Chapter I (2)

It is expected that the stupid and sequacious masses, the white victims of slavery, will believe, and, as a general thing, they do believe, whatever the slaveholders tell them; and thus it is that they are cajoled into the notion that they are the freest, happiest and most intelligent people in the world, and are taught to look with prejudice and disapprobation upon every new principle or progressive movement. Thus it is that the South, woefully inert and inventionless, has lagged behind the North, and is now weltering in the cesspool of ignorance and degradation.

We have already intimated that the opinion is prevalent throughout the South that the free States are quite sterile and unproductive, and that they are mainly dependent on us for breadstuffs and other provisions. So far as the cereals, fruits, garden vegetables and esculent roots are concerned, we have, in the preceding tables, shown the utter falsity of this opinion; and we now propose to show that it is equally erroneous in other particulars, and very far from the truth in the general reckoning. We can prove, and we intend to prove, from facts in our possession, that the hay crop of the free States is worth considerably more in dollars and cents than all the cotton, tobacco, rice, hay and hemp produced in the fifteen slave States. This statement may strike some of our readers with amazement, and others may, for the moment, regard it as quite incredible; but it is true, nevertheless, and we shall soon proceed to confirm it. The single free State of New-York produces more than _three times_ the quantity of hay that is produced in all the slave States. Ohio produces a larger number of tons than all the Southern and Southwestern States, and so does Pennsylvania. Vermont, little and unpretending as she is, does the same thing, with the exception of Virginia. Look at the facts as presented in the tables, and let your own eyes, physical and intellectual, confirm you in the truth.

And yet, forsooth, the slave-driving oligarchy would whip us into the belief that agriculture is not one of the leading and lucrative pursuits of the free States, that the soil there is an uninterrupted barren waste, and that our Northern brethren, having the advantage in nothing except wealth, population, inland and foreign commerce, manufactures, mechanism, inventions, literature, the arts and sciences, and their concomitant branches of profitable industry,--miserable objects of charity--are dependent on us for the necessaries of life.

Next to Virginia, Maryland is the greatest Southern hay-producing State; and yet, it is the opinion of several of the most extensive hay and grain dealers in Baltimore, with whom we have conversed on the subject, that the domestic crop is scarcely equal to one-third the demand, and that the balance required for home consumption, about two-thirds, is chiefly brought from New-York, Pennsylvania and Massachusetts. At this rate, Maryland receives and consumes not less than three hundred and fifteen thousand tons of Northern hay every year; and this, as we are informed by the dealers above-mentioned, at an average cost to the last purchaser, by the time it is stowed in the mow, of at least twenty-five dollars per ton; it would thus appear that this most popular and valuable provender, one of the staple commodities of the North, commands a market in a single slave State, to the amount of seven million eight hundred and seventy-five thousand dollars per annum.

In this same State of Maryland, less than one million of dollar's worth of cotton finds a market, the whole number of bales sold here in 1850 amounting to only twenty-three thousand three hundred and twenty-five, valued at seven hundred and forty-six thousand four hundred dollars. Briefly, then, and in round numbers, we may state the case thus: Maryland buys annually seven millions of dollars worth of hay from the North, and one million of dollars worth of cotton from the South. Let slaveholders and their fawning defenders read, ponder and compare.

The exact quantities of Northern hay, rye, and buckwheat flour, Irish potatoes, fruits, clover and grass seeds, and other products of the soil, received and consumed in all the slaveholding States, we have no means of ascertaining; but for all practical purposes, we can arrive sufficiently near to the amount by inference from the above data, and from what we see with our eyes and hear with our ears wherever we go. Food from the North for man or for beast, or for both, is for sale in every market in the South. Even in the most insignificant little villages in the interior of the slave States, where books, newspapers and other mediums of intelligence are unknown, where the poor whites and the negroes are alike bowed down in heathenish ignorance and barbarism, and where the news is received but once a week, and then only in a Northern-built stage-coach, drawn by horses in Northern harness, in charge of a driver dressed _cap-a-pie_ in Northern habiliments, and with a Northern whip in his hand,--the agricultural products of the North, either crude, prepared, pickled or preserved, are ever to be found.

Mortifying as the acknowledgment of the fact is to us, it is our unbiased opinion--an opinion which will, we believe, be endorsed by every intelligent person who goes into a careful examination and comparison of all the facts in the case--that the profits arising to the North from the sale of provender and provisions to the South, are far greater than those arising to the South from the sale of cotton, tobacco and breadstuffs to the North. It follows, then, that the agricultural interests of the North being not only equal but actually superior to those of the South, the hundreds of millions of dollars which the commerce and manufactures of the former annually yield, is just so much clear and independent gain over the latter. It follows, also, from a corresponding train or system of deduction, and with all the foregoing facts in view, that the difference between freedom and slavery is simply the difference between sense and nonsense, wisdom and folly, good and evil, right and wrong.

Any observant American, from whatever point of the compass he may hail, who will take the trouble to pass through the Southern markets, both great and small, as we have done, and inquire where this article, that and the other came from, will be utterly astonished at the variety and quantity of Northern agricultural productions kept for sale. And this state of things is growing worse and worse every year. Exclusively agricultural as the South is in her industrial pursuits, she is barely able to support her sparse and degenerate population. Her men and her domestic animals, both dwarfed into shabby objects of commiseration under the blighting effects of slavery, are constantly feeding on the multifarious products of Northern soil. And if the whole truth must be told, we may here add, that these products, like all other articles of merchandize purchased at the North, are generally bought on a credit, and, in a great number of instances, by far too many, never paid for--not, as a general rule, because the purchasers are dishonest or unwilling to pay, but because they are impoverished and depressed by the retrogressive and deadening operations of slavery, that most unprofitable and pernicious institution under which they live.

