Newspaper Page Text
4
fanner cf the J>mitli
planter’s Journal,
DEVOTEDTO agriculture, horticulture
NEWS. MEMORIES OP THE LOST CAUSE,
LITERATURE, BC7KNOE «nd ART.
HUNKY MOORE,
A. R. WRIGHT.
PATRICK WALSH.
TERMS—S2.OO per Annum, in Advance
SATURDAY, MAY 18m, 1872.
TWO DOLLARS A YEAR.
J'rom and after this date, the sub
scription price us the Banner op the
South ani> Planters’ Journal will
be $2 a year We hope this will in
duce a large addition to the subscrip
tion list, as our paper is now one of the
cheapest in the South.
April 27, 1972.
Southern Losses.
Ky the last United States census it
appeal’s the losses and depreciation of
pioperty in the Southern States exceed
twenty two hundred million dollars—
so vast a sum that the mind can hardly
conceive the amount. Os this, perhaps
one thousand million may be set down
to slave property emancipated, ami half
as much to depreciation in value of
landed property. The balance, say
seven or eight hundred millions, to the
robberies perpetrated by United States
Army officers, upon cotton, mules and
horses, provisions, timber, and what
ever was available to them, there being
a long meriod of time in which such
a fcMj el 'P etrate d notoriously
pshties.
eminent, whether civil or military, who
did not steal, were rare exceptions,
yet there were such, to their honor belt
said.
In the border States, Missouri, Ken
tucky, Maryland and Delaware, the
value of real estate increased largely in
the past ten years, while personal pro
perty decreased, over two hundred
millions, as shown by census figures.
Siuce the slave property in those States
hardly equalled half this depreciation
in personalty, tho chief causes of it
were perhaps the same to which are
attributed above the seven or eight
hundred millions decrease in personalty
in the whole Southern States. For the
border States were largely subject to the
oppressions of the military during that
period just after the close of hostilities,
m which the whole South was the prey
ot any vagabond who wore a uniform,
whether of right or fraudulently.
The more prompt recuperation of
the border States, and especially the
advance in value of real estate, we readi
ly attribute to the greater political
quiet that prevailed in those States
during several years in which the more
Southern States were being violently
constructed, reconstructed and re-re
constructed,—for some of us went
through this ordeal three distinct times,
and each time in strict accordance with
the act of Congress for each case made
and provided. Also in the border
States was a smaller proportion of ne
gro votes, and the State Governments
were never monopolized by them.
White men were the ruling class, and
there was never such utter insecurity
and uncertainty of law and govern
ment, as prevailed here for years, and
still prevails in Florida and South Caro
lina.
The Germantown Telegraph com
ments on the relative value of es-
BANNER OF THE SOUTH and PLANTERS’JOURNAL.
tate in the Southern and border States,
with a very different view as to the
causes of difference, however. It says:
“The landowners of the South have
suffered more from the Ku Klux Klan,
and the rebel denunciation of carpet
baggers, and the general rebel hostility
to emigrants than from emancipation
of slaves. Northern policy lias tri
umphantly vindicated itself in the bor
der States, and had it been allowed
free scope it would also have vindicated
i in the other States of the South. "
It would be bard for us to tell wiiat
it was that hail “free Scope" in all the
years reconstruction in the South if it
were not “Northern Policy.” With
army officers for State Governors, and
squads of soldiers at every central
point over the whole country, military
appointees in half the civil offices, ami
the land swarming with United States
tax gatherers; and habeas corjnis sus
pended whenever a lieutenant or a
captain chose to have it so,—all this
was “Northern policy” pure and sim
ple. The oppressions and wrongs of
this policy alone bred the Ku Klux
Klans, for whom we are no apologizers,
but of whom we can say with truth
that witnesses bribed by Northern
money told more of wrong than they
ever were really guilty of.
Ot general hostility to emigrants,
there never was the least, but on the
contrary hundreds of ln>na Jide settlers
here from the North came just after
the war, and are yet here, taking part
with us in everything, and leading
prosperous and peaceful lives among us.
