The weekly North-Carolina standard. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 186?-1869, 1869-03-03
who compl.ip, ,

eeSs IN AiiutiAS iduit y II 10 ccidou tndt
the honest, the industrious, and those who
are the friends of the Union, are heard to
complain, No sane man expects that a
country can pass through civil war of un-
heard o., proportions without being made to
feel disastrous consequences It was only
an inevitable result that hard times should
follow. All men of good sense whether
they were guilty or innocent of the cause
of the calamity, know this, and in
manly spirit bear up cheerfully and are
doing the best they can under it. Uneer
the diligent hands of such men our country
can be brought up rapidly, and if all were
such, in few short years the material traces
of the rebellion would be effaced But all
are not such, and it is this large, and to the
State worthless, class who, in a great meas
ure, do the grumbling-who as far as in
them lies, discourage every one, and whose
course would speedily run down the country
to level with old Spain, Mexico and such
dilapidated countries ~ %
Of those loudest in their complaints are
those who hang around, waiting, Micawber
like, for something to turn up, so that they
can live without going to work. This is a
very numerous class in the South at this
time. Their condition is in no wise enviable.
They are too lazy to work and the vocation
of spunging has gone up with the general
leveling of the surrender, and they do not
know how to live. So far as the country
and society are interested, it does not matter
in the least that they should live. 1t were
as well they should give this up also, for
they never did add aught to the substantial
elements of the country. Yet these men
murmur. They cry out on the extravaganza
of the General Assembly in aiding to de-
velope the State by Railroads, and raise
huge alarm about taxes while they have
no property on which to levy tax-are
considered as men who have no visible
means of support, and the Sheriff returns
their poll tax. as not to be collected. Such
men venture even to appear in the columns of
Democratic newspapers and raise terrible
howl. We hear murmurs from the old fogy
wing of the slaveocracy, whose chattels are
enfranchised and have taken the attitude of
I. men-who have their broad but worn out
/ acres still in possession, but are sadly en-
numbered with debts that it was intended
should be cancelled by puttinga victim
or two on the auctioneer's block. Such
men never grow weary of heaping curses
on the lazy, idle and worthless ringers"
! Ever since it has become matter of vo-
lition with the once slave whether he will
toll for himself and no longer for old mas
ter; ever since the day that his brow no
longer reeks with sweat that enures to ma
king bread for the master, he is worthless
and poor creature wrong, evil and
crime is set to his account. If he unhappiy
fails in energy, then as pauper he ruins the
country. If he is manly and energetic and
pushes his way, then the d-n saucy niger
wants to get above sohite folks. Yes, these
acres must now dissolve and pass away to
|
the chattel, and poverty is approaching like
strong man armed. The choice is to grum-
BILE and curse. or put off aristocratic i'm
munity, and buckle down to hard work and
draw bread and money out of the old plan
tation. Wewould recommend it rs SOW
ereign remedy for discomfort. and the negro
would not appear nearly SO lazy. 1t is an
experiment that we can commend. and
know that its effects will greatly improve
the physical bulk-cure dyspepsia and give
new color to life itself and all its surround
ings.
Yet another class that complains are those
unhappy men who have failed to receive an
office, and are now out in the cold. Poor
men! objects of commiseration they are, be-
cause the dull people fail to perceive their
rare qualifications. The flood tide of pro-
gress has left them up high and dry on the
beach, and all the poor comfort left them is
found in denouncing those more favored
than themselves and in uttering lugubrious
complaints and murmurings. Sad, sad in
deed, is the prospect for the future of our
country from their point of view. AS they
now see it, every Office holder is scoundrel,
and corruption reigns rampant where they
should have been placed. Daily the future
grows darker and their state becomes more
hopeless, and is it to be wondered that their
cries are almost frantic ? Occasionally they
break out in the most acrid walls in the
Sentinel and journals of the party in the OPP
position. Well, it seems sad satisfaction
/ in their disconsolate condition, and it were
cruel to deny it to them. We can hardly
find it in our hearts to reproach them for this
and for that other manly enjoyment they
find in the tournament. 1t is so becoming
in all concerned-to them it is very mean
ing full they, poor creatures, enjoy it all
as reality and never discover its comic lu-
dicrousness. Let those who have nerve and
will to toll, do and become, pass it by as a
harmless fancy that will die out in reno
waited state of society, and those winnings
and chicalric doings will figure largely in
some future edition of Joe Miller and help
to amuse the children Of those who really
are men in this crisis.
Gen Grant, in conversation with Senator
Pool of North Carolina, expressed himselfas
particularly anxious for substantial recon
struction in the South. North Carolina and