The countryman. (Turnwold, Putnam County, Ga.) 1862-1866, October 20, 1862, Image 2

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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.”