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A   VISIT 

TO 

THE    UNITED    STATES 


LONDON  :     PRINTED    BY 

SPOTTISWOODE      AND      CO.,      NEW-STREET      SQUARE 
AND    PARLIAMENT    STREET 


WHITE    AND     BLACK 


THE    OUTCOME    OF  A    VISIT    TO 


THE    UNITED    STATES 


SIR  GEORGE   CAMPBELL,    M.P. 


CHATTO    &    WINDUS,    PICCADILLY 

1879 


PREFACE. 


I  HAVE  long  thought  that  a  man  has  not  seen  the 
world  till,  besides  following  the  beaten  tracks  in  the 
countries  of  Europe  and  Western  Asia,  which  have 
all  drawn  from  the  same  sources,  he  has  seen  and 
realised  both  the  great  civilisation  of  the  Old  World 
which  exists  in  China,  owing  nothing  to  our  sources, 
and  the  new  departure  in  Western  civilisation  which 
has  taken  place  in  a  New  World,  in  America.  While  I 
was  in  India  I  was  able  to  make  a  short  run  round 
to  China.  The  circumstances  of  a  hard-working  life 
have  not  permitted  me  to  fulfil  my  desire  to  visit 
America  till  I  accomplished  it  this  last  autumn. 
Besides  the  wish  to  see  America  as  others  have  seen 
it,  I  had  also  a  special  desire,  for  reasons  which  I 
explain,  to  learn  something  of  the  present  position 
of  '  the  nigger  question  ' — a  subject  on  which  very 
little  has  been  written  in  this  country,  and  in  regard 
to  which  I  had  failed  to  get  much  clear  information  of 
a  recent  date.  For  that  reason  I  gave  special  atten 
tion  to  some  of  the  Southern  States,  viz.,  Virginia, 
North  Carolina,  South  Carolina,  and  Georgia. 

During  my  tour  I  kept  rough  notes,  but  only  as 

209 


vi  PREFACE. 

an  aide-memoire  to  myself,  and  not  in  a  state  intended 
for  publication.  After  my  return  I  had  occasion  to 
visit  my  constituents  in  the  Kirkcaldy  Burghs,  and  I 
varied  the  monotony  of  our  ordinary  political  subjects 
by  telling  them  something  of  what  I  had  seen  in 
America.  To  go  through  a  group  of  Scotch  burghs 
one  has  to  make  a  good  many  speeches  ;  and  so  it 
happened  that  on  several  occasions  I  went  over  ground 
connected  with  or  suggested  by  my  American  expe 
riences.  I  also  wrote  an  article  on  '  Black  and  White 
in  the  Southern  States,'  which  the  Editor  of  the 
*  Fortnightly  Review  '  was  kind  enough  to  publish. 
Several  of  my  friends  have  been  so  good  as  to  say 
that  they  have  been  interested  by  it,  and  some  of  them 
have  added,  '  It  is  only  a  pity  that  you  did  not  carry 
the  subject  a  little  farther.'  Thus  encouraged,  I  have 
thought  that  some  might  be  glad  to  see  the  evidence 
on  which  my  conclusions  were  founded,  as  contained 
in  my  notes.  The  fact  is,  too,  that  though  we  have 
plenty  of  books  about  the  Far  West  and  life  in  the 
Rocky  Mountains,  and  so  on,  there  seem  to  be  very 
few  regarding  the  more  accessible  parts  of  the  United 
States.  I  certainly  had  great  difficulty  in  finding 
such  books  to  guide  me  in  my  travels,  and  was 
obliged  to  take  my  information  in  a  great  degree 
from  that  of  Mr.  Anthony  Trollope,  written  almost  a 
quarter  of  a  century  back.  A  Member  of  Parliament, 
Mr.  Hussey  Vivian,  who  recently  visited  America, 
and  who  is  a  very  competent  observer,  has  published 
a  book  of  a  very  interesting  character;  but  it  so 
happens  that  his  specialities  are  different  from  mine. 


PREFACE.  Vll 

He  tells  much  about  mines  and  metals,  and  other 
things,  of  which  I  have  no  knowledge. 

It  has  occurred  to  me,  then,  that  there  might  be 
room  for  such  a  book  as  I  now  oifer,  containing  much 
of  what  I  have  picked  up  during  my  tour  in  the  United 
States.  I  fancy  that  my  notes  may  perhaps  be  useful, 
if  only  as  a  sort  of  guide  and  handbook  to  others  con 
templating  a  similar  tour  ;  and  that  those  interested 
in  the  position  of  the  coloured  population,  and  the 
political  and  industrial  questions  arising  out  of  it, 
may  find  a  good  deal  which  has  not  yet  been  given 
to  the  public. 

It  will  be  seen  that  I  made  a  very  rapid  run  through 
the  Northern  and  some  of  the  Western  States,  and  saw 
something  of  the  interior  of  Illinois  and  the  farmers 
of  that  country  ;  and  then,  after  visiting  Pennsylva 
nia,  Baltimore,  and  Washington,  made  a  more  careful 
study  of  the  condition  of  things  in  the  four  Southern 
States  which  I  have  already  mentioned. 

In  addition  to  the  Black  question  I  have  been 
much  interested  in  the  cultivation  and  handling  of 
cotton,  which  I  had  also  seen  in  India  and  Egypt ; 
and  in  the  Southern  cotton  mills,  which  now  rival 
the  North  in  the  production  of  the  coarser  goods,  just 
as  the  mills  in  our  cotton-producing  possessions  rival 
those  of  Lancashire.  There  seems  to  be  no  doubt  that 
both  in  America  and  Egypt  the  yield  of  cotton  to  the 
acre  is  much  larger  than  in  India.  The  bale  of  which 
I  speak  is  about  450  Ibs. 

My  tour  was  so  far  cut  short  that  I  was  not  able 
to  make  a  little  stay  in  New  York  and  Philadelphia 


viii  PREFACE. 

in  the  winter  season,  as  I  had  hoped  ;  and  I  have  not 
had  an  opportunity  of  going  into  the  social  and  poli 
tical  affairs  of  New  England,  which  I  should  have 
much  liked.  That  and  a  great  deal  more  remains  for 
another  tour,  if  I  should  ever  be  able  to  accomplish  it. 

I  have  worked  up  and  supplemented  the  general 
views  which  I  presented  in  the  Kirkcaldy  Burghs, 
and  submit  the  whole  as  '  A  Bird's-eye  Yiew  of  the 
United  States.'  Then  I  have  been  permitted  to  re- 
publish  my  article  on  '  Black  and  White,'  and  have 
prefaced  it  with  some  remarks  on  our  own  manage 
ment  of  coloured  races  in  our  American  and  African 
colonies.  I  have  put  into  some  shape  those  parts 
of  my  Journal  which  I  thought  might  bear  publica 
tion.  During  the  return  voyage  I  had  made  notes  of 
the  Constitutions  of  some  of  the  States  ;  and,  as  a 
specimen  of  the  most  improved  and  modern  State 
Constitutions,  I  have  appended  the  principal  parts  of 
the  Constitutions  of  some  States,  especially  Illinois. 

I  left  a  blank  side  in  my  Journal,  on  which  I  have 
sometimes  subsequently  noted  up  later  experiences 
and  corrections,  and  I  have  thought  it  better  to 
amalgamate  these  with  the  rest,  rather  than  to  put 
them  separately  as  notes ;  but  the  effect  is  to  create 
some  anachronisms,  as  it  were  ;  so  I  have  not  entered 
the  precise  dates,  but  have  followed  generally  the 
order  of  time,  place,  and  subjects.  At  the  same  time 
a  journal  must  necessarily  contain  something  of  an 
olla  podrida  of  various  and  sometimes  incongruous 
subjects  a  good  deal  mixed  together.  If  it  be  re 
marked  that  on  some  subjects  several  repetitions  are 


PREFACE,  IX 

to  be  found,  I  reply  that  this  is  the  evidence  on  which 
my  conclusions  are  founded,  and  that  proof  of  this 
kind  necessarily  depends  on  the  cumulative  testimony 
of  various  witnesses. 

Things  march  rapidly,  and  while  I  write  the  Black 
question  seems  to  have  assumed  a  new  phase,  creat 
ing  great  interest  in  it,  owing  to  the  movement  of 
large  numbers  of  that  race  from  Mississippi  and  Louis 
iana,  seeking  to  escape  from  tyranny  and  ill-usage, 
and  to  find  new  homes  in  Kansas — a  State  where  I 
have  mentioned  that  the  negroes  seem  to  be  well 
treated,  and  in  the  back  parts  of  which  a  good  many 
of  them  are,  I  have  heard,  successfully  established  as 
independent  small  farmers.  There  was  an  outbreak  of 
yellow  fever,  and  I  did  not  visit  Mississippi  and  Louis 
iana  ;  but  I  have  several  times  mentioned  the  former 
State,  as  that  in  which  the  practice  of  '  bull-dozing,' 
or  bullying  the  negroes,  has  most  prevailed.  There 
were  also  severe  election  contests  in  parts  of  Louis 
iana,  accompanied  by  much  violence  ;  and  some  cases 
of  very  unjustifiable  lynchings  of  Negroes  were 
reported  during  my  visit.  To  these  things,  no 
doubt,  the  movement  is  due.  I  have  also  men 
tioned  the  case  of  a  county  in  Georgia,  in  which 
the  negroes,  being  dissatisfied  with  their  treatment, 
formed  a  league  among  themselves  to  abandon  that 
county  and  leave  their  persecutors  without  labour. 
That,  I  take  it,  is  exactly  what  has  been  done  on  a 
larger  scale  in  the  States  of  the  Lower  Mississippi.  It 
is  a  form  of  strike  as  a  counter- move  against  ill-treat 
ment;  and  under  the  circumstances  the  move  may  be  a 


X  PREFACE. 

bold   and  effective   measure.     There   is   nothing   so 

o 

likely  to  bring  the  landowners  to  a  sense  of  what 
they  owe  the  negro  population  as  to  make  them  feel 
the  want  of  it.  The  only  fear  is,  that  these  poor 
people  are  rushing  into  an  independence  for  which 
they  have  not  the  means  ;  but  I  gather  from  the 
latest  accounts  that  the  movement  is  rather  striking 
in  its  sudden  and  concentrated  form,  than  one  which 
involves  a  very  great  population.  The  numbers 
are  said  to  have  been  somewhat  exaggerated.  I 
think  it  will  probably  be  found  that  it  is  only  the 
population  of  particular  counties  or  districts,  where 
there  has  been  special  ill-usage,  who  have  emigrated 
in  mass.  If  the  efforts  now  being  made  to  obtain 
assistance  for  them  in  the  North  should  be  successful, 
and  they  should  be  enabled  to  locate  themselves  in  a 
temperate  region  in  Southern  Kansas,  the  effect  may 
be  beneficial  on  the  whole.  At  the  same  time  I  have 
expressed  a  strong  belief  that,  in  the  Southern  States, 
whites  and  blacks  are  interdependent — neither  can 
do  without  the  other.  I  think  they  themselves  have 
found  this  to  be  so  ;  and  generally  speaking  industrial 
questions  are  not  the  cause  of  serious  dissension. 

