Savannah morning news. [volume] (Savannah) 1868-1887, 1883-07-27

WHAT THE SOUTHERN STATES
HAVE TO SHOW.
/ Facts and Figures-PrOductS of Mines
and Farms-Wealth I'm Fruits and
Vegetables-Her Large Forest Area
Constantly Increasing Transportation
Facilities.
Baltimore San.
The Southern Exposition, which will
! open at Louisville on the 1st of August.
While containing exhibits from all parts
OF the United States, as well as from many
/ Iorelgn countries, will, as its name i'm
! plies, be primarily devoted to displaying
| the resources of the South The sixteen
states stretching from Delaware to Texas
! and from Florida to Missouri, with their
/ 9OO,OOO square miles of surface and nearly
| twenty millions of people, contain almost
one-half of the settled area of the country
and well-nigh two-fifths of its popuIa-
| tIon. Slavery, the war and the poll
cal disorders of the reconstruction period
! all retarded the development of the mag
| nlhcent natural resources of these States.
| Carrying such weights as these, it is no
wonder that the South fell behind in the
| race for wealth, and it is not surprising
that In proportion to Its population it can
| show but two dollars fer every five in the
| North and West; that the average resi-
| dent of Massachusetts is four times as
rich as his cOuntryman in Virginia, and
that, man for man, Ohio can quadruple
! the wealth of Georgia. The bonds that
| have so long restricted the free eXpan-
| sion of the capacities of the South are
! at last broken, and in the past five years
! there has been throughout all its bOr-
! ders a wonderful movement in almost
! every branch of industrial activity. 1t
! knows that it has lost ground to make uD.
and it is earnestly addressing itself to the
task. The cotton exposition at Atlanta in
| 1881 was revelation to the world of the
| power that lay in the new South, and it is
| confidently predicted that the exhibition
about to open at Louisville will have even
more surprises for those who have been
! brought up in the belief that to the south
of Mason and Dixon's line there was a
commercial Nazareth out of which there
could come no good thing.
In any display of resources of the South
its agricultural products and it's agricul-
| tural systems are entitled to the place of
| honor. Nearly twO-thirds of her employed
| population find their bread in the tiliing
| of the fields. In the last census year the
| products of her farms amounted to more
than $3.50, ,000, 900, an average of about forty
dollars for every inhabitant. OF this az
| gregate more than One-third was repre-
sented by the value of the cotton crop. In
the more distinctively cotton States, such
as South Carolina, Mississippi and Texas.
more than half the value of all the pro-
duce of their soil was in cotton. In her
cotton lands the South has a perennial
source of wealth. In cotton she controls
the markets of the world.
No foreign competition has as yet been
able to even seriously threaten her su-
| premacy. While her crop of the great
! GtaDln UnfC larppr and 1aroar WITH IN,
| creasing population here and else
where, her farmers and planters are be-
| ginning to raise in addition many things
which they were formerly in the habit of
buying from their neighbors. Food sup
plies of all sorts are now being raised on
the farms of the progressive men of the
South. In places convenient to means of
rapid transportation landowners are
availing themselves of the advantages of
fered by their more advanced seasons to
raise early fruits and vegetables for the
Northern markets. Every resident of
Baltimore knows that tomatoes, peas, pO-
tatoes, Strawberries and so on make
their appearance in considerable quanti-
ties in our markets some weeks if not
months earlier thai; was the case ten or
! twelve years ago. The industry, now in
its infancy, is capable OF almost indefinite
expansion. The steadily growing city
! populations of the South will continually
| increase their demand for early produce,
and the improvement in the means of
| transportation will reduce the cost of
| bringing the garden truck of Georgia and
! Carolina to the tables of New York and
| Philadelphia. The crowded town that
will spring up around the already form
ing manufacturing centres of the South
will afford an even more certain and
! profitable home market.
In Florida the raising of tropical fruits
| has become an important and extremely
! lucrative industry. So well has it paid
| that unimprOved lands in the orange belt
now command prices that would buy ten
| times the number of acres in any of the
neighboring States. Three years ago the
value of the tropical fruits raised in Flori-
! da was nearly three-quarters of a million,
| and it must since have greatly increased.
! With the extension of railroad facilities
the business must assume still larger
proportions, and it is, perhaps, not too
much to expect that the products of
Florida orchards will drive out of our
markets the foreign fruits, which now
cost us something like eighteen millions
year.
The reduction of the tax on tobacco can
hardly fail to stimulate the cultivation of
that great Southern product. The cattle
raising industries of Texas bid fair to be-
come every day more lucrative and more
valuable. Hostile legislation abroad can
be but temporary. The demands of the
poorer classes in European cities for flesh
food must in the end prove too strong for
the prOtectionist interest of the agricultu-
raj population. The wool product of
Texas has increased more than fivefold in
the last ten years, and between 1870 and
1880 the wool clip of the South had ad-
vanced from 100000 pounds to more
than 30,000,0O0.
1t would be useless to 90 through the
long line of the products of Southern farm
labor and dwell upon their present cOndi-
tiOn and their future prospects. But there
are some changes in the general system
of agriculture that call for passing men,
ton. Wherever close cultivation and
varied crops will pay, the best results are
likely to be gained on small tracts of land
worked by their owners or renters, and
| the great increase in the number of the
! farms of the South, and the accompany-
/ ing decrease in their acreage, are among
the most promising features in the present
condition of that section. The 760, 600
| Southern farms Of 1860 had become
| 1,740,000 in number in 1880. while their
average size had fallen from $40 acres to
| 154. A large part of the old Southern
farm, as a rule, remained uncultivated /:
! in this respect there has been a decided
advance, the proportion of improved land
in farms having risen from 30 per cent. in
1860 to 81 per cent. in 1880. Further i'm
provement s.still necessary to put the two
sections of the country upon an equal
footing, as in the North the improved land
| forms 66 per cent. of the farms,
The completeness with which farm Is
equipped with proper implements and
| machinery has much to do with the prof
its realized. The South is making rapid
progress in this direction, the value of
machinery in proportion to the number
of acres in farms having increased nearly
% per cent. IN the last decade, though it
is still behind seme other parts OF the
Union, n The greater use of machinery in
the North enables the same number of
men to raise more valuable crops.
Thus, though the South has 4.O6O.-
900 of people employed in agri=
culture and all the rest of
the country has but 3,500,0O0, the annual
value of the products of the former was
only S7f0, 100000, as against S., ,450, 900. 900
raised by the other section; or in other
words, while in the North every person
engaged in agriculture raised on an aver
age $414 worth of various crops, ia the
South a mans labor only produced some
Sl9O: On the other hand, it must be re-
membered that the average monthly
wages in the South for farm labor, where
the hand finds himself, is but SIG, against
$26 in the Northern States.
Gradually the most serious remaining
I,sors bnn f0 hO - O., -