The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1894-03-07
Whittier are We Tending.
From the Spartanb,.rg Spart1n.

uCTe Is u qucoGIoH oi1do oiioAAA va
gage the attention of every one one,
who have the interests of prosperlng
at heart. Our State is on the decline,
swift and sure; and even now if we
could turn, it would be many years
before our country will be what it was
some years ago. We will not see the
woes of it, but it will fall with terri
BILE consequences on the next genera
tion, and if we could realize now what
it will be, we would be willing to con-
slider it more circumspectly than we
now do. We need not be Gladstone
or Grady to understand this ques-
tion. Everyone, from the learned D,
D. to the thinking ploughboy, if he
has given it a moments considera-
ton, sees it, and knows that unless
some remedy is applied soon, the
consequences will be fearful. But
selfshness and not altogether igno-
rance is causing all the classes to blind
their eyes to the true condition of at
fairs.
Our meaning is that the country is
being dcpopulatcd to build up the
towns and cities; and although it may
be a seeming benefit to the latter at
the onset, yet when reaction sets in,
the depressing effect upon both will
be mutual. There is restless desire
in our country for a new life and new
surroundings and it is not healthy for
even the government or the domestic
circle. The farm houses, that were
the pride of and an honor to our fore
fathers, are now wreck to what they
once were. The yards that once could
boast of magnolias and flowers OF ev'
cry shade and hue are unkempt and
unpaled. The lands that they ter
raced so carefully, with such honest
pride and good husbandry, are now
| unproductiye and no more are abun,
dant crops harvested from them.
Some of the incest houses in Spartan
burg and Union a,e almost without o
roof and look as if they never knew
paint.
It used to be the pride Of the father
| to give his children each little farm
and settle them around him in his old
age. He would meet with his neigh
bors often and discuss farming and
stock while his wife would entertain
her visitors with receipts for wines
| and iellies. But now the father
teaches his boy that to succeed he
| must up and away to the already
crowded town and secure q clerkshiI
at no matter what price. The fault is
not altogether with the men, for not
long ago the wife of a man who start
ed on nothing and who now is in com,
Portable surroundings was heard to re-
| mark that if they had gone to town in
their young days that they now WOULD
have been wealthy. The spirit dis
played by this wife is prevalent to a
greater extent than one would suppose.
People in the country seem to think
that because one or two men became
Independent in town, that all may dc
the same. They don't seem to think
if the energy displayed by these men
were displayed by them on the farm,
that they too would be independent
now, instead of paying high house
rent in town all for the sake of being
city folks. "They pay dear for their
| whistles" He lives hard and all his
hard earnings go to enrich his older
neighbors, the city butchers and the
grocerymen, while his little farm is be-
| ing rented for little more than is ne,
cessary to pay taxes.
All the men who own farms are
leaving them for the town, and where
they are willing to accept almost any
price for their services to help exc out
their income. Is this right minded
competition?
The farmers inheritance, which he
should hold as a sacred trust, the tai
ent that he should cherish and increase
is growing up in gullies and being
ovcrspread with briars and brambles'
But is this all? Suppose he manages
to hold his farm and returns to it after
10 or 12 years. What has he to give
them 100 acres of land, washed away
and broken, houseless and harmless
Can his sons farm? No. They know
nothing about it, if they were so in
clined.
They are willing, they say, to go to
town and live hard; but ask them if
they were ever willing to subscribe
s1OO for the education of their own
and their neighbors children. Veri-
ly the poor are becoming poorer and
the rich are becoming richer. They
want teachers for two or three hun
cred year. In nearly every section
of the country there is material and
money enough for fine country
school. Some schools that s, me years
ago paid teachers 5000, are now running
the public school three months on
$3.50, irrespective Of grade or quail
fcations.
The people who remain on the farms
will be the worst class of white ten
ants and negroes who have no stamina
of manhood or patriotism about them
They will control the ballot boxes and
lawlessness will be everywhere. All
cannot live without the farm. 1t