The Louisiana Democrat. [volume] (Alexandria, La.) 1845-1918, 1890-10-08
RApIDEs PARISH.

One of the most serious drawbacks to
the prosperity of this and many another
parish in the state is the large size of the
plantations. With neighbors mile or
more apart, there necessarily result bad
roads, petty and almost inaccessible post
offices, small churches, monthly or BIZ
monthly services, little real pastoral la
Dor, meagre facilities for education. a
lack of all those social pleasures and re-
finement which thickly settled neigh
borhood affords, u: d !, soil not half cult
waited.
The first grand need of these parishes is
to cut up their farms, double OF quadruple
their population, and thus get people
closer together. An hundred acres, max
ing full allowance for wood lot and pas
turage, can by jndicions and intensive
culture be made to produce moro than
five hundred produce under the present
slip-shod system of farming. To accom-
plish this it is of paramount Importance
-hither essential, IN fact, to draw intelli-
gent, Industrious and hardy settlers from
any quarter where they may be had.
1t is fact too plain for argument that
under the present system planters and, in
consequence, every other class are becom-
ing poorer and poorer year by year. A
change, and that speedily, is demanded
We are aware that there are many large
land holders who own little else; who ar
que that if they sell the bulk of their lands
at low prices and Oh long times they will
not have the means of living. But ample
experience should by this time have taught
them the folly of attempting to prosper
by holding on to their lands with the
hope, which each recurring year proves to
have been delusive, that its cultivation
by freedmen on wages OF for a share in
the crop will secure them fair living,
much less a competency. The fact might
as well be faced, that this section can
never be developed to the extent Of any
thing like its capacity by negro labor. In
isolated cases a planter may accumulate
some means over actual expenses by the
labor of thirty, forty, or sixty hands, bnt
can any country prosper under such con.
ditions as thesei Clearly not.
Now is propitious time to secure white
immigration. Agricultural interests in
the West have been and are in languisfl-
ing condition, and at the West and North
thousands of young men, and men with
families as we'll, who have been brought
up OH farms and Injured to outdoor labor,
have been forced to abandon the country,
and crowd into the cities. And this, by
the way, may account for the anomaly
that cities there arc being knilt up at a
surprising rate while the farms are neg
iected, if not actually deserted. And the
question may here arse, can there lie per-
manency in the prosperity of the former
which can only be sustained by that Of
the latter9
Be that as it may, if proper effort were
made; if these home-seekers could be
brought to know the advantages of the
soil and climate Of this favored section,
there is no question but they would seek
it. Under the vivifying effect of such
cultivation as this class would bestow
Rapides parish would be made the garden
spot of the world. This is no exaggerated
panegyric, but sober fact which intelli-
gent investigation could not fail to verify.
There is scarcely thing necessary to the
wants of man that he connot here grow
and produce by a proper. distribution of
his crops. Ho can raise all he requires
for his table, for the support of his stock
and for the purchase of the comforts and
clegancies of life. The grains Of the
North grow side by side with sugar, rice
and cotton; the peach of New Jersey and
Delaware fourishes along side of the fig
and the apricot: the pear and the straw
berry grow to perfection. 1t is land OF
fruit and of flowers; the rare and costly
exotic of the North bloom and thrive i'll
utmost profusion with but small care,
and lend charm to the humble home or
the prnce]y residence. In brief, there is
no spot on earth upon which nature has
showered her favors with so lavish hand.
Have not Gould and Huntington and
the Queen and Crescent management been
remiss in not making creator efforts to Sc.
cure white immigration into the country
intersected by their lines of road, the de-
velopment of which would add so largely
to the value of their properties' The peo-
pie themselves are too poor to do much in
that direction, so it must largely devolvc
upon the railroads, which, indeed, would
be benefited as much as, nay, more than
the present occupants of the land.
-[Alexandria Daily Times.