Fisherman & farmer. [volume] (Edenton, N.C.) 1887-19??, 1896-03-27

Reminitions Of Bill Arp.

Bill Arp i'll the Atlanta Consti.
tuition says: That Fitzgerald set
tlement is an episode that is as
unaccountable as it is sudden
Over 5000 people-families OF
pensioned soldiers have drop
ped down upon us without warn,
ing and are building a city in
our pine woods. Their pension
money, it is said, amounts to
nearly a million dollars year,
and their comrades keep coming.
They are said to be good, indus
trious people and sound in wind
and limb and nobody can see
from the outside where the pen
sion business comes in, but never
theless they are drawing the
money and our folks are bound
to get some of it. Six thousand
are on the way and before long
they will own the country and be
voting the Democratic ticket. So
let them come l repeat it sir,
let them come, as Patrick Henry
said. They have settled in the
best portion of Georgia. We
didn't know it till recently. The
pine woods have for half a cen-
tury been under the ban. The
few people who settled there
were considered half-fed, talloW
faced, long-legged crackers who
raised a few poor cattle and
razor back hogs, and lived on
'taters and hard shell religion.
But all that wide belt from Lin
coin through Putnam and Hous
ton and Irwin and Sumpter and
Randolph and On westward Into
Alabama is now known to be a
most fruitful and productive re-
glon, and the climate perfectly
delightful. 1t is like a fairy tale
to read what the last ten years
have developed in that belt of
country that is underlaid with a
clay subsoil and overdressed with
pine forests. In recent years l
have been Watching the fruit in
dustries of Marshallville and
CyClonette and Prison and Cuth-
bert with anlazenent, and de
light, and my information is that
the adjacent country is equally
productive and delightful. The
Georgia Southern railroad splits
this region right in the middle,
and along its line has been plant
ed within ten years, by actual
count, 742 900 fruit trees, cover
ing orchards of I3,4oo acres.
The land devoted to melons is
much more, and besides this the
growers raise corn and cotton
and sugar cane and potatoes and
ground peas enough to sustain
all family expenses-a thing of
beauty and joy forever, and it is
a fascinating feast to the eye to
travel over this line Of road and
take notes Of the beautiful I'M
provenents that meet the eye at
every station. Mr.. Sparks build
ed wiser than he knew when he
was building this road through a
region that everybody said was
de5olatc and always would be.
Dame Nature. is ever unlocking
her treasures and she has only re-
Gently unlocked the pine woods
to our Southern friends. But
Georgia is not the only State tn At
has been found by the refugees
from the long winters and SHOW
clad fields of the icy North. We|
see by the papers that the hegira
has begun from all over that
frozen country, and that Alaba-
ma and Mississippi are rapidly
filling up with prosperous immi-
grants 1t is the swelling tide
that has just begun to overflow
the South and every letter that a
settler writes back to his wintry
home will bring ten more for
these people are surprised to find
that We are kind and hospitable,
and that the barbarians of the
South have moved AWAY