The Magnolia gazette. [volume] (Magnolia, Miss.) 1872-current, 1886-07-30
STRAWBERRY FARM.
escription of the Largest One
in the World.
re Mirth and Industry Go Hand In
Hand and There Is No Discrlmi-
nation Between Male and
Female Labor.

1
bland and There Is No Discrimi-
nation Between Male and
Female Labor.
lid you ever see strawberry farmp
strawberry bed nor a strawberry
bh, but farm of three or four hum
Il acres, on which nothing is culti-
tied but strawberries. Not unless
have been to Florida or somewhere |
hg the southern Atlantic coast, and
bn you get as far up as Norfolk, Va,
can not only see great number of
kwberry farms, but one of 440 acres,
fch is the largest of its kind in the
bid, as Norfolk is the greatest straw
fry shipping place in the world. Afar
the delicious odor comes waited,
4 little closer-mind, this is straw
Try time-the glow, the picturesque
rs, the work and fun are unsurpassed.
r nearly all the pickers are negroes,
the negro laughs, sings, shouts and
Il q
by day-for the Norfolk strawberries
b in their prime about the first week
May-and half mile from the straw
Ery fields one can hear the shrill
hghter, the wild cries of the laborers,
e hoarse shouts of the overseers, the
Iunds of music and dancing, as, when
6trapping young fellow or a comely
bsky maiden have got good handful
/ parti-colored tickets, they are pretty
bre to make dash for the rude dane
lg pavilion and engage in a lively
Eeakdown. Coming out of the skirt of
tushwood into the field the scene un-
bids itself. The hot May sunshine
lours down upon hundreds of men,
tomen and children, nearly all black.
The field is divided into long rows and
That appears to be bcdlam is soon
bund to be really wonderful system
II order. Every thing goes by the
Eatch of the strawberry farmer, who
Inows to minute when the gang-plank
lill be hauled in of the big New York
|teamer, putting and steaming in her
lock up the river, her dark hull out
lined clearly against the wharves and
lhipping of Norfolk-who calculates to
second how long it will take the stall
Eart oarsman to pull the heavy light
Frs, laden with strawberry crates high
Rbove their heads, upstream to the
|teamer. He knows, too, that the in
Etant it is flashed over the wires that the
New Jersey berries have touched GER
fain figure he can not ship another
basket, although he may have thousands
bf them filed with the luscious fruit
30, from the day he begins to ship until
the New Jersey berries come in he has
every energy under whip and spur tc
get the berries on the New York steam
er. The negro is not like any othel
laborer on earth. He will not work un
less he is amused. AS in the old SLAYER,
days when harvest time came the mas
ters furnished ice and whisky and had
banjo in the field, and the head man il
the long row with swinging scythes wa
ordered to sing his reaping song loudly
that the others might join in as the gilt
tering blades moved down th
wheat, so the strawberry farmer of to
day has to keep his hands amused o
they will not work. He must allow tn
rough pavilion to be put u
he must let Josh and Yellow Jack an
Sam Jubilee bring their rusty old fiddle
and their bones and banjos on the shak
bench for the musicians; he must let
booth be erected where lemonade an
candy and tobacco can be bought fo
strawberry tickets; he must allow aver
cradle darky with q push-cart to shot
energetically the beauty and luscious
ness of his wares as he trundles his car
around the edge Of the field. The merr,
brown-faced laborers look ragged an
poor, albeit their pockets are stuffe
with tickets-the currency of the straw
berry field-but the pickers always wes
their old clothes in strawberry tim
They have fashy silk frocks and gloss
broadcloth at home, but down on the
knees or sitting squat on the grour
would be death to those sacred ga
ments. The men and some of the won
en- wear big, coarse hats, but amor
the women the antediluvian slat SUI
bonnet is by no means superseded, f,
the colored belle is always careful of h
complexion. Each has a tray holdir
six quart-baskets. When this tray
filled up it is then taken to the payil
booth, where the paymaster, with quar-
boxes full of red and green tickets, I
ceives the baskets and checks them o
Thus, no distinction is made betwe
male and female labor, and the one til
picks the most Strawberries makes t
highest wages. 1t is the rule on t
large farms not to cash any tickets un
after the rush of the strawberry seas
is over, but the ticket is legal tend
for any thing in and about the stra
berry farms.
The laborers are divided into ganl
over each of which is placed an ov,
seer, colored, like the pickers the
selves Sometimes these are surly a
disagreeable. But the African bel
naturally a good tempered creatu
they are oftener very jolly felloy
Nothing is more amusing than @
darky's assumption of authority ov
another darky. If picker is alert a
spry, and particularly if she belongs
the gentler sex, the overseer is patrt
izingly encouraging.