Carpetbaggers are not emigrants, nor
should they be so considered, for the
word is only applied to the political
offscourings of the North who come to
steal, and go away when they are
gorged with plunder.
The Telegraph joins to the full
baggers” in its reference in the same
article from which we have quoted to
the vast accumulation of State debts.
Ihe taxation rendered necessary by
these debts; as it says, is enough to
drive away emigration. The carpet
baggers alone are responsible for those
debts, and it is for account of these
debts alone they are denounced.
“Northern Policy" has had tree scope
indeed, and all that we are, we are in
spite of it. Its freest scope is in South
Carolina, where the negro population
is in the largest majority, and the fate
of that down trodden State is yet in
obscurity.
The Tomato.
The tomato is supposed to have been
first introduced into England about
l.)90, and it was widely cultivated in
gardens solely as an ornamental plant,
the bright red and yellow fruit being
greatly admired. The fruit was never
used for food, until perhaps within the
last forty or fifty years, and indeed, it
was commonly supposed to be poison
ous. Buist says: “As an esculent
plant 1828-9, it was almost detested:
in ten years more every variety of pill
and panacea was “extract of tomato.”
At this time there is no vegetable
grown in our gardens more universally
liked. It is palatable and pleasant,
and esteemed to be the most healthful
of all garden truck. It is singular and
interesting, that this greatest popularity
of all vegetables has been attained by
the tomato, after two hundred years ot
utter neglect as an article of food.
Lotanically, the tomato is of the
same family with the egg-plant and
Irish potato. It does best in a light
lawn, tree of weeds and only moderate
ly fertile. If too rich, the plant runs
exuberant growth, and bears little
fruit. The vines should be supported
as they grow to good size, so that the
fruit will be fully exposed to the sun
and air. It never ripens to perfection
lying on the ground. Early fruit may
be brought to maturity by cutting
back the vine as ■ soon as the lower
limbs set their fruit. This throws
the strength of the growth to the
fruit, increases iu size and hastens the
ripening.
i The Fowl House.
The sweepings from the poultry
house, if properly saved, will prove the
richest source of manure on the planta
tion. Analysis of the droppings of do
mestic fowls shows more than sixteen
per cent, of nitrogenous matter, and
nearly six per cent saline matter, indi
eating its value to be nearly equal to j
the richest specimens of Peruvian Gu
ano. Since the cost of it is nothing, j
the profit in the use of it is great. The j
fowl house should be swept out twice
or three times every week, and all the
droppings placed in a barrel, and, while
fresh, they should be covered over with
land plaster, charcoal dust, or fine
woods earth. This will preserve it in
good condition, and prevent any loss by
evaporation.
The peculiar richness ot the dung of
fowls is supposed to be from the fact
that the liquid and solid excrements are
together. Its value as a manure is far
more permanent than any guano, the
strength of it being very perceptible for
years.
For liquid manuring, there is no
better preparation than water, in which
fowl house manure has been leached, j
A barrel half filled from the fowl
house, and sunk in Ihe ground in the
garden, and then kept filled w ith water,
to be used as wanted, will furnish’
liquid manure for many weeks. When
the j t 8 ho„l.l be j
dilute* for it is r ve'rv
plants by using too strong a solution. i
A correspondent of the Farm and
Home gives his practice and experience
in the use of this manure, which we
copy below, remarking, however, that
probably the use of ashes is not advi- j
sable as he used it, since the tendency
of an alkali in direct contact with the
manure, would he to free and dissipate
the ammonia. He says:
I manure my garden with a mixture
of hen droppings, land plaster, wood
ashes, woods earth, and a little salt. I
keep about thirty fowls ; beneath their
roost, I have a shelving floor made of
boards, which collects .-ill the droppings
I sweep this clean, twice aweSk, into a
box made for the purpose, and in the
coui-se of a year gather eight or nine
barrels of far better guano than I can
buy from the “Agent of the Peruvian
Government. I mix with this ei<*ht
barrels ot plaster-—the genuine article
eight barrels ot good ashes, the same
bulk ot woods earth, free from trash, or.
weeds, and about a sack of refuse salt/
This gives me about thirty-five or
thnty-six barrels ot a first-rate compost
for my garden, costing me nothing but
a few dollars for the plaster, and the
time spent in gathering and mixing.
