The Charleston daily news. [volume] (Charleston, S.C.) 1865-1873, 1870-03-19
IMMIGR4TION.
A shrcwd and Suggestive Letter.
TO THE EDITOR OF THE NEWS.

Ihave pondcred over the article OF the cor
respondent of the Columbia Phoenix, In yester-
days DAILY NEWS. While it is admitted on
all sides that immigration is the one thing
needful for our State, there are many causes
which prevent Immigrants from coming here.
have conversed with, q few that left our State
again for the West. They all tell the same
story; they arc satisfied with their wages, with
their general treatment, and their work, but
not with their food. They are not accustomed
to s'hog and homipy.' In Germany farm
laborer gets between sixty and eighty dollars
per annum, room to sleep in, generally in
his employers house, and the following meals:
They commence work between and o'clock
A. NJ, but before they so to work they receive
from the house-servant cup of good coffee
and slice of bread and butter; at S o'clock A.
M. they get warm breakfast, with coffee,
meat, &C.; at 10 o'clock u boy comes to them
in the field to bring them glass OF brandy or
beer, and slice of bread and butter At IL
o'clock they come home and have wholesome
dinner, consisting of soup'or vegetables and
meat. At4 o'clock a boy again brings them
coffee and bread and butter. At sundown they
come home and have their warm supper; then,
after they have fed aud cleaned their horses
and cattle, they 20 to bed. Such man can
do twice the work of q farm laborcr we have
to employ at present.
When a farm laborer concludes to leave
Germany to 60 10 the United States. he intends
to better his situation, else he would stay at
home. True, he is willing to undergo some
hardships to have his greatest wish fulfilled,
that is. to acquire some lands Of his own,
which is very difficult in Germany at about
$1,000 per acre. Here he has prospect to be-
come landowner in a few years.
AS for getting immigrants here. the Phoenix
correspondent proposed q joint stock COM
pany, which is all very well; but he speaks
about disposing OF the immigrants as if they
were things, and not men. 1t reminds me of
q worthy German who had been here about
twenty years, and who inquired innocently of
me, when the late Captain Weitng arrived
here last fall, where all the immigrants were
that were to come. l told him they were ut
the wharf He said no, he did not mean those
people, "they are like me and yon," he a6-
ded. mean immigrants. said, ''well are
we two not immigrants also, as well as those
people; do you expect immigrants are cattle ?'
This seemed to be to him q poser, and he did
not answer. l suppose something like that
was in the mind of the Columbia Phoenix cor
respondent.
The best immigration agents are the immi-
grants themselves. The thousands that go to
the West go there because their friends wrote
them to come, and, in most cases, sent the
means out for them to come. To turn the
stream of immigration to South Carolina
that is, provided they are really needed and
wanted hcre-there is one thing necdfIl, and
the only thing that will bring them here. Let
immigration societies be formed and money
raised to pay the passage Of the first thousand,
and those will soon draw thousands after them,
and among them people with means, ready to
buy lands at once. Then let the planters that
employ these men treat them well, permit
them to plant vegetables, SO they can get their
accustomed food, and South Carolina will soon
GET her share of the tide OF immigration. The
money advanced to the immigrant to pay
his passage is not lost; he will repay it to the
society In year or two from his wages: