Newspaper Page Text
26
TURNWOLD, GA., OCTOBER 20, 1862.
Extortion.
'No paper in Georgia has denounced ex
tortion more than The Coantryman. I yet
believe it to be a grievous and unpardona
ble sin. For some months past, however, I
have seen how utterly futile, if not, harmful
has been my own denunciation,and that of the
press generally, on the subject which heads
this article. Hence, for some months past,
The Countryman has ceased to denounce
extortion, first because he sees he is unable
to ‘do justice to the subject/ and 2ndly be
cause he has seen that this denunciation of
extortion in general terms, without point
ing out what extortion is, has had an unhap
py effect upon our penple.
Our people have got. to believe that all
high prices constitute extortion. This jb
far from being the case. For instance, a
few days ago I bought of Messrs. Carter &
Harvey ,in Ealonton, a bolt ofosnaburgs,
■for which I paid 55c a yard. I also enga
ged a keg or two of nails, and agreed to pay
30c per pound. Now was not this the most
outrageous extortion ? Far froqa it. In
stead of being extortion, I believe the usu
al per cent, was not made upon the articles.
Messrs. Carter & Harvey had paid 50c per
yard for their osnaburgs and 25c per pound
for nails (which latter they had obtained
from the Messrs. Denham, who put them
selves to considerable inconvenience to ob
tain them for the accommodation of our
people, and could have sold them for much
more in Atlanta, through which place they
were brought from Cooper’s Iron Works
into this county, than the price at which
they sold them to Messrs, Carter & Harvey.)
But to return to the subject.—Messrs.
Carter & Harvey, in selling their osnaburgs
and nails at 55c and 30c, 5 or 6 times the
amount they used to sell them for, were
not so much guilty of extortion as they
were when they used to sell them at the
old prices, for I dare say they do not make
so great a profit now as they did then. Yet
our people will purcha&e such articles at
the prices mentioned, and think there is
wonderful extortion in it. They don’t re
member that everything is bearing a high
price now. They do not remember that
what they have to sell brings a high price
too, and that they are not only willing t,o
receive, but actually demand a high price
for it. What do we country people sell
onr jeans, our wool, our stripes, our butter,
our chickens, our eggs, our tallow, our can-
files, at ?
Jt is a poor rule that won’t work both
THE COUNTRYMAN.
wavs. But people are not disposed to let
it work both way6. Everybody wishes to
be an extortio, uer, but nobody desires to be
an extortionee. Everybody wishes to sell
hie neighbor his goods and chattels at four
or five hundreo 1 thousand prices, but it
makes him as ‘ma d as blazes’ if his neighbor
offers to sell him anything at more than
one half what it cC 'St.
A case in point oi ccurred with The Coun
tryman a few days ago. Having patrioti
cally determined tha 11 would not raise any
more cotton for sale during this war (if I
ever do) I concluded I would open a little
hat shop, and make it answer the place of
my cotton ci*op as far as I could. But wool
is enormously high. Great Jehosaphat !
how high it is 1 Wool Fats have to be high
too, or else they will have to be made of
something else besides wool. But my
bands haven't learned that secret yet.
Now here was a case that troubled me very
much indeed. I was making nothing to
sell, had to buy a great many things, and
pay war prices for them all. Wool hats
meet with ready sale, and to support my
family, I thought I would employ hands,
and get them to manufacture these articles.
‘ But they will sell so high, you will be
called an extortioner.’—‘ Yes, I dread-that,
but my necessities are imperious in their
demands.’—So I concluded I would ex
change a wool hat for 2 pounds of wool.
The old lule used to be 4 pounds of wool
fti exchange for a wool hat. * Now/ says
1, ‘I’ve got the thing all right : no extortion
now : only half price/
One of my friends, a farmer as well as
inyself, met me at Crooked Creek Church.
‘ Mr. Countryman/ said he—(several per
sons were standing around)—‘ I’ve got some
wool I want made into hats : what will
you make them for?’—‘Two pounds of
wool will make and pay for a wool hat/
said I, with becoming meekness at the idea
of my selling hats so cheaply : * A wool
hat used to be exchanged for 4 pounds of
wool—now I charge only 2— that’s all I
want/
‘But, Mr. Countryman, your price for
hats is very high. Two pounds of wool
are equal to #4, and that’s enormous for
wool hats/
‘ Did you say you had some wool V
1 Yes.'
‘ What did you say it is worth V
‘ Two dollars a pound/
‘Well, I can afford to make your hats
very cheap with a little help from you.
Sell me your wool at 10c, and I will make
your hats at 20c/
‘ But clean wool always was worth 40c a
pound.'
‘ Very well : sell me your wool at 40c,-
and I will make your hats at 80c/
The laugh was against my friend, and
he had to yield the point, but he has not
yet yielded me his wool at 40c, and I have
not concluded to base my calculations, or
the price of my bats either, upon the idea
that he or anyone else will do so.—This
is only one case in point. There are mill
ions of others. Everybody is extorting,
(in one sense of the word) but nobody
wishes to be extorted upon.
Let our people come back from their
wanderings and consider what extortion is.
If they will only take a reasonable and un
selfish view of the subject, there will not
be so much murmuring and complaint. He
who is really an extortioner, speculator, or
engrosser, should be denounced. He who
seils or manufactures'for a fair profit, and
thus adds to the mercantile, or manufactur
ing facilities of the land, for supplying the
necessities of life, deserves your thanks
rather than your curses.
Kossuth and Garibaldi.
“ A Scottish newspaper says that poor
Kossuth, the Hungarian patriot, is in the
final stage of consumption, and that prob
ably before many weeks pass away, a no
ble country will have to weep for the loss
of one of her noblest and most gifted men.
A Turin correspondent of the London
Times, says, that * whatever events the fu
ture may have in store for Italy, Garibaldi's
game, is played out. He is old, premature
ly old, broken in health, worn by fits of ex
cessive activity, still more wasted by long
periods of involuntary repose. The gout tor
tures and paralyzes his limbs—sorrow will
soon gnaw into his very soul.’ The Times
editorially says Garibaldi.is insane.”
The above were once two honored names
in the Confederacy. Now' no one will re
gret their demise. Kossuth at one time re
viled our institutions, and Garibaldi, it is
said, entertained a proportion to come and
fight, to enslave us. Let them die the
death, and so perish all the enemies of my
country !
Substitute for Quinine.
“ In the present scarcity of quinine, it is
worth knowing that the berry of the com
mon dogwood will break fevers as success
fully as quinine. We know four planta
tions where they used it successfully last
summer. One pill is a dose. The season
is now at hand to collect and dry them for
use. They will prove invaluable at home,
and in the hospitals of our soldiers.”