The Louisiana Democrat. [volume] (Alexandria, La.) 1845-1918, 1897-08-04
BILL ARP'S WEEKLY LETTER
BARTOW,S PHILOSOPHER STATES
BETTER TIMES ARE COMING.
PATIENCE is A GOOD MEDICINE.
Time Discounts Doctors or Politicians In
Bringing All Things Around hight
Side Up.
ssVotohmon tell liz of the NIGHT"

father time is q good doctor. be-
lieve that he is about to cure the coun-
try of hard times. Certain it is that
neither politicians nor legislation has
done any good. The disease was not
even diagnosed. but the patient is get
ting well. Neither Cleveland nor anti
Cleveland nor Mckinley nor the tariff
nor PopuIism has had anything to do
with it. Time is the medicine, and
when time cures patient he stays
cured good, long period. l had rheu-
matism several years, and the doctors
worked on me until they got tired and
quit, but old Doctor Time came
along, and after o while the rheuma-
tism just quit me and went away OF Its
own accord. For six years we have all
been cussin' and fussin and discuss
in about the disease that afflicted the
country. Every politician had rem
envy, but somehow the people have
lost confidence in our so-called states
men and their medicine won't stay on
the stomach. A tirst-class politician
can argue the leg off m iron pot or
the spots off leopard. I heard Aleck
Stephens make great speech away
back in the 40's and he proved that
the.Democratic party was responsible
for all the calamities that had befallen
the country for twenty years, even to
the high price Of coffee and the low
price of cotton and the yellow fever
in Savannah.
I was Illuminating about this because
I have been travelling around good
deal of late, and if the times are not
better then all signs deceive me. Farm
ing is claimed to be the foundation OF
all prosperity-the mudsills of the
building-and if SO, then I know the
times are improving, for the diligent
farmer is prospecting everywhere in the
sunny south outside of floods and
cyclones. The crops in South Carroll
ma are well advanced and promising.
Harvest is at hand in north Georgia
and Tennessee, and was never better.
Everything the farmer grows COM
mands fair price, and everything he
has to buy is cheap. The price of
wheat and corn and hay is better than
it was from 1880 to 1S90-wheat at 81
per bushel, hay at 81 hundred, corn
at so cents, sweet potatoes at rs cents,
Irish potatoes at so, chickens from Is
to 20 cents, and wood at SIS a cord.
What is the matter with the farmer?
Suppose his cotton is down to 7 cents,
he can make money on it at that. A
man at Union, S. G., told me he made
last year 500 bales on 800 acres, and
cleared $4,000. How is that? When
I was young merchant cotton aver
aged about 8 cents pound; corn 40
cents bushel; wheat rs cents, pota-
toes Is, wood 81 q cord. Shifting and
calico were 12a cents yard, sugar
and coffee 12A cents pound. Iron
was cents, and steel Is cents and
nails s cents. Now all these things
except coffee are half price, and all
that the farmer grows for sale is %
per cent higher, except cotton. But
still he is not happy, Up north, Of
course, it is different, for it takes all
they make in six months summer to
support them the six winter months.
I am sorry for those people, that is
for all the clever ones, and wish they
could sell out to the fanatics and fools
and come down here to this blessed
land Their laboring class who have
no land and work about for wages say
they are not coming, for they can get
$50 month up there and we pay oul
negroes only $40. That's so. That:
the way it is put down in the las
census. But the census don't tell how
the farm laborer up there is only
wanted three months and the othe1
nine he jobs it around for little or moth
ing, and it takes his last nickel to KEEP
from freezing to death. And the cen
sus don't tell how our negro laborerl
on the farms get their wages all the
year round and get comfortable cabi1
rent free and have no firewood to bu.
and every family has garden and the.
raise chickens and eggs and pig o.
two and have scraps enough from thei
table to support two hound dogs and ,
! flee. Besides all this, they bait hole
! in the creek and catch suckers by nigh
: and hunt rabbits on Sunday
Talk about orr cheap labor. Their
isn't respectable negro man in Bar
tow county who isn't better off an
happier than the average farm lahore
at the north. That is one good thin
the negro has done for the south. II
has inundated the northern scurf an
the foreign scurf and kept them away
| saw in the columns of The Constitr
ton not long ago statement in figure
that was taken from Boston paPs
showing that since 1S90-th foreig
population, inclusive Of their childre
born since their arrival, has increase
g per cent in New England, while til
natives have increased bnt per Gel
in all that time. The exact figure
were given. Isn't that awful? Ne,
England had just as well give up thei
time-honored and historic country re
n llgion and all to these foreigners.
). When L was in Nashville the othe
y day looked with pride at the exhibit
OF our southern industry that greete
. ME everywhere. In former letter
made special mention of the magnif
cent display of the Nashville and Cha1
tanooga railroad; that includes th
Western and Atlantic railroad of ,ou
state. But our other southern road