The Opelousas journal. [volume] (Opelousas, La.) 1868-1878, 1873-01-11

prevail over III. lISIc liz IL, LiC SuA1C II
numbers, sinew and corporal force. 1t
is not the problem of the South what to
do with him, but what he shall do with
himself. The first necessity lies with
the white MAJ to set the example OF
personal labor. A tone of universal
querulousness, which is a symptom of
the want of ahealthy nature, is heard all
over the South on the subject of the
darby.
"Ican't keep a pig, nora chicken, nor
anything else to eat Oh my place. said
an unusually robust Georgian to me.
"The negroes take everything that We
have"
AS I had heard a similar remark made
several hundred times, thought would
ask this much plundered man more min
utely about it.
"HOw many pigsdoyOu raiSe?" said |.
"Nigh on to two hundred"
GLOW many do the negroes steal?"
eve miss nigh on to twenty hogs"
One is tempted to wish that the ne
grOes had got even a larger allowance of
pork, Judging from the quantity that is
set on the tables at the railroad stations
and hotels in the Gulf States. Boiled
hog and hard water seemed to be per
pctually before me as | rode from the
| ClroIinas to the Gulf. The water of
itself had an inevitable stomach ache in
it, which the hog Wassurc tOprecipitate.
There is no doubt that the negro is Il
formidable raider upon poultry and pigs,
but this is one Of the results OF too much
land and 4 universal antipatlIy among
the whites to putting up fences.
"It would be political haniSlImcnt,"
said Gov. Smith. OF Georgia, for any
public man to agitate for a fence and
stock law in this State. The land lies
open and the stock run loose, so thatthc
darkY is always close to temptation"
The passion to
KEEP IMMENSE TRACTS or LAND
is more of a mistake in the South; it is
nearly a vice, because it tightcns and
hardcns the social impulses, and it will
inevitably carry tens Of thousands of
people to the poor house. ! was gun
ming a few weeks ago at Shipping Point,
on the NirginiasidG of the Potomac, and
Il man told me that it had been the pur-
pose of some land agents to buy 81, 200
acres in thatneighb0rhOOda at the request
Of the expelled Alsatians. Fifteen thOus-
and acres had been obtained, when the
large Virginia land owners round about
made a combination tOkeep thefOreign-
erS out.
"Wc don't want thcmhcrc," idthcse
gentry, to be cultivating the ground in
little patches and controlling all the Of
fees"
1t is hard to believe that such q story
can be true of men of ordinary human
sagacity. Many of the Southern States
have sent agents to Europe to induce
emigration, but | found the crudest no.
tons prevailing i'll the South as to the
whole scope and nature of immigration.
Most of the people conceive the immi-
grant to be some kind of a beast, who
will be q substitute of the negro and
work not for himself but for thcm-the
old residents. 1t is unnecessary to say
that no such man exists whose services
will he worth the price of his passage
money. There is a provincial prejudice
in the South against newcomers who
would exercise any influence, and a man
is called a stranger in the South whOhas
lived there twenty years. A healthy and
continuous emigration is never led by
brutCs, but by men of faculties and au-
dacity, who go ahead and their cOnstitu-
ency follows. Kentucky was unanim-
Ously settled by lawyers from Virginia,
North Carolina and Pennsylvania, and so
much litigation followed in consequence
that the whole State was plastered three
deepwith cOnt1ictingtitles. Of the same
class is the present immigration to Tex
Us, which is the only healthy tide of
movement in the whole South. If the
Texas people were to turn back every
lawyer and politician they would merely
he repeating what the people from Vir-
ginia to Louisiana dOnOw with Northern
men. The social clOsenessOf old society
inevitably drives every Northern man,
though of the hest intentions, right into
carpet-baggers' hands. Who cares to
immigrate into a region where his wife
is not called upon and where the ever
lasting and remOrsGleSs topics of the
hour are politics and the negro. A gen
tlemm in Atlanta said to me
"OUE WOMEN
+ have carried their feelings too far, and
we have lost many a good man who
might have acted with lis and spent his
money amongst lis because we gave
him nc social encouragement.
have often felt a desire to take such a
, man up to my house, but [ am deferred
by the fear that my daughters might
offend him."
To a great degree the fact is true that
, Northern women getnO hospitality at all
=, in the Gulf States. The Northern set
tier can have daily dealings in business
and confab with the men of the place
: but at the coming of night curtains ARE
drawn and the settler feels that he is
, still Il stranger. | felt a sadness to see
, these surly conditions amongst people
who might do each other good, and tC
hearthe constantremark North,
ern men of "The South will never come
, to anything until the old generation
dies off" while the SOutherner is equal.
, ly certain that the only solution will be
I'd to eXpel the carpet-baggers and remove
+ the negroes back to Africa. The mos
} GIGANTIC PIECE o STUPIDITY
which any people ever entertained il
that of the Colonization Society to re
, move the only labor and the most con.
sOnant labor out of the South after j
has been brought there at frightful ex
: pense and trained and civilized, merely
L to carry out q political prejudice, with
t out a particle of moral science or pub
L that there is no real discOrd between
{ the native whites and blacks by tn
fact that the Democratic Legislature o
? Alabama prefers and proposes to cleo
I a negro to the United States Senate t,
I, defeat Parsons or Spenser, ParsOn
has lived thirty-twO years in Alabama
5 and would be an honor to the State il
the Senate, yet he is still called q Yam
U kee. Spenser is a genuine carpet-bag
: ger, hut he is a man of amiable nature
and the amount of hate which is turnet
upon him il out of proportion to hi
offfensiveness. Still, when q Democrat
ic Legislature votes sOlidlyfOr d negr,
to go to the Senate it may be inferred
i thattO eat crow has got to he q luxury
One is everywhere struck in the Soutl
with the courteous and gentle nature
of many of the native people, and it i