The Sun.
London, England, 1861-07-12 00:00:00

THE SUN, LONDON, FRIDAY EVENING, JULY 12, 1861.

ROYAL INSURANCE COMPANY,
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Subscribed Capital, £2,000,000. Paid-up and Accumulated
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THE. CONSOLS ASSOCIATION,
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be obtained on apalication to
THOMAS H. BAYLIS, Managing* Director.

IHE CIVIL WAR IN AMERICA.

THE SOUTHERN STATES.
(From the Special Correspondent of the Times.)

NATCHEZ, MISSISSIPPI, JUNE 14.
On the morning of the 3d of June I left New
Orleans in one of the steamers proceeding up the
Mississippi, along that fertile but uninteresting
region of reclaimed swamp lands, called " the
Coast," which extends along both banks for 120
miles above the city. It is so called from the name
given to it, " La Cote," by the early French settlers.
Here is the favoured land—alas ! it is a fever-land
too !—of sugar-cane and Indian corn. To those who
have very magnificent conceptions of the Missis-
sippi, founded on mere arithmetical computations
of leagues or vague geographical data, it may be_,
astonishing, but it is neverthelesstrue, the Mis-
rtirtificial for Many hundreds of miles.
Nature has, of course, poured out the waters, but
man has made the banks. By a vast system
of raised embankments, called levees, the river
is constrained to abstain from overflowing the
swamps, now drained and green with wealth-pro-
ducing crops. At the present moment the surface
of the river is several feet higher than the land at
each side, and the steamer moves on a level with
the upper stories, or even the roofs of the houses,
reminding one of such scenery as could be witnessed
in the old days of treckshayt in Holland. The
river is not broader than the Thames at Gravesend,
and is quite as richly coloured. But then it is 180
feet deep, and for hundreds of miles it has not less
than 100 feet of water. Thus deeply has it scooped
into the rich clay and marl in its course, but as it
flows out to join the sea it throws down the vaat
precipitates which render the bars so shifting and
difficult, and bring the mighty river to such a poor
exit. A few miles above the wharfs and large
levees of the city the country really appears to be
a sea of light green, with shores of forest in the
distance, about two miles away from the bank. j
This forest is the uncleared land, extending for a
considerable way back, which each planter hopes to
take into culture one day or other, and which he
now uses to provide timber for his farm. Near the
banks are houses of wood, with porticoes, pillars,
verandahs, and sun-shades, generally painted white
and green. There is a great uniformity of style,
but the ideal aimed at seems to be that of the old
French chateau, with the addition of a colonnade
round the ground story. These dwellings are
generally in the midst of small gardens, rich in
semi-tropical vegetation, with glorious magnolias,
now in full bloom, rising in their midst, and groves
of live oak interspersed. The levee is as hard and
dry as the bank of a canal. Here and there it is
propped up by wooden revetments. Between it and
the uniform line of palings which guards the river
face of the plantations there is a carriage road. In
the enclosure near each residence there is a row of
small wooden huts, whitewashed, in which live the
negroes attached to the service of the family. Out-
side the negroes who labour in the fields are
quartered in similar constructions, which are