To show how well we are sustained in our remarks upon hay and other special products of the soil, as well as to give circulation to other facts of equal significance, we quote a single passage from an address by Paul C. Cameron, before the Agricultural Society of Orange County, North Carolina. This production is, in the main, so powerfully conceived, so correct and plausible in its statements and conclusions, and so well calculated, though, perhaps, not intended, to arouse the old North State to a sense of her natural greatness and acquired shame, that we could wish to see it published in pamphlet form, and circulated throughout the length and breadth of that unfortunate and degraded heritage of slavery. Mr. Cameron says:

"I know not when I have been more humiliated, as a North Carolina farmer, than when, a few weeks ago, at a railroad depot at the very doors of our State capital, I saw wagons drawn by Kentucky mules, loading with Northern hay, for the supply not only of the town, but to be taken to the country. Such a sight at the capital of a State whose population is almost exclusively devoted to agriculture, is a most humiliating exhibition. Let us cease to use every thing, as far as it is practicable, that is not the product of our own soil and workshops--not an axe, or a broom, or bucket, from Connecticut. By every consideration of self-preservation, we are called to make better efforts to expel the Northern grocer from the State with his butter, and the Ohio and Kentucky horse, mule and hog driver, from our county at least. It is a reproach on us as farmers, and no little deduction from our wealth, that we suffer the population of our towns and villages to supply themselves with butter from another Orange County in New-York."

We have promised to prove that the hay crop of the free states is worth considerably more than all the cotton, tobacco, rice, hay and hemp produced in the fifteen slave States. The compilers of the last census, as we learn from Prof. De Bow, the able and courteous superintendent, in making up the hay-tables, allowed two thousand two hundred and forty pounds to the ton. The price per ton at which we should estimate its value has puzzled us to some extent. Dealers in the article in Baltimore think it will average twenty-five dollars, in their market. Four or five months ago they sold it at thirty dollars per ton. At the very time we write, though there is less activity in the article than usual, we learn, from an examination of sundry prices-current and commercial journals, that hay is selling in Savannah at $33 per ton; in Mobile and New Orleans at $26; in Charleston at $25; in Louisville at $24; and in Cincinnati at $23. The average of these prices is _twenty-six dollars sixteen and two-third cents_; and we suppose it would be fair to employ the figures which would indicate this amount, the net value of a single ton, in calculating the total market value of the entire crop. Were we to do this--and, with the foregoing facts in view, we submit to intelligent men whether we would not be justifiable in doing it,--the hay crop of the free states, 12,690,982 tons, in 1850, would amount in valuation to the enormous sum of $331,081,695--more than four times the value of all the cotton produced in the United States during the same period!

But we shall not make the calculation at what we have found to be the average value per ton throughout the country. What rate, then, shall be agreed upon as a basis of comparison between the value of the hay crop of the North and that of the South, and as a means of testing the truth of our declaration--that the former exceeds the aggregate value of all the cotton, tobacco, rice, hay and hemp produced in the fifteen slave States? Suppose we take $13,08-1/3--just half the average value--as the multiplier in this arithmetical exercise. This we can well afford to do; indeed, we might reduce the amount per ton to much less than half the average value, and still have a large margin left for triumphant demonstration. It is not our purpose, however, to make an overwhelming display of the incomparable greatness of the free States.

In estimating the value of the various agricultural products of the two great sections of the country, we have been guided by prices emanating from the Bureau of Agriculture in Washington; and in a catalogue of those prices now before us, we perceive that the average value of hay throughout the nation is supposed to be not more than half a cent per pound--$11.20 per ton--which, as we have seen above, is considerably less than half the present market value;--and this, too, in the face of the fact that prices generally rule higher than they do just now. It will be admitted on all sides, however, that the prices fixed upon by the Bureau of Agriculture, taken as a whole, are as fair for one section of the country as for the other, and that we cannot blamelessly deviate from them in one particular without deviating from them in another. Eleven dollars and twenty cents ($11.20) per ton shall therefore be the price; and, notwithstanding these greatly reduced figures, we now renew, with an addendum, our declaration and promise, that--_We can prove, and we shall now proceed to prove, that the annual hay crop of the free States is worth considerably more in dollars and cents than all the cotton, tobacco, rice, hay, hemp and cane sugar annually produced in the fifteen slave States_.

HAY CROP OF THE FREE STATES--1850.

12,690,982 tons _a_ 11,20 $142,138,998

SUNDRY PRODUCTS OF THE SLAVE STATES--1850.

Cotton 2,445,779 bales _a_ 32,00 $78,264,928
Tobacco 185,023,906 lbs. " 10 18,502,390
Rice (rough) 215,313,497 lbs. " 4 8,612,539
Hay 1,137,784 tons " 11,20 12,743,180
Hemp 34,673 tons " 112,00 3,883,376
Cane Sugar 237,133,000 lbs. " 7 16,599,310
------------
$138,605,723

RECAPITULATION.

Hay crop of the free States $142,138,998
Sundry products of the slave States 138,605,723
------------
Balance in favor of the free States $3,533,275

There is the account; look at it, and let it stand in attestation of the exalted virtues and surpassing powers of freedom. Scan it well, Messieurs lords of the lash, and learn from it new lessons of the utter inefficiency, and despicable imbecility of slavery. Examine it minutely, liberty-loving patriots of the North, and behold in it additional evidences of the beauty, grandeur, and super-excellence of free institutions. Treasure it up in your minds, outraged friends and non-slaveholders of the South, and let the recollection of it arouse you to an inflexible determination to extirpate the monstrous enemy that stalks abroad in your land, and to recover the inalienable rights and liberties, which have been filched from you by an unprincipled oligarchy.

In deference to truth, decency and good sense, it is to be hoped that negro-driving politicians will never more have the effrontery to open their mouths in extolling the agricultural achievements of slave labor. Especially is it desirable, that, as a simple act of justice to a basely deceived populace, they may cease their stale and senseless harangues on the importance of cotton. The value of cotton to the South, to the North, to the nation, and to the world, has been so grossly exaggerated, and so extensive have been the evils which have resulted in consequence of the extraordinary misrepresentations concerning it, that we should feel constrained to reproach ourself for remissness of duty, if we failed to make an attempt to explode the popular error. The figures above show what it is, and what it is not. Recur to them, and learn the facts.

So hyperbolically has the importance of cotton been magnified by certain pro-slavery politicians of the South, that the person who would give credence to all their fustian and bombast, would be under the necessity of believing that the very existence of almost everything, in the heaven above, in the earth beneath, and in the water under the earth, depended on it. The truth is, however, that the cotton crop is of but little value to the South. New England and Old England, by their superior enterprise and sagacity, turn it chiefly to their own advantage. It is carried in their ships, spun in their factories, woven in their looms, insured in their offices, returned again in their own vessels, and, with double freight and cost of manufacturing added, purchased by the South at a high premium. Of all the parties engaged or interested in its transportation and manufacture, the South is the only one that does not make a profit. Nor does she, as a general thing, make a profit by producing it.