I prefer it to stable manure. It is finer,
more easily incorporated with the soil,
more handy to haul and spread, free
from all noxious seeds, and better suited
to all vegetables.”
What English Farm Laborers Live On.
A\ e give from the Dublin Freeman's
Correspondence the following picture,
drawn from the life of an English agri
cultural laborer—a representative man.
Our readers will understand four shil
lings to stand for one dollar, and ask
themselves whether, when the laboring
class is reduced to the condition here
described in the wealthiest and most
mouev ed country in the world, thev can
avoid concluding that “there must be ■
something rotten in the State of Den
mark, or feel surprise that a demand |
| for republicanism or some other “ism,”
1 has arisen:
’lhe man is sixty years of age: he
has worked as a farm laborer ever
j since he was ten years old, on one farm
laloneI alone * or forty years of that time. He
began life as a crow minder, and then
served first the grandfather, then the
son, and now the grandson, on the
same farm. His wages were first of all
only eight shillings a week, then by 1
degrees rose to twelve, to drop again !
to eleven. He has had nine children,
and brought up seven of them. He I
. has four sons, all of them farm laborers j
; All have worked as he has done him-
self ever since thev were eight years of
age. Only the two eldest have had
any education. He has to walk two
j miles to work, and must be upon the
j ground every morning at six. At
j eight he has half an hour for breakfast
! generally dry bread. If he can catch
anything else lie does, sometimes “a i
j ot bacon the size of your forefinger
sometimes a hit ot 'cold meat Sit of !
two pounds which had to serve the
| family for a week, sometimes a cold
potato. After this sumptuous repast,
he goes to work till one o'clock, and
then he has an hour for dinner, which
consists of the same strengthening diet
as the breakfast At halt-past five he
leaves oft work and comes home to
supper, which again consists of drv
bread and tea, and any scrap of meat
which could be saved out of the scant
allowance for the week. From his
i master he never received anything ex
tra save two quarts of home-brewed
beer one day during harvest time. The
I most he ever had to live upon was six
j teen to eighteen shillings a week.
! which formed the combined earnings
j ot the whole family. The rent of hTs
j cottage was once £4 a year, then £.5
lAn old cottage at 30s. was then hired
[and here the family dwelt till it was
pulled down. So much for the stom
ach—now for the back. Ever since he
married he cannot remember having
had anew garment. Now and then
he gets an old coat from his master—
what more he needs he buys second
hand in the village. “It would often
puzzle a lawyer," says this man, whose i
inuncisJohiKLewhLofWalton parish, l
I “to
! have kfiown us all sit looking at each
■ other and considering where the next
(meal was to come from." And this
i John Lewis is a hard working, respect
able man, sober, honest, self-denying
who has spent sixty years amid toil and
privation such as the slaves on the
cotton plantations of America have
never known. No wonder that the
rising generation, sons and daughters
ot such men as John Lewis, should
look with envy on the occupant of the
county jail as being less worked and
better fed than they; and what is mar
velous is the resignation of those peo
ple who have kept honest and respect
able, not because they preferred the
comforts of their home to the county
jail, but simply because they had a
character to loose.”
How to Get Immigrants South.
Our correspondent, Agricola, a well
known successful planter of East
Alabama, thinks the best way to o- e t
emigrants into the South is to bring
them in at Southern ports. We would
be delighted to see it done, but we ask
him to look at the tacts. I* itty vessels
arrive at New York to every one that
conies to a Southern port/ Shipping
cannot be improvised just to carry inu
migrants. There must be sufficient
trade and commerce with foreign coun
tries to induce regular lines of vessels.
