The Burlington weekly hawk-eye. [volume] (Burlington [Iowa]) 1860-1876, 1861-06-01
Death and the Dry Goods.

| But as these were of Eden growth and fitted
| only for an Eden climate, when the reluctant
wearers were driven from those favored shades,
| they were furnished with clothing made of skins.
These two materials became the recognized
types of all subsequent attire. When our CON-
mon mother daintily fitted to her taper fingers
her first kid glove, she must have looked regret
| fully at hand which bore the stain of the ear
liest human guilt, guilt which first made it
necessary that any living creature should die
In after years, her skillIul daughters exchanged
the fig leaf for the fibre of fax, from which af.
ter, infinite labor, fine linens and delicate laces
| were wrought. But robes OF this material were
not only expensive but thin, and not equal to
| the exigencieS of cool and variable climate
So the skin drapery suggested WOOL and man
wrapt himself thereafter in the stolen garments
of the sheep The docie animal, unconscious
of rights submitted yearly to be feaced, and, as
| encroacbment always grows were it is not resis-
ted, his owner soon learned that beast that
could yield his clothing might also yield his life,
and Woodworking became also, by natural &C.
quence, mutton loving people. Thus was a
| second time illustrated the scriptural axiom,
"death by SIM"
But the sons of Eye were not always satisfied
with mere linsey-woolsey, and even Solomon's
model housewife wrought in other materials be-
| sides wool and fax. True to her esthetic in
stncts, she arrayed herself in silk and purple.
Here was new fabric, rich, graceful and luxu.
rious; but the same fatal necessity was woven in
| its web 1t became needful that thousand in
nocent worms should die, in order that another
and gutter worm might Dress Human art
could devise no method by which the delicate
cocoon could be unwound and the denuded in.
sect saved. We have been taught to divide
the honey with the laborious bee, but we yield
4 .cx1 Iii, ,irtfn tnt 10
ny end self guided fingers that FIRST taught Us
to toll and spin. =
There came a new era, the era of q cheaper
and more inocuous material, andcotton was king
1t was the third and most serviceabe form o.
the vegetable drapery, and maid and matron ar
rayed themselves 10 tue SMOKY fabric, little deem
ing that it was the price of blood. surely whole
fields of the graceful cotton plant might bloom
and ripen, and yield cir feecy product un
touched by the stain OF resulting death. Alas
no. The recurring penalty was here exacted il
its sternest form. Hitherto there had been onl.
The loss of humble animal life, but now the sac
rifce was human Cotton will only grow Is,
theorists and savans tell us) where man, in
state of freedom, will not work. The valued
commodity is the fruit of compulsory labor, of
labor obtained by the exercise of an arbitrar
power, power without limit, power over life AM
limb. More than that: the titled cotton field
Of the South have yeiaed a harsher protuc
than the dainty vegetable WOOL Side by side
with the cotton plant has sprung up a darke
growth, tyranny and rebellion and love of con
quest and power. These grew and ripened, IN
Ill the fields are now bristpg with the dead
" harvest, Where grows the wheat, ther
blooms the blood.red poppy, promising relic
alike to hunger and pain. Where the cote
seed is sown there also are sown the seeds
tyranny and revolt; there treason plumbers 10y
atty upon the land, and points'to the blue va
tiers in the distance, where waves the pirate
flag.
There remains but another textile fabric, an
thit, 100, has its deadly ssociations-hemp.-
The full era of this is only now dawning.-
Springfield Republican.