The progressive farmer. [volume] (Winston, N.C.) 1886-1904, 1901-08-06

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slavery he was restrained from all
excess and from all extremes. He
was we'll housed, we'll clothed, and
we'll fed. His health was a matter
of great solicitude; there was too
much money invested to act other
wise and the result was as expected,
robust health, and great resisting
power to the encrOachment of dis
ease. Withdraw all these fostering
surroundings, and place them in their
opposites and we see at one why
such results follow. The sudden
change from an evenly, sober life,
with all the degrading passions and
appetites held in subsection, to one
of license, irregular mode of living,
poor clothing, radical change of
diet, with his passions allowed full
play, no wonder he falls an easy prey
to this disease, whose p~arentage is
our so-called civilization, into which
he has been introduced. In slavery
his diet was corn bread, fat bacon,
m~olasses, COW peas and all the vege-
tables he could carry. Now he de-
spises corn brl ad and substitutes
flour, and prefers beef instead of
bacon, without vegetables, rations
reduced about one-half consequent
ly the vigor of his manhood has ma
terially declined.
From census reports we find some
strange facts. Alabama had in 1880,
10, 200 more females than males
amongst the oolored population. Out
of the total births of the whites in
Mississippi in 1880, there was 675
more males than females. Total
births of the cOlOred race, an Excess
of 56 females. In Louisiana white
males in excess 1S5, colored females
in excess IL. In North Carolina OK,
cess of white males 500, excess of
females in the colored race 1873. In
Florida, the excess of white males
80, excess of colored females 127. So
we find males predominant in the
white race, females in the cOlOred
race. Why this difference The
longevity of the two races is about
the same, more aged females in
either race than males.
We have seen that the negro read
lily succumbs to consumption, and
have given a conclusive reason for
it. But in slavery they we're equally
as susceptible to typhoid fever as
the whites, and it proved fatal in a
greater degree now they T almost
wholly exempt from it. For more
than twenty years l have not seen
a case of it, as it formerly occurred,
yet have had them employed as ser
wants to attend white ase From
the nature of typhoid fever the negro
appears peculiarly suited for the
ravages of this disease but, strange
to say, it passes him by. The exemp
ton cannot be easily accounted for,
as his hygienic surroundings are not
to be compared to what he was &C
customed to when in slavery. Ma
larial affections, rheumatism, diph-
Their, and contagious diseases affect
him about the same as formerly !;
~venereal diseases are tenfold more
common, due TO former lack of re
straint. 1t was comparatively rare
for a negro child to die, or even to
be affected by diseases peculiar to
white children, except the contagious
diseases. never knew n to have
cholera infantum, or commissions !;
but they cannot defect the rice water
stools, and have fits equal to the best
of white children.
I never knew spectacles worn or
needed in the olden time, except by
very old people, but now it is equally
as common with the young colored
dude and dudine, as it is amongst
those from whom they ape the fad.
Advanced civilization does not ap-
pear to carry with it the power to
resist disease, much less is it o
ducive t produce athletes, butrather
the reverse : it produces effeminancy.
This is quite apparent in the increase
of mental diseases. When the negro
population lay just outside the pale
of civilization, an insane negro would
have been considered an anomaly,
and lunacy was almost unheard of in
former times; but since their free
dom it has been grated on as a kind
of aenex, usually pertaining to a