It  is  the  struggle  for  political  power,  and  the 
question  whether  the  coloured  people  are  to  be 
allowed  to  vote  freely,  which  has  caused  all  the  trouble. 
The  greater  the  trouble  the  more  necessity  for  settling 
the  question  whether  real  effect  is  to  be  given  to  the 
15th  Article  of  Amendment  to  the  United  States  Con 
stitution,  providing  that  the  right  to  vote  shall  not 
be  denied  or  abridged  on  account  of  race  or  colour. 


PREFACE.  xi 

It  is  notorious  that  in  the  late  elections  the  free  exer 
cise  of  that  vote  has  been  abridged  and  destroyed  by 
violence  and  fraud  in  several  Congressional  districts. 
These  disputed  elections  must  be  decided  by  the 
present  Congress.  I  cannot  but  think  that  it  would 
be  good  policy  on  the  part  of  Northern  Democrats 
honestly  to  give  up  the  few  seats  which  have  been 
won  by  the  South  by  means  which  cannot  possibly 
be  defended  ;  and  that  it  is  nothing  but  the  most 
evident  prudence  on  the  part  of  Southern  Democrats 
to  accept  that  solution  and  be  content  with  the  great 
majority  and  complete  control  of  their  States,  which 
they  have  attained,  without  insisting  on  an  absolutely 
solid  South,  to  which  they  have  no  just  right,  if  elec 
tion  be  free. 

A  solution  of  this  kind  would  involve  an  even 
balancing  of  parties,  which  would  plainly  point  to 
compromise  ;  and  if  there  is  to  be  compromise  surely 
the  best  plan  would  be  to  let  the  President  of  com 
promise,  Mr.  Hayes,  sit  quietly  for  another  term. 
Mr.  Hayes  pleases  neither  party,  and  it  is  the  fashion 
to  run  him  down  and  call  him  weak.  Yet  he  is  the 
only  man  who  has  shown  some  independent  will  to 
act  for  the  benefit  of  his  country  outside  the  tram 
mels  of  party.  I  cannot  but  think  that  the  Civil 
Service  and  other  reforms  that  he  has  attempted  to 
initiate  are  well  worthy  of  a  trial.  No  doubt  if  the 
'  man  on  horseback  '  must  come  back — if  the  South 
must  be  kept  down  by  a  firm  hand,  Grant  is  the  man 
to  do  it.  Whatever  his  other  qualities,  he  knows 
the  policy  he  is  to  carry  out,  and  can  be  depended  on 


xii  PREFACE. 

to  do  it  firmly  without  flinching.  But  if  things  are 
to  be  settled  by  conciliation,  and  North  and  South 
are  to  come  together  on  friendly  terms  for  a  new 
departure,  then  I  venture  to  think  that  Mr.  Hayes 
is  an  able  and  good  man,  whose  personal  character, 
manner,  and  surroundings  well  fit  him  to  carry  out 
such  a  policy.  But  to  make  such  a  policy  possible  it  is 
absolutely  necessary  that  the  South  should  honestly 
accept  the  15th  Amendment. 

GEORGE  CAMPBELL. 

May  10,  1879. 


CONTENTS. 


A  BIRD'S-EYE   VIEW  OF  THE   UNITED   STATES. 

PAGE 

Inducements  to  Visit  America    . 

General  Features  of  the  Country     .  .     .         5 

The  Climate        ....  .10 

^  The  Races  composing  the  Population       .  .         ..12 

The  Principal  Products  of  the  Soil       .  .18 

Characteristics  of  the  American  People  .         .         .         .     .       21 

Language  .  .  .  .22 

Hotels  and  Food     .  .     .       23 

Railway  Travelling      .         .         .         .         .         .         .26 

Social  Arrangements        .         .         .         .         .         .     .       27 

Manners      .  .  .29 

The  Cities       .  .     .       32 

The  Country  Districts  .  ...       34 

The  Free  School  System 35 

Commercial  Morality  .......       37 

Protection  and  Reciprocity      .  .     ,       38 

The  Drink  Question  .  .         .  .45 

Religion         ....  .     .       51 

Political  System 57 

Home  Rule  in  the  States 71 

The  Position  of  Canada 77 

Taxation  in  the  States 79 

Land  System       .  84 

The  Currency  Question  ...  ....       89 

Opportunities  for  Emigration  and  Investment      .         .         .97 
Feeling  towards  England 109 


xiv  CONTENTS. 


THE  MANAGEMENT   OF  COLOURED   RACES. 

PAOK 

The  System  prevailing  in  our  Colonies     .         .         .          ..Ill 
Treatment  of  Natives  in  Africa  .  ...     120 


BLACK  AND    WHITE  IN  THE  SOUTHERN  STATES. 

^Objects  of  my  Inquiry  ...  .     .      120 

1  The  Character  and  Capacity  of  the  Negro    .  .128 

<  The  Negroes  as  a  Labouring  Population  .     .     140 

The  Political  Situation  in  the  South    .  .162 

[The  Caste  Question 194 


SOME  OF  THE  CONTENTS  OF  MY  JOURNAL. 

The  Voyage  and  First  Impressions 203 

New  York 205 

The  Elevated  Railway 208 

The  New  York  Country 209 

A  Scamper  North  and  West 211 

Boston 213 

The  Massachusetts  Country  .  .  .  .  .214 

The  Mohawk  Valley 215 

Niagara 216 

Canada  .  .  217 

Chicago 220 

Chicago  to  St.  Louis 223 

St.  Louis  .  .  ...  224 

Kansas 226 

^rThe  Blacks  in  the  West 228 

The  Missouri  and  Mississippi  .  .  .  230 

The  Interior  of  Illinois 231 

The  Western  Farmers 233 

Indiana  and  Ohio 238 

Pennsylvania                   ........  240 

Pittsburgh 241 

Interior  of  Pennsylvania           .         .         .         .         .     .  243 

Democratic  Meeting          ......  244 

Pennsylvauiaii  Farming  .          .                   ....  246 

Philadelphia         .  247 


CONTENTS. 


PAGE 


Republican  Meeting    ....  .     .     248 

Pennsylvanian  Industries    .         .         .  .         .         .250 

Philadelphian  Society      .  .     .     252 

The  Courts  and  the  Judges  .  .254 

Some  Pennsylvanian  Ideas       .         .         .  .     .     255 

Baltimore .256 

)te-The  Blacks  in  Maryland,  &c    .  .     .     257 

The  Hopkins  University      .  .                   .                        261 

The  Baltimore  People     .  .     ,     262 

A  Democratic  view  of  Politics  .         .         .         .         ,263 

Washington .     .     265 

)£  Conversation  with  the  President  .         .  .266 

Appearance  of  the  City    .  .     .     270 

Some  Opinions  on  several  Subjects        .         .          .          .271 

Some  of  the  Public  Offices 274 

The  Revenue  System 276 

The  Weather  Department        ...  .     .     278 

General  Sherman         .         .          .          ,         .         .         .280 
Law  and  Lawyers  .         .         .         .         .         .         .     .     281 

Virginia      ..........  283 

$fc-  The  Blacks  at  Hampton 284 

Norfolk       ....  .287 

Petersburg ...  289 

Free  Trade  Views         .                   291 

Richmond 292 

Education 293 

The  Tobacco  Manufacture 294 

A  Visit  Jbo  the  Country 295 

The  Governor  of  Virginia         .         .         .         .         .     .  296 

Virginian  Views  of  Things 298 

North  Carolina 302 

Raleigh,  Capital  of  the  State 304 

Gaelic-speaking  Americans       .         .         .         .         .     .  305 

Cotton  Culture 306 

Condition  of  the  Negroes         .         .         .         .         .     .  307 

Political  Parties 310 

Agricultural  Geography           .         .                            .     .  312 
Education  .......                  .313 

The  Farmers .     .  314 

a 


xvi  CONTENTS. 

PAOK 

Some  Carolinian  Acquaintances       .  .     .     315 

The  Constitution  and  Legislation  .     317 

Durhams  and  Tobacco  Manufacture  .         .         .     .     320 

A  Southern  Cotton  Mill      .  .321 

Salisbury  and  the  people  there  .      ...     323 

South  Carolina  ....  .325 

To  Columbia,  the  Capital 326 

Wade-Hampton,  the  Governor  ...  .  327 

^-The  Election 329 

Education  ....  .332 

^Position  of  the  Negroes  333 

The  Tenure  of  Land  ...  .335 

Charleston  ...  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  336 

^he  Low-country  Negroes 337 

The  Rice  Country 338 

The  Sea  Islands 339 

Some  Representative  Men      .         .         .  .          .     .     340 

Visits  to  the  Country  .•?...  342 

^fJIow  the  Election  was  Won  .  .  .  .  .  .  345 

The  Exodus  to  Liberia 347 

South  Carolina  Legislation  .  .  .  .  .  .  348 

A  Visit  to  the  Rice  Districts 349 

The  Phosphate  Works  351 

The  County  of  Beaufort 352 

#The  Effect  of  Black  Rule 355 

An  American  '  Ryotwar'  Settlement  .  .  .  .359 

w     Georgia 362 

Augusta  and  the  Cotton  Mills 363 

Journey  to  Atlanta         .         .         .         .         .         .     .  365 

A  Southern  View  of  Things         .         .         .          .         .366 

Atlanta,  the  Capital 369 

The  Georgian  Legislature 370 

Some  Georgian  Acquaintances          .         .         .         .     .  371 

The  Liquor  Traffic       .......  376 

:5KViews  about  the  Nigger .         .         .         .         .  377 

Some  Statistics    .         .         .         .         .         .         .  379 

ore  Talk  with  Georgians       .         .         .         .         .  381 

Democratic  Orator  .         .         .         .         .          .         .386 

The  Election  of  Judges    .......  387 

Manufactures  and  Trade      ....  388 


CONTENTS.  xvil 

PAGE 

The  Georgian  Farmers  .  ...  389 

>4The  Independents  .......  390 

To  Calhotm  —  a  Farm  in  the  Country       .         .         .     .  392 

ft  The  White  Farmers     .......  393 

on  —  more  White  Farmers  and  Black  .  .  .  394 


The  Return  Journey  .         .         .         .         .         .         .397 

A  Cattle  Country    ........     398 

Washington  again        .         .         .         .         .         .          .399 

To  New  York          .  .  .     .     400 

Railway  Affairs  .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .401 

Some  Views  of  North  and  South     .....     402 

A  New  York  Market  .......     403 

New  York  Politics  and  Taxation     .....     404 

The  Voyage  Home       .......     405 

STATE  CONSTITUTIONS. 

