BALTIMORE, MD. 37 South and 30 per cent, for other sections. SUBSCRIPTION: $1.50 a Year; $1 for Six Months The value of farm products in 1890 was WILLIAM H. EDMONDS, $773,000,000 for the South, against $1,687, Editor and Manager. 000,000 for the rest of the country. That is, with less than one-fourth as much BALTIMORE, APRIL, 1894. invested in agriculture as all othersections, the South produced in value nearly half as The SOUTHERN STATES is an exponent of the much as they. Immigration and Real Estate Interests and general advancement of the South, and a journal The increase from 1880 to 1890 in the accurate and comprehensive information of value of farm products for the whole about Southern resources and progress. Its purpose is to set forth accurately and country was $248,000,000, and $107,000,000 conservatively from month to month the reasons Of this increase, or 43 per cent, of the why the South is, for the farmer, the settler, the home seeker, the investor, incomparably the whole was in the South. most attractive section of this country. But the most noteworthy fact brought out by these census figures is that the Some Census Figures on Southern Farm total value of Southern products, $773,000,- Interests. 000, made a gross revenue of 24.1 percent, on the capital invested in farming, $3,182,- Every comparison that is made between 000,000; while the value of the products the South and the rest of the country ac- of all other sections, $1,687,000,000, yielded centuates in some way the more extensive only 13. 1 per cent, on the capital invested, and varied resources and capabilities of $12,797,000,000. the South and its more rapid development. In whatever phase of development a com- The Florida Citizen, of Jacksonville, parison by authentic statistics can be insti- says tuted the showing is favorable to the "In this age of the world the only way to push any business is to advertise it. This South. is as true of attracting visitors, bringing In the latest census reports the improve- settlers, and securing the investment of outside capital, as it is of selling a new ment in farm conditions at the South, as remedy for disease or finding a market for compared with other parts of the country, some new implement. It is not enough to have a good thing ; it is also necessary to is strikingly and forcibly brought out. publish the fact to ihe world and to thrust From 1S80 to 1890 the value of farm it upon the notice of everybody." assets (lands, houses, implements, etc.,) And the Citizen might have added that 9 6 EDITORIAL. the channel through which Southern com- braska was instrumental in taking four- munities, railroads and real estate owners teen Nebraska families to Florida, why and agents, may the most effectively reach insist that this incident must be so closely possible settlers and investors in the followed as that only one such possible North is the Southern States. missionary shall be secured? Why not try to get ten Nebraska farmers from ten "It Wouldn't Pay." communities, or ioo or iooo, so that there The Baltimore Herald deprecates im- shall be hundreds or thousands to follow migration effort. In a recent issue it these pioneers, instead of fourteen families said editorially : only ? "The question of building up the State It is quite true that "energetic farmers by immigration is one necessarily of slow growth, and a recent circumstance related seeking homes are what are needed, espe- by some of our Southern contemporaries cially in the Maryland counties," and it as having taken place in Florida is an illus- tration in point. A farmer of Nebraska is also quite true that "these of themselves went to Florida a few years ago and settled will become magnets to attract others in a salubrious region there. He was pleased with his orange groves and wrote from their original homes," and for that to his old friends in Nebraska, sending very reason not get as many of these them papers and other printed material why calculated to inform them regarding the magnets as possible ? Why limit them to advantages of Florida as a place of resi- "a few?" dence. The result of his correspondence and influence with his old neighbors was And will the Herald enlighten us as to that a colony of fourteen families has "any which seeks to bring recently gone South to take up their place why scheme of residence in the vicinity of their former immigrants to Maryland at wholesale is friend. This incident discloses what must be probably doomed to failure?" Why must evident to any reflecting person—that a there be failure in Maryland of methods few energetic farmers seeking homes are that successful elsewhere? Is what are especially needed in the Mary- have been land counties These of themselves will there so much less to work on? Has become magnets to attract others from their original homes, and any scheme Maryland so much less to offer to possible which seeks to bring immigrants to Mary- immigrants in the way of soil, climate, land at wholesale is probably doomed to " failure healthfulness, agricultural capabilities, etc ? Herald is behind the times. Why ''necessarily of slow growth?" It The A has not been a thing of slow growth in careful observer could probably detect a thin fringe of its back. Texas, in Florida, in Arkansas. And in moss down the older Southern States, wherever any The way to get investors here is by pre- effort has been made, the increase in pop- senting the South's advantages to them in the proper way and by judicious advertis- ulation by immigration has been rapid. ing—The Press, Americus, Ga. Thousands of Northern farmers, garden- Eminently true. And as to what is judi- ers, fruit-growers and stock-raisers have cious advertising read page five of this moved into Mississippi, Louisiana and Ala- issue of the Southern States. bama in the last few years, and large plan- tations have been cut up into small farms, No Pauper Immigration. truck gardens and orcnards. This has In a recent number of the Outlook, Mr. come about as a result of aggressive and W. N. Reeves, of Eufaula, Alabama, has an expensive immigration work, which is still article urging all persons interested in being carried on with great success. And improving the condition of city tenement the same sort of work in behalf of Mary- dwellers and unemployed to send them land would accomplish like results. South, where they can go to farming on And, because one farmer from Ne- shares, the owner of the land furnishing EDITORIAL. 97 them land, stock and implements, and feed- 1251 answered emphatically " No." ing the stock, and advancing supplies to Kansas farmers should move South, the tenants till the crop is made, getting where, because of the lower cost of -living, back from the crop all that he has ad- the greater diversity of crops, the gain in vanced and half of the remainder. Mr. time by reason of being able to work out- Reeves is a man of. unusually good judg- doors the year round, the fact that two ment in most matters of business and pub- or more crops a year can be grown on the lic policy, but the advocacy of an exten- same land, the saving in freights, and on sion of this system now in vogue in the account of many other advantages, a farm- South would seem to be a serious mis- er who would starve in Kansas might live take. The South wants no pauper immi- well and save money. gration. An increase in the number of this Mr. Ratcliff Hicks, President of the sort of tenant farmers would be not a bene- Camden Rubber Works of Connecticut, fit but a disaster. As a rule, under this has recently made some large investments system property deteriorates in value, in New Orleans. In an interview with the houses and fences decay, and the land is Orleans Picayune, he said : exhausted, the tenant having no interest in New "New Orleans needs to be advertised in the North. keeping up or improving the farm he is I afraid you people here don't use cultivating, but living in a hand-to-mouth am down enough printers' ink in making known fashion, and interested in getting out of your greatness." the land only what it will produce by the the most improvident methods. He usu- This admonition may be profitably heeded by other in the South. ally gets every year deeper and deeper communities into debt, and when he has used up one On April 22d the passenger steamship farm and exhausted the indulgence of its Mexican, of the East India and Pacific owner he moves somewhere else, and goes Line, will sail from Port Royal to Liver- through the same process again. He is pool, inaugurating the first regular passen- nearly always unthrifty and irresponsible ger service between Europe and a South and a cumberer of the ground. What the Atlantic port. The event is an important needs is energetic, thrifty, indus. South and significant one, as an indication of the trious farmers, will own their farms who continually widening scope, and the widely interest in them beyond the and have some ramifying influences of Southern develop- will the land present crops, who improve ment. and build up homes and become desirable The cold wave that swept over the citizens. The South does not want ten- country the last week in March did great ants ; it wants land owners. damage to fruits and vegetables in the South. Vegetables that were killed have Kansas Farming Unprofitable. since been replanted for the most part, but The Kansas Commissioner of Labor, in the far South the season's peach and James F. Todd, has finished his investiga- pear crop was in some localities almost entirely destroyed. Fortunately, ac- tion relative to the farming industry of the on count of the great diversity of products, and State, and the conclusion is that farming the fact that there is some crop maturing is a very unprofitable business in Kansas. almost every month in the year, the loss The department sent 1916 letters to far- of any one crop is not so severely felt as it farming pay?" mers, asking "Does would be in the North, where the growing Answers came from 1292 of the 1523 season is limited to so small a part of the townships in the State. Of that number year. Immigration News. floving from California to Florida. in North Dakota are desirous of establish- ing colony in Mr. Emanuel Jose, formerly of San a either Maryland or Califor- Francisco, and the owner of a valuable nia, and that a committee will be here in a few days to look this section ranch in San Diego county, Cal., has over of the bought extensive tracts of land on the east country, and report their observations to coast of Florida, near Fort Pierce, and the prospective colonists. Mr. Richards also states that several he will establish a colony of industrious Northern people immigrants from the West and Northwest. are now investigating timber lands expect- Four hundred people are already domesti- ing to make large purchases along the B. cated there and in the near future ioo & O. will be added to this promising families A dispatch from Velasco, Texas, an- colony. nounces the sale of 40,000 acres of land in Texas Immigration. Brazoria county, between Velasco and An idea of the Texas immigration move- Galveston, to a syndicate composed partly ment can be had when it is stated that a of Galveston capitalists, who will open it tract extending twenty miles along the for settlement by farmers. Other transac- water front at Port Lavaca and reaching tions in real estate during the same week six miles into the interior has been sold, in the vicinity amounted to over $60,000. with the exception of a single 4000-acre pasture. In addition to the territory A few months ago, Rev. N. Burkart, of named, Swedish people have bought 15,000 Baltimore, induced a few German families acres across the bay in Calhoun county in the West to move to Maryland, the lo- and 8000 acres adjoining in Matagorda cality fixed upon being Dorchester county county. These lands have all been bought Those who came were so well pleased by Northern men and colony organizations, with the country that their former neigh- and are being divided into small tracts and bors have been following them. Several held for actual settlers. Immigrants from hundred have moved in and others are the Northern States, many from as far coming in increasing numbers. away as Minnesota are coming in all the The Arkansas Fruit & Development Co., time. It is common for one settler to buy 199 south Clark street, Chicago, have several farms—one for himself and the bought a large area of land in Arkansas to other for friends at home. be planted in fruit trees. A dispatch from Monroe, La., states The Southwestern Land Co., at Centre- that a colony of fifty Swedes has been ville, Miss., is locating colonies of immi- formed to move to that parish. They will grants on lands adjoining the town. Quite farm on the co-operative plan and will buy a colony of energetic and thrifty-looking land which will be sub-divided into twenty- Swedes have purchased lands and located acre farms. The dispatch further states there, and it is said that a very large num- that 200 Swedes will be located in the par- ber of others are expected. Those who ish before the close of the year. have settled seem delighted with the country and satisfied with the price of M. V. Richards, of the Baltimore & lands. Their intention is to raise truck Ohio Immigration Department, reports and fruit for shipment. They are buying that he has just received a communication up land in 10 and 15-acre lots, and paying from a county official of North Dakota rep- part cash and the balance in instalments. resenting that a large number of Germans Houses, both for business and residences, IMMIGRATION NEWS. 99 are in demand, and real