like the small single huts, called "Maltese,"
which were plentiful in the Crimea. They
are rarely furnished with windows; a wooden
slide or a grated space admits such light and
air as they want. One of the most striking
features of the landscape is its utter want of life.
There were a few horsemen exercising in a field,
some gigs and buggies along the levee roads, and
little groups at the numerous landing-places, gene-
rally containing a few children in tom-fool costumes,
as Zouaves, Chasseurs, or some sort of infantry,
but the slaves who were there had come down to
look after luggage or their masters. There were no
laughing,trenoi
ret
se chatteringeratehrsa6
euenntohivtnesa
Ipwlgatheringslonawnhet
hear
at
onash
hereaboutsnoourft
.tblacko lgnt
o:
merry,
dsfateieeredsout,nt nh de
osvfnehtghi
along the road without passes from their owners.
The steamer J. L. Cotten, which was not the less
popular, perhaps, because she had the words " Low
pressure" conspicuous on her paddle-boxes, carried
a fair load of passengers, most of whom were mem-
bers of Creole families living on the coast. The
proper meaning of the word " Creole" is very diffe-
rent from that which we attach to it. It signifies
ap:irssiaonnaofor Spanishinthe s
oernFthreernnchanddestcreenptinabloreneninn
Lo -
tries. The great majority of the planters here are
French Creoles, and it is said they are kinder and
better masters than Americans or Scotch, the latter
being considered the most severe. Intelligent on
most subjects, they are resolute in the belief
that England must take their cotton or perish.
Even the keenest of their financiers, Mr. Forstall,
an Irish Creole, who is representative of the house
of Baring, seems inclined to this faith, though be is
prepared with many ingenious propositions, which
would rojoice Mr. Gladstone's inmost heart, to raise
money for the Southern Confederacy and make them
rich exceedingly. One thing has rather puzzled
him. M. Baroche, who is in New Orleans, either
as a looker-on or as an accredited employe of his
father or of the French Government, suggested to
him that it would not be possible for all the disposa-
ble mercantile marine of England and France toge-
ther to carry the cotton crop, which hitherto gave
employment to a great number of American vessels,
now tabooed by the South, and the calculations
seem to bear out the truth of the remark. Be
that as it may, Mr. Forstall is quite prepared
to show that the South can raise a prodigious reve-
nue by a small direct taxation, for which the ma-
ohlnery already exists in every parish of the State,
and that the North must be prodigiously damaged
commercially in the struggle, if not ruined outright.
One great source of strengh in the South is its readi-
ness—at least, its professed alacrity—to yield any-
thing that it is asked. There is unbounded confidence
in Mr. Jefferson Davis. Wherever I go, the same
question is asked, " Well, sir, what do you think
of our President ? Does he not strike you as being a
very able man ?" In finance be is trusted as much as
in war. When he sent orders to the New Orleans
banks, some time ago, to suspend specie payments,
he exercised a power which could not be justified by
any reading of the Southern Constitution. All men
ap
from
pludedr.ecevTihineg any such
PresidentosfupthpenrUt nnirtedStatesis
far confidence,
and it need not be said any act of his of the same
nature as that of Mr. Davis would have created an
immense outcry against hlm
all the unanimity of consp.ir.acyß,uatndtihtes
unanimity Sou t h ha s
is not greater than its confidence. One is rather
tired of endless questions, " Who can conquer such
me enn ?" a
nB
e r
us u the question
Of
s the
fustian ho ul d be,abme Can
ann‘
dyingw o mthaiennNh
, theiroarntd
great deal too much,
trackschild
is and
exterminated fig tin g itl e
reev ei
sr ya
but they really believe that the fate which Poland
could not avert, to which France as well as the
nations she overran bowed the head, can never
reach them. With their faithful negroes to raise their
corn, sugar, and cotton while they are at the wars,
and England and France to take the latter and pay
them for it, they believe they can meet the Ameri-
rican world in arms. A glorious future opens before
them. Illimitable fields tilled by multitudinous
negroes open on their vision, and prostrate at the
base of the mountain of cotton from which they rule
the kings of the earth, the empires of Europe shall

lie, with all their gold, their manufactures, and I
their industry, crying out, " Pray give us more
cotton. All we ask is more." But here is the boat
stopping opposite Mr. Roman's—es.-Governor of
the State of Louisiana, and ex-commissioner from
the Confederate Government at Montgomery to the
Government of the United States at Washington.
Not very long ago he could boast of a very handsome
garden—the French Creoles love gardens—Ameri-
cans and English do not much affect them, but when
the Mississippi was low one fine day levee and gar-
den and all slid down the bank into the maw of the
river, and were carried off. This is what !s-called
the " caving in" of a bank ; when the levee is
broken through at high water it is said that a " eft
vasse" has taken place. The Governor, as he is
called—once a captain always a captain—has still a
handsome garden, however, though his house has
been brought unpleasantly near the river. His
mansion and the out offices stand in the shade of
magnolias, green oaks, and other Southern trees.
To the last Governor Roman was a Unionist, but
when his State went he followed her, and now he is
a Secessionist for life and for death, not extravagant
in his hopes, but calm and resolute, and fully per-
suaded that in the end the South must win.
As he does not raise any cotton, the conse-
quences for him will be extremely serious should
sugar be greatly depreciated ; but the consump-
tion of that article in America is very large, and,
though the markets in the North and West are
„qutpfr,,it .is hoped, as no exported sugar can find its
way into the State, that the South will consume
all its own produce at a fair rate. The Governor is
a very good type of the race, which is giving way a