The  Constitution  of  Massachusetts       .....     407 

The  Constitution  of  Virginia  ......     408 

The  Constitution  of  Illinois  .         .         .         .413 


A  BIED'S-EYE  VIEW  OF  THE  UNITED  STATES 

BEING  THE   SUBSTANCE   OF 

A    SERIES    OF    ADDRESSES    DELIVERED    IN    SCOTLAND    IN 
THE    BEGINNING    OF    FEBRUARY    1879 


A  BIRD'S-EYE  VIEW 

OF 

THE    UNITED    STATES: 

THE  SUBSTANCE  OF  A  SERIES  Of  ADDRESSES. 

I  HAVE  a  strong  belief  that  all  of  us  ought  to  know 
the  Americans  better  than  we  do.  They  are  really 
and  truly  our  kin.  This  is  not  a  mere  phrase. 
When  one  goes  among  them  one  finds  that  they  are 
very  little  removed  from  us  after  all,  and  the  com 
munity  of  language  makes  intimacy  very  easy.  An 
intimate  acquaintance  and  friendship  with  them  must 
be  most  beneficial  to  both  parties,  in  order  to  cultivate 
the  arts  of  peace  and  material  progress,  anfl.  to  avert 
the  possibility  of  misunderstandings  which  have  led, 
and  mights-even  yet  lead  to  war  between  two  sister 
countries,  than  which,  in  these  modern  days  of 
destruction,  nothing  can  be  more  awful  or  more 
terrible  ;  but  a  risk  to  which  we  are  always  exposed 
as  long  as  misunderstandings-  'are  possible.  It  seems 
to  me  very  unfortunate  that  most  of  the  popular 
English  writers  who  have  described  the  Americans 
have  caricatured  them  ;  and  that  is  so  not  only  as 
regards  the  writers  of  the  past  who  have  suffered 

B    2 


4          BIRD'S-EYE   VIEW   OF  THE  UNITED   STATES. 

from  American  finance  or  otherwise,  but  even  the 
popular  writer  Anthony  Trollope,  who  is  still  among 
us,  and  who  some  years  ago  gave  us  a  description  of 
the  Americans  in  his  very  vivid  and  popular  manner, 
seems  to  me  to  have  done  them  the  greatest  injustice. 
He  seems  to  make  the  worst  of  everything  ;  most  of 
their  ways  and  institutions  he  condemns  to,  I  think, 
an  unfair  degree  ;  and  you  may  imagine  the  spirit  in 
which  he  wrote,  when  I  mention  that  writing  in  the 
latter  part  of  the  great  civil  war  he  condemns,  in 
language  the  most  scathing,  all  who  would  do  any 
thing  so  mad  and  foolish  as  to  emancipate  the  slaves. 
The  only  wonder  to  me  is  that  after  all  that  has 
passed  the  feeling  of  the  Americans  towards  us  is  so 
good  as  it  in  fact  is.  They  really  have  a  very  kindly 
feeling  on  their  part ;  and  if  there  is  misunderstanding 
I  think  it  is  more  due  to  ignorance  and  prejudice  on 
the  part  of  many  people  in  England,  though  I  hope 
not  in  Kirkcaldy,  which  has  so  much  and  so  benefi 
cial  business  with  America.  It  is  certainly  the  case 
that  the  Americans  who  come  to  Europe  do  not  feel 
themselves  at  their  ease  in  England,  and  consequently 
it  happens — a  very  lamentable  fact,  I  think — that, 
almost  invariably,  after  spending  a  few  days  in  the 
country  and  seeing  Windsor,  Stratford-on-Avon,  and 
Abbotsford,  they  go  abroad  to  the  Continent  of 
Europe  and  spend  their  time  and  money  there.  I 
think  this  should  be  cured.  We  should  welcome 
them  more  than  we  do  ;  and  I  would  very  much 
urge  on  all  of  you  who  can  make  it  out  to  go  and 
see  for  yourselves  in  America  what  kind  of  people 


GENERAL  FEATURES  OF  THE  COUNTRY.     5 

they  are.  You  would  very  soon  find  that  you  are 
not  among  foreigners  there,  but  among  a  people  with 
whom  you  could  very  readily  make  yourselves  at  home. 

The  facilities  for  getting  to  America  are  now  very 
great,  and  the  expense  not  large.  The  Atlantic  no 
doubt  is  not  the  calmest  of  seas,  but  stout-hearted 
people  don't  mind  that.  The  voyage  is  now  reduced 
to  eight  days,  and  the  steamers  are  admirable  and 
very  numerous.  For  those  who  are  prepared  to 
travel  in  an  independent  way,  without  servants  or 
special  luxuries,  the  cost  of  travelling  in  America  is 
not  excessive,  and  the  comforts  are  considerable. 
Whatever  may  be  said  of  the  hotels  in  other 
respects,  they  are  very  convenient  for  the  passing 
traveller,  and  the  kindness  of  American  friends  to 
whom  one  is  introduced  is  unbounded. 

For  people  who  require  private  rooms  and 
accommodation  for  servants,  and  who  cannot  rough 
it  so  far  as  to  get  about  by  the  aid  of  tramways  and 
public  conveyances  only,  travelling  in  America  is 
much  more  difficult  and  expensive,  since  the  American 
establishments  do  not  afford  the  same  private  accom 
modation  jis  English  hotels,  or  if  they  do  charge  for 
it  excessively,  and  the  hack  carriages  are  enormously 
dear.  This  must  be  borne  in  mind  if  ladies  are  of 
the  party. 

GENERAL  FEATURES  OF  THE  COUNTRY. 

I  will  try  to  give  you  some  little  account  of  the 
country  and  the  people  ;  and  first  as  regards  the 


6          BIRD'S-EYE   VIEW   OF  THE  UNITED   STATES. 

objects   immediately  apparent  to  the  eye — the  com 
mon  botany  and  zoology  of  the  country,  I  was  sur 
prised  to  find  not  nearly  so  strange  as  I  expected. 
One   has   heard    so    much   of    the    extremely    new 
character  of  the  trees   and    animals   of  Australasia, 
and  other  distant  countries — of  trees  without  leaves, 
and  animals  that  walk  chiefly  by  the   aid   of  their 
tails — that  I  had  expected  in  America  also,  so  long 
an  undiscovered  continent,  to  find  numerous  strange 
appearances.     It  really  is  not  so  at  all.     The  vegeta 
tion  is  curiously  like  our  own.     Firs  and  oaks,  and 
other  trees,  look  very  much  like  those  in  Europe, 
and  the  animals  too  are  not  violently  unlike.     There 
are  partridges  and  birds  like  grouse,  and  American 
rabbits  not  so  unlike  ours,  and  other  creatures  very 
familiar  to  us.     But  there  is  this  peculiarity,  that, 
although  almost  all  plants  and  animals  are  like  those 
with  us  they  are  never  identical.     They  are   always 
similar,  but  never  the  same  species  ;  and  perhaps  it 
is  due  to  the  peculiarities  of  climate  that  European 
species   seem    never   to   have    superseded   those    of 
America.     For  instance,  while  the  European  rabbit 
has    overrun   Australia  and  Xew  Zealand,  it  is  un 
known  in  America,  and  the  small  American  rabbit — 
something  between  the  rabbit  and  the  hare  in  its 
habits — still   holds    its   place.      I    am  told   that   in 
reality  there  is  a  greater  difference  between  the  natural 
productions    of  the  country   east    and    west  of  the 
Rocky  Mountains  than  there  is  between  Europe  and 
the  Eastern  States.     I  did  not  myself  go  so  far  as  the 
Rocky    Mountains  ;    but   till  we   reach  the  western 


GENERAL  FEATURES  OF  THE   COUNTRY.  7 

part  of  the  American  continent,  I  may  say  of  the 
States  in  general,  that  they  are  not  so  mountainous 
or  so  hilly  as  Great  Britain.  The  most  decided  hills 
that  one  sees  are  close  to  the  eastern  ports,  but 
beyond  that  there  is  scarcely  anything  that  can  be 
called  a  mountain.  What  is  called  a  mountain  in 
American  language  is  sometimes  a  very  little  hill 
indeed.  On  the  other  hand,  one  is  struck  by  the 
immense  quantity  of  wood  all  over  the  country,  not 
less  in  the  Southern  States  than  in  the  North.  In 
fact,  the  Southern  States  are  especially  woody,  and 
it  is  the  quantity  of  wood  that  in  all  the  old  States 
makes  the  extension  of  cultivation  somewhat  slow 
and  difficult.  The  prevailing  tree  in  the  south  is  a 
pine,  which  very  much  resembles  our  Scotch  fir  ;  in 
the  north,  hardwood  trees  are  more  prevalent.  In 
truth,  not  a  tenth  part  of  the  older  States  is  yet 
really  cleared  and  cultivated.  There  is  yet  every 
where  room  for  immense  development.  The  rainfall 
is  generally  most  beneficently  arranged,  and  the  ge 
neral  character  of  the  land  is  one  of  much  fertility. 
In  this  respect,  however,  I  do  not  think  that  it  has 
upon  the  -whole,  or  taken  on  an  average,  an  advan 
tage  over  England  and  the  lowlands  of  Scotland. 
True,  some  western  lands  are  of  extraordinary 
fertility,  but  there  is  a  great  deal  that  is  only 
moderately  fertile,  and  that  is  the  case  in  regard  to 
most  of  the  Eastern  States.  When  we  compare  the 
country  on  the  whole  with  England,  I  think  it  may 
be  said  that  perhaps  it  is  about  on  a  par — the 
average  of  the  soil  is  as  good,  perhaps  a  little  better. 


8          BIRD'S-EYE   VIEW   OF  TIIE   UNITED   STATES. 

In  some  respects  the  climate  is  brighter,  but  the 
winters  are  certainly  more  severe,  and  the  extremes 
of  climate  lead  to  an  enormous  growth  of  weeds, 
which  makes  agriculture  in  some  respects  more 
difficult  than  with  us.  True,  in  the  west  there  are 
what  are  called  prairie  States,  great  parts  of  which 
are  free  from  natural  •  wood  ;  but  it  is  an  entire 
delusion  to  suppose  that  magnificent  prairies  with, 
magnificent  natural  grass  are  easily  available  to  the 
settler.  I  travelled  considerably  west  of  the  Missouri 
in  search  of  such  a  prairie,  and  never  found  one. 
The  ground  is  all  taken  up  and  enclosed,  and  the 
natural  prairie  grass — never  very  good — fails  as  soon 
as  cattle  are  turned  upon  it  in  large  numbers. 
Hence  in  Illinois  and  such  States,  the  farmers  are 
obliged  to  resort  to  artificial  grass,  just  as  we  do  in 
this  part  of  Scotland. 

On  the  whole,  then,  taking  the  country  mile  for 
mile  and  acre  for  acre,  I  can  say  that  it  is  about 
equal  to  but  not  superior  to  England  ;  but  then  there 
is  this  vast  difference,  that  it  is  not  one  England,  but 
forty  Englands.  Some  people  seem  to  have  been 
offended  by  Mr.  Gladstone's  recent  article,  when  he 
said  that  the  United  States,  if  they  kept  together, 
must  certainly  surpass  us.  It  seems  to  me  that  Mr. 
Gladstone  only  spoke  a  truth  which  must  be  self- 
evident,  without  attributing  to  the  American  people 
any  great  superiority  over  ourselves,  at  all  events 
over  Scotchmen.  We  are  a  people  a  little  over 
30,000,000,  who  have  no  means  of  extension  in  our 
own  country.  We  are,  as  it  were,  like  a  hive  of  bees 


I 

GENERAL  FEATURES  OF  THE  COUNTRY.      9 

which  is  constantly  sending  forth  swarms  to  establish 
other  hives  elsewhere,  but  does  not  itself  admit  of 
extension  ;  whereas  the  Americans  are  already  up 
wards  of  40,000,000,  perhaps  nearly  45,000,000  of 
people  who  are  continually  extending  themselves 
every  day  ;  they  have  not  one  hive  but  forty  hives, 
and  these  only  very  partially  occupied  ;  and  not  only 
do  they  send  their  swarms  into  their  own  hives,  but 
they  are  continually  receiving  new  swarms  from  us  and 
from  others.  It  follows,  as  a  matter  of  course,  that 
under  such  circumstances  the  forty  hives  must  surpass 
the  one  hive  in  population  and  production,  if  only 
they  keep  together.  And  we  may  be  very  comfort 
able  at  home  without  grudging  them  their  extension. 
In  truth,  what  the  Americans  suffer  from  at 
present  is  too  much  land.  They  would  have  better 
settled  what  they  have  if  they  had  less  of  it.  At  "one 
time  it  was  supposed  that  soon  after  passing  the 
Missouri  they  had  reached  the  natural  limit  in  that 
direction,  and  that  the  country  was  then  bounded  by 
a  great  rainless  tract,  marked  in  the  map  as  the  great 
American  desert ;  but  it  has  been  discovered  that 
this  is  quite  a  mistake,  that  the  country  called  desert 
is  not  desert  at  all,  but  very  capable  of  excellent 
cultivation,  and  especially  good  for  raising  wheat 
and  cattle.  The  most  rapidly  developing  States  in 
the  west  are  those  situated  in  that  tract  marked  as 
desert  in  the  map.  In  fact,  that  is  the  great  feature 
of  recent  American  extension,  and  from  these  there 
comes  a  large  portion  of  the  wheat  and  the  beef 
which  to-day  renders  your  food  so  much  cheaper 


10       BIRD'S-EYE   VIEW  OF  THE   UNITED   STATES. 

than  it  has  been.  Wheat  is  a  plant  which  thrives  in 
a  dry  climate,  and  great  tracts  in  the  far  west  are 
now  found  to  be  suitable  to  it,  while  even  where  the 
land  is  too  dry  or  steep  for  wheat,  good  grazing  is 
still  found  on  the  slopes  and  in  the  valleys  of  the 
Kocky  Mountains. 

THE  CLIMATE. 

The  Americans  are  accustomed  rather  to  boast  of 
their  climate,  and  to  compare  the  brightness  of  their 
skies  with  our  foggy  atmosphere  ;  but  on  the  other 
hand  there  is  no  doubt  of  this,  that  they  suffer  from 
extremes  of  heat  and  cold  more  than  we  do.     The 
heat  in  summer  is  excessive  in  New  York.     For  a 
few  weeks  in  the  height  of  summer  I  am  told  that 
it  is  not  an  uncommon  thing  for  the   thermometer 
to  stand  at  110°,  and  to  be  almost  as  high  at  night 
as  in  the  daytime.     And  then  the  cold  in  winter  is 
very  severe,  and  though  kept  out  of  houses  by  stoves 
— not  the  most  wholesome   things  in  the   world — 
much  interferes  with  agricultural  and  other  opera 
tions.     It  is  generally  believed  that  the  effect  of  this 
climate  has  been  to  make  the  American  race  perhaps 
keener  and  brighter,  but  not  so  healthy  and  rosy  as 
our  people  are.     The  difference  in  the  women  espe 
cially  has  long  been  noticed.     Still  I  am   bound  to 
say  I  saw  a  great  many  men  in  America  who  looked 
very  robust    and  well,   and  might  have  passed   for 
Scotchmen  ;    and  that  even  some  of  the  ladies   are 
now  becoming  pretty  beefy,  as  it  has  been  irreverently 


THE    CLIMATE.  11 

expressed.  I  say  this  without  detracting  from  the 
reputation  for  a  somewhat  delicate -looking  beauty 
which  is  well  deserved  by  so  many  of  them.  The 
great  advantage  for  practical  purposes  of  the  American 
climate  is  the  favourable  distribution  of  the  rainfall. 
The  rain  seems  never  to  fail,  and  it  generally  comes 
just  when  it  is  most  wanted.  I  believe  it  is  almost 
entirely  due  to  the  fortunate  distribution  of  the 
rainfall  that  the  Southern  States  so  completely  beat 
countries  where  labour  is  infinitely  cheaper  in  the 
production  of  cotton.  The  valley  of  the  Mississipi 
has  throughout  a  very  full  and  good  supply  of  rain 
at  the  right  season,  and  throughout  the  Union,  there 
seems  to  be  less  trouble  from  bad  weather  at  harvest 
time  than  with  us.  Many  crops,  maize  especially, 
stand  out  for  long  till  it  is  convenient  to  reap  them. 
In  California  1  believe  the  wheat  is  left  standing  for 
weeks  without  injury.  I  should  tell  you  here  that 
in  what  I  say  of  America,  I  usually  do  not  refer  to 
the  Californian  countries  beyond  the  mountains.  I 
did  not  go  there  ;  but  I  found  that  if  I  remarked 
anything  that  was  wanting  in  America  they  always 
said,  '  Ah, -you  would  get  that  in  California.'  I  have 
no  doubt  from  what  I  learned  that  California  really 
has  a  different  climate — not  so  hot  in  summer,  nor 
so  cold  in  winter,  but  more  like  that  of  Southern 
Europe,  as  shown  by  its  fruits  and  other  productions. 
I  think  one  of  the  most  extraordinary  things  I  know, 
as  showing  the  difference  between  the  energies  of 
different  races,  is  that  the  Spaniards  were  actually 
possessed  of  California  for  hundreds  of  years,  and 


12        BIRD'S-EYE    VIEW  OF  THE   UNITED   STATES. 

never  discovered  that  it  was  worth  anything  at  all, 
whereas  the  Americans  no  sooner  got  it  than  they 
made  it  one  of  the  finest  countries  in  the  world.  At 
the  same  time  I  should  say  this  by  way  of  caution, 
that  under  the  old  Spanish  grants  of  land  all  California 
has  been  monopolised,  and  it  is  not  owned  by  settlers, 
as  the  other  parts  of  the  States.  The  man  who  goes 
there  must  expect  to  be  a  labourer  rather  than  an 
owner  of  land. 


THE  RACES  COMPOSING   THE  POPULATION. 

And  now  I  will  tell  you  something  about  the 
origin  and  breed,  if  I  may  use  the  expression,  of  the 
people  of  America.  The  foundation  of  the  people — 
that  upon  which  their  language  and  manners  are 
based — is  almost  entirely  English,  derived  in  fact 
from  the  southern  counties  of  England,  from  which 
the  early  settlers  came.  Indeed,  I  am  inclined  to 
think  that  many  of  the  peculiarities  in  language  and 
other  respects,  which  we  now  call  American,  are  really 
old  English,  or  rather  old  south  of  England  pecu 
liarities.  We  Scotch  have  not  put  a  special  Scotch 
impress  on  any  part  of  the  United  States,  as  we  have 
in  Ireland  and  other  parts  of  the  world.  In  Canada 
only  does  one  hear  very  largely  the  Scottish  tongue 
and  find  especially  Scottish  settlements.  But  although 
none  of  the  United  States  are  specially  Scotch  there 
is  a  very  large  and  very  valuable  infusion  of  Scotch 
blood  throughout  all  of  them.  I  found  that  an 
immense  number  of  the  best  and  most  prominent  men 


RACES   COMPOSING  THE  POPULATION.  13 

wherever  I  went  claimed  Scotch  descent,  or  at  least 
a  share  of  Scottish  blood.  Then  there  is  another 
allied  breed  which  is  very  prominent  in  almost  every 
part  of  the  United  States — one  of  the  finest  races  of 
the  world — of  which  we  have  reason  to  be  proud  and 
may  well  think  second  only  to  ourselves.  I  mean 
the  Northern  Irish,  universally  called  in  America 
Scotch-Irish,  expressing  by  that  term  people  of 
Scotch  origin  who  had  settled  in  Ireland.  They  have 
emigrated  to  America  in  large  numbers,  and  are 
among  the  best  farmers  and  the  best  men  in  every 
way.  There  is,  as  you  know,  a  very  large  Southern- 
Irish  element  in  the  States,  mostly  comparatively 
recent  emigrants,  of  the  Catholic  religion.  A  very 
great  deal  has  been  said  against  these  Irish  in  the 
States.  I  confess  I  had  rather  been  led  to  believe 
that  they  were  a  rowdy  and  not  very  prosperous  set. 
I  have  been  agreeably  surprised  by  what  I  learned 
of  them  in  America.  It  is  true  they  have  not  very 
much  risen  to  the  higher  places,  in  fact  seem  com 
paratively  seldom  to  rise  as  compared  with  Scotch  or 
Scotch-Irish,  except  as  politicians  ;  but  they  are  admir 
able  labourers,  and  it  is  almost  a  proverb  in  the  States 
to  say  that  a  good  workman  does  as  much  as  an 
Irishman.  The  railways  and  other  great  works  of 
the  States  are  almost  dependent  upon  Irish  labour. 
And  in  the  cotton  mills  of  the  Northern  States,  which 
now  so  severely  rival  Lancashire,  I  am  told  that  the 
Irish  girls  work  better  and  are  generally  preferred  to 
Americans  and  Canadians  who  work  with  them  in 
the  mills.  Although  the  Irish  have  not  shown  that 


