The gold leaf. [volume] (Henderson, N.C.) 1881-1911, 1890-08-21
THE old NORTH STATE"
A GRAND DOMAIN, RICH IN NATU-
RESOURCES.

A Native of Michigan Who has Re-
Gently Travelled Over North Carroll
ma, Questions whether Another
State in the Union is POssessedsOf
Equal Natural Resources, for Main
tanning Herself as a Separate and
Exclusive Little Empire.
James Clement Ambrose IN Chicago In
terior.I
My late several weeks of travel in
the "Old North State that is south,
yet not too southern, persuade me that
l was amazingly ignorant as to this
one of our thirteen "original packages" I"
that then represented large north
western class not yet exhausted, and
that ought to make them this dis
closure.
TO day question whether another
State in the Union is possessed Of equal
natural resources, for maintaing herself
as separate and exclusive little en-
pire. Lying halt way between the
lakes and the gulf, with her feet in the
ocean, and stretching westward over
lowland upland and mountain sections,
till her head is bolstered by the Smoky
Mountains 1000 feet up and 500 miles
away, she holds the golden mean of
this temperate zone, and is gifted with
bountiful variety of climate and pro-
ductions by great change in elevations.
And still, shielded west st-northwest by
her private mountains, and the gulf
stream washing her coast, she keeps
mild tempered even at mid winter,
vegetation in parts always growing,
and stock always grazing even in the
mountains at new years. Her soil is
productive of all good things to eat,
drink, wear, and keep warm by, besides
something to chew; and two thirds OF
her $4,000 square miles is still
shadowed by forests of heavy timber.
Her pockets are full of useful minerals,
notably iron, gold and copper. She
enjoys rainfall of forty-fve inches,
has mean summer warmth that is
not mean of IS degrees, and winter
coolness of 49, In the midst of tar,
pitch and turpentine, she revels in good
health. She grows chiefly cotton, corn,
tobacco, wheat, oats, rice and rye.
Her factories handle cotton, wool, to-
bacco, iron, paper furniture and cotton
seed oil. In her fish and oyster beds
sleep millions of tons OF food-enough
for people of brains, and those who
need them. She rides upon 1,1oc
miles of her many streams by steam
craft, and has railways enough to tod
die around comfortably on. So, you
see, she could manage to live alone
a nice old maid-if the rest of the
country gave her the mitten.
Now, let me open my notebook a
little more in detail. Stand on deck
in the mouth of Tar River, ,and looking
seaward to the 8: Banks you cover &
twenty mile breadth OF shadows. Il
is Pamlico Sound at its widest. 1t i:
sixty miles in length, and the county
clerk will show you the chart Of it:
survey into lots, and tie entry of titls
to many blocks of odd shape and size
They are natural oyster beds, artificial
beds, and many still implanted. There
and in adjoining small sounds, art
oyster farms of one million acres anG
at Savannah l lunched on Pamlice
. oysters as robust as if selected in Bal
timore, while shad, herring, bluefsh
Spanish mackerel, ,mullet sturgeon, etc.
: Weld to commerce an annual catch o
5o,ooo,ooo pounds.
Try to 60 ashore and at many point
,, you will wonder, for many miles
, whether you are on land or unde
,, water, so thoroughly on level with
4 the sea does the State begin /; yet por
tions of these lowest bottoms are drain
a able. and others are becoming so b,
Il wider inland cultivation. A few mile
: farther back you are on the seacoas
a terrace of the State, a timber shell
a rising but foot to the mile, railway
u running forty miles without curve, cut
II or fill. 1t is mostly productive sant
|, = loan, the habitat Of the long-leat pine
n cypress, white cedar, live oaks, grape
\ and oteer fruits, as lavish as the Prom
n ised Land. This is one OF the Crane
y patches where grow the early water
melons of commerce, ,and present mean
:. Of transportation seem tired with over
n carriage of the forest products.
Q After about 12o miles in this oil
valley of the deep, you meet rapi'
d ascent to the second plateau. chang
y of climate, soil, surface, vegetation
: and now amid hills and valleys {
various grades, and embrading half tn
n State, you feel more at home. 1t
II something like my native Michigan
n with it villages much like hers, an
( their people as pleasant and industriou
h as "Michiganders" The cultivate
l. lands are devoted to corn, wheat, oat:
buckwheat, sorghum and tobacco, a
= familiar north,as also the redtop mead
, ows and the clovered hills here an
t there. The atmosphere is clear "a httl
n cooler than below, and its partakel
more active. This is the solid sectio
of the State, the territory of principa
" agricultural and manufacturing indus
$ tries. Many Friends made home
n here at an early day, and their habit
"a "a Of thrift have given character to tn
s. community. 1 was amid their bio:
n soming orchards of peach, pear, apple
d apricot and cherry of great size i
the region of Greensboro, while vins
Il yards are numerous, and gardens an
$. neglected fields are laden with all th
small fruits. Many tons of wild berrlt
+ gathered and dried, net comfortabl
fall min money To thousands IF worne