Wilmington journal. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1844-1895, 1871-09-15
From the New York Tribune.
Tie Need or the auwth

/ The first need of every Southern State
to-day is the application to it's soil OF the
system of surveys which is one of the most
benefcent devices for which mankind are
indebted to our Union. If Virginia, the
Carolinas. Georgia, and West Virgins
were surveyed into right-anRled sections
and parts thereof, as are the Public Lands
of the United States, their real estate
would he worth at least twenty five per
cent. more than it now is. and a thousand
acres of it corld be sold where hundred
can now be.
Such survey would affect no mans
title, affect no existing boundary. No
doubt, owners would gradually buy and
sell, exchange and release, SO as to brin g
their lines into conformity with the off
cial surveys; but they would do this only
SO fast and SO far as their own interest
should dictate. But estates of five to
forty thousand acres, which are row
S scarcely saleable at any price, would be
readily bought in sections, quarters and
eighths, at rates now unattainable.
Having been surveyed, all the lands that
the owners did not wish to retain should
be brought into market That is impossi-
BILE under the present no-system. Own
ers are anxious to sell they would gladly
accept very low prices, but there are no
buyers. He who has thousand or even
advertise as his land should be advertised;
the cost would be ruinous. and probably
his advertising would SILL ten other es-
tates and not sell his alter all. An en-
quirer who started southwark expressly to
look at his place would encounter 80 many
would-be sellers on his way that he might
never reach that place at all.
Now, there should be very extensive ad-
vertising of Southern lands, not merely at
~, d. N
many yet it cannot be done in an isolated
way. But let all those who have lands to
SEX IN Virginia put them in the hands of
one agent Or company, and let that agent
advertise them SO as to reach every Preside
io the North and half of those of Great
Britain and Germany-let him advertise
SO many acres in this, so many in that
county, with capacity and priceg-let him
make arrangements with steamboats, and
railroads for the cheap transportation of
those intending to purchase, and advertise
where and how excursion tickets may be
obtained, and there would be no difficulty
in selling ten million acres per an
mum, The agent CT company should pay
all expenses, take all risks, and be allowed
a liberal commission, such as would war
rant and incite the most extensive adver-|
Using, and unless exoIbitant prices were
asked. there could be no failure We are
confident that one hundred thousand ten
ant farmers, or sons of farmers, could be
drawn from the British isles alone to Vir-'
gnia within the next two years, if ade-
quate efforts were made within the next
two years, if adequate efforts were made to
enlighten them with regard not merely to
the cheapRess and value of the lands, tim
Der, &C., but to the means and cost Of
reaching those lands, the enhancement of
their value by railways, already built or in
process of construction, and the ease
wherewith their owner could be recalled
to Europe by telegraph, and set down at
his fathers Or brothers door, within two
weeks from the dispatch of the telegram.
/ lie masses in Europe know Just as much
OF this country as We do Of Australia, and
are generally in doubt whether Virginia is
in Boston or little north OF Chicago
SHOW them that it is within days ride
of New York, with ample and excellent
harbors, bays. rivers, 60, supplemented
by canals and by railroads, and they will
much prefer it to the remoter regions and
harsher climate TO the Northwest. The
facts that Indians no longer stray within
hundreds of miles of it's borders and that
1T has Episcopal churches, roads two hun
dred years old, an established social Or
Ger, &C., will prejudice multitudes in its
favor.
The South needs more people, greater di.
Verslty of pursuits, more skill, more energy
and thrift-more mills, more shops, more
factories, more furnaces-she does not
need more capital than will inevitably
How In upon her if she can but utilize
what she already has. We submit these
to her leading minds. in the
hope that they may SOW some seeds Of fu-
ture thrift and progress.