14       BIRD'S-EYE  VIEW  OF  THE   UNITED   STATES. 

aptitude  as  pioneers  in  the  settlement  of  land  which 
we  might  have  expected  of  men  so  accustomed  to 
small  farms  in  Ireland,  and  do  not  successfully  push 
west  as  do  Scotchmen  or  Germans,  and  although  like 
other  Americans  they  may  not  always  be  very  saving, 
I  understand  that  they  are  not  altogether  without 
these  good  qualities,  and  that  a  very  large  portion  of  the 
North-Eastern  States,  from  which  the  pushing  and  ad 
venturous  Yankees  have  gone  forth  to  occupy  the  West, 
have  been  filled  up  as  they  leave  by  Irishmen  taking 
their  places.  It  would  be  a  very  curious  thing  if  Pu 
ritan  New  England  became  a  Roman  Catholic  Irish 
colony,  while  New  England  goes  West  to  better  itself. 
Although  the  language  and  everything  else  in  the 
States  is  English,  there  is,  as  you  are  probably  aware, 
a  very  large  proportion  of  European  foreigners,  who 
have  become  naturalised  and  are  becoming  Anglicised 
there.  The  old  Dutch  of  New  York  are  not  very 
numerous.  But  one  is  apt  to  be  misled  regarding 
the  Dutch,  for  it  is  the  American  habit  to  call  all 
Germans  Dutch,  probably  the  German  word  deutsch 
having  become  naturalised.  The  Germans  are  a 
numerous  and  most  valuable  element  in  the  United 
States.  Perhaps,  taking  them  all  in  all,  they  are  as 
good  colonists  as  any  of  the  races  which  come  from 
these  islands.  For  if  they  are  not  so  bright  and  so 
pushing  they  are  more  hard-working,  and  saving,  and 
more  economical ;  in  fact,  they  are  quite  model 
colonists.  They  settle  down  on  the  land  and  work 
with  a  thriftiness  and  perseverance  which  no  Scotch 
men  could  beat — the  women  working  as  well  as  the 


RACES   COMPOSING   THE   POPULATION.  15 

men  ;  and  whether  in  the  east  or  in  the  west  you 
always  find  Germans  among  the  best  and  most 
numerous  of  the  small  farmers.  That  is  their  special 
vocation.  They  are  also  very  numerous  among 
small  shopkeepers  and  traders.  German  Jews  are 
now  becoming  very  prominent  in  the  States.  Of 
late  years  there  has  been  a  great  emigration  of  people 
from  the  Scandinavian  countries :  Swedes  and  Nor 
wegians,  and  people  from  Finland  and  some  parts 
of  Russia.  They  confine  themselves  to  the  extreme 
Northern  States,  pushing  on  to  the  far  north-west ; 
but  they  are  admirable  settlers,  and  a  great  source  of 
increase  and  improvement  to  the  States  to  which  they 
go.  In  several  parts  of  the  United  States  there  is  a 
considerable  old  French  element  which  contributes 
in  many  respects  to  the  brightness  of  the  population 
and  to  certain  branches  of  enterprise  and  industry. 

The  native  Indians  have  never  come  to  any  good  ; 
I  ana  afraid  they  have  never  been  very  well  managed 
in  the  States,  not  so  well  as  in  Canada  ;  at  all  events 
they  are  gradually  pushed  off  the  soil ;  only  a  few 
still  remain  as  pensioners,  and  they  cannot  be  ac 
counted  as  ji  considerable  element  in  the  population. 
On  the  other  hand,  the  negro  race,  imported  as  slaves, 
is  now  very  numerous  and  very  prominent,  forming 
about  half  the  population  of  many  of  the  Southern 
States.     We  have  heard  a  great  many  prophecies  of 
the  terrible  things  which  would  happen  when  these 
poor  helpless  children  were  set  free.     Mr.  Anthony 
Trollope,   whom  I  have   mentioned,   is    one  of  the 
most  lugubrious  of  the   prophets.      They   were   to 


16        BIRD'S-EYE  VIEW  OF  THE  UNITED   STATES. 

die  out  or  be  sent  back  to  Africa,  or  to  be  a  perpetual 
incubus  to  the  white  people  among  whom  they 
lived.  I  have  been  agreeably  surprised  to  find  how 
all  this  has  been  falsified.  Far  from  dying  out  they 
are  now  prospering  and  increasing.  They  produce 
that  immense  crop  of  cotton,  larger  far  than  any 
produced  in  slave  times,  which  supplies  the  mills  of 
the  whole  world.  They  are  capital  workers  at  rail 
ways  and  other  works  in  the  southern  climates  not 
fitted  for  white  men.  They  do  almost  as  much 
work  as  Irishmen.  I  was  told  that  many  of  them 
are  becoming  small  independent  farmers  ;  and  al 
together  instead  of  being  a  burden  they  are  becoming 
an  important  class  of  American  citizens.  They  are 
already  zealous  Christians.  They  have  adopted  the 
ways  and  habits  of  the  white  men.  They  have  the 
rights  of  citizens,  and  are  rapidly  being  educated. 

I  have  alluded  to  the  New  Englanders  of  the 
North-Eastern  States,  and  said  that  very  many  of 
them  have  pushed  further  west.  It  is  in  consequence 
of  this  emigration  that  the  great  North -Western 
States  are  very  distinctly  marked  by  a  New  England 
or  Yankee  character.  Undoubtedly  the  least  fertile 
portion  of  the  United  States  is  New  England.  The 
only  wonder  is  how  the  first  settlers  should  ever 
have  settled  there  ;  but  having  taken  root  there  they 
were  rewarded  for  their  industry  by  the  acquisition  of 
the  great  countries  to  the  north-west.  The  State  of 
New  York  is  a  great  State  ;  but  its  agricultural 
citizens  have  abundant  room  within  their  own  State  ; 
and  it  is  rather  the  City  of  New  York  than  the  State 


RACES  COMPOSING  THE  POPULATION.  17 

that  is  so  prominent  in  American  politics  and  com 
merce.  That  city  is,  in  fact,  situated  in  a  position 
extraordinarily  favourable  to  commerce,  and  has  far 
outdone  all  rivals.  It  has  a  magnificent  harbour, 
with  a  tide  just  enough  to  keep  it  clean  and  sweet, 
and  not  so  much  as  to  render  necessary  dry  docks 
and  other  elaborate  appliances  which  we  require. 
Ships  of  the  largest  burden  lie  alongside  the  shore 
for  miles,  and  have  facilities  such  as  are  not  found 
in  our  harbours.  Then  in  the  latitude  of  New  York 
there  is  a  natural  cleft  in  the  Alleghany  Mountains — 
the  only  cleft  which  exists  from  the  Gulf  of  Mexico 
to  Northern  Canada.  Through  that  cleft  there  is  a 
splendid  waterway,  the  Hudson  Eiver,  and  railways 
have  been  carried  alongside  of  it.  Thus  it  is  that 
New  York  has  a  natural  advantage  which  no  other 
port  possesses.  In  the  country  districts  of  the  New 
York  State,  as  in  the  city,  there  are  still  considerable 
remains  of  the  old  Dutch  element,  but  nearly  Angli 
cised  ;  the  other  settlers  on  the  land  of  all  classes, 
both  British  and  foreign,  constitute  a  very  large  and 
prosperous  population  of  small  farmers.  Pennsylva 
nia,  again,  is  a  very  great  State,  originally  founded 
by  English  Quakers,  but  in  which  the  German  ele 
ment  is  now  very  large.  It  is,  perhaps,  the  most 
advanced  State  in  the  Union,  in  regard  to  its  manu 
factures  and  the  character  of  its  agriculture.  Penn 
sylvania,  too,  has  very  largely  colonised  the  Western 
States.  Virginia  is  an  old  State,  but  not  so  prosper 
ous.  I  ani  afraid  most  of  the  Englishmen  who  have 
taken  up  land  there  have  not  made  a  particularly 


18        BIRD'S-EYE  VIEW  OF  THE   UNITED   STATES. 

good  thing  of  it,  except  those  in  the  hilly  country  to 
the  west,  where  splendid  cattle  are  produced.  But 
Virginia  is,  as  it  were,  the  mother  of  the  Southern 
States.  From  Virginia  people  have  very  largely 
gone  southwards  to  colonise  the  higher  and  cooler 
parts  of  the  Carolinas,  Georgia,  and  the  other 
Southern  States  ;  so  that  in  these  States,  while,  as  I 
have  said,  about  half  the  population  are  negroes,  the 
other  half  are  very  decent  and  respectable  white 
people,  principally  small  farmers.  There  has  not 
been  much  white  immigration  there  of  late  years,  but 
in  the  last  century  a  good  many  Scotchmen  went 
there,  especially  Highlanders. 

THE  PRINCIPAL  PRODUCTS  OF  THE  SOIL. 

If  you  look  at  the  map  you  will  see  the  great 
varieties  of  latitude  and  of  physical  configuration 
which  enable  the  United  States  to  produce  so  many 
things,  and  so  largely  to  supply  the  world  with  food 
and  the  materials  for  clothing.  Round  the  Southern 
seaboard,  from  North  Carolina  to  Texas,  and  up  the 
Mississippi  to  Arkansas  and  Missouri,  we  have  a  belt 
of  States  producing  by  far  the  largest  portion  of  the 
cotton-supply  of  Europe.  On  the  lowlands  of  the 
Carolinas  and  Georgia  rice  of  fine  quality  is  grown ; 
and  near  the  mouths  of  the  Mississippi  there  are 
great  sugar  plantations  ;  but  these  latter  articles  only 
thrive  under  protection,  and  are  not  exported.  There 
has  lately  been  a  good  deal  of  talk  and  fuss  about  the 
production  of  sugar  from  maize-stalks  and  sorghum, 


THE  PRINCIPAL  PRODUCTS   OF  THE   SOIL.         19 

a  Chinese  millet.  Many  farmers  cultivate  patches 
of  the  latter  ;  but  so  far  as  I  could  learn,  this  sugar  is 
not  likely  to  come  to  much — only  a  sort  of  molasses 
for  domestic  use  is  ordinarily  obtained. 

The  American  tobacco  is  principally  grown  in  the 
Central  States ;  still  to  a  large  extent  in  Arirginia,  but 
even  more  in  Kentucky  and  Tennessee,  and  farther 
west,  and  now  a  good  deal  in  Pennsylvania  also. 