estate in town has mington, traffic manager of the road, has greatly increased in price. been making some initial efforts to interest Northern farmers in the trucking and farm- A number of Norwegians, lately of Da- ing attractions of the territory traversed by Fla., kota, have settled near Kissimmee, his line, and is much encouraged by the on lands purchased from the Disston Syn- results. dicate. These men are all robust, muscu- lar, show good countenances and are not Mr. G. A. A. Deane, Land Commis- afraid to work. Another colony is now sioner of the St. Louis, Iron Mountain and being worked up, that will embrace well- Southern Railway, has started an experi- to-do Nebraska and Kansas farmers. This mental farm near Hope, Arkansas, for the colony will be made up of men of means, purpose of showing to homeseekers the who will take with them several carloads farming and fruit growing capabilities of of stock, farm machinery and household that section. This was brought about by goods. the Business Men's Club of Hope. C. D. Tinsley, of Petersburg, Va., is It is said that Messrs. C. A. Valentine negotiating for the sale of 50,000 acres of and A. M. Lundeen, of Chicago, have in land, on which the prospective purchasers hand the organization of a colony of expect to locate colonists. Scandinavians to be settled in Arkansas. H. D. Lane, commissioner of agricul- ture of Alabama, and P. Sid. Jones, On the subject of immigration, the immigration agent of the Louisville & Examiner, of Aberdeen, Miss., says: Nashville Railroad, will start early in "The immigration association that has April on a tour of Illinois, Wisconsin and accomplished the grandest results in that the Dakotas, their purpose being to induce line for East Mississippi in the past few immigration to Alabama. years, and whose efforts are now being daily developed into realties, is Colonel Gov. Fishback, of Arkansas, has re- E. E. Posey, general passenger agent of ceived a letter from a colony of farmers of the Mobile & Ohio railroad. Since his Saline county, Neb., who want to go to connection with the "Old Reliable" he has Arkansas and establish a dairy business. instituted and pushed several of the most popular and effective movements to secure The managers of the Atlantic Coast immigration for Mississippi and Alabama Line have been studying the subject of im- that have been yet devised and they are migration, and are preparing to take up already proving highly successful. Through immigration work in a practical way. The his arrangement for special excursions and Atlantic Coast Line is one of the most ag- cheap rates of transportation large num- gressive roads in the South in what it bers of Western and Northwestern land undertakes, and having determined to and home-seekers have been induced to adopt a policy in furtherance of immigra- visit East Mississippi, resulting in the set- tion to its territory, its plans may be ex- tlement of hundreds of thrifty, industrious pected to be broad and progressive and families in this portion of our State, and successful. Mr. T. M. Emerson, of Wil- the work has hardly been begun." Real Estate News. Texas Real Estate. ments in this direction and although the suspension of several American mortgage The Southern States is in receipt of companies had the effect of temporarily the following interesting letter on real stopping mortgage investments in this estate conditions in Texas from Mr. C. H. State, there is recently a disposition to Silliman, President of the Fort Worth loan more freely. The Scottish-American Chamber of Commerce: Mortgage Company, the United States and "In regard to the condition of Texas Colonial Mortgage Co., the Texas Land real estate and the opinion of English in- and Mortgage Co., the Land Mortgage vestors as to Texas investments, I will Bank of Texas, Ltd., and others are now state that good farming lands in what is doing an active business in the State. In known as the black belt or central Texas, fact, there are ample funds for the best se- is in good demand. They have changed curities in mortgages The second class hands in the last six months at 10 per cent. risks go begging for takers. Of course, to 25 per cent, over the prices obtained there are certain drawbacks in every new two years ago. This is a belt of country country which impedes the investment of extending from Tarrant county on the capital. One particularly, the homestead West, Hunt county on the East, and from law, absolutely prohibiting the lending of the Red River on the North to the Gulf on money on 200 acres owned and occupied the South, taking in the valleys of the by the borrower. This is exempt under Brazos and Colorado rivers, where failure the constitution of the State and no lien of crops is almost unknown. These rich can be fixed on it. Then there are in some alluvial lands are in constant demand by counties incompetent abstracters and the home parties. Thousands of tenants have fact that limitation does not run against acquired homes by making small cash a married woman, makes it extremely dif- payments and balance in installments, ficult for an attorney to come to an abso- paid out of the profits in cultivating the lutely correct conclusion as to the validity land. Some of these lands change hands of a title. These matters, however, are at $30 to $40 per acre. There is also great being cured by limitation and through the activity in what is known as the coast coun- courts. With all these drawbacks, I look try, extending from Houston to Victoria. upon Texas a most promising field for in- The large pastures in that section of the vestment." State, which have been occupied exclusively by the stockman, are being subdivided It is reported that Mr. J. C. Perfater, a and settled by immigrants from the West. wholesale produce merchant of Chicago, These lands have been held in large bodies will put up a 10-story office building and in the past at $2.00 to $5.00 per acre, but in theatre at San Antonio, Texas small tracts with easy payments they are readily salable at $5.00 to $10.00 per acre. Building operations are very active in There is very little movement in Panhandle San Antonio, Texas. A feature of the ac- or grazing lands in West Texas. Lands in tivity is the changing of the fronts of the the great timber belt of East Texas are old buildings on main thoroughfares. intrinsically worth as much as they ever Owners all over the city are tearing down were but there is very little changing unsightly frontages and erecting in their hands in that direction at the present time. stead those of most modern design. "In Texas there are agents for six or eight English mortgage companies. All Mr. H. W. Fuller, general passenger seem to be well satisfied with their invest- agent of the Chesapeake & Ohio Railway REAL ESTATE NEWS. 101 Co., has purchased "Cismont," the farm which consists of 12,000 acres in Citrus of the late George Randolph, near Kes- county, Fla., a hotel and several cottages. wick, Va., and will make it his country Among recent sales of Virginia real residence. estate was a tract of forty acres in the 111 suburbs of Alexandria, which, it is stated, Mr. T. J. Bunn, of Bloomington, , and Mr. H. C. Bunn, of Chicago, have been has been purchased by Philadelphia parties traveling through Texas and making a who will divide it up into residence lots. study of the Texas cities in the interest of The farm of C. H. C. Fulkerson, in Lee capitalists, who are looking for attractive county, Va., has just been sold for $30,000 investment opportunities in that State. an average of $100 per acre. The fair grounds property at Union, S. Real estate in the vicinity of Colum- C, owned by the Union Building & Loan bia, S. C, is attracting the attention of Association, was recently cut up into forty investors. It is stated that a syndicate lots, ranging in size from one to three has been formed to build a town in the acres. half of were sold at' About them southern suburbs of Columbia to be private sale and the remainder at auction, called "Kleinbeck-Park." The property very satisfactory prices being realized. is to be improved, pleasure grounds laid out and possibly a large hotel built for a B. Hair, of Elko, S C, has bought a J. winter resort as well as an amusement block of ground in Augusta, Ga , on casino. which he will build a number of residences- A recent land sale in Texas was of A party of Indiana people recently 1765 acres near La Porte to E. G. Harris, made some purchases of real estate at of Jacksonville, 111., who intends using it Crowley, La., after having spent several for a ranch. days studying the town and the surround- ing country. Americus (Ga.) is a thriving town sur- rounded by a splendid farming and fruit- A. R McMurtry, of Rockville, Ind.; growing country. Among the latest sales Dr. John B May and T. C. Gooly from New of farming property near Americus'was a Holland, Ohio, have been looking at tract of 200 acres, which sold for $18.00 Crowley, La., with a view to investing and per acre, while another tract of 150 acres locating. brought $3000, or $20.00 per acre. Mr T. Skaggs, of Beeville, Texas, J. Several Northern farmers have recently has sold 2440 acres of land adjoining Bee- bought farms in the neighborhood of Cuth- ville to parties who will cut it up into small bert, Ga., which is in a fine fruit-growing tracts to be sold to settlers. Beeville is in region. the centre of an exceptionally fine farming country. A number of persons from Kansas, Mis- souri, Illinois, Ohio, and other States have There is considerable real estate activity recently bought property near Angleton, at Keyser and Piedmont, W. Va. At Texas. The town is full of prospectors, Piedmont all the real estate belonging to surveyors and real estate agents, and the the old firm of Davis Brothers, in which hotel has been forced to construct an the heirs of Wm. R. Davis, deceased, have addition. an interest, will be sold at public sale so as to settle the accounts of the firm. This Mrs. Lydia Delauder, of Middletown, property includes the former residence of Md., has sold her home farm of 108 acres, Hon. H. G. Davis and Wm. R. Davis, 3 miles south of Middletown, to Oliver known as the "Davis Mansion," the Davis Beachley for $7000, a fraction less than $65 Bank Building, etc. per acre. George W. Morse, of Boston, repre- A Baltimore syndicate is reported to senting bondholders of the Homosassa have bought a tract of land near Luther- Land & Improvement Co., Homosassa, ville, in Baltimore county, and on the Fla., has purchased the latter property, Northern Central Railway. The property REAL ESTATE NEWS. is to be developed as a residence town for to be a reformation of commercial methods. the employees of the Northern Central —Memphis Appeal. freight yard to be established at Luther- ville. At Beeville, Texas, the Burr Brothers have sold 2500 acres of land adjoining the Realty in the South. town to L. B. Creath and W. C. Stone, of There is a difference in the valuation of the Commercial National Bank, and J. S. property in the East and in the South. In Dabney, of Austin county, for the sum of Boston a man who owns a building which $40,000. The new owners will put 1500 rental of a year, regards brings him a $3,000 acres of it on the market in tracts to suit the building as worth $100,000. In the purchasers, and the remainder will be re- South a man who owns a building that he served by Mr. Dabney, who will put 500 willing may rent for $3000 a year, may be acres of it into cultivation. to dispose of it for $30,000. It comes down to the question of living. The Boston idea As indicating the real estate activity in is better. wno live economically the Those Florida, it may be mentioned that the C. live best. Here in the South we must C. Robertson Real Estate Agency of learn thrift. In Illinois land which is not Jacksonville, has within the last two or nearly so fruitful as land in Mississippi may three weeks sold orange groves and other be rented for a smaller amount per acre property aggregating in value about than in Mississippi, though the land in the $110,000. former State is valued much higher than in the latter. We must discard the old ideas. Orlando, Fla., is having some real We must be content with less interest and estate activity. greater value. We must live so that we may retain that which we own. We must On the 28th of March Salmonson & Fes- learn the value of personal sacrifice to the senden, a real estate firm of Tampa, Fla., end that we may always be rich. There is bought a piece of property, consisting of a fascination about earning a high interest eighty acres adjacent to Tampa, for $7000. from a small property, but it leads to ex- A few days later they had it subdivided travagance and finally to ruin. The capi- into lots, which were offered at $35 each. talist who is content with a small interest They quickly sold 250 lots, some of the on his investment, and who lives accord- purchasers afterwards selling out for as ingly, will remain a capitalist, whereas, he as much as $125 a lot. who exacts an enormous interest, must necessarily force his customers into bank- Mr. Herman Specht, a wealthy and ruptcy, and in the end find himself without public-spirited farmer and fruit-grower, of customers. If, in the South, we should get Iowa Park, Texas, writes to the Southern to a three per cent, instead of a ten per States that he will make a deed for fifty cent, basis, we would be much happier. to one hundred acres of land to any per- There would be more business, smaller sons experienced in grape cultivation who and more productive and more numerous want to move to Texas, if they will culti- farms, more