New-York tribune., 1871-04-13
OUR SOUTHERN KINSFOLK.

OUR SOUTHERN KINSFOLK.
An influential deputation from Virginia has
been in philadelphia for the purpose Of making
arrangements for the Centennial Celebration.
There have been, of course, the usual cordial
greetings, dinners, pledges Of good fellowship,
and renewed assurances on both sides that the
batcbct whose sharp edge shOne so obtru-
siyely few years ago. is buried quite out OF
sight, never to be found again. We have
usually but little faith in alliances pledged
over frOthy champagne or fIOthler pubic
speeches; nothing could have been stronger
than the ties OF blood and social Intercourse
between the better classes OF the SoutA
and North before the war ties when
crumbled into ashes like threads OF fax
at the first firing of the guns of Sumter Yet
we attach special significance to this visit
and every sign of the renewal Of those ties,
remembering that now whatever trendllne>S
or cordiality may be developed between the
two sections will hereafter have SOLID OASIS
of community of interest to rest upon, Wlllch
it never had before Mcrcenary as the dogma
may be, it is undenabe that no sentimental
bond ever vet held two nations together whose
interests opposed each other. How dear my
SISTER was to me-" said ThacEeray, until we
"ouarreled about the twenty-pOund note"
Slavery was our twenty-pOund note: 1t Is can
celed now and forgotten. We are quite
aware of the bitterness which the war has
left in the minds of the very best OF the South
ern people. NOrtherncrs are too apt to he sur
prised and inpatient with it. They 20 down into
Virginia and Carolina, and come back bored
and indignant. "The people, they complain,
"have but one subject which they roll as
"morsel of gall under their tongue-the war;
To the busy Northener, it is an accomplished
fact, labeled, put aside to make way for matters
weightier, because belonging to to-day. lie for
gets how ideas cling and take root among an
agricultural population; fOrgcts that he has no
devastated fields, overturned social system, IN
suited prcjudCes, to remind him hourly OF the
war. He is slow to put himself in the South
erner's place, and therefore, to judge him
fairly Slavery was not only property to HIM,
and the basis of his social rank, but entered,
in many instances, kindly and tender ele-
ment into his domestic life.
Yet so long as it existed there was no hope
of any sincere alliance between him and any
free people. The slave was his MASTER bound
him down TO a narrow and destructive line of
policy, debarred him from any road to success
but agriculture, forced on him the opening of
the savo trade, the conquest of Cuba and
Mexico the foundation Of a half-barbarc en-
pire to insure life He was the dwarfed Troll
upon his hearth who, as in the old fables, did
his mcnial work, yet held him bound by
malignant spell apart from his fellows The
keener sighted among our Southern friends
IL
of interest which never existed before
between the South and North. One
of the deputaton in Philadelphia ex-
presses this warmly. "We welcome your
capital into our State" he says; "we will
"make room for your railroads and manufac
tories" Where capital, railroads. and manu-
factories go, good will and brotherly feeling will
soon follow. 1t may require one or two gem
eratiOns to efface the sore remembrance Of
the war from the memory of the better classes,
but the stir of buster life and outdoor air
let in upon them will do it at last and they
will recognize their old kinsfolk, which is in
deed no slight matter For the social and dOmes-
tic relations of the cultured order in nation
are the milestones which show its progress on
the road to civilization; not the tricks Of its
pOlltlClanS, nor INC OuJIdgcS Oh llS hu-hluA
Kans or the thevings of its Rings.
THERE'S, too, peculiar signifcancein in the eager
haste with which the proposal of a Centennial
Celebration has been welcomed in the South.
1t has been like the signal for a golden we'd
ding which will bring the scattered children
back to the old homestead. The Old Thirteen
States have certain memories in common which
can hardly be shared with fervor by the others.
Quarrel as they will, they cannot rid them
selves of the fact that they are brothers by
blood there is the cradle in which they
were rocked; there are the old familiar faces
of Washington, Jefferson, Penn, sacred to
their childhood; there is the bell which rang
out on their birthday the legend of Liberty to
all nations. And when to this impcriShable
bond of old associations is added the homo
gencity of race and interest, what shall divorce
themf Whatever danger to the Union may
hereafter arise from the admission of alien
pOygamous or heathen hOrdes on our borders,
the old States will, we are assured, form
hereafter nucleus of adhesion firm and inn
pregnable.
The sympathes of youth don't get much OF show
over the border There Youthful culpTits taught