There  is  some  very  fine  grazing  ground  in  the 
Central  States,  Kentucky,  Tennessee,  and  West 
Yirginia.  The  blue  grass  of  Kentucky  is  famous ; 
though  it  is  not  blue  at  all,  but  green,  and  very  like 
our  common  natural  grass.  In  the  South  aa  East- 
Indian  grass,  known  as  '  Dhoop,'  or  Sun-grass,  has 
been  introduced,  and  proves  very  productive  as  a 
permanent  grass.  In  most  of  the  Northern  States 
timothy  grass,  rye  grass,  and  clover  are  largely  sown ; 
and  in  some  parts  further  south  lucerne  is  a  produc 
tive  crop. 

Efforts  are  being  made  to  reintroduce  silk  in  the 
South,  but  it  has  been  tried  before,  and  I  doubt  if  it 
will  come  to  much.  The  tea-plant  grows  very  well, 
but  it  requires  too  much  labour  to  be  a  practical 
culture  in  the  States.  There  is  too  much  frost  for 
coffee.  The  Southerners  are  trying  to  grow  Bengal 
jute,  but  nothing  has  come  of  these  experiments  yet. 
They  used  to  cultivate  indigo,  but  it  has  quite  gone 
out;  Bengal  has  beaten  them  in  that.  And  they  have 
not  attempted  to  rival  our  Indian  opium.  Attempts 
are  made  to  produce  wine,  but  I  think  it  is  only  in 
California  that  vineyards  are  very  successful. 

c   2 


20        BIRD'S-EYE   VIEW   OF  THE   UNITED   STATES. 

In  the  Northern  States,  little  as  one  would 
expect  it,  the  most  valuable  product  of  all  is  hay, 
chiefly  grown  from  artificial  grass.  That  shows 
how  much  is  done  for  the  rearing  of  flocks.  Maize, 
or  Indian  corn,  is  an  immense  production  all  over 
the  country.  Of  this  also  much  is  used  to  feed 
animals.  After  that  comes  wheat,  the  production  of 
which  has  made  wheat  cheap  in  our  markets,  and  the 
cultivation  of  which  is  so  much  increasing  that  it 
may  be  confidently  predicted  that,  unless  we  have 
any  unhappy  quarrel  with  the  United  States,  which 
God  forbid,  bread  never  can  again  be  dear  in  this, 
country;  for  the  means  of  communication  are  im 
proving  every  day.  The  production  of  barley  is  not 
large,  but  there  is  a  great  abundance  of  oats.  Wheat 
is  produced  both  in  the  North-Western  States,  where 
snow  covers  it  in  winter,  and  much  further  south, 
where  the  winters  are  mild.  In  the  intermediate 
zone  maize  prevails. 

I  trust  cheap  meat  is  about  to  be  secured  to  us 
in  addition  to  cheap  bread.  Already  bacon  is  produced 
in  America  at  an  extraordinarily  low  rate,  and  the 
people  of  a  large  number  of  the  States  are  now 
devoting  immense  attention  to  the  production  of  beef. 
It  is  not  only  that  great  herds  come  from  the  western 
grazing  grounds  of  Colorado  and  Texas,  but  in  the 
settled  agricultural  countries  people  are  more  and  more 
giving  themselves  to  cattle-breeding.  They  import 
very  carefully  the  finest  bulls,  and  are  raising  the 
character  of  their  cattle  every  day.  Nothing  im 
pressed  me  so  much  throughout  my  tour  as  the 


CHARACTERISTICS   OF  THE  AMERICAN  PEOPLE.      21 

great  extent  of  country,  North  and  South,  East  and 
West,  in  which  the  farmers  are  going  into  cattle- 
breeding  for  our  market  with  enthusiasm — one  hears 
the  talk  of  beeves  everywhere,  and  the  cattle  trade 
is  ready  to  assume  enormous  proportions.  You  are 
aware,  too,  that  extraordinary  efforts  are  being  made, 
day  by  day,  to  find  improved  means  of  bringing  the 
American  meat  to  your  doors.  An  immense  number 
of  fine  steamers  are  fitting  up  for  the  trade  in  live 
cattle,  which  is  growing  by  leaps  and  bounds  as 
never  trade  grew  before.  I  cannot  but  have  some 
sympathy  with  our  farmers,  who  are,  I  am  afraid, 
having  rather  hard  times  ;  but  still  they  have  con 
siderable  advantages  in  many  respects,  and  must 
more  and  more  devote  themselves  to  supplying  us 
with  milk  and  butter,  to  finishing  off  the  education  of 
foreign  cattle,  to  turning  their  farms  into  a  sort  of 
market -gardens  of  high  culture.  And,  without  touch 
ing  upon  political  subjects,  I  must  venture  to  hope 
that  our  Government  will  not  be  led  into  any  re 
striction  upon  the  importation  of  cattle,  which  would 
have  the  effect  of  keeping  very  dear  the  butcher's -meat 
consumed  i>y  the  people  of  this  country. 

CHARACTERISTICS  OF  THE  AMERICAN  PEOPLE. 

I  now  proceed  to  tell  you  something  of  the 
characteristics  of  the  American  people — I  mean  the 
real  American,  born  and  bred  in  the  country,  as 
distinguished  from  the  foreign  element,  of  which 
there  is  so  much.  In  some  things,  no  doubt, 


22        BIRD'S-EYE   VIEW  OF  THE   UNITED   STATES. 

are  peculiarities  which  make  them  unlike  us  ;  but 
in  very  many  other  things  they  are  like  us.  And  it 
seems  to  me  that,  after  getting  over  the  first  surface 
differences,  the  likenesses  are  much  more  numerous 
and  much  more  prominent  than  the  unlikenesses. 
We  have  heard  of  their  popular  '  Yankeeisms,'  which 
are  supposed  to  give  us  a  fair  specimen  of  the 
American  people  ;  but  what  I  found  when  I  went 
there  was,  that  the  peculiarities  of  language  and  other 
wise  which  had  been  held  out  to  us  as  '  Yankeeisms  ' 
really  almost  exhaust  all  that  there  is  of  American 
peculiarity.  These  l  Yankeeisms '  of  our  literature  are 
not  specimens  of  what  is  behind,  but  are  in  themselves 
nearly  the  whole  of  the  features  in  which  the  people 
differ  from  us.  In  their  general  style,  in  their 
manners,  and  in  their  language  they  are  in  a  very 
marked  degree  British,  and  not  foreign. 

In  regard  to  language  especially  I  was  really 
surprised  to  find  how  little  difference  there  is,  and 
how  much  their  idioms  and  everything  else  are 
thoroughly  English.  It  is  a  curious  thing,  but  it 
seems  to  me  that  the  only  people  who  talk  very 
American  indeed  are  the  higher  class  of  people,  and 
especially  the  ladies — the  sort  of  fine  ladies  one  sees 
in  foreign  hotels  on  the  Continent  of  Europe. 
Perhaps  the  truth  is  that  these  people  are  the  oldest 
Americans,  who  have  brought  down  most  completely 
the  provincial  peculiarities  which  they  carried  with 
them  from  certain  parts  of  Old  England  or  established 
among  themselves  in  the  early  days  of  American 
settlement.  It  may  well  be  that  these  have  been 


CHARACTERISTICS   OF  THE   AMERICAN  PEOPLE.      23 

handed  down  among  the  richer  classes,  whereas 
among  the  lower  classes,  intermixed  so  much  as 
they  have  been  with  new  arrivals,  the  language  has 
assumed  a  sort  of  cosmopolitan  English  character. 
I  found  that  in  many  parts  of  the  States  the  common 
labouring  man  used  language  which  I  could  not  dis 
tinguish  from  that  of  a  tolerably  educated  man  of  the 
same  class  in  these  islands.  I  might  have  been  in 
doubt  what  county  he  came  from,  but  if  he  did  not 
happen  to  use  a  few  peculiar  American  phrases  I 
should  not  have  known  that  he  was  not  a  Britisher. 
It  was  not  only  that  my  ear  became  accustomed  to 
the  American  intonation,  for  I  constantly  found, 
again,  that  when  I  met  ladies  of  the  more  well-to-do 
classes  the  '  Yankee '  peculiarities  came  out  as  pro 
minently  as  ever.  Of  the  body  of  the  people  I  think 
it  may  be  said  that  their  language  is  English — a 
little  better  than  that  used  in  any  county  of 
England. 

The  hotels  are  certainly  a  very  peculiar  American 
institution.  Mr.  Anthony  Trollope  hits  them  off 
very  well.  Although  he  does  make  the  worst  of 
things,  I_am  not  prepared  to  say  that  there  is  not 
much  truth  in  his  description  of  the  hotels.  I  have 
said  that  they  are  extremely  convenient  for  the 
passing  traveller  ;  but  as  residences  in  the  way  many 
Americans  use  them  I  do  not  know  that  I  should 
care  for  them.  It  struck  me  as  curious,  in  regard 
to  hotels  and  some  other  things,  that,  inventive  and 
progressive  as  the  Americans  are,  there  is  in  these 
things  a  sort  of  dead  level  of  uniformity  about  them. 


24       BIRD'S-EYE  VIEW  OF   THE  UNITED   STATES. 

Wherever  you  go  in  all  these  vast  States  the  hotels 
are  almost  all  on  the  same  plan.  So  are  the  railway 
carriages,  and  so  are  some  other  things.  There  does 
not  exist  either  the  cosy,  comfortable  English  hotel 
or  the  foreign  cafe.  There  is  nothing  in  New  York 
or  anywhere  else,  so  far  as  I  saw,  like  the  Boulevards 
in  Continental  cities.  But  there  is  everywhere  the  uni 
versal  American  hotel,  the  lower  hall  of  which  is  a 
kind  of  place  of  assembly  for  all  the  world,  or  at  all 
events  all  the  male  world.  That  public  life  in  the 
hotel  hall  is  what  the  American  men  seem  to  like 
best.  The  reading-rooms  and  other  public  apartments 
are  not  very  comfortable ;  but  the  barber's  shop 
attached  to  every  American  hotel  is  luxurious.  I  do 
agree  witli  Mr.  Trollope  in  denouncing  as  the  most 
horrible  place  in  the  world  the  ladies'  room,  which  is 
always  the  stiffest,  barest,  and  most  uncomfortably 
gorgeous  place  that  it  is  possible  to  conceive — not  a 
book  or  a  newspaper  or  a  domestic  comfort  of  any 
kind — a  place  into  which  a  stranger  can  hardly  dare 
to  enter,  unless  he  be  a  man  of  iron  nerves;  and  if  he 
does  enter  cannot  make  himself  comfortable  in  any 
sort  of  way.  It  seems  very  strange  that,  with  the  ex 
perience  of  Continental  travelling  which  the  Americans 
have,  after  seeing  the  nice,  comfortable  drawing-rooms 
in  Swiss  and  other  hotels,  they  won't  condescend  to 
introduce  something  of  the  kind  into  their  own. 
Then  in  their  mode  of  feeding  the  Americans  are 
certainly  peculiar,  and.  their  ways  are  quite  different 
from  our  ways.  You  never  see  such  a  thing  as  an 
English  joint  or  an  English  dish  put  upon  the  table. 


