Savannah morning news. [volume] (Savannah) 1868-1887, 1882-09-14
The Prosperity of the South.
Boston Advertiser.

The first day of September is the time
when Southern business begins a new
year. In Georgia they have observed
general thanksgiving, and throughout
the South the newspapers have pub
lished the annual business review of
their respective localities. And where
ever one looks the people of the South
seem to be exceptionally happy and
cheerful. In Texas the people expect
with reasonable confidence that their
State will produce more cotton than does
any other State; they hope to have the
finest railway system of all the Southern
States, and there is good reason for the
belief that before many years. Texas
will have the largest school fund in the
Union. The States along the Missis-
sippi are profoundly happy over the
liberalitv of CONGRESS- and the intelli
gence of the River Commissions il is
firmly believed that hereafter the MISS.
sippi navigation will not suffer from any
obstruction, and that the riparian dis
tricts will he free from disastrous mum
dations. The railway system of the
whole South is expanding wonderfully,
manufacturing is beginning in the most
hopeful manner, coal mines are opened,
iron works are in active operation, and
last but not least-the people of the
South give more attention to business
than to politics. The South looks now
upon crop of unexampled magnitude.
and the economic prospects of the old
slave States are such as to encourage the
hope that for the next twenty years the
South will be what the West has been
during the last twenty years-the great
field attracting capital and rewarding its
operations with great wealth.
The statements are borne out by the
business reports of the South just is
sued. And these reports are the more
impressive because they relate to year
of poor crops generally. If the South
purely agricultural region-could
thrive on a relatively poor crop, what will
it accomplish with full crop of wheat,
corn, cotton, tobacco and farm products
generally? 1t is fairly certain that the
South has harvested nearly or fully all
the wheat which it will consume during
the year just begun. The very modest
estimates of Bradstreets place the
Southern wheat harvest at 48,500,-
600 bushels, besides 16, 1000, 600 bush
els for Kentucky and 10000, 900 for
Missouri; other estimates are much
higher, and no one need be surprised if
the South, excluding Kentucky and
Missouri, should harvest sixty million
bushels of wheat and six hundred mil
lion bushels of corn. Missouri is ex-
pected to have from 21O, 900, 900 to $780,
900, 600 bushels of corn Kentucky will
have about 100000 bushels; Texas
about 1875, 600, 900; Tennessee about &c..
600, 900 bushels. This is an enormous
increase over all previous years, and
similar increase has taken place in all
minor crops, while cotton is expected to
be fully as prolific as ever before. But
it is worth while to indulge in particulars.
Memphis reports for the year ended
August 81, 1882. decided loss in cot
ton; a traffic in cereals three times
larger than the year before, sales of
corn meal aggregsting $4,000 barrels;
and the importation of food stuffs from
the Illinois and upper Mississippi rivers,
thirty barges and two steamers so laden
having arrived during the spring and
early summer months. The Memphis
Appeal thinks that Tennessee has har-
vested enough corn to last two years.
Knoxville, in the same State, had, &C
COluluS W GAC OfSJOItSCSC, NioOO VI
$4, 500, 900 in dry goods, of 81 5000 in
boots and shoes, of $1,000 900 in gro
ceres, Of SO, 900, 900 in hardware and ma
chinery, and of considerable amounts in
coal, IRON and marble. The place has
zinc, car, ice and iron factories, and it
hopes to establish line of iron works
all the way to Chattanooga. Florida
shows the enterprise and progress of a
Northern State. Texas has produced
during the year ended August 81, 1881,
878, S54 bales of cotton, worth $50, 094,-
GAS; grain and hay worth So, 497, 1926;
wool worth So, 129, 919; hides worth
81 ,626, 735; lumber and shingles worth
81, ga, 1923, and in all, according 10 the
Galveston Neaos $97, $50, 45S. But this
covers only the goods sold in the mar
ket; the goods actually produced are
much higher, as they include the arti-
cles consumed by the producer, especial
ly on farms. Accord ng to the Charles
ton Neaos and Courier the principal city
of South Carolina has done business in
the year ended August 81, 1882, amount
ing to $75,000.00O, against $71, 200, 900