factories and a greater com- vate and maintain a vineyard on it. And mercial solidity. The value of realty besides giving the land he will pay for the would be largely increased. There ought cutting's. Notes of Southern Progress. An Important Maryland Enterprise. Export Coal Co. at Pensacola, Fla., have developed a coal and coke trade A number of New York and New Jersey with Mexico which, though somewhat small at people are interested in a project to locate present, is rapidly increasing in proportions. a manufacturing town in Maryland at or The new company expects [to ship an near the mouth of the Patuxent river, and on extensive scale from the Cumberland dis- to build a railroad line to the river. Some trict, the tonnage coming over the West time ago parties in Trenton, N. ] , secured Virginia Central and Baltimore a large tract of land on Drum Point harbor & Ohio roads to Locust Point, thence going with the idea of making a summer resort by vessel to the destination. It is believed and manufacturing village of the place. that as soon as the line is fairly established The Baltimore & Drum Point road was to and contracts are made with Mexican rail- connect it with Baltimore and Washington. road and smelting companies for fuel, that The scheme has been lying dormant for the business will require a weekly service. some time, but interest in it has been Thus far little or no bituminous revived by the report obtained on excellent coal has been found in Mexico, and the railroads authority that a party of New York people depend on wood for the locomotives. with ample means have secured options on Much of the coke used in the great silver- 20,000 acres of land, which include five smelting plants has been shipped from miles of deep water front on the Patuxent England, but it is found that the American river It is understood the purchasers product is just as good for the purpose and intend to place a colony upon the property can be delivered at a lower figure. The and to establish several factories, which demand 'or locomotive fuel is indicated are to have a railroad outlet by an exten- when it is stated that there are miles sion of the Washington & Point Lookout 5500 of line in operation in that country, with road, a branch of the Baltimore & Ohio, nearly 500 locomotives, many of which extending at present from Alexandria to burn valuable hardwoods for lack of coal. Shepherd. The people in the last-named project are understood to be back of the ones who are trying to secure a charter for New England Moving South. the Maryland Progressive Improvement It is learned authentically that in addition Co. from the Maryland legislature. This to the Massachusetts Mills, of Lowell ; the is to have company $6,000,000 capital. Dwight Co., of Chicopee, Mass.; the Otes Frederick Stone, Frank Ford and Frank J Co., of Ware, Mass., and Bliss, Fabian & M. Neal, who negotiated the options on the Co., of New York, all of whom have been land, are among the incorporators of the mentioned as intending to build large new company. cotton mills in the South, a number of other New England concerns will follow American Coal for Mexico. their example. These companies have The result of the recent visit of Balti- decided that it is necessary to build mills more capitalists to Mexico is that a line of South in order to compete in the manufac- vessels will be piit on the route between ture of coarse goods, but they believe that Baltimore and Tampico to carry soft coal they can hold on to their fine goods trade and coke to Mexico. The first step has in New England. The mills to be Duilt by been taken in this direction by making the four concerns mentioned above will arrangements to build coal docks of 8000 probably represent an aggregate cost of at tons capacity at Tampico. least $2,500,000 to $3,000,000. They will Coal exporters in West Virginia, and the be very large, have every modern im- 104 NOTES OF SOUTHERN PROGRESS. provement in construction and equipment to schools and colleges each over $15,000 and will take all of their skilled help from in value, a stone bridge, a Pythian temple, New England. It is said that these new a courthouse, 280 dwellings of $2000 and mills will have at least 50,000 spindles over each, for which permits have been each. taken out since January 1, as well as a Three Months' Progress. number of miscellaneous buildings. A conservative estimate of the amount of The Manufacturers' Record in its quar- money to be spent in building the various terly review of manufacturing growth in structures, including machinery, etc., for the South, says: "The gain during the factories and power plants, results as first three months of 1894, as compared follows : with the last quarter of 1893, shows a very Factories and ... . $880,000 decided improvement. The total number power stations Business and public buildings and bridge... 5,015,000 of new enterprises organized during the Dwelling-houses 825,000 last quarter of 1893, was 436, while for the Total $6,720,000 first three months of this year the total The Detrick & Harvey Machine Works, was 662, an increase of 226. This number the Ellicott Manufacturing Co., the Camp- is larger than during any quarter of 1893, bell-Zell Iron Works, the White & Middle- except the first, which showed consider- ton Gas Engine Co., and other manufac- able activity prior to the general depres- turing concerns are enlarging their facto- sion that came on last spring. In face of ries and greatly increasing their facilities. the business conditions that have prevailed The new baryta mill reported elsewhere, a since last summer, this gain is very satis- new box factory, one of the largest in the factory, and indicates that the South, not- country, to be started, are noteworthy withstanding the depressing influences of additions to Baltimore's factories. the tariff agitation, is gradually but slowly- getting in position for a decided industrial A company is being formed in Norfolk growth. Comparing the new enterprises to be called the Elizabeth River Terminal during the last quarter with those during Co., which has for its object the develop- the fourth quarter of 1893, it is seen that ment of the cotton trade at that point. the number of machine shops, foundries The plan is to secure ninety acres of land and woodworking factories has nearly at Swimming Point, near the Seaboard Air doubled, new textile mills have increased Line terminus, in Portsmouth suburbs, and from five to nine, brick works from seven erect compresses, warehouses and wharves to eleven, canning factorines from ten to of a capacity for handling all cotton re- twenty-seven, ice factories from seven to ceived in the city. The bales will be twenty, electric plants from twenty-one to shipped from the company's wharves twenty-four, water works from thirteen to direct to Europe and received by the twenty-four and miscellaneous enterprises carload, as the warehouses will have rail- from 190 to 293. All along the line there road connection with all lines entering has been a general increase, excepting in Portsmouth. By means of the new ware- flour mills. houses it is believed a great saving can be effected in transfer and storage charges, Building Activity in Baltimore. saying nothing of the advantage of cen- Besides its industrial activity, Baltimore tralizing the business. is having a remarkable building movement The gingham mill at Haw River, N. C, in spite of the hard times. The following built and equipped last year, has been so list of building enterprises planned or in successful that preparations are being made process of construction will give an idea of to double the size of the building, and in a this : Two bank and office buildings, two few months 10,000 spindles will be running. passenger-railway stations, a city college, a hotel, a music hall, two electric-power The rapid increase in exports at New- stations, a high-school, three office build- port News is shown in the following fig- ings, two fire-department houses, two hos- ures: Total value for February, 1894, $1,- pitals, several large warehouses, six 449,507 ; 1893, $776,634, a gain of eighty-nine churches, two synagogues, two graded per cent. Exports in January and Febru- schools, one bank addition, eight additions ary, 1893, $1,381,485; 1894, $3,107,507, or 125 NOTES OF SOUTHERN PROGRESS. 105 per cent, more than the previous year. ized at Raleigh, N. C, to deal in real estate During January and February, 1,894, 2,011,- and to locate colonies and individuals in 418 bushels of corn were shipped, against North Carolina. The Company states that 329,872 bushels in the same period of 1893. it will give special care to the interests of colonists and homeseekers, handling only The Bishop Fibre Co., of Jacksonville, such lands as can be fully commended for Fla., manufactures mattress and brush fibre productiveness and for healthfulness and under patents owned by the company from desirability of location. palmetto. The company now owns a large plant in Jacksonville, which has been The Noel Mill Company at Estell running for about two years, and is put- Springs, Term., has a mill with a daily ca- ting up a factory at Daytona with capacity pacity of 3500 barrels of flour. It began to make twenty tons mattress fibre per day operations on January 4 and is now running and will in the near future put up addi- regularly. This company has the largest tional plants over the State. winter-wheat flour mill in the world, the being the plant of the National Waco, Texas, is to have a cotton palace next largest and exposition, under the auspices of the Milling Company of Toledo, Ohio, which has a daily capacity of 2500 barrels of flour. Waco Commercial Club, of which J. W. its wheat from Tennes- Riggins is president. Architects of national The mill obtains Illinois reputation have been invited to submit see, Kentucky, Indiana, Missouri, Tennessee wheat- designs. It will be a large building, hav- and Kansas, preferring export busi- ing at least 100,000 square feet of floor The company has begun an shipments space, with domes, pinnacles, towers and ness, having only recently made Liverpool and turrets. The interior will contain samples to Amsterdam, Glasgow, of every Texas product from the field, Belfast. elevator with a mine and factory, and the building will be Attached to the mill is an grain. The covered with cotton, grain, grasses, seed, capacity of 520,000 bushels of minerals and other natural productions. mill, being built by Nashville capital and properly- Professional decorators will be employed managed by Nashville men, is institution, and to arrange the displays in the most artistic considered a Nashville manner. makes the flour capacity of that place 9000 barrels daily. It is next to the largest The National Mining & Milling Co. has winter-wheat milling point in the United been organized at Baltimore with a paid States, closely pressing St. Louis. The up capital of $90,000, to mine and manufac- milling business of Nashville has grown to ture baryta. The ores will come from the above capacity from 300 barrels daily- Blacksburg, S C , and the factory will be ten years ago. at Baltimore. be built from The Lynchburg & Rivermont Street A telephone line is to Railroad Co. has bought Rivermont Park Tampa, Fla., along the east shore of Tam- river, reaching all at Lynchburg, Va., for $7,000. pa bay to the Manatee the towns along the river, Palmetto, Mana- The Allen & Boyden Co. has been organ- tee, Braidentown and others. General Notes. Southern Immigration. at that price, he is nearly certain to be able to sell again at a profit some time during The following article was written by Mr. the year." F. W. Guillaudeu, of New York, vice-presi- Also, Matthew Marshall, in a recent dent of the Old Dominion Steamship Co.: article in the New York Sun, says: The winter storms in the West and North- "How foreign competition affects the west, with the attending suffering and loss remuneration of our laborers is exhibited of life, seem more severe than usual this very plainly by the price of wheat. The winter, and again provoke the query why wheat of India, Russia, Australia, and Argentina has knocked ours down to the people should, and, having chosen, con- half of what it brought a few years ago, tinue to live in such a climate. and the prospect is that it will fall still " The answer is, doubtless, that it is an lower evil to be borne with, in view of the profita- In a general way, the "wheat, basis" ble results of agricultural pursuits in that may be said to be the measure for pretty section of the country. much everything else in that section—and Doubtless this has been largely true in the new figure will not more than pay the the past, but the conditions are fast chang- farmer his cost of production, if it does that ing. A recent financial article in the New —while there is no permanent improvement York Times contains the following signifi- in the conditions possible cant language : If, then, in addition to the terrible cli- "The price of wheat in Chicago for May mate, comes the difficulty of making a live- delivery has gone down four cents during lihood from the crops that can be grown,, the week, and yesterday made a new the time seems ripe for a movement to record in touching sixty cents, the lowest price ever known As to that, however, more favored localities, and this is the it was daily touching the lowest price ever opportunity of the South, particularly the known, as it declined from the quotation middle South — Virginia, the Carolinas, of a week ago Wheat is being as widely Georgia, etc. discussed as it was in the spring of 1884, when the first great break took place under While it is true that the price of cotton the weight of India supplies. India was has reached a low point, yet the best then the new competitor, and conceded to farmers, who raise cotton and other >hings be a permanent one, with all that that im- corn, hogs, cattle, etc. —say it thus pays plied. Any one who will turn to the news- — papers of that time will see that the ques- well Moreover, in the sections described, tion of India wheat was one about which almost every variety of crop can be, and is the public was greatly concerned It being, grown and marketed. knocked this country off the dollar basis The climate will allow outdoor work the We have now, just ten years later, to face the problem of Argentine wheat, with year round, with practically no winter Australian wheat on top of it. The latter feeding or housing of live stock. is not large, but coming on top of the The country is sufficiently served by rail- other it is like the inch on the man's nose. roads connecting it with all markets, Argentine wheat looks as if it would knock us off the eighty-cent basis to which we North, East, West, and foreign— while were pushed down by India. To what new manufacturing interests are rapidly spring- basis will Argentine push us ? The indica- ing up, giving a home market for agricul- tions are that it will be sixty cents. If growers of wheat in South America can tural supplies. sell the grain at a profit in the European The amount of food products for man markets at present prices, and it would and beast 'produced by the South in the seem that they can, for they are constantly last few years is astonishing, and as the increasing their supplies, sixty cents will have to be accepted as the new basis. By supply was previously drawn from the basis is meant a figure at which if one buys West and Northwest, this unerring sign of GENERAL NOTES. 10: prosperity for the South reverses the posi- for its manufacture at the lowest possible tion in the West to the extent of diminishing cost ; here is found the combination of the great Southern market for her products. climate the cheapest power, both steam There is room in plenty, and a hearty and water, that the world affords, welcome for the thrifty, industrious and and an abundant supply of labor easily capable immigrant or settler from the trained, and which, by reason of the low Northland, with prosperity and success cost of living, can always be had at a lower assured as a result of the same determined, cost than laborers in other sections where intelligent and careful efforts which at living must of necessity be more expen- present seem to count for little under his sive In the Carolinas and Georgia and in forbidding surroundings some of the other States there are water- The South need not turn to Europe for powers almost without limit that can be immigration to fill her spare room Let her utilized at the lowest possible cost, while make known her advantages to our own peo- in the States where water-powers are less ples in the great Northwest, and, indeed, abundant coal can be can at a price almost in the New England States as well, and as satisfactory as water-power. We not tempt the thrift, the energy and the intelli- only have in the South the raw material gence of those sections to come to her, and without the cost of transportation and thus obtain a well prepared and valuable other expenses necessary before the cotton addition to her population, her citizenship can reach Northern or European mills, but and her wealth. we have the natural advantages for cotton Let the State governments, railroads, mills greater than any other country. It is manufacturers, and all interested in the no longer a question as to whether^ the development of the country, put forth South can develop its cotton-manufacturing their efforts in this direction, and the best business A few years ago our New Eng- results must be obtained land friends persistently claimed that the South would never become a great cotton- Cotton Manufacturing in the South. manufacturing section. They had many reasons for the faith that was in them. The world has about 85,000,000 spindles, Some said that the South lacked energy representing an investment of probably ; some said that its people were not adapted upwards of $2, 000,000, 000. Of this vast either to the management of cotton mills industry the United States have a little or to become skilled laborers in the mills over one-fifth in capital invested, or over ; some said that we had not the capital, and |4oo,ooo,ooo, and less than one-fifth in the that New England capital would never leave number of spindles, or 15,000,000. Though its own section to go into Southern mills ; the South produces over 60 per cent, of all some said that while we might in time pro- the world's cotton crop, it has only about duce the coarse goods, we would never in one-thirtieth of the total cotton-manufac- the South produce the finer product. turing business. It furnishes the raw Reasons without end were found, but the material for more than one-half of all the logic of events has year after year proved spindles of the world. For 100 years the that all the arguments were without foun- South has been raising the cotton, shipping dation. The South has not only developed it to New England and to Europe, and its cotton manufacturing with amazing permitting the manufacturers of those rapidity, but it has put its own money into countries to grow rich on turning it into mills, it has managed them, it has furnished the finished product. The $300,000,000 a the labor for them, it has pushed its goods year which the cotton crop brings to the into all markets, and practically monopo- South would be trebled if we could manu- lized the coarse goods business. It has facture at home all the cotton which we turned its attention to the finer goods, and now produce. To do this would require its success in that line is just as assured as an investment of upwards of $1,200,000,000. its success in coarse goods ever was. At It is needless to say that the South's advan- tages for cotton production are not more last New England begins to see that south- pre-eminent than its advantages for cotton ward the star of cotton manufacturing manufacturing. Here where the cotton is takes its way, and a number of the oldest raised nature has furnished every requisite mills of that section are preparing to save io8 GENERAL NOTES. their trade by building new mills in the will have between 50,000 and 75,000 spin- South. Despite the general depression in dles. The increase in spindles last year business interests since the late financial was over 200,000, and at this rate only the troubles and the uncertainty regarding the South would have about 5,000,000 spindles tariff", Southern cotton-manufacturing in- ten years hence, but the probability is that terests are attracting great attention in these figures will be reached before 1900, or Northern financial circles. It is almost within six years.— -Manufacturers' Record. universally conceded that the future growth of this industry is in the South ; that the A Unique Development. progress of the past is but an indication of Six or seven years ago Mr. O. M. Crosby, what the future will bring forth. while making an exploration tour of In the last twenty years cotton has Florida, was attracted by the beauty and brought into the South nearly $6,500,000,- the manifest advantages of a section of 000. Much of this enormous sum has gone country in De Soto county, on he dividing West and North to pay for foodstuffs and ridge between the Gulf and the Atlantic, manufactured goods Had it remained in sixty miles from each, and he determined, the South the wealth of this section would although it could only be reached by a be today vastly greater than it is With ride of twenty miles in a private convey- increased attention given to the produc- ance, to become its pioneer and developer. tion of foodstuffs at home, as is now being He returned North and interested several done, with the great growth in manufactur- of his friends in the enterprise, and finally ing interests that is going on, the South is organized the Florida Development Co., becoming more independent of other sec- of which he became and is still president. tions in these lines, will and not only The town that is now known as Avon retain at home the millions of dollars that Park is the outgrowth of his work. The have annually gone West for corn and methods that have been employed are bacon, but will add to this the millions that original, unique and noteworthy. are being received from other sections for The company bought an entire township, its early fruit and vegetables. Cotton, the 20,000 acres, or thirty-six square miles, and foundation crop of Southern agriculture, is began at once the work of improvement also the foundation of a manufacturing and advertising. The lands were surveyed industry which will add more wealth to and plotted. One section was reserved for the South than any other one industry a town site and laid out in one-acre lots, The progress that has been made in the the price of which was put at #25.00 each, development of cotton manufacturing in payable in monthly instalments of #2.00. the South, even during the general depres- Every purchaser was given his choice sion of the last twelve months, is the of the unsold lots, and the same strongest testimony that could be given to rule prevails today. The other lands were the unequalled advantages of this section divided into ten, twenty, forty and eighty- for this industry In 1880 the South had acre tracts and put at $15.00 per acre, also 161 cotton millsj with 667,854 spindles. By payable in instalments ; ten dollars cash 1890 they had increased in number to securing a ten-acre lot. The company put 255 mills, with 1,766,553 spindles. In the all receipts from the sales into improve- next three years there was a rapid gain- ments, and today they have a fine sixty- and the number of spindles rose to 2,552,, four-room hotel on Lake Vernon, filled 000 by January, 1893. During 1893 cotton- with visitors ; a number of handsome mill building continued active, while many- cottages, in which intending settlers live old mills increased their capacity by put- while building their own houses ; ten and ting in additional machinery, and the South a-half miles of streets, opened and cleared now has 405 mills, with 2,774,087 spindles of trees and stumps ; over two miles of and 62,427 looms, including a few mills sidewalks, fiuir boards wide, and 140 under construction and sufficiently far families settled and now living in the advanced to have determined upon the township. number of their spindles In addition to It is Mr. Crosby's proud boast that no this the mills projected, but upon which purchaser has ever lost a dollar at Avon construction work has not yet commenced, Park ; he can always sell his land for as GENERAL NOTES. 109 much or more than he gave for it, and the says that 2,000 persons are now employed advance in price has averaged 100 per in the fishing business in the Newberne cent, per annum. This is not a bad show- and Beaufort sections, from which $300,000 ing. The growth of the settlement and worth of fish and 10,000 barrels of clams the increase in land sales have advanced were shipped last year, while 500,000 steadily from the beginning. Of the 800 bushels of oysters were canned. The land sales made by the company, 179 were truck business is also very important ; 120,- made from the 1st of January to the 1st of 000 barrels of Irish potatoes and 150,000 March of the present year. packages of other truck were shipped Improvements are still going on, and from Newberne during the year. The additions to some twenty residences are in lumber mills in that section have in the course of erection by settlers. The com- past ten years, the Governor says, pro- pany is planning a tourists' hotel, a rail- duced 100,000,000 feet of lumber. road to Fort Meade, (twenty miles distant), a bank, a drug store, etc. Naval Stores in Florida. Among all the attractions of the place, A syndicate represented by L. S. Camp- probably the greatest is the character of bell, it is announced, has purchased 12,000 the people who are locating there—not a acres of land, heavily timbered, and intends negro, not a pauper, not an idler ia the to operate several turpentine farms on the place—every man is a worker in the hive. tract. A railroad is to be built from Blox- An apt illustration of this fact was given re- ham, on the Ocklocknee river, to give the cently. A citizens' meeting was called and producers an outlet 'o market by way of it was decided to lay a mile of sidewalk. the Carrabelle, Tallahasse & Georgia road. The money was raised to pay for it. Nails It will also be used for hauling lumber. were given by the merchants ; the hauling was done by the livery stable and The Fruitland Nurseries, of Augusta, others who owned teams, and every man Ga., are located on a high ridge west of agreed to give one day's work to put it and adjoining the limits of the city. down. They called it "a sidewalk bee." In the tract of nearly 400 acres are soils At eight o'clock in the morning seventy- of every variety found in that section of five men with hammers, saws and "horses" the State, thus enabling every class of were on the ground, and the work, or products to be grown under the most rather fun, began. The minister was there favorable conditions. The nurseries have with his hammer; the doctor was there been owned and conducted by the same with his saw ; the lawyer, the editor and management since 1857. and