The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1870-11-17
Hs, 8 CO.; 9 Pl:'rlopri!ey p IT. eytors. rs
III Iarger Ell EPrrodnetion and Fewer gAeres.

wbo.smay not have the opportunity of seeing it
elssWheTe we present the, address. OF Hon.
Horace. Capron, Commissioner Of Agriculture
for the United States, delivered at the Cotton
States Fair Association in Augusta recently
Tthank you for this opportunity OF present.
ing, very briefly, q, few suggestions concerning
theimmediate, pressing agricultural needs OF
the South. You will permit me to express my
convictions plainly, in a spirit of utmost kind
ness and sympathy. You knew well, and have
boosted long, the advantages and resources OF
thelaCotton States, the great variety and pro-
duetiye capacity of your soils delightful cil-
mate csosvaried by elevation and conhguratlon
of surface as to be adapted alike to the fruits
and fibres of the tropics and all the products OF
thetemperate zones-a wealth OF precious and
usefuEmetals sufficient to supply for genera
tions the material for the artizans of the world
al amount of water power wonderful to con-
template, and. the largest supply of timber and
wood to be found within the United States.
YetSo1 are constantly and rapidly reducing
the fertility of those soils, and turning out farm
after farm TO swell the area of the hundred mil
lion acres of exhausted lands You ignore the
marvellous capabilities Of your sunny, climate
in neglecting the myriad form of production to
which elevation, latitude, situation, soils and
various natural peculiarities contribute so mu-
w.
bowels of the earth waiting to respond to the
call of enterprise and the magic touch of labor !;
yourswater power in its silent majesty or resist
less energy, goes son forever" in it's thousand
lines of march to the sea, occasionally remind
ing you as at Richmond or i'll the Shenandoah,
of its mighty capabilities which you have so
long permitted to run to waste. -
And YOUR forests are solitudes, unblest with
the. hum of busy and enriching labor, while
yoriF very hoe handles are often brought from
distant States and your finest timber is remorse-
lessly girdled that your lands may be cleared by
that slow woodman, grim decay.
You possess tract of country mt tor mlghty
empire; it is actually a wilderness, almost
sohtade.HIts railroads, turnpikes, farm I'M
provements, scientific husbandry, manufac-
tories. model school houses and churches, are
vet mainly in the future. All this work is be-
fore YOU. 1t is true the country is compara-
lively new and very wide; and the workers are
few /: but parts Of it have been settled for two
hundred years, aud yet scrubby pine forests
grow where the settlers grew their supply OF
corn and tobacco. Has. improvement been
commensurate with your resources and In pro-
portion to the numbers of the population? and
has population kept pace with other less favored
portions of the country or made such advan-
ces as might reasonably have been expected
with these immense resources? The truth
compels me to say no-your consciousness
echoes the negative. Why is it? The reasons
are many. Prominent among them are these:
First. A wasteful and slovenly system OF ag-
riculture, the curse of our whole country, has
been practiced in the cotton States.
Second, The extension of the raw products OF
agriculture by manufacture has been ignored or
discouraged, culture has been restricted to
few crops, and the policy of buying nearly
everything needed to eat, drink or wear has
been encouraged.
Third. Labor. has been mainly restricted to a
seryile class, becoming badge of dishonor
rather than the crown of glory that it is "a
large portion of the people, have formerly lived
in comparative idleness or unproductive en-
ployment; and the intellect and ambition of
the influential or ruling class has been spent
upon politics to the neglect of material devel-
opnent. i&t
You have sometimes held commercial con-
ventiens while destitute of any commerce OF
your own; it is significant sign of the times
that you now, anexclusively agricultural peo-
ple assemble to consider the means of agricul-
tural improvements.
As YOU have listened to my frank detail of
obstacles to progress, permit me with equal
brevity to note certain means of recuperatlon.
Nv first counsel would be-practice a restora-
tive instead of an exhaustive system OF Ggr'cut-
ture. A system that involves abandonment of
lands, and removal to new scenes is unworthy
of the age and reproach to modern civlllza-
tion.
No man is worthy to be farmer who does not
annually leave his land in better tilth and
strength than he found it. The intellect must
share more largely with muscle, the toll OF ag-
riculture machinery directed by skilled labor,
and propelled by brute force, and also by the
mighty power of steam, must take the place OF
expensive and inefficient human strength. This
change, as 1 said in this State year ago, in
wolves the necessity for smaller farms, better
culture, liberal use of manure, rotation in crops,
and larger working capital in proportion to
permanent investment. You are already spen-
ding millions annually on the old lands OF the
Atlantic States for commercial fertilizers.
While I would commend judicious expendl-
ture in this direction, would make this basis
of practical rotation with course OF grasses
and other restorative agencies OF scientific ag-
riculture. The business of Agriculture should
be an industry and not speculation. The in
sane pursuit of specalities has long been
curse to American agriculture. A whole COM
munity runs wild upon hopes, when selling at
fifty cents per pound and in two years they are
scarcely worth the price of picking, and ex-
travagance begotten of high expectations IS
forthwith followed by bankruptcy. Wheat
brings two dollars per bushel, and whole States
become wheat-Gelds, while every other interest
languishes, until the bread crop becomes 50 50
abundant as to be fed to swine in preference. to
shipment for human food. The sheep with
wool at one dollar per pound, holds high, place
in popular esteem; but is kicked from the pas
ture by every Randolph of the farm at the hrst T
indication of heavy decline in the value OF
its fleece. In your section, cotton, great boon
20 spegate gate Of production may become an unmit
gated evil if left to usurp the place of all other
crops. The crop of last year produced hun
dred millions of dollars more than one, fifty
per cent larger ten years ago. Three millions
Of hales may command q profit of $40 per bale