We are credibly informed that many of the farmers in the immediate vicinity of Baltimore, where we now write, have turned their attention exclusively to hay, and that from one acre they frequently gather two tons, for which they receive fifty dollars. Let us now inquire how many dollars may be expected from an acre planted in cotton. Mr. Cameron, from whose able address before the Agricultural Society of Orange County, North Carolina, we have already gleaned some interesting particulars, informs us, that the cotton planters in his part of the country, "have contented themselves with a crop yielding only _ten or twelve dollars per acre_," and that "the summing up of a large surface gives but a living result." An intelligent resident of the Palmetto State, writing in De Bow's Review, not long since, advances the opinion that the cotton planters of South Carolina are not realizing more than one per cent. on the amount of capital they have invested. While in Virginia, very recently, an elderly slaveholder, whose religious walk and conversation had recommended and promoted him to an eldership in the Presbyterian church, and who supports himself and family by raising niggers and tobacco, told us that, for the last eight or ten years, aside from the increase of his human chattels, he felt quite confident he had not cleared as much even as one per cent. per annum on the amount of his investment. The real and personal property of this aged _Christian_ consists chiefly in a large tract of land and about thirty negroes, most of whom, according to his own confession, are more expensive than profitable. The proceeds arising from the sale of the tobacco they produce, are all absorbed in the purchase of meat and bread for home consumption, and when the crop is stunted by drought, frost, or otherwise cut short, one of the negroes must be sold to raise funds for the support of the others. Such are the agricultural achievements of slave labor; such are the results of "the sum of all villainies." The diabolical institution subsists on its own flesh. At one time children are sold to procure food for the parents, at another, parents are sold to procure food for the children. Within its pestilential atmosphere, nothing succeeds; progress and prosperity are unknown; inanition and slothfulness ensue; everything becomes dull, dismal and unprofitable; wretchedness and desolation run riot throughout the land; an aspect of most melancholy inactivity and dilapidation broods over every city and town; ignorance and prejudice sit enthroned over the minds of the people; usurping despots wield the sceptre of power; everywhere, and in everything, between Delaware Bay and the Gulf of Mexico, are the multitudinous evils of slavery apparent.

The soil itself soon sickens and dies beneath the unnatural tread of the slave. Hear what the Hon. C. C. Clay, of Alabama, has to say upon the subject. His testimony is eminently suggestive, well-timed, and truthful; and we heartily commend it to the careful consideration of every spirited Southron who loves his country, and desires to see it rescued from the fatal grasp of "the mother of harlots." Says he:

"I can show you, with sorrow, in the older portions of Alabama, and in my native county of Madison, the sad memorials of the artless and exhausting culture of cotton. Our small planters, after taking the cream off their lands, unable to restore them by rest, manures, or otherwise, are going further West and South, in search of other virgin lands, which they may and will despoil and impoverish in like manner. Our wealthier planters, with greater means and no more skill, are buying out their poorer neighbors, extending their plantations, and adding to their slave force. The wealthy few, who are able to live on smaller profits, and to give their blasted fields some rest, are thus pushing off the many who are merely independent. Of the $20,000,000 annually realized from the sales of the cotton crop of Alabama, nearly all not expended in supporting the producers, is re-invested in land and negroes. Thus the white population has decreased and the slave increased almost _pari passu_ in several counties of our State. In 1825, Madison county cast about 3,000 votes; now, she cannot cast exceeding 2,300. In traversing that county, one will discover numerous farm-houses, once the abode of industrious and intelligent freemen, now occupied by slaves, or tenantless, deserted and dilapidated; he will observe fields, once fertile, now unfenced, abandoned, and covered with those evil harbingers, fox-tail and broomsedge; he will see the moss growing on the mouldering walls of once thrifty villages, and will find 'one only master grasps the whole domain,' that once furnished happy homes for a dozen white families. Indeed, a country in its infancy, where fifty years ago scarce a forest tree had been felled by the axe of the pioneer, is already exhibiting the painful signs of senility and decay, apparent in Virginia and the Carolinas."

Some one has said that "an honest confession is good for the soul," and if the adage be true, as we have no doubt it is, we think Mr. C. C. Clay is entitled to a quiet conscience on one score at least. In the extract quoted above, he gives us a graphic description of the ruinous operations and influences of slavery in the Southwest; and we, as a native of Carolina, and a traveler through Virginia, are ready to bear testimony to the fitness of his remarks when he referred to those States as examples of senility and decay. With equal propriety, however, he might have stopped nearer home for a subject of comparison. Either of the States bordering upon Alabama, or, indeed, any other slave States, would have answered his purpose quite as well as Virginia and the Carolinas. Wherever slavery exists there he may find parallels to the destruction that is sweeping with such deadly influence over his own unfortunate State.

As for examples of vigorous, industrious and thrifty communities, they can be found anywhere beyond the Upas-shadow of slavery--nowhere else. New-York and Massachusetts, which, by nature, are confessedly far inferior to Virginia and the Carolinas, have, by the more liberal and equitable policy which they have pursued, in substituting liberty for slavery, attained a degree of eminence and prosperity altogether unknown in the slave States.

Amidst all the hyperbole and cajolery of slave-driving politicians, who, as we have already seen, are 'the books, the arts, the academies, that show, contain, and govern all the South,' we are rejoiced to see that Mr. Clay, Mr. Cameron, and a few others, have had the boldness and honesty to step forward and proclaim the truth. All such frank admissions are to be hailed as good omens for the South. Nothing good can come from any attempt to conceal the unconcealable evidences of poverty and desolation everywhere trailing in the wake of slavery. Let the truth be told on all occasions, of the North as well as of the South, and the people will soon begin to discover the egregiousness of their errors, to draw just comparisons, to inquire into cause and effect, and to adopt the more utile measures, manners and customs of their wiser cotemporaries.

In wilfully traducing and decrying everything North of Mason and Dixon's line, and in excessively magnifying the importance of everything South of it, the oligarchy have, in the eyes of all liberal and intelligent men, only made an exhibition of their uncommon folly and dishonesty. For a long time, it is true, they have succeeded in deceiving the people, in keeping them humbled in the murky sloughs of poverty and ignorance, and in instilling into their untutored minds passions and prejudices expressly calculated to strengthen and protect the accursed institution of slavery; but, thanks to heaven, their inglorious reign is fast drawing to a close; with irresistible brilliancy, and in spite of the interdict of tyrants, light from the pure fountain of knowledge is now streaming over the dark places of our land, and, ere long--mark our words--there will ascend from Delaware, and from Texas, and from all the intermediate States, a huzza for Freedom and for Equal Rights, that will utterly confound the friends of despotism, set at defiance the authority of usurpers, and carry consternation to the heart of every slavery-propagandist.

To undeceive the people of the South, to bring them to a knowledge of the inferior and disreputable position which they occupy as a component part of the Union, and to give prominence and popularity to those plans which, if adopted, will elevate us to an equality, socially, morally, intellectually, industrially, politically, and financially, with the most flourishing and refined nation in the world, and, if possible, to place us in the van of even that, is the object of this work. Slaveholders, either from ignorance or from a wilful disposition to propagate error, contend that the South has nothing to be ashamed of, that slavery has proved a blessing to her, and that her superiority over the North in an agricultural point of view makes amends for all her shortcomings in other respects. On the other hand, we contend that many years of continual blushing and severe penance would not suffice to cancel or annul the shame and disgrace that justly attaches to the South in consequence of slavery--the direst evil that e'er befell the land--that the South bears nothing like even a respectable approximation to the North in navigation, commerce, or manufactures, and that, contrary to the opinion entertained by ninety-nine hundredths of her people, she is far behind the free States in the only thing of which she has ever dared to boast--agriculture. We submit the question to the arbitration of figures, which, it is said, do not lie. With regard to the bushel-measure products of the soil, of which we have already taken an inventory, we have seen that there is a balance against the South in favor of the North of _seventeen million four hundred and twenty-three thousand one hundred and fifty-two bushels_, and a difference in the value of the same, also in favor of the North, of _forty-four million seven hundred and eighty-two thousand six hundred and thirty-six dollars_. It is certainly a most novel kind of agricultural superiority that the South claims on that score!

Our attention shall now be directed to the twelve principal pound-measure products of the free and of the slave States--hay, cotton, butter and cheese, tobacco, cane, sugar, wool, rice, hemp, maple sugar, beeswax and honey, flax, and hops--and in taking an account of them, we shall, in order to show the exact quantity produced in each State, and for the convenience of future reference, pursue the same plan as that adopted in the preceding tables. Whether slavery will appear to better advantage on the scales than it did in the half-bushel, remains to be seen. It is possible that the rickety monster may make a better show on a new track; if it makes a more ridiculous display, we shall not be surprised. A careful examination of its precedents, has taught us the folly of expecting anything good to issue from it in any manner whatever. It has no disposition to emulate the magnanimity of its betters, and as for a laudable ambition to excel, that is a characteristic altogether foreign to its nature. Languor and inertia are the insalutary viands upon which it delights to satiate its morbid appetite; and "from bad to worse" is the ill-omened motto under which, in all its feeble efforts and achievements, it ekes out a most miserable and deleterious existence.

TABLE NO. IX.

AGRICULTURAL PRODUCTS OF THE FREE STATES--1850.

------------------------------------------------------------
States. | Hay, tons | Hemp, tons | Hops, lbs
--------------------|------------|-------------|------------
California | 2,038 | |
Connecticut | 516,131 | | 554
Illinois | 601,952 | | 3,551
Indiana | 403,230 | | 92,796
Iowa | 89,055 | | 8,242
Maine | 755,889 | | 40,120
Massachusetts | 651,807 | | 121,595
Michigan | 404,934 | | 10,663
New Hampshire | 598,854 | | 257,174
New Jersey | 435,950 | | 2,133
New York | 3,728,797 | 4 | 2,536,299
Ohio | 1,443,142 | 150 | 63,731
Pennsylvania | 1,842,970 | 44 | 22,088
Rhode Island | 74,418 | | 277
Vermont | 866,153 | | 288,023
Wisconsin | 275,662 | | 15,930
|------------|-------------|------------
| 12,690,982 | 198 | 3,463,176
============================================================

TABLE NO. X.

AGRICULTURAL PRODUCTS OF THE SLAVE STATES--1850.

------------------------------------------------------------
States. | Hay, tons | Hemp, tons | Hops, lbs
--------------------|------------|-------------|------------
Alabama | 32,685 | | 276
Arkansas | 3,976 | 15 | 157
Delaware | 30,159 | | 348
Florida | 2,510 | | 14
Georgia | 23,449 | | 261
Kentucky | 113,747 | 17,787 | 4,309
Louisiana | 25,752 | | 125
Maryland | 157,956 | 63 | 1,870
Mississippi | 12,504 | 7 | 473
Missouri | 116,925 | 16,028 | 4,130
North Carolina | 145,653 | 39 | 9,246
South Carolina | 20,925 | | 26
Tennessee | 74,091 | 595 | 1,032
Texas | 8,354 | | 7
Virginia | 369,098 | 139 | 11,506
|------------|-------------|------------
| 1,137,784 | 34,673 | 33,780

TABLE NO. XI.

AGRICULTURAL PRODUCTS OF THE FREE STATES--1850.

------------------------------------------------------------
States. | Flax, | Maple Sugar | Tobacco
| lbs. | lbs. | lbs.
--------------------|------------|-------------|------------
California | | | 1,000
Connecticut | 17,928 | 50,796 | 1,267,624
Illinois | 160,063 | 248,904 | 841,394
Indiana | 584,469 | 2,921,192 | 1,044,620
Iowa | 62,660 | 78,407 | 6,041
Maine | 17,081 | 93,542 |
Massachusetts | 1,162 | 795,525 | 138,246
Michigan | 7,152 | 2,439,794 | 1,245
New Hampshire | 7,652 | 1,298,863 | 50
New Jersey | 182,965 | 2,197 | 310
New York | 940,577 | 10,357,484 | 83,189
Ohio | 446,932 | 4,588,209 | 10,454,449
Pennsylvania | 530,307 | 2,326,525 | 912,651
Rhode Island | 85 | 28 |
Vermont | 20,852 | 6,349,357 |
Wisconsin | 68,393 | 610,976 | 1,268
|------------|-------------|------------
| 3,048,278 | 32,161,799 | 14,752,087
============================================================

TABLE NO. XII.

AGRICULTURAL PRODUCTS OF THE SLAVE STATES--1850.

------------------------------------------------------------
States. | Flax, | Maple Sugar | Tobacco
| lbs. | lbs. | lbs.
--------------------|------------|-------------|------------
Alabama | 3,921 | 643 | 164,990
Arkansas | 12,291 | 9,330 | 218,936
Delaware | 17,174 | |
Florida | 50 | | 998,614
Georgia | 5,387 | 50 | 423,924
Kentucky | 2,100,116 | 437,405 | 55,501,196
Louisiana | | 255 | 26,878
Maryland | 35,686 | 47,740 | 21,407,497
Mississippi | 665 | | 49,960
Missouri | 627,160 | 178,910 | 17,113,784
North Carolina | 593,796 | 27,932 | 11,984,786
South Carolina | 333 | 200 | 74,285
Tennessee | 368,131 | 158,557 | 20,148,932
Texas | 1,048 | | 66,897
Virginia | 1,000,450 | 1,227,665 | 56,803,227
|------------|-------------|------------
| 4,766,198 | 2,088,687 | 185,023,906

TABLE NO. XIII.

ANIMAL PRODUCTS OF THE FREE STATES--1850.

-----------------------------------------------------------
States. | Wool, | Butter and | Beeswax and
| lbs. | Cheese, lbs. | Honey, lbs.
-----------------|------------|--------------|-------------
California | 5,520 | 855 |
Connecticut | 497,454 | 11,861,396 | 93,304
Illinois | 2,150,113 | 13,804,768 | 869,444
Indiana | 2,610,287 | 13,506,099 | 935,329
Iowa | 373,898 | 2,381,028 | 321,711
Maine | 1,864,034 | 11,678,265 | 189,618
Massachusetts | 585,136 | 15,159,512 | 59,508
Michigan | 2,043,283 | 8,077,390 | 359,232
New Hampshire | 1,108,476 | 10,173,619 | 117,140
New Jersey | 375,396 | 9,852,966 | 156,694
New York | 10,071,301 | 129,507,507 | 1,755,830
Ohio | 10,196,371 | 55,268,921 | 804,275
Pennsylvania | 4,481,570 | 42,383,452 | 839,509
Rhode Island | 129,692 | 1,312,178 | 6,347
Vermont | 3,400,717 | 20,858,814 | 249,422
Wisconsin | 253,963 | 4,034,033 | 131,005
|------------|--------------|-------------
| 39,647,211 | 349,860,783 | 6,888,368
===========================================================

TABLE NO. XIV.

AGRICULTURAL PRODUCTS OF THE SLAVE STATES--1850.

--------------------------------------------------------------
States. | Wool, | Butter and | Beeswax and
| lbs. | Cheese, lbs. | Honey, lbs.
--------------------|------------|--------------|-------------
Alabama | 657,118 | 4,040,223 | 897,021
Arkansas | 182,595 | 1,884,327 | 192,338
Delaware | 57,768 | 1,058,495 | 41,248
Florida | 23,247 | 389,513 | 18,971
Georgia | 990,019 | 4,687,535 | 732,514
Kentucky | 2,297,433 | 10,161,477 | 1,158,019
Louisiana | 109,897 | 685,026 | 96,701
Maryland | 477,438 | 3,810,135 | 74,802
Mississippi | 559,619 | 4,367,425 | 397,460
Missouri | 1,627,164 | 8,037,931 | 1,328,972
North Carolina | 970,738 | 4,242,211 | 512,289
South Carolina | 487,233 | 2,986,820 | 216,281
Tennessee | 1,364,378 | 8,317,266 | 1,036,572
Texas | 131,917 | 2,440,199 | 380,825
Virginia | 2,869,765 | 11,525,651 | 880,767
|------------|--------------|-------------
| 12,797,329 | 68,634,224 | 7,964,760

TABLE NO. XV.

AGRICULTURAL PRODUCTS OF THE SLAVE STATES--1850.

---------------------------------------------------------------
States. | Cotton, bales | Cane Sugar, | Rough Rice,
| of 400 lbs. | hhds. 1000lbs. | lbs.
-----------------|---------------|----------------|------------
Alabama | 564,429 | 87 | 2,312,252
Arkansas | 65,344 | | 63,179
Delaware | | |
Florida | 45,131 | 2,750 | 1,075,090
Georgia | 499,091 | 846 | 38,950,691
Kentucky | 758 | 10 | 5,688
Louisiana | 178,737 | 226,001 | 4,425,349
Maryland | | |
Mississippi | 484,292 | 8 | 2,719,856
Missouri | | | 700
North Carolina | 50,545 | | 5,465,868
South Carolina | 300,901 | 77 | 159,930,613
Tennessee | 194,532 | 3 | 258,854
Texas | 58,072 | 7,351 | 88,203
Virginia | 3,947 | | 17,154
|---------------|----------------|-------------
| 2,445,779 | 237,133 | 215,313,497
================================================================

RECAPITULATION--FREE STATES.

Hay 28,427,799,680 lbs @ 1/2 _c._ $142,138,998
Hemp 443,520 " " 5 " 22,176
Hops 3,463,176 " " 15 " 519,476
Flax 3,048,278 " " 10 " 304,827
Maple Sugar 32,161,799 " " 8 " 2,572,943
Tobacco 14,752,087 " " 10 " 1,475,208
Wool 39,647,211 " " 35 " 13,876,523
Butter and Cheese 349,860,783 " " 15 " 52,479,117
Beeswax and Honey 6,888,368 " " 15 " 1,033,255
-------------- ------------
Total 28,878,064,902 lbs., valued as above, $214,422,523

RECAPITULATION--SLAVE STATES.

Hay 2,548,636,160 lbs. @ 1/2 _c._ $12,743,180
Hemp 77,667,520 " " 5 " 3,883,376
Hops 33,780 " " 15 " 5,067
Flax 4,766,198 " " 10 " 476,619
Maple Sugar 2,088,687 " " 8 " 167,094
Tobacco 185,023,906 " " 10 " 18,502,390
Wool 12,797,329 " " 35 " 4,479,065
Butter and Cheese 68,634,224 " " 15 " 10,295,133
Beeswax and Honey 7,964,760 " " 15 " 1,194,714
Cotton 978,311,600 " " 8 " 78,264,928
Cane Sugar 237,133,000 " " 7 " 16,599,310
Rice (rough) 215,313,497 " " 4 " 8,612,539
------------- ------------
Total 4,338,370,661 lbs. valued as above, at $155,223,415

TOTAL DIFFERENCE--POUND-MEASURE PRODUCTS.

_Pounds._ _Value._
Free States 28,878,064,902 $214,422,523
Slave States 4,338,370,661 155,223,415
-------------- ------------
Balance in pounds, 24,539,694,241 Difference in value, $59,199,108

Both quantity and value again in favor of the North! Behold also the enormousness of the difference! In this comparison with the South, neither hundreds, thousands, nor millions, according to the regular method of computation, are sufficient to exhibit the excess of the pound-measure products of the North. Recourse must be had to an almost inconceivable number; billions must be called into play; and there are the figures telling us, with unmistakable emphasis and distinctness, that, in this department of agriculture, as in every other, the North is vastly the superior of the South--the figures showing a total balance in favor of the former of _twenty-four billion five hundred and thirty-nine million six hundred and ninety-four thousand two hundred and forty-one pounds_, valued at _fifty-nine million one hundred and ninety-nine thousand one hundred and eight dollars_. And yet, the North is a poor, God-forsaken country, bleak, inhospitable, and unproductive!

What next? Is it necessary to adduce other facts in order to prove that the rural wealth of the free States is far greater than that of the slave States? Shall we make a further demonstration of the fertility of northern soil, or bring forward new evidences of the inefficient and desolating system of terra-culture in the South? Will nothing less than "confirmations strong as proofs of holy writ," suffice to convince the South that she is standing in her own light, and ruining both body and soul by the retention of slavery? Whatever duty and expedience require to be done, we are willing to do. Additional proofs are at hand. Slaveholders and slave-breeders shall be convinced, confuted, convicted, and converted. They shall, in their hearts and consciences, if not with their tongues and pens, bear testimony to the triumphant achievements of free labor. In the two tables which immediately follow these remarks, they shall see how much more vigorous and fruitful the soil is when under the prudent management of free white husbandmen, than it is when under the rude and nature-murdering tillage of enslaved negroes; and in two subsequent tables they shall find that the live stock, slaughtered animals, farms, and farming implements and machinery, in the free States, are worth at least _one thousand million of dollars_ more than the market value of the same in the slave States! In the face, however, of all these most significant and incontrovertible facts, the oligarchy have the unparalleled audacity to tell us that the South is the greatest agricultural country in the world, and that the North is a dreary waste, unfit for cultivation, and quite dependent on us for the necessaries of life. How preposterously false all such babble is, the following tables will show:--

TABLE NO. XVI.

ACTUAL CROPS PER ACRE ON THE AVERAGE IN THE FREE STATES--1850.

---------------------------------------------------------------------
States. | Wheat, | Oats, | Rye, |Ind. Corn,|Irish Potatoes,
|bushels.|bushels.|bushels.| bushels. | bush.
---------------|--------|--------|--------|----------|---------------
Connecticut | | 21 | | 40 | 85
Illinois | 11 | 29 | 14 | 33 | 115
Indiana | 12 | 20 | 18 | 33 | 100
Iowa | 14 | 36 | | 32 | 100
Maine | 10 | | | 27 | 120
Massachusetts | 16 | 26 | 13 | 31 | 170
Michigan | 10 | 26 | | 32 | 140
New Hampshire | 11 | 30 | | 30 | 220
New Jersey | 11 | 26 | | 33 |
New York | 12 | 25 | 17 | 27 | 100
Ohio | 12 | 21 | 25 | 36 |
Pennsylvania | 15 | | | 20 | 75
Rhode Island | | 30 | | | 100
Vermont | 13 | | 20 | 32 | 178
Wisconsin | 14 | 35 | | 30 |
|--------|--------|--------|----------|---------------
| 161 | 325 | 107 | 436 | 1,503
=====================================================================

TABLE NO. XVII.

ACTUAL CROPS PER ACRE ON THE AVERAGE IN THE SLAVE STATES--1850.

---------------------------------------------------------------------
States. | Wheat, | Oats, | Rye, |Ind. Corn,|Irish Potatoes,
|bushels.|bushels.|bushels.| bushels. | bush.
---------------|--------|--------|--------|----------|---------------
Alabama | 5 | 12 | | 15 | 60
Arkansas | | 18 | | 22 |
Delaware | 11 | 20 | | 20 |
Florida | 15 | | | | 175
Georgia | 5 | 18 | 7 | 16 | 125
Kentucky | 8 | 18 | 11 | 24 | 130
Louisiana | | | | 16 |
Maryland | 13 | 21 | 18 | 23 | 75
Mississippi | 9 | 12 | | 18 | 105
Missouri | 11 | 26 | | 34 | 110
North Carolina | 7 | 10 | 15 | 17 | 65
South Carolina | 8 | 12 | | 11 | 70
Tennessee | 7 | 19 | 7 | 21 | 120
Texas | 15 | | | 20 | 250
Virginia | 7 | 13 | 5 | 18 | 75
|--------|--------|--------|----------|---------------
| 121 | 199 | 63 | 275 | 1,360

RECAPITULATION OF ACTUAL CROPS PER ACRE ON THE AVERAGE--1850.

FREE STATES.

Wheat 12 bushels per acre.
Oats 27 " "
Rye 18 " "
Indian Corn 31 " "
Irish Potatoes 125 " "

SLAVE STATES.

