The daily dispatch. [volume] (Richmond [Va.]) 1850-1884, 1867-06-25
nv Jor Mr.. Kelley and the South.

RESPONSE, he made them q speech ABOUT
the South, which is sufficiently remarka-
bic TO DO worthy Of notice. Mr.. KELLEY
appears to have beer forcibly impressed
with the vast natural and advan-
tages of the South, the poverty Of its peo-
ple. and the quiet and order that pre-.
vailed. His speech has many truths In It,
blended here and there with extravagant
assertions, suggested by his preiudices.
We are ready to concur with Mr.. KELLEY
in his statement that the cultivation Of the
leading staples to the neglect Of the other
products, and the cultivation of those
staples with a pertinacity and zeal that
was reckless, has seriously impaired south
ern lands in some sections,
There is more truth than poetry in the
remark attributed by Mr.. KELLEY to a
southern cotton planter-viz. We bought
"niggers and mules to raise cotton, and
ERASED cotton to buy niggers and mules"
Nor can we assert that Mr.. KELLEY VEN
lures the reverse Of truth when he said in
reply us, anu youi Sontip"ouS Se''"io
"of cotton having eaten up your land,
"your negroes and mules were about to
"eat you when the war begun"
Mr., KELLEY dwclls with much emphasis
ppon the povcrty-the extreme and squalid
poverty-which he met with in the South.
He seems to have had bis sympathies
worked upon. In telling his sad story he
was rudely interrupted by one of the
Philadelphia mob, who exclaimed that
"thc people were too lazy TO work." The
earnest response Of the speaker was mo,
my friend, they are not too lazy to work."
That was true. But he need not have
taxed his ingenuity to ascribe this poverty |
to the systems Of cultivation and slavery.
No country in the world was ever more
beautifully supplied with the necessaries
Of life before the wal than the South, and
no laborcrs anywhere in the world were
ever supplied so literally with food as
wore the slaves of the South. But a de-
vaStating war and the humiliation Of four
billions of southern property, involving
nc uiSpI SdLIIdlIVhVi DutAA'i i"oO't "NtN |
quite enough without the intervention Of
a bad season and failing crops to produce a
FAMINE. "Come with me, my friends"
said Mr.. X, "to South Carolina, and be-
"hold a mother who, having 'roped' her
"self to a plough, is striving to drag it
Through the earth, while her son, appa-
~"rently about eleven years old, endeavors
"tO guide it, that they may open a turrow
Gin which to deposit the few seeds north
"crn charity has sent them"
1t is not wonderful that Radical orators,
who came, like Mr.. KELLEY, to difiuse
Radical views and advance the cause Of
radicalism, should have their sensibilities
aroused by the scenes of desolation which
have been left by the war. Did it not
often occur to them that their political
defamation, with such scenes before them,
was like mockcry? Here was the cry for
bread, and these orators were offering a
stone; for a fish, and they rendered the
gift of a serpent.
But Mr.. KELLEY, despite his p~rejudices,
was quite captivated by the natural re-
sources of the South-mineral, agricultu-
raj, and manufacturing. He spoke of the
water-power OF the southern rivers as
greatly exceeding that of those in the
manufacturing districts Of New England.
He advised his fellow citizens, in seeking
new homes, not toput a thousand or fifteen
hundred miles between themselves and
the old homes of their families by going to
the distant West and Northwest. "There
dis" said he, ga more genial climate and
ga country Uhe South as rich and beau
"tiful within a few hundred miles of your
home, where you can buy agricultural
"and mineral lands at from two to five dol
GLARS an acre in which you can buy land
"almost contiguous to towns destined, un-
"der the influence Of freedom, soon to be
"large cities, whose railroad connections
"are already established, at from five to
"ffteen dollars an acre."
He uses this glowing language
81 saw during my trip Il country upon
which the Almighty has with most lavish
hand bestowed his richest material gifts. II
is gorged with every mineral. L nave scarcely
been in a State that does not abound In coal,
iron, copper, and lead, and have travelled for
days over a region of country as richly under
laid with gold bearing quartz as the noun
tains Of Colorado or California
We conclude this notice with the follow
ing description of North Carolina, which,
with a few exceptions, will apply with
equal force to Virginia:
my friends, North Carolina is the most
beautiful and richest portion of Gods earth
upon which my vision or feet have ever rested.
You know that she produces cotton, rice, in
digo, tar, pitch, turpentine, and superior tim
her. You know that her soil and climate are
adaIited To the ceTeals-wheat, corn, rye,
~buckwheat, and oats.
but you probably do not know that that
State, long known US the Rip Van Wrinkle of
the Union, is the land of wine and honey, the
apple and peach, of the tig and pomegranate
all of which i saw prospecting IN open field,
and under the most artless culture. Its native
vines made the fortune of ~Longworth, who
carried cuttings thence. The wine producing
vineyards of western Pennsylvania, around
the base and on the islands of Lake Erie, and
scattered through Missouri, are from the cut
tiugs taken from the native vines of North
Carolina.
"The Catawba, the Lincoln, the Isabella,
and richer than all the, Scuppernong, of which,
a. ii has not been yet successfully transplant
ed, eastern North Carolina has the monopoly.
There II grows spontaneously as a weed.
There Is not Il vegetable we produce that
viii not thrive in North Carolina, and under
these Astounding stores OF agricultural wealth,
Ii belt, ranging from forty To one hundred miles
wide across the entire Stale. il SO richly nm