little before the encroachments of the Anglo-Saxons,
and he possesses all the ease, candid manner, and
suavity of the old French gentleman—of that
school in which there are now few masters or
scholars. He invited me to visit the negro quar-
ters. "Go where you like, do what you please,
ask any questions. There is nothing we desire to
conceal." As we passed the house, two or three
young women flitted past in snow-white dresses with
pink sashes, and no doubtful crinolines, but their
headdresses were not en regle—handkerchiefs of a
gay colour. These were slaves going off to a dance
at the sugar-house; but they were indoor servants,
and therefore better off in the way of clothes than
their fellow-slaves who labour in the field. On ap-
proaching a high paling at the rear of the house the
scraping of fiddles was audible. It was Sunday,
and Mr. Roman informed me that he gave his
negroes leave to have a dance on that day. The
planters who are not Catholics rarely give any such
indulgence to their slaves, though they do not
always make them work on that day, and sometimes
let them enjoy themselves on the Saturday afternoon.
a quadrangular enclosure,
Entering a wicket gate,
lined with negro huts, lay before us. The bare
ground was covered with litter of various kinds,
amid which pigs and poultry were pasturing. Dogs
puppies, and curs of low degree scampered about on
all sides ; and deep in a pond, swinking in the sun,
stood some 30 or 40 mules, enjoying their day of
rest. The.huts of the negroes belonging to the per-
sonal service of the house were separated from the
negroes engaged in field labour by a close wooden
paling ; but there was no difference in the. shape and
size of their dwellings, which consisted generally of
one large room, divided by a partition occasionally
into two bedrooms. Outside the whitewash gave
them a cleanly appearance ; inside they s ere dingy
and squalid—no glass in the windows, swarms of
flies, some clothes hanging on nails in the boards,
dressers with broken crockery, a bedstead of rough
carpentry ; a fireplace in which, hot as was the day,
a log lay iu embers ; a couple of tin cooking utensils;
in the obscure, the occupant, male or female,
awkward and shy before strangers, and silent till
spoken to. Of course there were no books, for the
slaves do not read. They all seemed respectful to
their master. We saw very old men and very old
women who were the cankerworms of the estate;
and were dozing away into eternity mindful only
of hommony, and pig, and molasses. Two negro
fiddlers were working their bows with energy in
front of one of the huts, and a crowd of little chil-
dren were listening to the music, and a few grown-
up persons of colour—some of them from the ad-

joining plantations. The children are generally
dressed in a little sack of coarse calico, which
answers all reasonable purposes, even if it be not
very clean. It might be an interesting subject
of inquiry to the natural philosophers who follow
crinology to determine why it is that the hair
of the infant negro, or of the child up to six or
seven years of age, is generally a fine red russet,
or even gamboge colour, and gradually darkens into
dull ebon. These little bodies were mostly large-
stomached, well fed, and not less happy than free-
born children, although much more valuable—for
once they get over juvenile dangers, and advance
towards nine or ten years of age, they rise in value
to £lOO or more, even in times when the market is
low and money is scarce. The women wore not
very well-favoured, except one yellow girl, whose
child was quite white, with fair hair and light eyes;
e.
and the men were disguised in such strangly cut
clothes, their hats and shoes and coats were so won-
derfully
ou, thatalf a
eonees t
hcouldnot a s a tellgra
gravity
whattyw
were h
must be the index to serene contentment and perfect
comfort, for those who ought to know best declare
they are the happiest race in the world. It struck
me more and more,
the faces of the slavesas lalel
dejection is the prevailing, xavi examined
rinnotehtdet
universal,sh
ueuetxh expression rt ehscashti
aodnreaeoc
apf
teristic of the race. Let a physiognomist go and see
Hw
eelrle
ttrhe
ae rt
ee
dw,
feor
re abuntheydant
gooevidenceshti that
etfhey its
kwi
ne rde,
good food, and a master who wittingly could do
them no injustice, as he is, I am sure, incapable of
it. Still, they all looked exceedingly sad, and even
the old woman who boasted that she had held her
old master in her arms when he was an infant, did
not look cheerful, as the nurse at home would have
done, at the sight of her ancient charge. The pre-
cints of the huts were not clean, and the enclosure
was full of weeds, in which poultry—the perquisites
of the slaves—were in NI possession. The negroes
rear domestic birds of all kinds, and sell eggs and
poultry to their masters. The money they spend in
purchasingtheitra greataccs, molasses, clothes, and flour—
whisky,delight, they must not have.
Some 70 or 80 bands were quartered in this part of
the estate. The silence which reigned in the huts as
soon as the fiddlers had gone off to the sugar-house
was profound. Bafore leaving the quarter I was
taken to the hospital, which was in charge of an
any. They
old negress. The naked rooms contained several
satno listlessly
books
t o oanm theuse
flock beds on rough stands, and five patients, three
but their own dull
of whom were women.
stipToathieleelyn;g
them,bthe od uswere suffering from
pneumonia and swellings of the glands of the neck:;
hlnotoosk,eiiFtvheeory:ahtttitiodnltto
one man had fever. Their medical attendant visits
them regularly, and each plantation has a practi-
tioner, who is engaged by the term for his services.
Negroes have now only a nominal value in the mar-
ket—that is, the price of a good field hand is as high
as ever, but there is co one to buy him at present,
and no money to pay for him, and the trade of the
slave-dealers is very bad. The menageries of the
gentlemen who advertise " Virginia negroes con-
stantly on sale, money advanced on all descriptions
of property," &c., must be full—their pockets
empty. This question of price is introduced inci-
dentally in reference to the treatment of negroes.
It has often been said to to me that no one will ill-use
a creature worth £3OO or £4OO, but that is not a
universal rule. Much depends on temper, and many
a hunting-field could show that if value be a gua-
rantee for good usage, the slave is more fortunate
than his fellow chattel, the horse. If the growth
of sugar cane, cotton, and corn be the great end of
man's mission on eaith, and if all masters were like
Governor Roman, slavery might be defended as a
natural and innocuous institution. Sugar and cot-