Wheat 9 bushels per acre.
Oats 17 " "
Rye 11 " "
Indian Corn 20 " "
Irish Potatoes 113 " "

What an obvious contrast between the vigor of Liberty and the impotence of Slavery! What an unanswerable argument in favor of free labor! Add up the two columns of figures above, and what is the result? Two hundred and thirteen bushels as the products of five acres in the North, and only one hundred and seventy bushels as the products of five acres in the South. Look at each item separately, and you will find that the average crop per acre of every article enumerated is greater in the free States than it is in the slave States. Examine the table at large, and you will perceive that while Massachusetts produces sixteen bushels of wheat to the acre, Virginia produces only seven; that Pennsylvania produces fifteen and Georgia only five: that while Iowa produces thirty-six bushels of oats to the acre, Mississippi produces only twelve; that Rhode Island produces thirty, and North Carolina only ten: that while Ohio produces twenty-five bushels of rye to the acre, Kentucky produces only eleven; that Vermont produces twenty, and Tennessee only seven: that while Connecticut produces forty bushels of Indian corn to the acre, Texas produces only twenty; that New Jersey produces thirty-three, and South Carolina only eleven: that while New Hampshire produces two hundred and twenty bushels of Irish potatoes to the acre, Maryland produces only seventy-five; that Michigan produces one hundred and forty, and Alabama only sixty. Now for other beauties of slavery in another table.

TABLE NO. XVIII.

VALUE OF FARMS AND DOMESTIC ANIMALS IN THE FREE STATES--1850.

----------------------------------------------------------------------
States. | Value of | Val. of Animals | Cash Val. of Farms,
| Live Stock. | Slaughtered. | Farm. Imp. & Mac.
---------------|---------------|-----------------|--------------------
California | $3,351,058 | $107,173 | $3,977,524
Connecticut | 7,467,490 | 2,202,266 | 74,618,963
Illinois | 24,209,258 | 4,972,286 | 102,538,851
Indiana | 22,478,555 | 6,567,935 | 143,089,617
Iowa | 3,689,275 | 821,164 | 17,830,436
Maine | 9,705,726 | 1,646,773 | 57,146,305
Massachusetts | 9,647,710 | 2,500,924 | 112,285,931
Michigan | 8,008,734 | 1,328,327 | 54,763,817
New Hampshire | 8,871,901 | 1,522,873 | 57,560,122
New Jersey | 10,679,291 | 2,638,552 | 124,663,014
New York | 73,570,499 | 13,573,883 | 576,631,568
Ohio | 44,121,741 | 7,439,243 | 371,509,188
Pennsylvania | 41,500,053 | 8,219,848 | 422,598,640
Rhode Island | 1,532,637 | 667,486 | 17,568,003
Vermont | 12,643,228 | 1,861,336 | 66,106,509
Wisconsin | 4,897,385 | 920,178 | 30,170,131
|---------------|-----------------|--------------------
| $286,376,541 | $56,990,237 | $2,233,058,619
======================================================================

TABLE NO. XIX.

VALUE OF FARMS AND DOMESTIC ANIMALS IN THE SLAVE STATES--1850.

----------------------------------------------------------------------
States. | Value of | Val. of Animals | Cash Val. of Farms,
| Live Stock. | Slaughtered. | Farm. Imp. & Mac.
---------------|---------------|-----------------|--------------------
Alabama | $21,690,112 | $4,823,485 | $69,448,887
Arkansas | 6,647,969 | 1,163,313 | 16,866,541
Delaware | 1,849,281 | 373,665 | 19,390,310
Florida | 2,880,058 | 514,685 | 6,981,904
Georgia | 25,728,416 | 6,339,762 | 101,647,595
Kentucky | 29,661,436 | 6,462,598 | 160,190,299
Louisiana | 11,152,275 | 1,458,990 | 87,391,336
Maryland | 7,997,634 | 1,954,800 | 89,641,988
Mississippi | 19,403,662 | 3,636,582 | 60,501,561
Missouri | 19,887,580 | 3,367,106 | 67,207,068
North Carolina | 17,717,647 | 5,767,866 | 71,823,298
South Carolina | 15,060,015 | 3,502,637 | 86,568,038
Tennessee | 29,978,016 | 6,401,765 | 103,211,422
Texas | 10,412,927 | 1,116,137 | 18,701,712
Virginia | 33,656,659 | 7,502,986 | 223,423,315
|---------------|-----------------|--------------------
| $253,723,687 | $54,388,377 | $1,183,995,274

RECAPITULATION--FREE STATES.

Value of live Stock $286,376,541
Value of Animals slaughtered 56,990,237
Value of Farms, Farming-Implements and Machinery 2,233,058,619
--------------
$2,576,425,397

RECAPITULATION--SLATE STATES.

Value of Live Stock $253,723,687
Value of Animals slaughtered 54,388,377
Value of Farms, Farming Implements and Machinery 1,183,995,274
--------------
$1,492,107,338

DIFFERENCE IN VALUE--FARMS AND DOMESTIC ANIMALS.

Free States $2,576,425,397
Slave States 1,492,107,338
--------------
Balance in favor of the Free States $1,084,318,059

By adding to this last balance in favor of the free States the differences in value which we found in their favor in our account of the bushel-and-pound-measure products, we shall have a very correct idea of the extent to which the undivided agricultural interests of the free States preponderate over those of the slave States. Let us add the differences together, and see what will be the result.

BALANCES--ALL IN FAVOR OF THE NORTH.

Difference in the value of bushel-measure products $44,782,636
Difference in the value of pound-measure products 59,199,108
Difference in the value of farms and domestic animals 1,084,318,059
--------------
Total $1,188,299,803

No figures of rhetoric can add emphasis or significance to these figures of arithmetic. They demonstrate conclusively the great moral triumph of Liberty over Slavery. They show unequivocally, in spite of all the blarney and boasting of slave-driving politicians, that the entire value of all the agricultural interests of the free States is very nearly twice as great as the entire value of all the agricultural interests of the slave States--the value of those interests in the former being twenty-five hundred million of dollars, that of those in the latter only fourteen hundred million, leaving a balance in favor of the free States of _one billion one hundred and eighty-eight million two hundred and ninety-nine thousand eight hundred and three dollars_! That is what we call a full, fair and complete vindication of Free Labor. Would we not be correct in calling it a total eclipse of the Black Orb? Can it be possible that the slavocracy will ever have the hardihood to open their mouths again on the subject of terra-culture in the South? Dare they ever think of cotton again? Ought they not, as a befitting confession of their crimes and misdemeanors, and as a reasonable expiation for the countless evils which they have inflicted on society, to clothe themselves in sackcloth, and, after a suitable season of contrition and severe penance, follow the example of one Judas Iscariot, and go and hang themselves?

