The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1870-07-21
SOUTHERN SOCIETY.
From the n. \. Tribune.

From the N. \. Tribune.
One of our leading magazines for August
gives the first place in its pages to dolorous
lamentation from Southerner over the pre-
sent state of society in the land of ''far
women and brave men," The subject was a
pregnant one, and, with its actual tragic
facts, might have satisfied the most ambi-
tious magazine writer. The curse of sudden
poverty, the bitterness of defeat falling upon
the dominant class, and the equally abrupt
elevation of a race of serfs to a political level
with their masters, suggests countless dra-
matte combinations, not only full of food
for thought for the philosopher or statesman,
but which might well have served as the text
for a few of those sensible, friendly words
whose healing power are so much needed
and welcome nowadays, between South and
North.
The cause which induces this modern Jere-
miah, however, to take up his tale of woe is a
far different one. Slavery is the Holy of
Holes over whose desecration he weeps He
portrays her laid waste, trampled under the
feet of mudsills and carpet-baggers, with such
extremity of unction that like the prophet,
his soul is vexed within him, his eyes do fail
with tears, his bowels are troubled for the
destruction of this daughter of his people. 1t
is not either the bald, ugly fact of slavery as
popularly known that he delineates, but that
ideal patriarchal institution whose infinitely
sweet and tender relations were won't to be
urged upon us in poem and novel by gushing
Southern ladies. The thing being finally and
incontestably dead, we vainly hoped that our
Southern friends would be content to bury its
unwholesome corpse and be done with it.
What is our dismay therefore, to find them
raising an Irish ''Keen" such as this over the
dead body, and threatening to come again
and again with fresh ardor to unending fune-
rails. -
But this is not the only mistake we have
made, it seems. Popular opinion held that
there were two classes of whites in the slave
holding States before the war, whose dividing
lines were tolerably sharply drawn-the
wealthy and cultured order, and the clay
eaters, ''the poor trash" on whom even the
negroes looked down. Our friend, however
represents state, on the contrary, of entire
and blissful democracy. "The wife of a
wealthy man was the friend of poor semp-
stress; and the principal of ohildren's
school" he adds, breathless, with uplifted
hands, "once entertained at her table the
highest in the land!" From this Acadian SIM
plicity the war has dragged them large for
tunes have been made as well as lost; envy
and jealousy for the first time find entrance to
their bosoms. ''They murmur not, and re-
| vile not, he informs us sadly; but how terri
BILE is the disintegration that thus tears apart
the sempstress, the President, and the school
| ent The picture he draws is pathetic enough
| The Yankee newcomers ''have strange habits
and outlandish ways, the servants are hire
hngs, the skeleton peeps from the cupboard
at every convivial meeting, and Atra Cura
sets behind every horseman.' Atra Cura is a
very unpleasant companion in any shape; but
are we to understand that she appears to our
| Southern compatriots % hen
1t is for fallen slavery, however, that he
ends, as he begins, his wall; and really SO
strongly does he put the case, that we are
surprised at the obstinacy of our colored
friends in remaining free if they could pos
sibly vote themselves again into the fiowery
chains of such pleasant bondage ''They
feel in their hearts, che tells us, ssthat
they were in the hands of friends who did
what could be done for their welfare and
happiness. The slave remained for life a
devoted friend OF the master, and was ever
greeted with beaming eye and cordial
JOY. The serving race received more than
the ruling race, and the freedmen therefore
will feel the loss grievously in COM
fort and happiness" After pausing
to weep $50 lavish is he of tears) over the
blinded freedman thus rushing on his own de-
struction ofliberty, he reaches the eliminating
point of sentimental pathos, the height of
mischance wrought by the war, which will
probably surprise most of our readers.
Thousands of Southern men and women in
the South in every generation had been
brought up by colored wet-nurses. White
nurses are now introduced wherever they
can be procured" He then enters into q
disquisition on the subtle change this will
produce on the next generation, bemoaning
the loss of the influence of the colored nurse
on the white foster child. Acadian simpli.