Wilmington journal. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1844-1895, 1849-03-16
Terms for Adycrfisins.

&c But the greatest safeguard of liberty in
Virginia was the individual freedom of mind,
which formed of necessity, the character of
independent landholders, living apart on their
plantations In the age of commercial mo-
nopoly, Virginia had not one market towns
not one place of trade. AS to all outward APP
pearance it looked all like wild desert, and
the mercantile world, founding lis Judgment
on the absence of cities, regarded it as one
OF the poorest, tniserablest, and worst coun-
tries in America II did not seek to share ac-
lively in the profits of commerce it had little
OF the precious metals, and still less of credit
it was satisfied with agriculture. Taxes
were paid in tobacco remittances TO Europe
were made in tobacco the revenue of the
clergy, and the magistrates of the colony, was
collected in the same currency the colonial
tradesman received his pay in struggling par
cells of it; and ships from abroad were obi
ged to be whole months in the rivers, before
boats visiting the several plantations on their
banks could pick up a cargo. In the season
OF commercial revolution, the commercial
element did not enter into the character of the
colony. Its inhabitants daily grew more
and more averse to cohabtation.'"
Such was the character of Virginia in 1900
-ninefy-two years after the colony was foun-
uCus oiu NCIly~SlA uClOIC hCl lHOCpChuChSS
such she has remained. have seen law
passed by her Legislature during the revolu-
tionary war, prohibiting merchants from ser
wing as Representatives in the Continental
Congress.
But this primitive character of Virginia
could not have been preserved TO the extent
we now behold, but for peculiar circumstan-
ces. The soil of Virginia was found to be a.
dapted 10 the cultivation of tobacco, and Afri-
can slave labor to its cultivation and tobacco
soon became an article of commerce. The
introduction of this sort OF labor had the effect
of excluding, in great measure, emigration
from Europe-the emigration which subvert@
ed the ascendency of the Quakers of Pennsyl-
vania-which has materially modified the
original character of New England, and still
more of the new free States of the VEST
And it has been through negro slavery that
agriculture has been made, for the first time
in the history of the world, so profitable and
attractive as 10 render rural life the favori.e of
wealth as well as of the mass of the people
to make the country instead of the towns the
abode of elegant manners and refined TASTE
And this system of society has prevailed
throughout the other States of the South, ow-
ing TO the similarity of their primitive charac-
ter to that of Virginia-to her eXample-to
emigration into them of many Virginans, the
warmth of the climate, and to the culture of
cotton, which is more favorable to the EN-
ployment of slave labor than that of tobacco.
Thus, then, we have fifteen Southern States
-one-half of the number belonging TO the
Union, occupying half our territory--who pre-
sent the extraordinary, and, so far as my re-
searches extend, the unparalleled result of a
population which has acquired greater wealth
by agriculture than any other people in any
other manner; and who have consequently
given ascendancy within their borders to
country life over city, in social and political
power. In Great Britain, the only country
which can be compared in civilization with
ours, the landholders are indeed very veal
thy class, perhaps the most so, but they have
dwellings in London, and pass large part of
the year there. The landhoIders of Great Bril-
tain also constitute but small portion of the
population. .
ITO be continued) -..