CHAKACTERISTICS   OF  THE   AMERICAN   PEOPLE.      25 

Nor,  on  the  other  hand,  have  you  well-cooked  dishes 
handed  round  in  the  French  style.  They  have  a 
style  of  their  own,  which  is,  that  your  meal  is  served 
in  a  large  number  of  curious  oval  little  dishes,  which 
are  put  before  you  all  mixed  up  together,  without  the 
smallest  regard  to  time  or  tide,  or  hotness,  or  coldness, 
or  anything  else;  and  especially  you  have  to  this 
day  what  Mr.  Trollope  vividly  describes,  a  waiter  who 
stands  over  you  as  a  sort  of  taskmaster,  and  makes 
you  eat  your  meal,  not  at  your  convenience  but  at  his. 
I  do  think  it  is  a  very  great  pity  that  the  founders  of 
the  American  Republic  did  not  introduce  a  little 
Scotch  cookery  among  their  early  institutions.  I  am 
very  happy  to  say  that  more  recent  reforms  have 
introduced  one  excellent  Scotch  food  which  we  are 
too  much  inclined  to  discard  ourselves.  I  mean  oat 
meal  porridge.  They  generally  give  cream  with  it — 
a  very  commendable  arrangement.  In  truth,  I  could 
have  eaten  oatmeal  porridge  in  the  States  with  great 
satisfaction,  if  I  had  not  felt  insulted  by  the  constant 
practice  there  of  calling  it  '  Irish  oatmeal.'  The 
Americans  themselves  seem  to  have  a  partiality  to 
live  upon  qysters,  which  are  there  produced  in  enor 
mous  quantity,  and  I  believe  of  excellent  quality,  for 
I  do  not  eat  them  myself.  Their  beef  is  generally 
good,  but  not  always  well  cooked;  the  mutton  not 
good.  They  have  a  most  delightful  variety  of 
different  kinds  of  bread,  not  only  of  wheat  but  of 
maize,  corn,  buckwheat,  and  other  things.  They 
drink  a  very  great  deal  of  tea  and  coffee,  and  a  great 
deal  of  excellent  milk  ;  but  what  is  unpardonable, 


26        BIRD'S-EYE   VIEW  OF  THE  UNITED   STATES. 

considering  the  excellent  dairy  facilities  which  they 
have,  the  butter  is  always  salt  and  bad.  When  I 
speak  of  tea  or  coffee,  however,  I  should  say  that 
coffee  is  the  principal  drink  of  the  States,  and  is 
generally  very  well  made.  Tea  is  comparatively  quite 
rare,  and  is  almost  always  very  badly  made.  I  shall 
notice  separately  in  connection  with  the  drink  ques 
tion  the,  to  us,  extraordinary  absence  of  wine  and 
other  liquors  from  their  meals. 

The  railway  carriages  are  another  American  insti 
tution  whicli  are  quite  different  from  ours.  They  are 
very  long  and  heavy  conveyances,  with  entrances  only 
from  the  ends,  and  seats  ranged  along  each  side.  There 
seems  to  be  no  objection  on  principle  to  a  variety  of 
classes.  On  all  the  chief  railways  of  the  Northern  States 
there  are  drawing-room  cars,  which  practically  take 
the  place  of  first-class  carriages.  But  the  ordinary 
American  railway  carriage,  which  is  the  only  car 
riage  without  distinction  of  class  on  a  large  proportion 
of  railways,  is  such  that  it  may  be  generally  said  that 
all  are  second-class.  In  these  travelling  in  America 
is  somewhat  cheaper  than  travelling  first-class  in  this 
country ;  and  so  far  as  my  experience  goes  there  is 
generally  an  entire  absence  of  any  rough  and  rowdy 
element,  such  as  some  have  supposed  must  result  from 
an  amalgamation  of  classes.  I  am  inclined  to  think  the 
people  who  most  suffer  from  the  American  system  are 
those  who  travel  third-class  in  this  country.  For 
them  there  is  no  cheap  third-class,  and  consequently 
for  them  travelling  is  much  dearer  than  in  this 
country.  There  seem  to  be  no  railway  porters  in 


CHARACTERISTICS   OF  THE   AMERICAN  PEOPLE.      27 

America.  People  manage  themselves  and  take  care 
of  themselves,  and  the  railways  run  through  the 
middle  of  streets  and  towns  without  any  fencing.  I 
asked,  l  Are  people  not  constantly  run  down  and 
killed  ? '  The  answer  I  got  was,  c  They  sometimes  are ; 
but  they  learn  to  take  care  of  themselves.'  For 
travelling  at  night  there  are  the  Pulman  cars,  or 
other  cars  in  the  style  of  the  Pulman.  But  here,  too, 
it  struck  me,  there  was  a  too  extreme  uniformity 
and  great  absence  of  variety.  The  cars  are  very 
gorgeous  and  not  very  comfortable — sometimes  very 
crowded  and  much  overheated.  The  great  steamers 
which  run  on  protected  waters  and  rivers  are,  I  think, 
the  most  comfortable  institutions  in  the  way  of 
travelling  that  exist  in  America  or  in  any  other 
country. 

If  you  want  to  have  an  idea  of  the  general  state  of 
society  which  exists  in  America  I  would  put  it  to  you 
in  this  way — if  in  this  country  you  were  to  kill  off  all 
the  country  gentlemen,  with  all  their  wives  and  fami 
lies,  and  make  the  farmers  the  owners  of  the  land  which 
they  till,  you  would  have  something  which  you  could 
hardly  distinguish  from  America.  American  towns 
are  very  much  like  English  towns.  The  social  arrange 
ments  of  Kirkcaldy  are  very  like  the  social  arrange 
ments  of  an  American  country  town.  But  there  is  this 
great  difference,  in  the  outward  aspect,  that  in  an  Ame 
rican  town  of  this  size  you  would  have  very  large  and 
very  broad  streets,  lined  with  trees;  and  very  nice  villa- 
like  houses,  probably  on  the  whole  better  than  our 
houses.  In  that  respect  the  American  town  is  a  better 


28        BIRD'S-EYE   VIEW  OF  THE  UNITED   STATES. 

and  a  nicer  place  than  our  towns— in  dry  weather,  at 
any  rate.  But  when  it  conies  to  rain,  as  the  streets 
are  all  unpaved,  they  are  exceedingly  muddy.  I 
have  said  that  the  country  gentlemen  element  is  alto 
gether  wanting  ;  but  the  plutocrats,  the  money  people, 
are  quite  as  strong  in  America  as  in  this  country — 
perhaps  stronger ;  that  is  socially,  and  in  everything 
not  regulated  by  the  first  principles  of  the  American 
Constitution  and  system — these  they  cannot  get 
over.  In  all  other  matters  the  plutocrats,  it  seems  to 
me,  rule  the  country  even  more  than  they  do  here. 
The  rich  people  rule  the  press,  and  the  press  rules 
the  country.  I  am  afraid  that  is  a  good  deal  the  case 
in  most  parts  of  the  civilised  world. 

There  is  a  popular  idea  that  the  Americans  are  so 
civilised  that  they  object  to  marriage,  and  that  for  in 
crease  of  the  population  the  Americans  must  depend, 
not  upon  themselves,  but  upon  the  foreigners.  I 
believe  that  this  is  quite  a  libel.  The  peculiar  sects 
of  which  we  hear  so  much  are  but  a  drop  among  the 
population.  I  myself  saw  none  of  them,  but  I  did 
see  a  great  many  people  who  did  not  belong  to  these 
peculiar  sects,  and  my  decided  impression  is  that  the 
Americans  marry  earlier  and  trust  to  their  wits  to 
support  a  family  more  than  we  do  ;  that  they  have 
large  and  rapid  families,  just  such  as  we  have ;  and 
there  is  not  the  least  danger  that  the  American 
population  will  die  out.  In  nothing,  I  think,  does 
Mr.  Trollope  so  much  libel  the  Americans  as  in  the 
most  odious  character  which  he  attributes  to  the 
average  middle-class  woman  of  America.  He  seems 


CHARACTERISTICS   OF  THE  AMERICAN  PEOPLE.      29 

to  depict  her  as  a  kind  of  hideous  Jezebel  who  in 
vades  tramway-cars  and  other  public  places,  turns 
men  out  of  their  seats  in  the  most  audacious  and 
unfeeling  manner,  and  asserts  women's  rights  with 
the  most  entire  disregard  to  the  rights  of  unhappy 
males.  Perhaps  Mr.  Trollope's  denunciations  have 
had  some  effect  in  wrorking  a  reform,  but  all  I  can  say 
is  that  I  saw  nothing  whatever  of  the  kind.  Where 
a  car  is  crowded  men  will  generally  give  seats  to- 
women,  just  as  they  do  on  the  Metropolitan  Railway 
in  London,  but  I  never  saw  anything  more  than  this. 
On  the  contrary,  it  seemed  to  me  that  the  more 
purely  American  of  the  American  women — those  who 
are  not  accustomed  to  spend  money  in  an  ostentatious 
way  in  Europe,  and  to  over-dress  and  over-peacock 
there — are  very  nice  people  indeed.  It  is  the  ( Daisy 
Millers,'  and  the  Daisy  Millers'  mammas,  who  to  some 
extent  have  given  the  American  women  a  bad  name. 
See  them  at  home,  and  they  seem  to  me  among  the 
nicest  of  their  sex.  The  American  girls  are  certainly 
more  independent  than  our  girls  are.  They  think 
it  a  reproach  if  they  cannot  be  trusted  to  go  with  a 
young  man  either  to  a  church  or  a  theatre.  I  won't  say 
whether  that  is  better  or  worse  than  our  system; 
but  I  do  admire  the  independence  of  the  American 
girls  in  helping  themselves  by  useful  employments.  In 
this  respect  I  hope  many  of  our  girls  are  following 
their  example.  Ladies  of  a  class  who  would  not  like 
to  go  out  as  school  teachers  and  telegraph  clerks 
among  us  do  so  quite  freely  in  America,  I  think  the 
last  school  I  was  in  before  I  came  to  Kirkcaldy  was  a 


30        BIRD'S-EYE  VIEW  OF  THE  UNITED   STATES. 

black  school  for  little  negro  children  in  the  Southern 
States,  taught  by  a  young  white  Northern  lady,  whom 
we  should  think  almost  superior  to  that  sort  of  work. 
I  am  sure  our  women  have  much  to  learn  from  the 
American  women  in  the  matter  of  helping  others  and 
helping  themselves. 

