The Press.
London, England, 1857-03-14 00:00:00

THE PRESS.

to exclusive separate public emoluments or privileges but
in consideration of public services.
Sec. 3. No religious test shall ever be required as a qua-
lification to any office or public trust in this State.
Sec. 4. All men have a natural and indefeasible right to
worship God accoiding to dm dictates of their own con-
sciences.

Observe the admission, " dictates of their
" consciences." We turn a few pages, and we
come to the articles whieh treat of " Division
"of the Powers, of Government, &c." It is
therein enacted :

To possess the right of suffrage, a person must have at-
tained the age of twenty one years, have resided one year
in the State, anti the last fa ix months in his voting district—
" Indians not taxed, Africans, and descendants of Africans "
are excepted.
- -

So much for the value of paper constitutions,
and preambles about all men being equal. In
the eighth article " the emancipation of slaves "
is provided against in these terms :

The Legislature shall have no power to pass laws for
the emancipation of slaves, without the consent of their
owners, nor without paying their owners, previous to such
emancipation, a full equivalent in money for the slaves so
emancipated ; they shall have no power to prevent emi•
grants to the State from bringing with them such persons
as are deemed slaves by the laws of the United States, so
long u any person of the same age or description shall be
continued in slavery by the laws of this State.
Mr. Olmsted is an ardent Abolitionist, and
argues the case against slavery both on the
grounds of humanity and economy. His illus-
trations of nigger life, and his dialogues of the
blacks, are often good of their kind, but we
are surfeited with that sort of matter. The
freshest and best portion of his work is that
which describes the boundless resources of
Texas ; and assuming that a peaceful state of
society could be formed there, and that civil
war and dissensions could be banished from
Texas, undoubtedly that community would
flourish with extraordinary prosperity. But it
is not enough that a country has great natural
resources. Spain in the Old World produces
the finest wool, the most delicious bread, the
strongest wine, and the best oil; and of what
avail are these resources against a degenerate
Executive, a fanatical priesthood, and a long
course of civil wars? Mr. Olmsted does not
understand considerations like these, and he
is rather dazzled (like other travellers) with
the wonderful natural resources of Texas.
On the climate of Texas Mr. Olmsted ob-
serves:—

In point of climate Texas claims, with at least as mach
justice as any other State, to be called the Italy of Ame-
Sea. The general average of temperature corresponds,
and the skies are equally clear and glowing. The pecu.
liarities over other climates of the latitude are found in its
unwavering summer sea-breeze and its winter northers.
The first is a delightful alleviation of its summer heats,
flowing in each day from the gulf as the sun's rays become
oppressive, and extending remotely inland to the furthest
settlements with the same trustworthy steadiness. It con-
tinues through the evening, and is described as having so
great effect that, however oppressive the day may have
been, the nights are always cool enough to demand a
blanket and yield invigorating rest. The range of ther-
mometer in summer is uniformly high, though seldom
reaching the extremes that occur at the North. A new-
comer feels principally in irritating eruptions that he has
entered a semi-tropical atmosphere.
The northers prevail during the winter months in the
western parts of the State, where the sweep of the air
down from the great plains is unimpeded by forests. They
alternate at intervals of a few days with mild weather, and
ca- -e a great and sudden change in the temperature,
piercing to the bone by their force and penetrating chill
any one inadequately prepared to meet them. There is
some exhilarating quality, however, about them that tempers
their malice, and with shelter they are easily endurable.

No part of his work is more interesting to
us than his description of the'German emi•
grants, who appear to have settled in Texas in
great numbers. Several graphic descriptions
of their log houses, their comparative neatness,
and their elevated manner 'aro given in his
pages.
.The author observes :
In social and political relations, the Germans do not
occupy the position to which their force and character
inonld entitle them. They mingle little with the Americans,
except for the neceQsary buying and selling. The manners
and ideals of the Texans and of the Germans are hope-
lessly divergent, and the two races have made little
acquaintance, observing me another apart with unfeigned
curiosity, often tempered with mutual contempt. The
Americans have the prestige of preoccupation, of accustomed
dominance over Mexicans and slaves, of language, carital,
political power, and vociferous assumption. The Germane,
quiet, and engrossed in their own business, by nature law-
abiding and patient, submit to be governed with little
murmuring. _ _

Tno " vociferous assumption " mentioned in
this extract is highly characteristic of Ameri
can life, and is natural to a land of " Universal

257

Suffrage." The German life strongly con-
trasts with the clamorous eagerness of the
Americans, and in reading Mr. Ohnsted's
account we confess to a bias in favour of the
German modes of life and thinking. Here is
an interesting picture :
The family whose hospitality we sought were newly-
arrived German farmers. They had reached Texas in
the fall, and had been settled here but abcut two months.
Their house, although built merely fur temporary occu-
pancy, until they could spare. time and money for one
more comfortable, was a very convenient long narrow log
cabin, with two rooms, each having a sleeping loft over
it, two halls .)r rooms open at the ends, and a corn-crib.
The cooking was done outside by a camp-fire, but with
utensils brought front Germany, and peculiarly adapted
to it. A considerable stock of furniture was stored in the
hills yet in the boxes in which it had been imported. The
w.ills of the two rooms bad been made tight with clay, the
doors were furnished with latches. (No man who has tra-
velled much on the frontier will look upon these indica-
tions as trivial.) Our supper was served to us on china,
on a clean table-cloth, in one of these rooms, skilfully and
nicely. A sofa, occupying one side of the room, bad evi•
dently been made by the women of the family after the
building of the cabin. On the walls there were hung a
very excellent old line engraving of a painting in the
Dresden gallery, two lithographs, and a pencil sketch, all
glazed, and framed in oak.
So much for the house and furniture. Its
inhabitants are thus described :
The family consisted of several middle-aged and elderly
people, a young man, a young lady, and four very sweet
flaxen-haired children. They were all very neatly dressed,
the head-dresses of the females being especia ly becoming
and tidy. They were courteous and affable, and the tones
of voice were amiable and musical.

