Keowee courier. [volume] (Pickens Court House, S.C.) 1849-current, 1906-11-28

III I~----~~- w tAoAP uhy hOeh0A oOAs
lect money for my brothers. debts.
When | had leisure / read English
poetry and fiction.
81 went TO millpond one day
with number of companions and
remained in the water for three
hours. While walking home in the
hot sun l felt a pain in my left eye.
suppose l was run down by hard
work at school and by the want of
wholesome and nutritious food. My
eye, becoming worse, physician
was called. He said i had erysipe-
las. I suffered awfully, and finally
my mother sent to Augusta, thirteen
miles distant, for the doctor whom
we always consulted in serious cases.
He confirmed the diagnosis of the
other doctor. Well, in ten days,
perhaps, my eye burst. Then it was
found that / had fibroid tunor, the
growth OF which had caused me such
intense agony and destroyed Iny eye.
81 was i'll long time. The war
came to an end, but l had taken no
part in it. I helped my mother in
the management of her affairs, and
then bought a plantation in Florida.
But my health was not good in that
region, labor was dear and scarce,
and / moved back to South Carolina.
My mother gave each of her children
farm, and by her gift l came into
the ownership of 400 acres of land"
"You were planter until you
were 80 years old, and until then
you had taken no part in public mat
ters?"
rs A FARMER YET.
eyes, | was farmer up to that
time, and am farmer now. I was
good manager, even if l say it, and
made money with corn and cotton.
Wholly without caution, impulsive
and quickly coming to decision, 1
do things, suppose, which I might
not do, we're l of different tempera-
ment. In 1881 I concluded to pur-
chase more land. l bought it, to-
gether with number of mules and
considerable machinery. Then we
had lean year. My cotton crop
fell off $4,000 in value. Ihad good
credit and was not hurt, but was
inoonvenienced and worried. Ca
lamity sometimes sets me to think
ing. had read agricultural periodi-
Gals, and had been stirring and
prosperous man for South Carolina.
For year or two l gave the condi-
tions which prevailed in my State
much reflection and came to the con-
clusion that the old order of things,
the ante bellum habits and practices
in farming, bad to be changed. We
had the best organized and most
complete aristocracy in the world.
1t lived principally by land and poll.
tics. An honest aristocracy in pub
lie Office, it was selfish, arrogant and
unprogressive. The planters left
the management of their lands to
negroes, and there was little intelli-
gent agriculture and practically no
rotation of crops.
"I began to talk reform in farm
ing. In 1886 l attended a meeting
of farmers from all parts of the
State. Many of them were politi-
clans. Our Agricultural Depart.
ment was charging as 25 cents ton
for inspecting fertilizers and was
spending a lot of public money in
other ways and doing little if any
good. / made a speech, which !
read, urging that there be an annex
to the State University for the
teaching of agriculture and technical
pursuits. put my suggestions and
opinions down in plain language,
and my style caused some surprise.
l heard men say that / would be
Governor, but had no thought of
politics, had declined, in fact, to run
for the Legislature, and my only