The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1848-07-16

serving traveller would look in vain among them
here for that intelligence and its frults-that eco
nomy and Thrift, and the thousand consequent
nameess home comforts and means of enjoyment
which are SO general among the humbIest classes
of our own people at home. Placed by the govern
ment on excellent land, with good facilities IN a
near market here for the surplus of their agrcul-
raj productions, they seem at first to have entered
with some degree of enterprise upon the cultivation
of the soil. But the al-engrossing business of the
country-the cutting OF mahogany-in the hands OF
q few capitalists, soon ured them away from their
fields, the very luxurlant fertility of whose SOIL be-
meath tropical sky, required continued round of
steady though by no means severe labor, to the less
continuous and therefore more attractive labor of
mahogany cutting, with its frequent returns of good
wages, often In advance. These temptations ap-
pear TO have been too great for their degree of orcs
cast to counterbalance, or, consequently, resist
Their fields were abandoned TO the care of the fe-
males; In other words, to necessary neglect; while
the men were away from home most of the year,
on the coast, In the mahogany cuts. The cOnse-
quence was inevitable. Nature, with her tropical
luxuriance and vigor, soon re-asserted her supre-
macy; and the fields that had lately marked the re-
turn OF cul livatlon, speedily overgrown again
with rank, wild vegetation. The women, with
drawn from their appropriate avOcatlons, or, more
properly speaking, having added to these the tolls
OF the field and of the transportation of few scanty
products OF their r-aring on their own persons, to
market, to obtain few household accessories and
perhaps comforts-whlch many of them do to this
day-the women, say, undoubtedly suffered most
severely, perhaps they generally do in pioneer
rural life: And 1t would pain the heart, it seems
TO me, of any human being, to hear them recount,
in their simple but graphic language, the privatons
and tolls and suilerlngs they endured, and in
measure continue to endure. 6" never was used
to this kind of work, 'sad very intelligent active
mulatto woman III the country to the writer, as she
was trudging along towards town, with heavy
load on her head: and she evidently spoke the
truth in all respects, for he knows her well. 81
in Philadelphia, and owned my little house and lot
and worked out when ! pleased, and got good
wages In hard money for ito
No wonder that many of the emigrants sickened
and died, as was the case; while part of them.
more fortunate, perhaps than either class, returned
home, as those left here still invariably and fondy
call the United States Meanwhile, the men, ex-
posed-in the pursuit of the calling tina thad ured
them from their rich lands, productive in every
thing that the soil OF tropical or with few excep
tions) temperate climate can rear, and the even
moderate cultivation of which would have secured
them an Independence for after years,-to the al
tenate burning heats and drenching rains, or,
worse than those, the combined searching rays of
tropical sun and marsh or sea water which their
vocation compelled them to endure, have, from
these fruitful sources, very generally contracted
chronic diseases, palms, and ailments, which have
broken down their constitutions, crippled them,
and made them prematprely old and inefficient for
themselves in the decline of life, instead of being
surrounded with the comforts and conveniences
which faithfully pursued agriculture is to repay
the ter of the soil, destitute IN a great degree of
them; without the force left (for the sons have
very generally followed the avocation of the
fathers,) TO again reclaim their re-wooded fields
from the supremacy of nature, which, hemming
them In within the narrow circuit of small plat of
open ground that surrounds their small and scdntly
furnished cabins, seems to grudge them their un-
profitable occupation, and resolved to extrude
them from these limited precincts in the
midst of her realms. This is no fancy picture.
1t is not highly colored 1t is drawn from the life
from careful and frequent observation made by the
writer, of the general--not universal condition
h. St,x,~r Al
causes that have produced it. "Did you know
Mr.. =, of BatimoreP' was asked the writer, a
few days since, by an old looking, decrepit black
man On being replied to that he e., had known hlm
WELL though he was now dead: ''Well, he was my
first master; waited on his table till was grown
up And the contrast between his present condi-
ton and that which had evidently been his lot for
years, with what 1t certainly had been in Baltimore,
under that master, struck the writer with force
not easily described.
The writer has entered into these details, and
will yet pursue them little further, account of
the subject of emigration hither being now again
agtated among portion OF the American colored
population He has not done so to deter them from
the step. Far from it, He has desired to merely
hold up beacon-warnDg to caution them against
the mistaken course of most of their predecessors
II any of the free American coored population, of
Industrious habits and enterprising, dispositions,
are inclined to exchange the comforts OF their
American homes, with their domestic and social
means of happiness, q have not used the words UNI
heedngly,) for civil and political equality here let
them bear well in mind that these. latter advan-
tages are not to be gratuious additions to what
they now possess; they have their inevitable price
either comfort lost or labor bought-the one or
the other. Whatever inducements this government
may hold out IN the shape OF guarantees, am very
confident will be relgiousy observed and fulfilled
Let them come, but with all the habits of industry
they possess, and all the prudent judgment and fore
thought they can command. There Is no country
where they will need them more, to secure their
happiness, and none, surely, where with the prac-
uce of the one and the exercise OF the other, the
agrlculturlst may more certainly secure an indie
pendence, and with 1t the happiness which that
circumstance, so tar as 1t goes, naturally secures
1t is an error, very prevalent, believe, among
all classes in northern climates-and in such In
clude, of course, the northern States of our country
that clothing and shelter, especially the former,
are matters Of little moment IN tropical climates;
that, so far as comfort Is concerned, the require
ments OF decency need alone be consulted in the
matter OF personal covering. AS regards the West
Indies, at least. this is very great mistake, and
the emigrapt hithcr, from whatever country or la-
tude, who should come with this idea, and in con-
sequence entertaining the notion that he will have
TO labor very little, indeed, to sustain life and be
comfortable, and with the fixed and settled inten-
ton of acting accordingly, could not commit
more egregious, and, to himself, calamous error.
This is emphaticaly true, when applied to any in
tended emigrants of whatever class, from our
country. True--thc lower rural classes of creoes
can, and do live without much care or attention to
either OF the referred to departments of civilized
life. And they may live in their rude, unlurnlsh-
Gu, chDlUs, anu On tue grounC, Will
nothing but hog-skin beneath and coarse blanket
over them, as many really do, ard think themselves
very comfortable, Tor they have never known, nor
aspired TO any thing better. But the American
immigrant has not been accustomed to such life,
whether in Maryland or Alabama; and coming
here from either OF these extremes, he cannot en-
dure, without much physical suffering, such desti
tuition of the household comforts to which has been
accustomed. Again, the creole can, and does fire.
quenty, live almost exclusively on the spontaneous
productions OF prolific soil; but the American
colored man, accustomed to different diet, would
pine, contract consequent diseases, and most pro-
badly, die, by such course of living. All these
comforts and to him necessa RES must be procured
by labor here any where else. Many arti-
cles, which to the creole may be Injuries,
IN the inn onf mrs nee What ia mn