Richmond enquirer. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1815-1867, 1867-01-08
NEW YORK FARMING, OR MUCH ADO
ABOUT NOTHING.

We write with the census Of 1860 before us
but use round numbers and omit small frao
tions. In that year New York, with a population
ioEncarly four millions, produced eight millions
6! bushels Of wheat, and twenty millions o.
bushels Of Indian corn. Her farming lands
were valued at eight hundred and three mil.
lions; her farming machinery and implements
at twenty-nine million dollars she had five
hundred and three thousand horses one mil.
lion one hundred and twenty-threc thousand
mich COWS hundred and twenty thousand
working oxen, and seven hundred and twenty
seven thousand other cattle; two and hall
millions Of sheep, and one million nine hun
dred thousand hogs.
Now, one may SEQ at glance, that in so
cold climate, the twenty millions of bushels
Of Indian corn would not feed her live stock
four months in the year. Milch COWS are
there fed on meal the year round, and would
Of themselves cat up double the corn crop.
This leaves for bread about two bushels and
peck Of wheat a head to her inhabitants.
J Add to tlaeualue Of t'te farms. the cost Of
| implements, the cost 81 support Of work
oxen and work horses, the wages of labor, and
the millions spent in condensed chemical ma
nures, and we should say that New York
high scientific farming is the most costly
amusement that gentlemen ever INDUCED ill.,.
Their lands should improve rapidly, because
everything they make on them is consumed
at home, and four times as much more con-
sumed from abroad. This immense manure
fund, added to the concentrated manures,
and guano, lime and plaster, which they ap-
ply to their lands, should rapidly improve
them. On the contrary, they would seem to
deteriorate, New York made thirteen millions
bushels of wheat in 1850, and only eight mil
lions in 1850, her population having increased
about million in the mean time.
New York and New England farmers are
the worst in tue world The results prove
it. In fact, their farming population is very
generally poor, ignorant, and unintelliscnt.-
Southern farmers have heretofore been the
best in the world, because nine-tenths of the
learning, wealth and talent Of the South
was engaged in farming. Such an agricultu-
raj phenomenon has never before existed since
the early and pure days Of the Roman Rcpub-
lie, when her mobiles were all farmers. With a
smaller population and less capital invested in
farming, Virginia, North Carolina and Ken
tucky produced abo ut four times as much of
agricultural values as New York. OF corn and
wheat five times as much.
Yet these three States were not half ~ rich,
prosperous and progressive as was New York !;
for they contained only ten thousand Of pau
pers and criminals, and she about TWO Hun
DRIED AND TWENTY-FIVE THOUSAND. 1t is
estimated that there are always ten destitute
persons not yet driven to crime or the poor
house, to one criminal or avowed pauper. On
this basis we may compute the numbers Of
the destitute in New York at two and
quarter millions. Now the accumulated wealth
oit every country Is tho recruit ok tho cSpfoi-
tation Of labor by skill and capital. Tho
poorer the laborers, the richer, more pros
porous and progressive the country;-for all
wealth is made by labor, but exploited or ab-
stracted, and expended or accumulated, by
skill and capital. If laborers are permitted
to consume what they make, there will be
nothing for the rich to abstract, and expend
in luxury md ostentation, or to accumulate.
We of the South permitted our slaves to
consume most Of what they made, hence no
one was driven to beg or steal but then, lit
tie was left to accumulate or expend in luxu-
ry, or in great public or private works. That
England, Now York and Massachusetts,, are
the most prosperous countries in the world
is evidenced by the fact that they have most
criminals and paupers Just as the magn-
.ude of commerce is indicated by the num-
Der of wrecks, and the amount Of travelling
by the depth Of the ruts.
The loss of the Southern staples, trade, and
market, will tell very severely on the gains Of
the rich and cunning Mt the North. North
ern agriculture will afford, as We have seen,
narrow basis for exploitation, for abstraction
cannot advance ahead Of production. Every
thing depends on the revival Of Southern pro-
duction; but instead of repressing vagrancy
and idlencss here by proper police, the policy
is to patronize and protect them in the name of
freedom. With our laborers at work, Soutll-
ern production might approximate to the
status quo ante bel'um. But Thad Stevens,
who is higher authority at the North than
Constitution or Inspiration, says the only
cure for the evil of tho times will be to set
the negroes to voting. We must have more
political agitation, more hatred between the
races, more prosecutions Of the South, upon
the theory that the hair'of the dog is good
for the bite