Our conversation with them was naturally left pretty
much to our German companion. He went, however,
after supper to call on one of the neighbours. An hour
or two later, as I returned to the house after looking to
our horses, one of the elder women spoke to me in
German. I could not understand, and she called to the
young lady, who came before me, and, bowing in a very
formal manner, addressed me in these words :—" Sire,
will you to bed now go, or will you for rest wait " 1
replied that I would at once go to bed, if she pleased.
She bowed and walked before me till opposite the open
door of the second tight room, in which a candle had
been placed, and pointing to it, said ; " There, Sire."
There were three single beds in our sleeping room, all
extremely clean, and we were provided with washing
apparatus, and other bell chamber luxuries very unusually
found, even in the " best hotels," in the Southwest. The
walls of the room, too, were adorned with some good
engravings, and some paintings of religious subjects, of
ordinary merit.

The mother of this emigrant family regretted
only " th.tt the children, who commenced so
" well their education in Germany, cannot here
" (Texas) continue it." That is an awful draw-
back, but it applies to most colonial life.
In order to show how colonists and emi-
grants degenerate, we may quote an instance
of an Irish lady recorded in these pages.
Her own account of herself is thus given

'When she left Ireland she was an abolitionist ; she
wouldn't own a slave ; and, bless you, as to whipping one,
why she'd just as soon think of whipping a white person.
But she very soon had to change her.views on arriving in
Texas. She found they couldn't get any servants they
could depend on, except niggers, and now she had just as
lief whip a nigger as not. She used to think niggers were
hard used, bnt now she knew they weren't a bit tuore than
they deserved to be. They all deserved to be whipped ; if
they were whipped more they'd be better ; unless they was
whipped they was good for nothing. She knew and ao•
knowledged she didn't whip her own servants half enongh ;
they were so saucy, and didn't care a bit for your interests.
There was a girl they had owned now four years, and she
didn't care a bit more for their interests than she did for
anybody else's. The other day a lady called out to her that
the pigs were in the garden, and what do you think she
said? Why she said they weren't any of her pigs, was they?
If the bad grammar of the foregoing passage
belonged to the Irish lady, some of our village
schoolmistresses would probably recommend
that her own medicine should be applied to
her cure.

The following is significant as to the state
of literature in Portions of Texas :

In the whole journey through Eastern Texas, we did
not see one of the inhabitants look into a newspaper or a
book, although we spent days in houses where men were
lounging, about the fire without occupation. One evening
I took up a paper which had been lying unopened upon
the table of the inn where we were staying, and smiled to
see how painfully news items dribbled into t.e Texas
country papers, the loss of the tugboat Ajar, which
occurred before we left New York, being here just given
as the loss of the " splendid steamer °car."

There is an appendix of several pages in
which are "scraps from newspapers," contain-
ing many curious traits of manners. This is
a particularly cool announcement from
.an
editor :
To our patrons, who looked for the prompt appearance
of our paper this week, with its usual quantity of reading
matter, we have to plead, as an excuse, ths assizes of our

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258

printer, the severe affliction of the publisher, and the
norther. Our office is a very cold one, and it was almost
impossible to work in it on Friday last.
Here is a stun pie of the newspaper invectives
against the Mexican priests :

The worst passions and the silliest fears of the deluded
horde of Mexican peons, who populate to such a danger-
ous extent the county of Bexar, have Seen appealed to by
a ..piad of black•robed villains, who exercise over the
minds of their miserable followers a despotism more
absolute than that of any Turkish nobleman over those
who people his seraglio.
Into the hands of these priests, fellow-citizens, the ballot-
box has been placed in San Antonia. Serpent•like have
they entered into the jacala of their countrymen, and
there hissed into the ears of the inmates the mandates
from which a Mexican has no appeal, and the consequence
has been, that on election day a horde of political lepers
have crawled to the ballot-box, and there nullified the votes
of thousands of your countrymen, who had weighed well
the principles in controversy. Great God ! shall these
things always exist? Shall a race of men, Sac. Sc.

Enough. The passage is worth notice as a
proof that " the ballot-box " is no security
against furious passions.
There are several advertisements of the
following kind :

TAKEN UP
And committed to the gaol of Itexar County, Texas, on
the 13th day of March, 1854, a Negroman, calling himself
Martin or Tom. He says he is a blacksmith, and belongs
to John Beal, Attakapas, on Red River. Said Negro is
about forty•eight years of age, five feet eight or nine inches
high, and head a little bald. His back is marked with the
whip, and marks of cupping on both temples and back of
the neck. He speaks Creole French and broken English.
The owner of said Negro is hereby notified to come
forward, prove property, pay charges, and take him away,
or he will be dealt with as the law directs.
W. B. KNOX, Sheriff B. C.
By L. SARGENT, Deputy.