Cotton Supply, Demand, Etc. [pp. 562-571]

COTTON.
pation that the presence of the slaves prevented immnigration to the
country. How is it now? The immigrant will not consent to cornpete with the negro after he has been freed. The reason why the
immigrants gave the go-by to the South and went to settle the
Western wilds, is obvious enough. If we now desire immigration
it is not for love of the stranger. It would make him stare at us to
tell him so. No. We want immigration to give value to our
lands; and may be we have some ambition to become populous,
rich and strong. It is necessary now-a-days to be respected. The
negro is an impediment, which must be removed. The onus is upon
those who emancipated him to take care of him and put himn ol a
soil and climate congenial to his apathy and indolence, and let him
return to the savage state. Buy Venezuela or Guyana, and send
him there. Here, he will certainly starve and perish. And this is
no idle assertion, the beginning is already.
In the third place, we must change our system of agriculture. We
must produce everything we want, and we can do it; we can manufacture everything we have always been buying; we must make provisions first, and live less expensively. The greater part of the once
slave States is capable of producing all sorts of small grain. The
whole of them is better suited to raising stock than the North or
West; we can make wine, and raise all sorts of fruit. But here is
the rub: formerly, if we planted a crop of cotton we realized the
proceeds within the year for present enjoyment. Now, if we plant
a vineyard or an orchard, and raise stock, they willrnot yield anything
for several years. We shall have to wait. Well, there is no help
for it; we must take patience and do it. And when the time does
come to enjoy we shall be amply repaid for our trials and probations. The sort of labor in these, to us new branches, is one
which requires intelligence, dexterity and industry, and consequently,
much more suited to the white man and the white woman.
And I am afraid the last phrase may shock s)me nice sensibilities.
But I have said it; I think I am right, and maintain it. There are
no servants among the Americans, not one. The negroes at present,
as servants, are worse than none. Shall we go and live in hotels,
and have no domestic circle, no domestic happiness and fire-side;
eat, drink, and dress, and sleep in public? I prefer to be my own
servant. There is plenty of room for improvement inr some of our
habits. There is such a thing as economy of service. We live in
an age of improvement and discoveries, and patents, and laborsaving
machines. Let us try a change, inasmuch as change we must. It
is not alone in the States that a change has taken place in domesticity. It has taken place in the old world as well.,, What with the
trades unions of England, the liberty and fraternity of the
French, and other new notions, every body is an aristocrat or free.
It is said to be proven by history that there is an aristocracy in every
democracy. No doubt the axiom is very true in politics. The
aristocracy in a political community is a superior class that more
or less exploits the inferior, but it appears that in sociology we are
about to prove that the aristocracy will have to wait upon itself.
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