New-York daily tribune. [volume] (New-York [N.Y.]) 1842-1866, 1856-03-25
TEXTS FOR SOUTHERN COMMERCIAL
CONVENTIONS.

There was lately at that home Of pseudo-de-
nocracy, that center Of self-suficency, that
fathomless bungless barrel of political small beer
Richmond Wa Commercial Convention. What, IN
one view of the case, il might be asked could
Commercial Convention do there, where commence
save in human Aesh-can hardly be named if we
except, too sales Of that weed which, while 1t has
blasted the soil turns domestic aars, hotel parors,
railroad cars theater boxes legislative halls, nay,
even churches, into huge pt-boxes-concretlons OF
beasty filth respecting neither age nor se1-and 10
which the aboriginal grease and stencil of savages are
attractive in comparison O progress! o cviliza-
ton o chivaryl refinement! Niggers and to-
bacco. squirting, But let even Commercial COnven-
tions sit at Richmond, and let Art incarnae-Apollo--
with the grace-crowned limbs of berty-with the pulp
of flesh not expectoraed away, and the bow-mouth of
beauty that knows quid, and would feel its dirty
stain as n wound-come to the rescue of Virginia and
the South If such Conventions would calculate the
dignity and purity Of man, what might they not
effect The deliberations of the meeting in question
having been of the same quzzcal pattern as its
predecessors shall modesy offer for the considera
ton of those whom it may few appropriate
texts-a few elesac thoughts the condition of the
South-beginning with Virginia, in the hope of en-
Tightening future Conventions.
To commence then: The generous bosom of our
mother earth CLOVIS perennally with nutrition, when
not scared with cruel save-drving hands. The
history of lost empires proves this Slavery utterly
DESTROYS the soil of country that it will not yield
food for man or beast. II denies wealth. and hence
commerce; and IL future Southern Commercial Con-
yentons do not recognize this TRUTH they will but
babble as their foolish precursors Not more surely did
the lava that lateyboled over the mountain peaks IN
the Sandwich Islands, marring the teemng valleys,
bear desoation in it, heats, than has blaVery over
saughed and rendered carous the best lands of the
South Around even the Capitol of the nation these
death prints are spread; and in proof of this let US
give some facts.
Slave-tuled lands just the south side Of the
Potomac worn out and abandoned, have been lately
purchased by freemen TO be reclaimed to the use OF
man. Upon the ruins Of forts, ships, houses, even
cities we can look without despair; but what codness
circles the patriotic heart in travelling miles on miles
over country fertile as this part of Virginia certainly
once was and meeting everywhere with the footsteps
of the destroyer destroyer not Ike the pioneer oil
TIE forest-not like an army ravaging OF wealth
garnered UP in farm village and city, leaving the earth
unhur-bu destroyer of the soil itseli-draning its
innermos marrow till it is bauen-curst-andn ourishes
neither man nor beast and evokes neither house nor
town. nor liberty, nor yet Slavery, but leaves the
earth ruined BY the fiat of Justice, that knows out
two thngs-cause and effect-nor VIII be reit oil the
smallest due These terrible presentations start from
ont the old plantations, not sparing Mount Vernon
and even some of the new States show territory 20
worn out and abandoned.
What if the coil of State were NJ combusnoie as
the dead grass Of the great praires ana lew men
who CHANGED to obtain by conquest git, or purchase,
the fee ofthe domain should combine together and say
., H. burn this soil and send the ashes to England,
and Get there from our money to spend while WE live
for as for posterity what did it ever do for us =!
What if they should so say and so act Their names
would meet with worldwide execration. And yet this
is said and done by every day in every State south
of the Potomac We have heard them assert that they
could and did wear out the land 50 that it was
worthless in seven years that they could make more
morey by cutting down timber and wearing ont new
land than upon dland and long they had slaves
TO do the work they would do H. and would anybody
else not fool. Not the word fool, but knave, should
have rounded such averment.
If the reader disbeleves that this system has been
practiced upon let him visit few of the spots shall
row point out. Start south upon the old stage road
from Washington 10 Richmond making slight detour
across the Mount-VeInon estate, and by taking few
notes OF what visible ltducf
of tie blight upon the wasted land of the saveowner.
About foriy-f,e miles south OF Washington there
was, during the Revolutionary War town of az
much importance as any in Virginia. IL trade
some 1000 hogsheads OF tobacco year, grown upon
surrounding sl0ve-tled plantations. The name of
this town was Dumfries. Foreign ships came to It's
wharyes; Its INGREDIENTS Of wealth, and is
neghborhoOd noted the abode Of rich planters
who babe their slaves cut down the forests and plant
and gather crops while the land would produce and
then cut down more, giving up the old fields, by
one, TO that greatest of all Virginia pr0duction-old
fed-pines. Gradually, but surely the whole land so
rch in frstcrop tobacco productions, was reduced to
barrenness and desoationa soil of slaves incapable
of local sastentation.
One by one, the owners of lands 20 destroyed sold
out their possessions Tor less than 1.-THE Of what their
buildings cost; and in many cases to a neighboring
planter, taking pay in human flesh that the master
could not feed though he still hoped TO be able TO
noursh diminished number upon enlarged do