There must be large capital invested
and plenty of freight provided
Gradually the Southern ports will es
tablish such relations with Liverpool,
i Havre, Bremen and other ports. In
the meantime almost the entire im
j migration into this country will take
place as it is now, through this and
j one or two other Northern ports,
j It is an entirely practical thing to
i get immigrants to go South, even
j at 'tor they land here at Castle Garden.
| But it can not be done by talking and
holding conventions, and passing
; resolutions, and sending agents to
spend a month or two traveling in
Europe. It must be done, if at all, in
the same plain, common sense sort of
way that men do other business. If
Agricola wants a gin, or a plough, or
a mule, he does not call a meet
! iug of his neighbors and deliver
! a harangue and pass a resolusion that
they are good things to have and
ought to encouraged. No, he sends
an order :o his merchant here, there, or
elsewhere, or he goes himself aud pur
chases what he wants. Now, the same
sort of practical work will get immi
grants. If Agricola would like to
have one, five or a hundred white
■ laborers, all he has to do is to send us
J f fr e order for them, describing the kind
I lle wants—whether English, Scotch,
! Irish. German, French, Scandinavian,
I or what not, whether single or married,
i *tate the wages he will pay, and how,'
| accompany his order with money
| enough to pay their expenses, which
can be deducted from their wages, and
we will fill his order wjjhin a reasonable
| If I>e would’like to divide up his
! la, ge plantation into small farms of a
I few acres each and sell them to good,
J well-to-do, thrifty English, Scotch, or
J German farmers, and will send us a
full plot and description of his property
j describing its location, facilities for
reaching it, accessibility to market,
j what can be produced, and the terms
j he offers, we can in all probability put
: him in a speedy way of realizing his
plans. If several land-owners in the
same vicinity were to unite their pro
perty for such a purpose, so as to offer
the advantages of a large settlement or
i colony, and would go to the trouble
| an< i expense of a thorough laying of
j out, having maps and plans executed,
: and agree to offer some inducements
; to immigrants, such as building small
houses or cabins, giving them a start,
donating some few lots for churches]
schools, and then be really ou hand
to receive and direct the new comers
when they arrive, it would not be a
difficult thing to get settlements made
in almost any part of the South. It
would be better, of course, to be near
rail roads or navigable streams, and
accessible to market. If people will
go to work in some such way they can
get a population amongst them that
\vM make the waste places blossom.
The South wonders why the tide of
immigration Westward ‘ cannot lie
turned in that direction. It can, if the
j do it. ~
So far as we know, there is not a
single Southern State represented in
this city by an agent whose busines it
is to induce immigrants to go South;
there is not a single rail road corpora]
tion in the South, with perhaps one
exception, that has set apart any of its
lands for colonization purposes, or that
offers any inducements in transporta
tion for settlers along its line.
Ihe truth is that every Southern
State should have its representative
here in New York, with means
enough to enable him to compete with
the VV est, actively engaged in repre
senting his State/ or, wiiat would be
better, for all Southern States to unite
,n „ establishing and sustaining an
agency here to carry out an active
programme in behalf ofthe South. We
will indicate further at another time
what such an agency could accom
plish.
It is enough to say now that the
destinies of the South are in the hands
ot its own people. They are at fault
if there is any delay in developing the
wonderful resources with which their
country is so bountifully blessed. Th :
South.
Hen Manure, Ashes, Plaster and
Salt.— John Jones, in the Rural New
} orker, says that a valuable fertilizer
and one in reach of every farmer, es
pecially adapted to garden culture as
well as tor top dressing and field cul
ture, is hen manure, ashes, plaster and
salt mixed in equal quantities, except
ing the salt, of which one fourth will
be sufficient. Mix intimately, and ap
ply either in hill at the surface or
broadcast. It gives good results upon
all soils and crops. I keep, usually
about twenty five hens; these roost at
a certain place the year round. Beneath
the roosts is a light plank floor. The
annual produce of dropping is six bar
rells, of the pure thing. This mixed
with the same of ashes and plaster
gives eighteen ban-els, the salt brings
it up to twenty barrel! sos choice fer
tilizing compost, equal to much of the
superphosphate of commercial ma
nure firms, avd worth far more than the
manure of two cows.