the merchant were all there, and the Their foreign trade has of late years in- ladies were there, too. That is, they creased rapidly, and their products are were there at dinner time, with a bountiful sent to Australia, China, Japan, Africa, the basket dinner, prepared by their own fair East Indies, Brazil, Bermudas, the West hands, for their toiling husbands and Indies, and every section of Europe and brothers, who, with coats off, had been the United States. laboring as a band of brothers for the Upwards of 250 acres are now used for general good. It was a sight full of nursery purposes, 100 acres for orchards lessons. and ornamental grounds. A clause in every deed executed by the The recently formed Young Men's Busi- company prohibits the sale of liquor of ness League of New Orleans seems likely any kind on the land, and no land is sold to be a very active and progressive organi- to negroes and none are wanted. So, not zation. It will no doubt be the means of a black face nor a drunken man is to be seen giving a great impetus to the city's devel- in the place. opment, particularly in the line of manu- The soil is specially adapted to the facturing. Mr Frederic Cooke, the growing of pineapples, lemons, limes, J. secretary of the league, will furnish any guavas, oranges and all citrus fruit, and information desired as to New Orleans or some fine pineapples are now growing the surrounding country. Mr. is there. Cooke particularly interested in the matter of Governor Carr, of North Carolina, farming, truck gardening and fruit grow- GENERAL NOTES. ing in the wonderful Teche country of for some years been running fast daily southwest Louisiana. steamers between Norfolk and New York during the trucking season, and the Mr. Harry Walters, of Wilmington, enormous development of this business N. C, vice-president of the Atlantic Coast around Norfolk is due in no small degree Line, has been elected president of the to the facilities provided by this company Wilmington Savings Bank, to succeed for the quick and cheap transportation of John Wilder Atkinson, who resigned on vegetables and fruits to the North. account of failing health. The City National Bank of Knoxville,. The Donaldsonville Land and Improve- Tenn., was organized in January, 1888, with ment Co., Donaldsonville, La., is offering a capital stock of $100,000. In the six liberal inducements to homeseekers to years following the bank has accumulated locate on their lands adjacent to the town. a surplus of $100,000, and this has been converted into capital stock, thus doubling It is estimated that there are 10,000,000 bearing and non-bearing orange trees in the capital in six years, besides paying dividends regularly. S. Shields is presi- Florida. California is credited with having W. 6,000,000 and Arizona about 1,000,000. dent of the bank. E. of Rockport, Texas, The business of the Pensacola and Mr. G. Holden has organized at San Antonio a Havana steamship line has increased so company to into of grape rapidly that another ship has been added go the business growing. The has purchased 1000 acres and to the service. company expects to begin planting immediately. The passenger department of the Queen They will use California and France cut- & Crescent route has printed in a pamphlet tings. the farmers' letters that have been pub- Mr. E. G. Hollister of lished in the Southern States, from Tecumseh, Mich., has been investigating the adapta- along. their line in Alabama and Missis- bility of the soil and climate of Florida to sippi. The pamphlet contains, besides celery growing, and thinks that the com- these letters, much information about of he is will establish those States. pany which manager a celery farm at Hastings, Fla. Mr. W. Y. Foster, president of the Hempstead County Bank, of Hope, Arkan- The Florida Fibre Co., which is experi- with sisal-hemp culture, has a sas, writes to the Southern States that menting tract of acres at Fort Lauderdale, a everything in that section looks promising 1400 and that with average crops the country small part of which is under cultivation. plantation at Fort Lauderdale, will be in better condition than for ten The which years. The business men of Hope have is on the Middle river about midway be- organized a very active "Business Men's tween Lake Worth and Biscayne bay, has Club." been visited on several occasions by Mr. Charles R. Dodge, a special agent of the The country about Charleston, S. C, Agricultural Department at Washington, including the Sea Islands, is a great truck- who has reported very favorably on the ing region. The truck farmers of that experiments being made, and says that section have this year the choice of two there is no reason why the sisal plant routes to Northern markets ; one the old should not be successfully cultivated in all-rail route by the Richmond & Danville Florida. The importance of the sisai-hemp and Pennsylvania railroads, via Wash- industry may be understood from the fact ington, and the other by the Seaboard Air that the importations last year from Yuca- Line to Portsmouth and Norfolk, and tan reached $4,500,000 in value. thence by the steamers of the Old Dominion Steamship Co. The railroads Through the efforts of Major Frank Y. handling this traffic use for it tropical Anderson, land commissioner, and W. C. refrigerator cars with air brake and Rinearson, general passenger agent of the Janney coupler. Oueen & Crescent system, a large number The Old Dominion Steamship Co. has of Scandinavian editors from Illinois, Wis- GENERAL NOTES. in •consin, Michigan and other Northern cent., as preparations are being made to States, will visit the South early in April. put in hundreds of thousands of plants this summer. The Buena Vista (Va.) Cassimere Mill is There is a large profit in pineapples if now running on double time to fill recent the grower knows his business. There are •contracts for 15,000 yards of cadet cloth in numerous instances on record where as Baltimore, Philadelphia and Cincinnati. much as $1000 per acre has been realized. Last year one commission concern in The Southern Finishing Works at Jacksonville marketed 10,000 crates for the Greensboro, N. C, are. running extra time gross sum of 152,000. There is always a to fill orders. good demand for prime pines in the North- The Pearl Cotton Mills, recently com- ern markets, and during the season prices pleted, at Durham, N. C, will commence rule all the way from $3 to $6 per crate. operations about April 1, running 10,000 The first shipment of Florida pines will be spindles. made about April 15. Messrs. Atwood Violett & Co., of The total production of coal in the South in was tons, against 24,900,- New Orleans, write : "The indications of a 1893 27,700,000 gradual revival of business confidence 000 in 1S92 and 15,200,000 tons in 1887. multiply daily, and this opinion is fully borne out by the increasing resumption of work in our numerous workshops and RAILROADS. factories throughout the country. Legiti- mate causes would seem to favor an The New Arkansas Road. advance in values, especially as applied to "The Lake Superior, Southwestern & cotton. A larger part of the existing Gulf Railroad Company has had its chief depression has been occasioned by exag- engineer, Col. L. S. Steadman, in the terri- gerated crop estimates, which at this time tory between Springfield, Mo., and Sabine are discredited. We are still 108,425 bales Pass, Texas, for the past two years. He behind the crop of 1890, which was 7,300,- has been quietly making an examination 000, and we are 794,000 in excess of the of the country and its resources, and the last crop, which was 6,700,000 bales. Not company has now decided to build from a only the stocks at known interior towns point on the St. Louis & San Francisco show a decided decrease, but we are today road near Springfield, Mo., to Little Rock, in receipt of advices from twenty-one une- with some branches in the northern coun- numerated towns in Mississippi showing ties of this State that have long been stocks of 18,000, against 32,000 last year. known to be rich in marble, zinc, copper, The question of this crop, whether large lead, manganese and timber, while the or small, has ceased to be one of import- river and creek bottoms make very rich ance. We have suffered already the effects farming lands and the hills the finest of of large crop ideas, and the future course grazing lands, with springs and mountain of prices will depend on the trade outlook, brooks in abundance. Contracts in part as well as prospects of the coming crop. have been let. Weather conditions thus far have been highly unfavorable in the greater part of Immigration Work of the Mobile & Ohio. the cotton belt as regards the preparation of the for the new crop, and it is reasonable to The immigration department assume that this crop is so far decidedly a Mobile & Ohio railroad, which is con- late one." ducted with so much energy and success, is in charge of Mr. E. E. Posey, the pas- Money in Pineapples. senger agent. Mr. Posey took up this It is estimated that Florida's pineapple work at a time when there were obstacles crop this year will reach 50,000 crates. to overcome such as do not now exist. The crop of last year was only 35,000, Seven or eight years ago the owners of while that of the year before reached only the Mobile & Ohio road, having observed 20,000. It is probable that the area in the great success of an immigration depart- pineapples will be ipcreased fully 50 per ment conducted by Mr. Posey for one of 112 GENERAL NOTES. the Western roads, organized a similar ers and fruit growers from the North and department for the Mobile & Ohio and West. induced Mr. Posey to take charge of it. The Jacksonville, St. Augustine & In- He found on going over the road that the dian river railroad, a part of the Flagler prevalent ideas as to immigration were system of roads in Florida, has been com- such as had been gathered from reading pleted to Lake Worth. The road extends about the Italian colony in New Orleans along the east coast of Florida, opening and the gangs of paupers dumped by the up a fine country to tourists and to fruit steamships at Castle Garden, and not un- growers and truck farmers. The magnifi- naturally any supposed attempt to populate cent Royal Poinciana hotel, recently the country with immigrants of this sort built by Mr. Flager, is at the terminus of was objected to. this road. As an initial and preparatory step, Mr. Posey went over the whole territory tribu- Mr. W. M. Davidson, general passenger tary to his road making speeches at every agent of the Plant system of roads has station, conferring personally with all the been elected Vice-president of the General leading citizens, visiting the farmers at Passenger Agents' Association. their homes, and he finally got them so The several railroads centreing at Jack- interested in his work that they became sonville, Fla., have combined to build a valuable allies instead of antagonists. The fine Union depot costing 100,000. contrast between conditions along the f road now and at the time he began his Mr. C. P. Atmore, general passenger immigration work is most remarkable. agent of the Louisville & Nashville rail- Instead of requests to "move on" with his road is making speeches at various points excursion trains there are clamorous ap- along his line. His purpose is to direct peals for opportunities to entertain every the attention of farmers and others to the excursion party of home-seekers that importance of co-operating with the rail- passes over the road. At any station along roads in efforts to secure immigration. the road a stranger who gets off the train is immediately accosted by one of the citi- The Georgia, Southern & Florida Rail- zens, who tells him that he is one of a way is to try the experiment of making committee to see that all strangers who may Palatka, the terminus of the road, a ship- desire it are given every facility to see the ping point for lumber hauled from points surrounding country, and that his time along its line and a proper conveyance are at the stran- ger's service. This sort of co-operation The bill incorporating the Richmond & and this sort of interest and enthusiasm Manassas Railroad Co passed the Virginia are of course powerful aids to the road in legislature and was approved by the It is stated that the will its efforts to buiid up its territory. governor. road connect with the Baltimore & Ohio at Mr. Posey, by the way, is one of the few Manassas, and that, with the Powhatan & passenger agents who can realize that a Farmville and a link fifty miles long to be railroad can profitably sacrifice passenger built from Petersburg to Ridgeway, N. C, rates to bring about an increase in the pop- a thorough route will be formed with the ulation of its territory. He advertises lib- Seaboard Air Line. erally to reach the attention of possible settlers, and then follows up vigorously A committee of the citizens of Brazoria, and persistently the connections and chan- Texas, is negotiating with the International nels opened up by the advertising. The & Great Northern Company to extend its transporting over cost of prospectors the line to Brazoria. A fund of $20,000 has been road is never allowed to stand in the way raised for a bonus, and a depot site in of securing possible settlers. As a result Brazoria donated. The distance is six of the energetic and broad and aggressive miles and includes a bridge to cost $24,000. methods of the Mobile & Ohio, the terri- tory traversed by the road in Alabama and The Southern Express Co's through Mississippi is being rapidly peopled with trains for Florida