It will be observed that we have omitted the Territories and the District of Columbia in all the preceding tables. We did this purposely. Our object was to draw an equitable comparison between the value of free and slave labor in the thirty-one sovereign States, where the two systems, comparatively unaffected by the wrangling of politicians, and, as a matter of course, free from the interference of the general government, have had the fullest opportunities to exert their influence, to exhibit their virtues, and to commend themselves to the sober judgments of enlightened and discriminating minds. Had we counted the Territories on the side of the North, and the District of Columbia on the side of the South, the result would have been still greater in behalf of free labor. Though "the sum of all villanies" has but a mere nominal existence in Delaware and Maryland, we have invariably counted those States on the side of the South; and the consequence is, that, in many particulars, the hopeless fortunes of slavery have been propped up and sustained by an imposing array of figures which of right ought to be regarded as the property of freedom. But we like to be generous to an unfortunate foe, and would utterly disdain the use of any unfair means of attack or defence.

We shall take no undue advantage of slavery. It shall have a fair trial, and be judged according to its deserts. Already has it been weighed in the balance, and found wanting; it has been measured in the half-bushel, and found wanting; it has been apprized in the field, and found wanting. Whatever redeeming traits or qualities it may possess, if any, shall be brought to light by subjecting it to other tests.

It was our desire and intention to furnish a correct table of the gallon-measure products of the several States of the Union; but we have not been successful in our attempt to procure the necessary statistics. Enough is known, however, to satisfy us that the value of the milk, wine, ardent spirits, malt liquors, fluids, oils, and molasses, annually produced and sold in the free States, is at least fifty millions of dollars greater than the value of the same articles annually produced and sold in the slave States. Of sweet milk alone, it is estimated that the monthly sales in three Northern cities, New York, Philadelphia and Boston, amount to a larger sum than the marketable value of all the rosin, tar, pitch, and turpentine, annually produced in the Southern States.

Our efforts to obtain reliable information respecting another very important branch of profitable industry, the lumber business, have also proved unavailing; and we are left to conjecture as to the amount of revenue annually derived from it in the two grand divisions of our country. The person whose curiosity prompts him to take an account of the immense piles of Northern lumber now lying on the wharves and houseless lots in Baltimore, Richmond, and other slaveholding cities, will not, we imagine, form a very flattering opinion of the products of Southern forests. Let it be remembered that nearly all the clippers, steamers, and small craft, are built at the North; that large cargoes of Eastern lumber are exported to foreign countries; that nine-tenths of the wooden-ware used in the Southern States is manufactured in New England; that, in outrageous disregard of the natural rights and claims of Southern mechanics, the markets of the South are forever filled with Northern furniture, vehicles, ax helves, walking canes, yard-sticks, clothes-pins and pen-holders; that the extraordinary number of factories, steam-engines, forges and machine-shops in the free States, require an extraordinary quantity of cord-wood; that a large majority of the magnificent edifices and other structures, both private and public, in which timber, in its various forms, is extensively used, are to be found in the free States--we say, let all these things be remembered, and the truth will at once flash across the mind that the forests of the North are a source of far greater income than those of the South. The difference is simply this: At the North everything is turned to advantage. When a tree is cut down, the main body is sold or used for lumber, railing or paling, the stump for matches and shoepegs, the knees for ship-building, and the branches for fuel. At the South everything is either neglected or mismanaged. Whole forests are felled by the ruthless hand of slavery, the trees are cut into logs, rolled into heaps, covered with the limbs and brush, and then burned on the identical soil that gave them birth. The land itself next falls a prey to the fell destroyer, and that which was once a beautiful, fertile and luxuriant woodland, is soon despoiled of all its treasures, and converted into an eye-offending desert.

Were we to go beneath the soil and collect all the mineral and lapidarious wealth of the free States, we should find it so much greater than the corresponding wealth of the slave States, that no ordinary combination of figures would suffice to express the difference. To say nothing of the gold and quicksilver of California, the iron and coal of Pennsylvania, the copper of Michigan, the lead of Illinois, or the salt of New-York, _the marble and freestone quarries of New England are, incredible as it may seem to those unacquainted with the facts, far more important sources of revenue than all the subterranean deposits in the slave States_. From the most reliable statistics within our reach, we are led to the inference that the total value of all the precious metals, rocks, minerals, and medicinal waters, annually extracted from the bowels of the free States, is not less than eighty-five million of dollars; the whole value of the same substances annually brought up from beneath the surface of the slave States does not exceed twelve millions. In this respect to what is our poverty ascribable? To the same cause that has impoverished and dishonored us in all other respects--the thriftless and degrading institution of slavery.

Nature has been kind to us in all things. The strata and substrata of the South are profusely enriched with gold and silver, and precious stones, and from the natural orifices and aqueducts in Virginia and North Carolina, flow the purest healing waters in the world. But of what avail is all this latent wealth? Of what avail will it ever be, so long as slavery is permitted to play the dog in the manger? To these queries there can be but one reply. Slavery must be suppressed; the South, so great and so glorious by nature, must be reclaimed from her infamy and degradation; our cities, fields and forests, must be kept intact from the unsparing monster; the various and ample resources of our vast domain, subterraneous as well as superficial, must be developed, and made to contribute to our pleasures and to the necessities of the world.

A very significant chapter, and one particularly pertinent to many of the preceding pages, might be written on the Decline of Agriculture in the Slave States; but as the press of other subjects admonishes us to be concise upon this point, we shall present only a few of the more striking instances. In the first place, let us compare the crops of wheat and rye in Kentucky, in 1850, with the corresponding crops in the same State in 1840--after which, we will apply a similar rule of comparison to two or three other slaveholding states.

KENTUCKY.

Wheat, bus. Rye, bus.
Crop of 1840 4,803,152 1,321,373
" " 1850 2,142,822 415,073
--------- --------
Decrease 2,660,330 bus. Decrease 906,300 bus.

TENNESSEE.

Wheat, bus. Tobacco, lbs.
Crop of 1840 4,569,692 29,550,432
" " 1850 1,619,386 20,148,932
--------- ----------
Decrease 2,950,306 bus. Decrease 9,401,500 lbs.

VIRGINIA.

Rye, bus. Tobacco, lbs.
Crop of 1840 1,482,799 75,347,106
" " 1850 458,930 56,803,227
--------- ----------
Decrease 1,023,869 bus. Decrease 18,543,879 lbs.

ALABAMA.