ton are, assuredly, two great agencies in this latter
world. The older got on well enough without them.
The scraping of the fiddles attracted us to the
sugar-house—a large brick building with a factory-
looking chimney, where the juice of the cane is ex-
pressed, boiled, granulated, and prepared for the
refiner. In a space of the floor occupied by
machinery some 15 women and as many men were
assembled, and four couples were dancing a kind of
Irish jig to the music of the negro musicians—a
double shuffle and a thumping Ecstasy, with loose
elbows, pendulous paws, and angulated knees,
heads thrown back, and backs arched inwards—a
glazed eye, intense solemnity of mien, worthy of
the minuet in "Don Giovanni." At this time of year
there is no work done in the sugar-house, but when
the crushing and boiling are going on the labour is
intense, and all the hands work in gangs night and
day; and, if the heat of the fires be superadded to
the temperature in September, it may be conceded
that nothing but " involuntary servitude" could go
through the toil and suffering required to produce
sugar for us. This is not the place for an account
of the processes and machinery used in the manu-
facture, which is a scientific operation, greatly im-
proved by recent discoveries and apparatus.
In the afternoon the Governor's son came in from
the company which he commands. He has been
camping out with them, to accustom them to the
duties of actual war, and he told me that all his men
were most zealous and exceedingly proficient. They
are all of the best families around—planters, large
and small, their sons and relatives, and a few of the
Creole population, who are engaged as hoopers and
stavemakers. One of the latter had just stained his
hands with blood. He had reason to believe a culp-
able intimacy existed between his wife and his fore-
man. A circumstance occurred which appeared to
confirm his worst suspicions. He took out his fire-
lock, and meeting the man, he shot him dead with-
out uttering a word, and then delivered himself up
to the authorities, It is probable his punishment
will be exceedingly light, as divorce suits and ac-
tions for damages are not in favour in this part, of
the world. Although the people are Roman Ca-
tholics, it is by no means unusual to permit relations
within the degrees of consanguinity forbidden by
the Church to intermarry, and the elastic nature of
the rules which are laid down by the priesthood in
that respect would greatly astonish the orthodox
in Ireland or Bavaria. The whole of the planters
and their dependents along " the coast" are in arms.
There is but one sentiment, as far as I could see,
among them, and that is,—" We will never submit
to the North." In the evening several officers of
M. Alfred Roman's company and neighbours came
in, and out under the shade of trees, in the t
illuminated by the flashing fireflies, politics were
discussed—all on one side, of course, with general
conversation of a more agreeable character. The
customary language of the Creoles is French, and
several newspapers in French are published in the
districts around us ; but they speak English
flaently.
Next morning, early, the Governor was in the
saddle and took me round to see his plantation.
We rode through alleys formed by the tall stalks of
he maize out to the wide, unbroken fields—hedge-