vegetables will very much thrifty and well-to-do farmers and garden- improve the condition in which shipments — GENERAL NOTES. will be received in the markets. The fast- Galveston and Houston scenes, and of the est freight schedule has not been equal to orchards of the fruit belt. It will be sent the requirements of the business. A great on application to W. F. White, passenger many shipments have reached the markets agent, Chicago, 111. in bad condition that would have safely It is announced that Baron Erlanger has come to hand had they not been so long on made arrangements whereby the Cincin- the way. nati, New Orleans & Texas Pacific and the The Plant City, Okeechobee & Lake Alabama Great Southern will be allied Worth Railway Co. has been incorporated with the Cincinnati, Hamilton & Dayton, to build a road 140 miles long from Plant which has 650 miles of lines, forming a City to Lake Worth, 125 miles distant. new trunk line from Lake Erie to the Gulf of Mexico via Cincinnati and the Missis- The bondholders of the Savannah, sippi valley. The Cincinnati extension Americus & Montgomery have decided to bonds are exchanged for securities in a new extend the road from Lyons, its present corporation to include the three railroads. terminus, to Savannah, a distance of about sixty miles. At present the Savannah, Americus & Montgomery pays a large sum for trackage over the Savannah & Western HOTELS. division of the Georgia Central in order to Flagler Hotel. reach a seaboard terminus. This extension The New will give Savannah another route to the The Royal Poinciana Hotel, just built by North and West by way of Montgomery. Mr. H. M. Flagler on the east coast of Florida, is on a peninsula formed by Lake of splendid Speaking the work the Worth on the west and the ocean on the Mobile Ohio railroad is doing in the & east, and is built on a plantation that has matter of inducing immigration to North- been under cultivation for twenty years. east Mississippi, the Okolona Sun says : Mr. McCormick, the former owner of the "It has already succeeded in bringing a plantation, set out groves of cocoanut and desirable settlers to the prairies, good many pineapple trees and ornamented the the work is still going on. Its and good grounds with shrubbery, flowers and vines. series of cheap excursions is well patron- These things have been disturbed as little ized, and many seekers after are homes as possible, and as the whole estate for brought amongst us. The great credit of many years has been kept in the highest the whole thing belongs to Mr. E. E. Posey, state of cultivation, visitors to the Royal the efficient and popular general passenger Poinciana have the advantage of enjoying agent. Full of erithusiasm, and with a all the delights of tropical groves and gar- imparts his magnetism which enthusiasm dens of the highest type. In archi- to others, he has thrown himself with his tecture, the new hotel is of the colonial whole heart, mind, body and soul into this order. The rooms are large, the halls are effort to people places our waste with spacious, the ceilings are high, and there happy, industrious immigrants." is, therefore, ample room for the circulation of the balmy and fragrant air. The face of It is reported that arrangements have the hotel is toward the west, looking out been completed to build the Florida, on Lake Worth. The ocean is behind, but Peninsular & Gulf road from Plant City to not half a mile away. This narrow penin- Charlotte Harbor, Florida. The road will sula is about fifteen miles long, traverse Hillsborough, Polk, Manatee and and stretched along it are villas and cottages De Soto counties. the winter homes of people who have such The Santa Fe road has issued a handsome an appreciation of the delights of this part pamphlet of forty-four pages devoted to a of Florida that they require permanent description of "The Coast Country of abodes there. Texas," which contains a great deal of The west facade is broken in its central valuable information and statistics con- portion by a noble colonade, and imme- cerning this part of Texas. The pamphlet diately back of this is the hotel office with a is illustrated with handsome pictures of lobby 100 feet wide and eighty-five feet ii 4 GENERAL NOTES. deep. And behind the office, on the ocean the Tampa Bay Hotel at Port Tampa, side, is a large octagonal ball-room. The Florida's three finest hotels, represent a 'house, and the grounds as well, are lighted cost of nearly' $5,000,000. by electricity, and on the ocean beach there are pavilions and bathing houses. It is reported that John B. Stetson, of On the lake shore there are a clubhouse, Philadelphia, has purchased the Parceland yacht club quarters, and dancing and music Hotel, at DeLand, Florida, and will enlarge pavilions. and improve it at an expense of $20,000. hotel at Lynch- The Norvell-Arlington A new hotel is to be built at Van Buren, burg, Va., has been almost reconstructed, Ark., at a cost of $25,000. carpenters, plasterers, painters, paper- hangers, plumbers and furniture and car- The Four Seasons Hotel at Harrogate, pet dealers having together transformed it Tenn., near Cumberland Gap, is rapidly into a new and modern establishment. filling with guests. The special through car system from Chicago via Cincinnati is The old American Hotel of Richmond, proving a great benefit to the hotel. A Va., has been rehabilitated and modern- Pullman leaves Chicago at 7.20 P. M. and ized and given a new name. It is now arrives at the hotel at 7.05 P. M., making known as the Lexington, and will seek the the run in less than twenty-four hours. best patronage. Bay Point, S. C, long a favorite resort An active and thorough canvass is being of the people of Beaufort as a pleasant made among the capitalists and business place to spend a few days or weeks in men of Charleston for the money needed hunting, fishing and bathing in the surf, is to build the new hotel that has been pro- to be developed as a general resort place. jected. With the example of Savannah and its splendid De Soto hotel before it, The new Planters' House at St. Louis, Charleston ought to raise all the money built at a cost of $1,200,000 upon ground required without trouble or delay. Aside valued at $500,000, is to be furnished from all question of immediate and direct throughout at an outlay of $250,000. The returns on the investment, the general old Planters' was considered one of the benefit to the city in improved business finest hotels in the country during the first conditions and enhanced real estate values twenty years of its existence, and the new that would follow would be a sufficient Planters' is expected to take similar rank return for the money expended. Wherever among the great hostelries of the present there is large tourist travel, investments of day. The building does not go quite as outside money will follow. far skyward as some of its rivals in Chicago The Middlesborough Hotel, at Middles- and New York, but ten stories are enough borough, Ky., has been sold by the receiver for any first-class hotel, and that is the for $8,000 above the bonded indebted- kind the new Planters' is going to be. The expect to it ness, which is $100,000. The hotel will be owners have ready to be reopened under a new management. opened by September 1st. The Pine Forest Inn, at Summerville, Commercial Hotel is the name of a S. C, is a favorite wintering place for New new hotel at Piedmont, W. Va., to be England people. Summerville is on an ele- opened about May 1st. vated sandy pine ridge, and the inn is in the midst of a pine forest of original growth. A new hotel at Fort Pierce, Fla., now nearly completed, will be known as the The Hotel Cochran, of Washington, D. Fort Pierce Hotel. C, has been obliged to close up on account of the foreclosure of a chattel mortgage on The Southern Hotel at Chattanooga, after the hotel furniture. The Cochran's patron- Tenn , being renovated, will be taken age was of the higher class. charge of by W. C. Morgan, who was formerly manager of Hotel Tybee and The Ponce de Leon Hotel, St. Augustine, Hotel Cumberland, on Cumberland Island, the Royal Poinciana at Palm Beach, and Ga. GENERAL NOTES. 115 CORRESPONDENCE. the only market crop which the settlers here have raised, the price of land has Georgia as a Corn=Growing State. steadily increased, which shows plainly enough that the pineapple industry is a Macon, Ga., March 24, 1894. great success here. Now the price of good Editor Southern States : pineapple lands is from $150 to $300 per As there are many people in the North acre, and I doubt very much if any really who have the impression that the Southern good lands of this kind in a good location States are devoted entirely to the produc- could be bought under $200 per acre. tion of cotton, rice and sugar cane, the Land in any country is worth what it following figures, taken from a bulletin will pay 10 per cent, interest on just as a issued by the United States Department of — house which will rent for $100 per year Agriculture, March 12, 1894, may interest more than enough to keep it in repair is them : worth at least $1000, and will sell for that In 1893 Georgia raised 33,678,000 bushels amount any day in open market. Now I of corn, more than the States of Maine, claim that an acre of first-class pineapple New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, land in the region about Eden is worth Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, $1000 per acre, and I am going to explain New Jersey and Delaware combined, their why. I set the value of it there so as to product being 32,787,000 bushels. Georgia be sure to get it high enough in the figures raises more corn than either of the States which I am going to present—figures of Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin and which will startle some of your readers, no Minnesota. Yet Georgia does not claim to doubt. be a corn-growing State—that is, it does Suppose we buy an acre of really first- not grow corn for shipment, only four per class pineapple land and pay $1000 for it. cent, being shipped out of the county Allowing for a few paths across the patch where it is grown. this acre will take 14,000 pineapple plants, A few years ago the American Agricul- which cost on an average $6.00 per turist offered two large prizes to the farm- thousand, and they may be had of any of ers growing the largest amount of corn on the growers in and about Eden. It will an acre of ground. A Georgia farmer cap- cost from I40.00 to $100 to clear the land tured the second prize, his yield being for the plants, and we will call it $75.00. 125^ bushels. I call attention to these The cost of setting the plants out is $1.50 facts for the purpose of showing the per thousand, and if we don't care to do it Northern farmer that he need not entirely ourselves, intelligent labor can be had for change his system of farming in removing that price by contract. The care of the South. In addition to corn, there are also patch for two years will cost $50.00, and raised wheat, oats, rye and barley. It for fertilizers the cost for the first year should be borne in mind that the Southern will be about $20.00 and for the second States all lie within the temperate, not year $40.00. Let us recapitulate : the tropical zone. Yours, etc. One acre of land iooo W. L. Glessner. $ Clearing it 75 Plants, i4,ooo@$6.oo per M 84 Setting our plants 21 in Florida. Pineapple Growing Care of patch, two years 50 Fertilizers 60 Eden, Fla., March 31, 1894. Editor Southern States: Total $ 1290 It has been said that "the farmer who To this we must add 10 per cent, for carries his eggs all in one basket is sure interest while the money was tied up and some day to drop the basket, and the eggs yielding no revenue. This would be will all be broken." Well, the farmers in $129, or a grand total of $1419 as the this section raise pineapples exclusively. . cost of one acre of pineapples at the end I have been raising them for fourteen of the second year. Now how can we get years, and so far I have not "dropped my a portion of this money back to pay us basket" or broken a single egg. When I for the use of our money and for our time came here in 1880 from a distant State and trouble ? land could be bought for $1.25 per acre, Well, if the plants have all had proper and although pineapples have constituted attention, the crop at the end of the : n6 GENERAL NOTES. second year ought to be 14,000 pineapples ; glean a comparative idea of the many every plant ought to fruit, but we will fads, fancies, explanations and opinions vol- allow 4000 for neglect and call the crop unteered and formed by the many friends 10,000 "pines." These are shipped to the of the medico-editorial party (before their Northern and Western markets in crates, departure) which had the pleasure of the average to the crate being about visiting North and South Carolina and sixty-four. My experience covering many Georgia as the guests of the Old Dominion years is that the net returns per crate, Steamship Co. and the Seaboard Air Line after deducting the cost of the crate and during February, eighteen hundred and that of gathering and shipping, are about ninety-four. $3.50. Other growers may possibly not "As we sailed from New York in the have had such good results, so we will call staunch and handsome steamship "Roan- it $3.00 per crate to be on the safe side. oke," we left in our wake one of the most This will make the net revenue $468 upon severe snow-storms of Northern winters, an investment of $1419 for two years, or but soon reached the balmy breezes of 33 per cent., which is 16.5 per year. After "Old