The Savannah morning news., 1903-07-27

AfzssS~
sharpcns tools and feeds team; the
tenant feeds himself and gives one
half of his crop for the use of team,
tools and land. Fourth, is lease. That
is when the land has been deadened
and is ready to be put in cultivation,
the land owner will give from three to
five years free of rent to get it put in
cultivation, the lessee to furnish his
team and tools and agree to put in
twenty acres to the house, the land
owner TO build the house and drive a
pump. AS only about one-quarter of
the negroes own their team, we have
to rent them mules when they want to
work a lease on the fourth or rent for
cotton. Some planters rent for money,
others for cotton. AS a rule, $50 pounds
of lint cotton is the rent. A rented
mule will live from three to five years,
so you do not make much interest on
your money renting mules to negroes;
only one in a great number will feed
a mule, and they will pillow him all day
and ride fifteen or twenty miles al
night to some church or saloon, and
then wonder why the mule will not
stay fat. We have two kinds of land
here, black loan and buckshot. The
former is very easy to work and is
very productive. often making 800
pounds of lint cotton per acre, and will
make from twenty-five or seventy-flVe
bushels of corn per acre, according to
the weather and amount of work IL
gets. After working II twenty or
twenty-five years in cotton without
changing to corn, it gets thin and will
not make over 300 pounds of lint cot
ton per acre. Plant it in cowpeas one
year, or in corn and peas, and you
have the new land again; it seldom
takes the second crop of peas to make
it as good as any new land; in fact,
on most of it, if you will put three
good mules to a pillow and break IL
deep, you will not need the peas. One
man can work about ten acres of this
land in cotton, but most negroes have
a wife and some children to help, and
work from fifteen to twenty-five acres;
one mule can work twenty-five acres
very easily when properly fed. AS a
rule, twenty acres to the family, four
in corn and sixteen in cotton; he will
make from twelve to eighteen bales
and our bales average about 900
pounds.
Most crops of cotton have to be
plowed about four times and hoed
about three times; sometimes not so
much and some years more, A good
hoe hand can hoe one to one and
work. This is the easiest part of the
business. and the simplest, as the only
object in working cotton is to keep
it clean and a little loose dirt around
the roots without skinning the plants.
1t is hard to get the negroes to thin 1t
out right; one stalk is a hill and from
eighteen to tWenty-four inches apart
Is about right on thin land. The rows
should be about thirty-six inches but
,~sol lo, oil
four 20 six feet is close enough try TO
fix mine so the cotton limbs will lap
in middles when it gets five feet high.
or as near that as possible, go 1t will
not blow over and rot so badly. We
lay our cotton by in July, and some
years 1t is August. Then the men cut
cordwood to run the gin with; about
one cord 20 three bales of cotton is
the rule with some thrown in for fear
of being short of wood in winter. 1t
is time to go to picking cotton by the
time your wood is cut, and that is
when the trouble begins. Every man.
woman and child that is able to go to
the field picks cotton. 1t is nice,
clean, light work. but so monotonous,
and it is hard TO get the negroes to
do what they can at it, They will Of
ten run off and leave their crops in
the field, even when they would make
500 or 5000 clear if they picked it,.
Then the planter has to hire that crop
picked. Pay from so to 60 cents per
100 in the seed for picking; a good
picker can pick from 200 to $50 pounds
in a day, so the cotton pickers get a
good per cent of that crop. We fur
niSh the negroes their supplies at
credit prices and make a good profit
on our goods, so at the end of the year
we try to have our rents clear; some
times we fail and sometimes we make
more, according to the price of cotton
and the year. That is, if 1t is a short
crop year or a big one. But we never
get to be millionaires, and none go to
the poorhouse. And 1 win say that l
do not know farmer in the county
that cannot order by letter or tele-
phone from $500 to $4,000 worth of
goods from Vicksburg or Memphis and
get them on thirty or even ninety days
IL he wants It, Most of the planters
here work from one-third to one-half
of their lands; the rest is in woods and
is being gradually cleared up and put
in cultivation. Open land is worth
| from $40 to $50 per acre, ad woodland
from SIS to $40. according to location
and the kind Of timber there is on 1t.
The steamboats, do all of the freight
handling along the river, and the Y.
! NJ. " r. r. is only nine or ten miles
! back of the river. l never saw MAJ
nure spreader. and never will In this
county. Peas do the work here, and
we get most of the vines for hay Hogs
do wen here with but little feed ex-
cept what they get in the woods. Cat
| tie stay fat on Bermuda grass in
| spring and summer and in the cane
brakes in winter Never house or feed
them Our farms are from 1000 to
| 3 600 acres and often are 5000 acres