less, unwalled, where the green cane was just learn-
ing to wave its long shoots in the wind. Along the
margin in the distance there is an unbroken boun-
dary of forest extending all along the swamp lands,
and two miles in depth. From the river to the
forest there is about 11 mile or more of land of the
very highest quality—unfathomable, and producing
from one to one and a half hogshead an acre. Away
in the midst of the crops were white-looking masses,
reminding me of sepoys and sowars as seen in Indian
fields in the morning sun on many a march. As
we rode towards them we overtook a cart with a
large cask, a number of tin vessels, a bucket
of molasses, a pail of milk, and a tub full
of hominy or boiled Indian corn. The cask
contained water for the use of the negroes,
and the other vessels held the materials for their
breakfast, in addition to which they generally have
each a dried fish. The food looked ample and
wholesome, such as any labouring man would be
well content with every day. There were three
gangs at work in the fields. One of men, with 20
mules and ploughs, was engaged in running through
the furrows between the canes, cutting up the

weeds and clearing away the grass, which is the
enemy of the growing shoot. The mules are of a
fine large good-tempered kind, and understand their
work almost as well as the drivers, who are usually
the more intelligent hands on the plantation. The
overseer, a sharp-looking Creole, on a lanky pony,
whip in hand, superintended their labours, and,
after a few directions and a salutation to the
governor, rode off to another part of the farm.
The negroes when spoken to saluted us and came
forward to shake hands—a civility which must not
be refused. With the exception of crying to their
mules, however, they kept silence when at work.
Another gang consisted of 40 men, who were hoeing
out the grass in Indian corn—easy work enough.
The third gang was of 36 or 37 women, who were
engaged in hoeing out cane. Their clothing seemed
heavy for the climate, their shoes ponderous and ill-
made, so as to wear away the feet of their thick
stockings. Coarse straw hats and bright cotton
handkerchiefs protected their heads from the sun.
The silence which I have already alluded to pre-
vailed among these gangs also—not a sound could
be heard but the blows of the hoe on the heavy
clods. In the rear of each gang stood a black over-
seer, with a heavy-thonged whip over his shoulder.
If " Alcibiade" or " Porn*" were called out he
came with outstretched hand to ask " how do you
do," and then returned to his labour ; but the
ladies were coy, and scarcely looked up from under
their flapping chapeuux de paille at their visitors.
Those who are mothers leave their children in the
charge of certain old women, unfit for anything
else, and " suckers," as they are called, are per-
mitted to go home to give the infants the breast at
appointed periods of the day. I returned horn.
mita mecum revolvers. After breakfast, in spite of
a very fine sun, which was not unworthy of a
January noon in Cawnpore, we drove forth to visit
some planter friends of M. Roman, a few miles
down the river. The levee road is dusty, but the
gardens, white railings, and neat houses of the
planters looked fresh and clean enough. There is
a great difference in the appearance of the slaves'
quarters. Some are neat, others are dilapidated and
mean. As a general rule, it might be said that the
goodness of the cottages was in proportion to the
breadth of the frontage of each plantation towards
the river, which is a fair index to the size of the
estate wherever the river bank is straight. The
lines of the estates are drawn perpendicularly to the
banks, so that the convexity of concavity of the
bends determines the frontage of the plantation.
The absence of human beings in the fields and on
the roads was remarkable. The gangs at work
were hidden in the deep corn, and not a soul met
us on the road for many miles except one planter
in his gig. At one place we visited a very handsome
garden laid out with hothouses and conservatories,
ponds full of magnificent Victoria Regia in flower,
orange trees, and many tropical plants, native and
foreign date and other palms. The proprietor
owns an extensive sugar refinery. We visited his
factory and mills, but the heat from the boilers,
which seemed too much even for the all but naked
negroes who were at work, did not tempt us to
make a very long sojourn inside. The ebony
faces and polished black backs of the slaves were
streaming with perspiration as they toiled over
boiler, vat, and centrifugal driers. The good refiner
was not gaining much at present, for sugar has
been falling rapidly in New Orleans, and the 300,000
barrels produced annually in the South will fall
short in the yield of profit, which on an average
may be taken at £ll a hogshead, without counting
the molasses for the planter. All the. planters
hereabouts have sown an unusual quantity 9f In-
dian corn, so as to have food for the negroes if the