Point" and Portsmouth, where we the first crop there is no expense for were deluged with rain. Just here let me clearing the land, and none for plants or remark that the Old Dominion Steamship setting them out, in fact a revenue can be Co. does not do things by halves, for it had from the sale of plants and suckers. entertained us, through its genial assistant So, with good care and fair luck, this acre manager, Mr. Window, in the most royal of pineapples will yield the owner on an manner. The officers of the ship are average 40 per cent, per annum every attentive and courteous, and leave nothing year after the second. If the cost of the undone for the comfort of every passenger land was only $200 or $300 per acre, entrusted to her care. the profits are correspondingly increased. "Arriving at Portsmouth we were met There is no industry in the world which by the officials of the Seab ard Air Line pays better than pineapple growing on the and Mr. John T. Patrick, commissioner of Indian river. Harry W. Richards. the Southern Interstate Immigration Bureau, who conducted us to two hand- Untold Advantages for Agricultural and somely fitted and most bountifully provis- Manufacturing Industries. ioned cars which were to be our traveling Prof. W. Blair Stewart, A. M., M. D., home. editor of the Philadelphia Medical Bulletin, "It might not be amiss to explain that and one of the party of editors of medical our party was organized and chaperoned journals who recently made a tour through by Dr. Wm. C. Wile, editor of the New the South, having been asked by the England Medical Monthly, who contributed Southern States for a statement of his much to our pleasure and enjoyment by impressions of the South, writes the fol- his genial manner and attentions. lowing interesting letter "Arriving at Southern Pines, Moore "Can you picture to yourself an ideal county, N. C, in the shades and shadows country, redolent with the sweet perfume of moonlight, the first impression received of orange blossoms and aromatics, where was that the ground was covered with one can drink of the fountain of everlasting snow. It was merely an optical illusion life and eternal happiness and wave aside, and a case of overdrawn imagination, for a as with the wand of a fairy, all cares, moment's investigation showed a white worries, physical and mental infirmities? sandy soil, which, at night, might be "Can you destroy this ideal and view a mistaken for snow. Our friend Patrick, a barren waste of sand and swamps filled resident of the place, was even victimized with alligators, mosquitoes, sea monsters on the same subject. Without detailing and the grim vision of miasmatic influences our royal welcome by the citizens of the which spreads its mantle over a defence- place, let me outline my general impres- less people and produces confusion, panic sions of this natural, midway sanitarium. and frightful mortality ? Its surroundings are such that malaria, "If you can, and, in addition, blend swamps and bogs have no existence. gradually from one to the other, you will Situated as it is, at an elevation of more GENERAL NOTES. 117 than six hundred feet above the sea level, in most of the claims made for this section, the center of the long-leaf turpentine pine and can recommend our patients and the belt, it affords facilities for invalids that general public to seriously consider the cannot be obtained in most resorts. The advisability of visiting it with a view not air is pure, balsamic, bracing and contains only of seeking renewed health, but also a large percentage of ozone, generated by pleasant homes. the pines, forming a natural therapeutic "All of the Seaboard and Piedmont agent. Government statistics show uni- regions are reached by the Seaboard Air formity of climate, absence of sudden Line, whose guests we were during our changes of temperature, dry atmosphere visit. It affords me great pleasure to and balmy, pleasant winters. In fact one speak of the fine equipment and modern can live out doors from sunrise until sunset facilities of this road. Its employees will during the greater part of the winter be found courteous and attentive, and the months. The hotel accommodations are general public will be impressed that the excellent and there is a new hotel in road is conducted for their benefit and course of erection which will have over comfort, and not in the sole interests of four hundred rooms. The water supply the company. Long live Colonel T. J. is excellent, and the forests are Anderson, their general passenger agent, !" full of game. Judging from the push who entertained us so royally and energy of the residents of South- Letter from Texas. ern Pines, most of whom are New Eng- A and the natural facilities they have enders, Mr. E. J. Martin, general passenger to offer, the place will ultimately become agent of the San Antonio & Aransas one of the most popular and desirable Pass Railway, San Antonio, Texas, sends midway health resorts of the South. the Southern States the following "This entire section of country, from letter: Henderson to Southern Pines, Charlotte, "In selecting a home, health and climate Wilmington, N. C, to Clinton, S. C, as well as productive land should be an affords untold advantages for agricultural important factor. Southwest Texas has a and manufacturing industries. If this pleasing variety in her climate, which, is section of country was properly known to calculated to give strength and energy to Northern capitalists, and if they could be the industrious settler. The prevailing induced to give it their personal attention, wind is the southeast wind from the Gulf, there is no question that there would be a sweeping up a gradual incline of the general tide of immigration South, and country, dispensing life to vegetation and instead of the old cry of 'go West, health to the inhabitants. young man,' it would be 'go South.' "The black waxy, black sandy and "Aside from the natural industries of alluvial soils are to be found in this section. the South, Southern manufacturers and About the best evidence of the richness business men tell me of the great need of and fertility of these various soils that flour mills where grain can be ground on can be found, is the fact that commercial the spot at small expense and compar- fertilizers, now common in the older atively large profit. States and constituting a fixed charge on "Passing on into 'Dixie Land,' it was all agricultural interests, are not used in our pleasure to visit the old towns of Southwest Texas. Atlanta and Athens, Georgia. Our recep- "Another fact worthy of special mention tion in this State was glorious, and we is that there are thousands of acres of were feted on the fat of the land. At land in cultivation that have been culti- Atlanta one of the party in a speech said, vated continuously for more than twenty 'our reception in Atlanta on this occasion years, which now yield as much per acre was equally as warm and enthusiastic as as they did when first planted. the one I received in sixty-three and four, "Our crops mature and are marketed but couched in a different manner.' earlier than elsewhere, thereby realizing to "Our impressions of the South were the producer the highest prices. Live most favorable, and were such that we stock does not require housing, and can, without hesitancy, heartily endorse feeding is only necessary during a very — n8 GENERAL NOTES. short time in winter, the winters usually Texas is part of a letter from Gen. John being very short. Snow and ice are ex- M. Claiborne, of Rusk, Texas : ceedingly rare in this section. "While Texas has grown enormously in "The San Antonio & Aransas Pass population in the last thirty years, and has Railway Co. has put forth extra efforts probably been more talked about and towards securing thrifty people, and its written about than any other State, there is labors have been amply rewarded. Never one section of the State wonderfully rich before in the history of the road has its in agricultural capabilities and in mineral immigration been so heavy as during the and timber resources that has had com- present season. The time has come paratively few accessions to its population when people of the older States have and is little known to the outside world. become wearied of snow and ice, and I mean that part of East Texas traversed today thousands are moving to our 'sunny by the Houston, East & West Texas clime' where out-door work can be carried Railway. This territory comprises an area on almost every day in the year. larger than the State of Maryland. The "It is a difficult task to tell the home- Southern terminus of this road is at seekers the exact place to locate. All Houston, the chief manufacturing city of that could be asked is that they come and Texas, with a population of 55,000, with inspect the country for themselves. fourteen railroads and the Buffalo river, "The most important stations on our which is a larger stream than the Thames line are Alice, Aransas Pass, Beeville, on-the-Clyde. The Northern end is at Boerne, Cameron, Comfort, Corpus Christi, Shreveport, La. Cuero, Eagle Lake, Flatonia, Floresville, "Efforts are now being made to settle Giddings, Gonzales, Hallettsville, Hous- immigrants along this line, and the people ton, Kenedy, Kerrville, Lexington, Lock- of this section invite homeseekers to come hart, Luling, Pettus, Rosebud, Rockdale, in and make their homes with them. This Rockport, Runge, San Antonio, Waco, region is nature's home for fruits, grapes, West Point, Winchester, Yoakum and berries and vegetables. Lands are cheap Yorktown. and terms of purchase are made easy. "Regular monthly round-trip tickets to "For certain sorts of manufacturing I any point on the San Antonio & Aransas know of no other country where cheapness Pass Railway can be purchased at one fare and abundance of raw material, market on the second Tuesdays in March, April for product and distributing facilities are and May, good for thirty days from date of found in such favoring combinations as sale. In addition to this, the San Antonio here. There ought to be saw mills, green & Aransas Pass Railway will give reduced sand marl mills, cottonseed-oil mills, fruit rates to parties of ten or more from and to canning and evaporating establishments, local stations. works for making vitrified brick, fire brick "By the way, there is another feature and tiling, etc. For diversified farming peculiarly applicable to our coast country and horticulture the conditions of soil which is of great importance to the 'sport- and climate are exceptionally favorable. ing fraternity' —the Tarpon fishing. The School-houses, churches, postoffices and Tarpon may be taken in Aransas and Cor- railroad stations are convenient. pus Christi bays during the entire year "It is a country with a prosperous that is, he may be hooked —the taking is future." quite another thing. There is, perhaps, no locality in America where the Tarpon Mr. W. G. Cooper, editor of the Rome is so plentiful as in Aransas bay. Tribune, Rome, Ga., closes a letter to the "To the true sportsman we can say that Southern States as follows : Aransas and Corpus Christi bays will "In this connection I would like to say afford him more sport and .a greater that the development of the fruit interest variety of fish than any other locality in in Northwest Georgia within the past five the United States." years has been wonderful, and it is a subject worthy of a place in your journal. The following brief description of a Orchards are covering the hill tops, and fertile and otherwise attractive section of many thousands of peach trees have been . GENERAL NOTES. 119 planted. In our own suburbs a large have not made great exertions to encourage nursery is already well established and immigration to this section long, long agr. selling stock in half the States of the Before the war the South was in the lead Union. of all other sections of America in railway "This is the Goshen of Georgia, having development. Then there came a period carried off the $1000 prize five times in when things stood almost still for a number succession at the Piedmont Exposition, of years in this respect. If the railroads and I will say in sober earnest that, having had begun then to encourage immigration, traveled through several of the richest if they had sent agents out to the North- States north of the Ohio river, I have west, to New England and over the waters never seen a region which combined so to foreign countries after the homeseekers well the resources of agriculture, horti- they are now bringing to this favored region culture and mining with a well developed of America, many of them might have commerce and a robust manufacturing saved themselves from drifting upon the interest. This variety has been the strength craggy shores of bankruptcy as they have of our city during the trying year just done within the past few years. past, and while other communities have The South needs new life. It needs a been in deep distress these people emerge greater population— a population of hard- from the fiery ordeal of the great panic working, thrifty farmers, who, with only so with good assets and good spirits." much land as each could cultivate, would live well at home and have something to trade to his fellow citizen in more crowded NEWSPAPER COMMENT. and less fertile sections of the country. No region of America has as great induce- The Salvation of the Railroads. ments to offer the homeseeker as the South No part of the Union is half so favored in All of the great trunk lines that lead into respect to agricultural advantages. And the South are taking up the great work of yet, for the simple reason that the Western building up the dilapidated plantations of railways have been working for the speedy the Southern States by bringing emigrants population of the land beyond the Missis- to them. sippi, the 'South's superior resources have Much has been written already about the been lost sight of by the stream of emi- general tendency to encourage immigration grants led Westward by the glowing stories by the roads that enter this section of the of the railroad immigration agent. country. The work is taking on new interest The Southern railroad manipulator has every day. One or two roads undertook it overslept himself in this business, but it is first as an experiment to settle the question not too late now by any means to awaken that confronts them ; What of the future ? to the situation. Now that the South's Never did this question appeal with such manufacturing interests have grown apace, telling effect to the mind of the railroad nothing could be more helpful to the gen- manipulators in the South as it has done eral development of the country than a vast within the past twelve months when earn- influx of thrifty settlers.