New-York tribune., 1869-03-12
KING COTTON.

Hardly q Southern paper reaches us but has
editorial comment of some sort on the pros
pcctiyc crop Of 1863. II is generally conceded
that it will I've large if the season IS at all
favorable. Some editors have the saRacity to
see that saying so much about n great crop
this year will have n bad effect ON that part Of
the crop of 1868 which remains uusold.
Now friends at the South, before your double
plows have thrown all the land into ridges for
cotton rows, take time aud give this whole
business Of agriculture q sober second thought
You have just come ont of great war in
which you were wOrstcd. The weakest thing
in the Southern military service during that
war was It's commissaIiat \ strictly agricul-
tural people having rs much pride of acres rs
any landed alistocracy in the world, were from
the first, and in all stages Of u four years
strife, weakened, hampcred thwartcd, dcmoral-
lied, and finally defeated, for want of beef,
corn, wheat, hay, and oats.
a great war is like a scyerc Illness 1t tries
the constitution and unmIsks the weakness of
the system. Tho agricultural system of the
South has been proved defective, because in n
protracted fight the breach appeared there first
Now what is the great characteristic of plant
deriving of a large income in clear money from
a broad surface, by the sale of vegetable
products. A small planter is one whose account
sales of cotton or tobacco, rice or sugar, do not
figure up more than $4,000 The sales
of the large planters range all the way
from $1,000 to 100000 A few, n very few,
Southern proprietors received over 100000
from u single crop. That mode of
deriving an income may have been
connected with the character and status of the
labOrcr, but such connection was not inscpara-
bic. A slave could cradle wheat or fatten hogs
if ordered to, just as well as he could pick
cotton or sucker tobacco. Slavery had inherent
sins enough without charging it with blundcrs
that were not, in the nature of things inscp-
arabic from unpaid labor. From the time of
Pocahontas the Southern domain was divided
into large estates. Those who surveyed and
plotted it felt as Bruins did abOut Cirsars body.
"Lct us carve him dish III for tile gods. not how
him like a carcass for tho hounds"
These broad areas were cleared and cropped
by spOrt-lOvBg men, FOR whose ears the bayimg
of pack of fox hounds was sweetest music.
Put man with these tastes ut the center of
Il 1900 acre tract ,Iand'what will he dot He will
have as few inside fences as possible; he will
make his money on crop that will cost him
the least time, or planning, or worry. lie will
say, dunn riUiDus, UiUamuS--" after us the del
"uge." Talk to him of rotation, fertilizers,
bone dust, the foot of the sheep having gold
beneath it, he answers you by blast Oh his
hunting horn. "My niggers know how to make
A" cotton" These seven words were the doom
of true progressive agriculture south Of Mason
and Dixon. -
The induesments that draw the Southern
agrlcultEnst toward cotton-fclds are very great.
lie Is in debt. lie wants carriage horses TO re-
place those which Bragg, or Johnson, or Lee
broke down dragging cannon. lie is living in
a cabin, and would like to do something with
those ghOstly and blackened chimney stacks
The saws of his gin-stand are bent and rusty
His press is rude and slow His mules are
stiff, and his plows worn; his tobacco sheds
went for camp fires. We admit that it would