Orleans County monitor. [volume] (Barton, Vt.) 1872-1953, 1875-08-30


bors. Anathemas long and loud are
pronounced, and much wind expended
telling how ''we will show them how to
farm, we will"; ''Catch weasel asleep
when you catch us going on this way"
They worry and hurry and drive, ear
ly and late; plow deep and harrow fine;
cultivate and irrigate, fertilize and sub
soil they do this with any amount of
vim for the first year, possibly a little
longer. AS time wags on we notice they
don't seem quite so enthusiastic; they
have less to say and, apparently, less to
do; they find even Nature is slower
and more deliberate about her labors
than they dreamed she could be. The
corn comes, surely, ''first the blade, then
the ear, and then the full corn in the
ar;" but it doesn't leap from blade to
full corn, large enoug n to roast, in a
day nor week; there is plenty of time
before the frost comes it can hang on
until Christmas so what's the use of
worrying it's self into fever about it
And so these northern men, finding that
laboring under a sultry, cloudless south
ern sky, from April until November, is
quite another thing than the farm-work
in Vermont, during the few months that
Jack Frost lets up his grip, learn a les
son from Dame Nature, and soon take
things almost as leisurely as those ma
tive and to the manor born.
The road we are traversing runs thro'
level, wooded region, along which are
scattered few well cultivated planta-
tions, and others whose owners fighting
steadily the new order of things, let
their acres lie idle rather than yield to
the inevitable. A little patch of corn,
field of cabbages, thirty or forty hogs
which hunt their living for themselves
these will keep the soul and body to-
gether and give this lord of creation op-
portunity to grumble out the balance of
his days, which, for humanity's sake, 1
pray may be few upon the land which
the sweat of the poor slaves brow earn
ed for him.
Negro cabins abound, some with a
few acres attached, bought "since the
surrender" with the savings from the
ten dollars earned each month during
the season others with only the garden
patch, while the occupants, male and fe-
male, work for Massa who owns ''de big
house ober yonder on de high road"
At the small way stations usually a
cluster of houses are gathered, with the
county store, post-office, numerous bar
rooms, and sometimes church. 0ftenel
the church will be found alone in some
beautiful grove, where rude seats be,
meath the trees do duty when an out
door meeting is held, while various
''blocks" are scattered about from which
the ladies mount their horses.
These country churches have for me 6
charm never found in the stately, granC
edifces found in cities. The service ii
always simple, unaffected, and though
the sermons are usually free from al
rhetorical flourish, they are sometime
sweeter and better in their influence
than more finished discourses. Som'
queer old customs remain IN these quie
places-one is evidently an Out-growtl
of the teachings of st. Paul. The wo
men believe it to be shame for then
to partake of the communion with un
covered faces, and so veil on veil is of
ten put over the bonnet and face. unit
it is difficult to tell where the head be
gins and the wells leave off.
We crossed the path of the recen
tornado, which brought instant death t
so many and robbed others of everything
wind, water and hail could destroy
Huge trees were lifted from their bed
and hurled a long distance, fences cal
ried beyond all hopes of recovery. an
everything turned upside down generally
Lexington, seventy-two miles north c
Augusta, is the largest town we passe
before reaching Columbia. 1t has som
sixteen hundred inhabitants and is quit
nice place; but like all southern villa
ges its porches and cellar doors occup
large space on the sidewalks, and al
as much in the way of the noses an
sore toes of pedestrians at night as tho'
in other places. But one gets accuston
ed to those trifes in time
The city of Columbia, the capital
the Old South State, is situated on Il
bluffs of the Congaree, not many mil
from the falls of that river, over whiC
poets tear their hair and string rhymir
words together.
Columbia used to rank as one of Il
loveliest, as well as one of the most a
I
| istocratic cities of the south, and nc
its natural charms could hardly be e
celleG but war made sad havoc and le
! a fearful trail. Eighty squares of bull
ings were burned to ashes in Februar
, 1865. Atlanta, Georgia. suffered in t
0 same way, but after the war ended the
t was large influx of northern ener
and capital which brought the city U
o and it is now far ahead of the Allan