—Atlanta Consti- ings have fallen to such undreamed of tution. depths. The hard times that have oppressed the The Awakening Interest in Immigration. railway interests of the whole country have borne heavy, indeed, upon the lines of the The recent action of the commercial South. The only remedy is to build up clubs of the five leading cities of Alabama the country through which these lines run, at Montgomery, is not -only timely, but it begins to appear. promises to awaken a live interest in the The railways of the South are setting subject of immigration. forth their best efforts to turn the tide of No question is of more vital importance immigration in this direction. to Alabama, and all the Southern States, The wonder is that Southern railways than that of increasing the white popula- have so long delayed this great and good tions of these States through the medium work. It is not at all easy to understand of a good class of immigrants. why the railroads of the Southern States The thrift, prosperity and development 120 GENERAL NOTES. of the State of Texas is a living proof of the force of good example set by indus- the value and efficacy of well directed and trious and thrifty German farmers and intelligent effort looking to this end. others who are being introduced by the For twenty years Alabama, Georgia, the railroads and immigration agents to cast Carolinas and others of the older of the their lot with us. Every German farmer Southern States have yielded largely from who proves by his own exertions that a their increase of the white population cotton grower can support his own family through the work of the agencies, so wisely on his own farm and make money by sell- organized and so ably conducted by the ing his cotton crop, produced practically Lone Star State during all this time. without cost, will be an example in his This has been good for Texas, but bad community, whose teachings are bound to for the balance of the Southern States. bear fruit. Let us, therefore, extend the Texas has drawn population not only from hand of welcome to the immigrants and the South, but from the East and West as encourage the men who are bringing them well, and the immense agricultural here. resources of that State have been well Homeseekers' Excursions. advertised throughout Europe, and as a If the transportation lines would bring result a large element of thrifty population down from the Northern States 50,000 gar- has been drawn from the continent of Europe. deners, horticulturalists, wine makers and workers in small industries, making only This has been accomplished in Texas, a small charge for transportation as an and can be accomplished in Alabama, and inducement for them to come to Florida the time is at hand. and locate here, the effort would be well The news columns of the Age-Herald repaid in an increased volume of freight this morning give a small, but practical within a few years, and traffic would grow example, which was brought to the atten- in volume year by year, yielding a per- tion of visitors at the railroad station yes- petual and ever increasing revenue. * * * terday. Some two years ago a lone millions of uncultivated Polander, tired of the climate of Nebraska, There are acres in Florida which, with the climatic condi- sought a home in Southern Florida, and tions that exist here, are peculiarly adapted the incident referred to shows that four- to the production of 'fruit and vegetables. teen Polish families are en route for Punta yet, nearly all the efforts have Gorda, Fla., from Green Bay, Wis., where As been directed to orange culture, but lemons can there is a large colony of these people, be cultivated in the southern portion of the who emigrated formerly from Buffalo and Pittsburg. State just as successfully as oranges. Pine- apples are receiving attention, and are The West and Northwest are crowded proving profitable. Some other fruits thrive with thrifty foreign farmers, many of whom as well here as anywhere in the world. can be easily induced to come South, if vegetable growing is properly proper efforts are made to bring about When it is more lucrative here this result. The carload of people who conducted than part of the Union, it passed through Birmingham yesterday in any other and would be more so still if the volume of business should be made the forerunners to a large were increased to such an extent that trans- stream of emigration from the less desir- portation lines could afford to give better able sections of the United States. rates. This increase will be easily attained Invitations are now being mailed to all if attract in sufficient numbers the kind the commercial bodies, probate judges, we of immigration that we need. The Citizen, commissioners and other officials of the — Jacksonville, Fla. State, calling attention to the meeting at Birmingham on April 24 next.—Age-Her- Immigration Needed. ald, Birmingham. That the greatest need of the South is a desirable class of immigrants is too mani- Welcome the Immigrants. fest to need argument. That such immi- The probably most potent factor in grants could be secured by proper effort introducing the self-supporting system admits of no question. among the cotton planters is going to be What plans should be adopted to secure GENERAL NOTES. 121 them is the great question. It can only be boxes. The receipts of foreign oranges done by extensive advertisement and for the season of 1892-93 was 64,070 boxes, granting prospective settlers cheap trans- and for the season of 1S93-94 21,712 boxes. portation through our territory for the pur- It will thus be seen that the receipts of pose of obtaining a suitable location. foreign oranges have fallen off very largely, The railroads stand ready to give the while those of Florida have increased. It cheap rates desired. In fact, they have should be noted also that 32,586 boxes now in operation a one fare rate to people of California oranges have come to the coming from the North to find homes, and Boston market this season, which is about would give still greater concessions to fifty per cent, more than all of the foreign immigrants coming South in parties for receipts to date. actual settlement. The growing of oranges in Florida is a There should be immigration associations comparatively new industry. A dozen in every State and sections of States, which years ago not much attention was paid to should co-operate with each other and it, but it gradually dawned upon capitalists with the railroads in using every means that it offered a good field for investment, possible to bring new settlers in this direc- and the industry today is a flourishing one. tion. They should unite on systematic Eight years ago 600,000 boxes were grown, plans for distributing information concern- in place of 4,500,000 this year. The firm ing the South, showing its natural resources, of York and Whitney, of this city, probably prices of property, its social, political, handle more now than came to the whole religious and educational conditions and city fifteen years ago. For several weeks minute information of every kind which a past one grower has been sending them prospective settler would want. three carloads, or about 1000 boxes, a week As a still more effective means to the of a high grade of fruit. This firm will sell same end, intelligent agents should be sent about 50,000 boxes this year of the foreign out to work up an interest where it would and domestic product, and do not pretend accomplish the greatest results. Well that it handles more than each of the organized, systematic, united and persis- several other firms. Blake & Ripley, tent work along this line is the salvation agents of the Florida Fruit Exchange, of the South. Fill the country from the probably do the largest business- Ohio to the Gulf and from the Atlantic to The Florida fruit can be had at a great Texas with a thrifty, industrious, white variety of prices. It is put up carefully population drawn from the enterprising and scientifically, being sorted both for North and the best elements of foreigners size and for quality. When'you see the fruit and the race problem will disappear and on the top of a box of oranges from the will richest the South be the greatest and test packers you can be sure that it is the earth. Sentinel, country on —The Evening same all the way through. In fact, so Knoxville, Tenn. closely is it sorted as to size that 176 oranges of one grade will fill a box every Florida Oranges in Boston. time ; 250 of another grade, 150 of another, This appears to be a great season for 126 of another, and yet the boxes are pre- the Florida orange growers, as the entire cisely the same size, namely, 12x12x22 crop will amount to over 4,500,000 boxes, inches, which is the standard. The pur- 430,000 of which have already been shipped chaser knows exactly how many oranges to the Boston market. he will find in his box, for it is stenciled Oranges are taking their inning, and by on the outside in plain figures. If a car- far the larger part that have come to Bos- load is of the grade which requires 176 to a ton are Floridas. More have been shipped box, that number will be stamped on every this year than ever before, prices are box, and there will be almost no variation. lower, and the fruit better. Boston mark- The fruit is sorted just as carefully as to ets received of the Florida orange crop in quality. In the fancy boxes that cost from the season of 1892-93 308,033 boxes. For $2.25 to $3 a box, no scaly or damaged the season of 1893-94 to February 24, the fruit will be found. An orange that has receipts have been 430,056 boxes — an grown so hear the limb of a tree as to be increase for this season over last of 122,000 worn by the motion of the branches, or has 122 GENERAL NOTES. been pricked by thorn, goes into the sec- but a happy one, and they are, in large onds, which frequently have fruit just as numbers, casting about for new and advan- good for eating as the best grade ; though, tageous locations where they can begin life of course, it does not look so nice. anew, with some promise of success The use of oranges increases from year before them in the future. The very credit- to year. They are valuable in promoting able manner in which the South passed appetite, keeping the digestive organs in through the recent trying ordeal and the good condition, so that it has often been sound basis upon which she now stands, said that the family that occasionally buys naturally attracts their attention, and with a box of oranges, cheats the doctor. — Bos- the innumerable inducements and advan- ton Herald. tages in the way of illimitable resources of - Turning Southward. every kind vouchsafed by nature , our sec- tion is coming to be regarded as a veritable All the indications now appear to point land of promise. unerringly to the probability that in the The South will welcome all such, and course of the next twelve months the tide of from the superabundance of her idle but immigration which has so consistently cultivatable lands, will furnish them all with avoided this section in the years gone by, homes, and the means not only of securing will turn Southward, and that there will a comfortable subsistence, but the oppor- be great accessions to our population from tunities of securing handsome competen- this source. The ground for this belief is cies for themselves in a few years if they the considerable number of inquiries being are thrifty, industrious, economical and in- made relative to the actual condition of telligent. In no land upon which the great affairs in the South, and the many advance orb of this universe shines can a living be guards who are sent to make personal made more easily and with less effort than inspections of the field, and whose reports in the South ; the soil needs only to be are invariably favorable as to the advan- tickled in the most superficial manner to tages and inducements offered here to bring forth the greatest abundance, while those who desire to seek more hospitable the wealth of mineral ores, vast timber and comfortable locations. fields and other resources would yield a The year just passed has been particu- sustenance for a population several times larly severely felt by the people of the greater than that of which the entire United West, where the rigors of the climate, States boasts today. — The Democrat, added to the unprecedented monetary Natchez, Miss. depression, has made their lot anything