The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1890-07-31
teen hands employed by the month.

they have great houses, to use tie qIr.
ginia term, to live in. The negroeshave
to be looked after constantly, but gang
cfnegrocs at Is cepts day, with . white
foreman, arc much cheaper laborers, Dir.
Ballentine says, than the same number
ofwhite meu at New York prices, for
farm help.
KS to the CLIMATE, itneed only be noted
that this is the sunny South, and that
The sun is tempered by the ac: and the
bay. The climate is such that If the
Wild western boomers could only yet
hold of it the vocabulary as laid down in
modern dictionaries would be insufficient
to sound its praise.
The crops of this region reali brought
to the piers in Norfolk, for even those
bound North by the railroad must cross
the bay in 8 steamer. Mr.. Balentine
carries his tc the piers in the market
wagons, but hundreds Of farmers On the
western shore of the bay use sloops of
about the size of the oyster slocps OF
New York harbor. When the great
steamers lie on one side of the pier aud
fleet of little sloops on the other, the
scene is one of intense animation, and
the aounds are beyond description. The
pier shed becomes q bedlsm, pco.
pied with acurvy black imps, and re.
sounding with such cries and yells and
shouts and songs and laughter as can be
heard nowhere else. Barrels and crates
are tossed up from the sloops by the
negro crews, grabbed by the negro roust.
abouts, and carried on the run across the
pier ard tossed through ports in the
black sides OF the ship to negro deck
bands in waiting, who instantly disap-
pear in what seems yawniDg cavern.
by 6 o'clock the ship is ded-often
crammed so full of The stuff that only
the spaces reserved for working tae
machinery remain empty between decks.
With that the darkies on the mosquito
fleet rush for the halliards and get on jib
and meinseil and cast off the lines that
hold them to the pier, and away they 60,
by the score, in such race down the
river as would stir the soul of the most
ennuied spectator. No more enthusias.
tic or capable sailors of sloops than these
darkies can be found, and with their
sweethearts perched on the little cabins
to urge them on, the negro pilots send
their little yachts driving down or beat.
ing up to windward, with relish for
victory and disregard for the rights
OF competition that are stunning to be-
hold.
Leaving Norfolk after an examination
OF the truck farmers the Northern agri.
culturist should go to Durham or to Ok.
ford, North Carolina, and look at the
tobacco plantations. 1t is in the regions
roundabout those towns that the very
finest tobacco in the world is grown.
North Carolina has few gold mines,
and on certain occasion last fall down
in Montgomery County, pocket vas
found in the placer diggins on Tebe
Saunders's farm than panned out $780,
900 in week. But Tebe Saunders is
nowhere in luck compared with the man
who owns and knows how to cultivate q
stretch ofthe white sand of Durham or
Granville Counties.
For instance, there is Farmer f. r..
Kuott, who lives near Oxford. Farmer
X. came out of the war without cent.
and what was worse he had no education.
But he was shrewd man in one respect,
and he is now able to draw check for
$100O00. He got hold of some of the
GRANVILLE sand, and began to raise
tobacco. For time the !obacco he and
others of the section raised was market.
ed st a very small profit. It went to
Richmond, and it was of the light golden
yellow, not then very we'll known as in
great demand in the market. But it was
as fine as silk-literally as fine as silk
and it made demand that is now world
wide. The market has shifted to the
towns in the section where it grows, and
railroads have been built to transport the
crop. On the market day the planters
bring in tbs stuff by the hogshead and
roll it of the wagons to wide floors to
warehouses built for the purpose. The
hogsheads are opened, the tobacco dump.
ed out and assorted, and an auctioneer
gets up and wants TO know how much he
is offered, and buyers from New York
and all other manufacturing centres tuna-
bic over each other in their anxiety 20
answer the question. Forty cents q
pound is Q common price for the leaf,
and seventy is often reached for choice
lots. Last year Mr.. Knott had some
choice lots and so many Of them that he
cleared $500 an acre from ten acres.
There we're several other planters in
Granville County who did as we'll, while
plenty of them made 5000 an acre
the top profit made by Mr.. Ballentire
on his choice lot of spinach on his truck
farm near Norfolk.
The tobacco crop requires intelligent
csre, but there is no Yankee farmer worth
forkfnl of daisies who couldn't learn 10
grow the crop in one season. The seed
is aown in specially prepared bed in
February. The plants are transplanted
to the field in May. From $500 to 4,SC0
plants are put on an acre, and darby,
who costs the planter about S14 month
all told, keeps two and half acres in
prime order if he is looked after properly.
The yield is from 700 to 1000 pounds
an acre, and the money for it should Re
in the planters pocket within ninety
days from the day the plants were set
out, after which he can go fishing or
zee his poor or rich relation or do any.
thing else that pleases him.
If, after looking over such farms and
such profits as are actually made here,
the man who has been fighting potato
bugs about the headwaters of the Hudson
or dosing the hog cholera in the Missis-
sippi valley or willing under the hot
winds OF the Western country doesn't
think there is money in some kinds OF
farming be is a curious sort of farmer.
Not all farms nor all planters make such
profits, but there are grades in farms and
farmers in the North as we'll as IN the
South.
Probably the first thing Northern
farmer would ask about these Southern
lands is the price Around Norfolk
farms that are we'll located cost $500 an
acre. That will buy a farm of good
truck land with good buildings, and if
properly managed it would yield SlO0
an acre in profits.
The best kind of farms for tobacco
culture in the golden tobacco belt are to
be had at S25 an acre. This price is for
land which should yield, under proper
cultivation, from four to ten times its
cost in profits every year depending on
the weather at certain stages Of the
growth Of the CROP and in rare cases
$500 an acre. The buildings are of q
kind That would not meet the approval
ofa thrifty Yankee, nor would the condl-
ton of the fences please him. But the
land is all right for tobacco.