As  to  the  men,  I  liked  their  style  and  manners. 
Generally  speaking,  there  was  comparatively  little  of 
the    Yankee    about  them.     I  heard   a    story    of  my 
friend  Mr.    Holmes,  the   Member  for  Paisley,  who 
made  a  tour  in  the  United  States,  and  when  he  got 
to    Chicago  he  was  very  anxious    to  see   a   typical 
American,  with  his  slouched  hat,  big  boots,  belt  with 
revolver  stuck  in  it,  and  so  on.     He  could  not  find 
one  for  a  long  time.     At  last  he  found  a  man  who 
exactly  came  up  to  his  ideas  ;  and  entering  into  con 
versation  with  him,  he  said,   l  Have  you  been  long 
here  ? '     '  Xa,'  was  the  answer,  '  Tarn  jist  a  month 
frae  GrlascaV     Perhaps  the  men  too  have  been  some 
what  affected  by  English  criticism.     At  all  events, 
it  is  now  the  case  that  in  their  conduct  they   are 
exceedingly  quiet  and   orderly,  and  only  spit  to    a 
moderate  extent.     In  fact,  as  regards  smoking  and 
everything  of  that  kind,  the  American  rules  are  much 
more  strict  than  ours.     Mr.  Trollope  denounces  the 
lower  class  of  American  men  as  rude  and  barbarous 
in  the  extreme.     For  my  part,   I  can   say  I  found 
them  quite  the  contrary.    Whenever  I  had  occasion 
to  talk  to  any  of  them  I  was  generally  impressed  with 
their  civility,  intelligence,  and  education.     One  thing 
particularly  struck  me,   and  that  was  the  quiet  and 


CHARACTERISTICS   OF  THE   AMERICAN  PEOPLE.      31 

orderly  character  of  their  political  meetings,  I  may 
almost  say  the  dullness  of  them,  for  I  think  they 
were  somewhat  too  quiet.  They  never  interrupt  a 
speaker,  but  always  let  him  say  out  his  say  without 
the  smallest  hindrance,  however  distasteful  his  ideas 
may  be  to  some  of  them.  When  I  said  that  some 
times  they  are  very  orderly,  to  the  point  of  dullness, 
I  might  illustrate  that  by  telling  you  of  an  American 
politician  whom  I  met.  He  had  been  up  attending  a 
political  meeting  at  a  country  town.  I  said,  l  How 
did  you  get  on?'  'Oh,'  he  replied,  'exceedingly 
well ;  I  gave  them  three  solid  hours  of  it,  and  they 
were  as  quiet  as  if  they  had  been  in  church.'  Upon 
the  whole,  my  impression  of  the  Americans  is  this, 
that  in  point  of  energy  and  enterprise  they  are  ra 
ther  above  the  average  Britisher,  but  not  above  the 
average  Scotchman — about,  I  may  say,  equal  to  an 
average  Scotchman.  They  are  certainly  very  pushing 
and  go-ahead  people  ;  but  then  if  they  make  a  great 
deal  of  money  they  also  spend  it  very  quickly — 
there  is  no  doubt  that  they  are  inclined  to  be  extra 


vagant. 


Everyone  who  goes  to  America  is  very  much 
struck  by  the  respect  for  law  which  prevails  there. 
They  are,  in  fact,  an  extremely  law-abiding  people  ; 
and  since  their  great  war,  having  learned  by  ex 
perience  how  horrible  war  is,  they  have  come 
through  great  trials  and  difficulties  with  wonderful 
avoidance  of  irritation  and  injurious  conflict.  I 
know  no  people  in  the  world  who  accept  defeat  in  so 
thoroughly  good-humoured  a  way ;  and  in  this  respect 


32        BIRD'S-EYE  VIEW   OF  THE  UNITED   STATES. 

I  think  that  the  tone  and  temper  of  the  people  of  the 
Southern  States  is  very  highly  to  be  praised. 

There  is  an  idea  prevalent  in  this  country  that 
in  regard  to  many  questions  of  social  science,  the 
management  of  prisons  and  such  like  matters,  the 
Americans  have  gone  far  ahead  of  ourselves.  I  did 
not  go  very  minutely  into  these  matters,  for  I  had 
not  time,  but  so  far  as  I  could  learn  I  failed  to  find 
that  they  are  much  ahead  of  us.  I  heard  quite  as 
many  complaints  of  prison  management  in  America 
as  ever  I  did  in  this  country,  and  I  doubt  very  much 
whether  their  sanitary  and  other  improvements  are 
greatly  superior  to  ours.  I  am  inclined  to  believe 
that  Edinburgh  and  Glasgow  have  done  quite  as 
much  in  the  way  of  social  science  progress  as  any 
American  town. 

I  was  specially  interested  in  the  condition  of  the 
Southern  States,  and  I  spent  a  good  deal  of  my  time 
there.  They  have  no  doubt  suffered  from  war  in  a 
pecuniary  way  as  well  as  by  losing  all  the  flower  of 
the  population  ;  but  they  have  a  good  heart,  and  are 
doing  well.  This  subject,  however,  is  a  special  one, 
which  I  shall  probably  take  occasion  to  explain  in 
another  shape,  for  it  is  scarcely  possible  to  do  so  now, 

I  do  not  know  that  there  is  anything  very  special 
in  the  larger  American  cities,  except  the  trees  in  the 
streets  which  I  have  mentioned,  and  the  strictly  rectan 
gular  character  in  their  arrangement  which  leads  to 
the  numbering  of  the  streets  in  the  way  you  have  often 
heard.  There  is  one  institution  in  New  York  which 
struck  me  as  very  successful,  and  that  is  the  elevated 


CHARACTERISTICS   OF  THE  AMERICAN  PEOPLE.    33 

railways  just  opened.  Instead  of  destroying  the 
narrower  streets,  full  of  traffic,  by  laying  tramways 
in  them,  they  leave  the  streets  for  the  ordinary  traffic, 
and  carry  the  railway  on  elevated  girders  above  the 
heads  of  the  people  and  the  carts.  That  seems  to  be 
successfully  done  in  New  York,  and  I  hope  to  see  it 
done  in  London  also.  The  Elevated  Railway  is  quite 
a  new  institution  in  New  York — only  started  in  the 
last  few  months  ;  but  throughout  all  the  towns  the 

tramwav-car  is  a  most  universal  and  successful  insti- 

•/ 

tution.  The  whole  population  use  the  tram-cars  ;  in 
most  places  there  are  comparatively  few  private  car 
riages,  and  cabs  are  always  dear. 

My  complaint  of  the  American  cities  is  that 
they  are  too  big — that  is  to  say,  too  many  people 
come  to  the  towns  who  had  much  better  go  and 
work  in  the  country.  I  was  almost  tempted  to 
say  that,  among  the  Americans,  for  every  man  who 
really  works  with  his  hands  there  seem  to  be  two 
who  seek  to  live  by  speculating  upon  him — espe 
cially  by  insuring  his  life — that  seems  to  be  the 
great  business  now  to  which  retired  generals,  go 
vernors,  and  other  great  men  devote  themselves. 
It  seemed  to  me  that  Washington  is  the  pleasantest 
and  best  of  American  cities.  Mr.  Trollope  describes 
it  in  very  horrible  terms,  but  it  has  certainly  been 
very  much  improved  since  those  days,  and  appeared 
to  me  to  be  a  charming  place.  Boston,  as  you 
may  have  heard,  is  a  delightfully  English -looking 
place.  Chicago  and  those  new  cities  seem  to  have 
been  overdone  and  to  be  much  too  large. 

D 


34       BIRD'S-EYE  VIEW  OF^  THE   UNITED   STATES. 

It  is  always  very  easy  to  see  the  cities  of  America ; 
everybody  expects  you  to  see  the  cities  ;  but  it  is  much 
more  difficult  to  see  the  country.  E  ail  ways  there 
are  in  abundance,  and  wherever  there  is  a  railway  you 
can  go,  but  there  is  an  extreme  want  of  good  roads. 
The  Americans  seem  to  have  skipped  over  that  stage 
in  human  progress  and  to  have  gone  direct  from 
no  roads  to  railways.  If  you  want  to  hire  a  trap 
to  drive  ten  miles  into  the  country  you  will  find 
it  scarcely  possible  to  get  such  a  thing.  But  the 
Americans  themselves  have,  for  country  use,  most 
admirable  private  vehicles — infinitely  lighter  than  our 
carriages,  quite  as  lasting,  and  every  way  superior ; 
and  I  cannot  imagine  why  we  don't  take  a  leaf  out  of 
their  book  in  this  respect.  Whenever  you  are  with 
friends  they  are  always  ready  to  drive  you  over 
the  country  with  their  fast-trotting  horses  and  light 
buggies — admirable  both  horses  and  buggies  are. 
That  is  the  only  way  in  which  you  can  see  America. 
To  my  view  no  man  has  seen  America  who  merely 
goes  from  town  to  town,  and  does  not  see  the  country 
in  the  way  I  have  described,  for  the  real  backbone  of 
the  population  of  America  consists  of  the  small  farmers 
who  cover  the  country.  The  American  Government 
have  been  exceedingly  wise  in  the  provisions  which 
they  have  made  against  land-jobbing.  Land  is  not 
appropriated  in  immense  blocks  by  the  early  settlers, 
as  in  most  of  our  colonies.  The  amount  which  each 
man  is  allowed  to  take  up  is  restricted  to  that  which 
he  can  beneficially  farm;  and  under  the  homestead 
law  every  man  who  settles  in  the  country  is  entitled 


CHARACTERISTICS  OF  THE  AMERICAN  PEOPLE.    35 

to  a  farm  of  this  kind.    I  believe  it  is  upon,  this  system 
that  the  true  greatness  of  America  is  founded. 

Much,  too,  is  due  to  the  system  of  free  education 
which  has  prevailed  in  the  common  schools  of  the 
North  for  the  last  two  Or   three  generations.     Not 
only   is   this    so   in    New   England,    but   the   New 
Englanders,    taking  their  ideas   to   the  West,    have 
developed  the  system  still  more  completely  in  the 
Western    States.     For   instance,  in  Illinois  it  is  re 
quired  by  law  that  there  should  be  a  school  every 
two  miles  at  least.      A   certain  proportion   of  the 
land  in  every  township  is  always  set  apart  for  the 
maintenance   of  schools.     The   State  maintains   not 
only  primary  schools  but  also  high  schools  in  number 
sufficient  to  meet  the  demand  for  higher  instruction ; 
and  even,  in  some  places,  agricultural  colleges  and 
such  special  institutions.     The  universities  and  col 
leges  for   general   education  of  the  highest  class  of 
all   are  the   only  institutions    not   included   in   the 
general  system  of  free  public  instruction  ;  but  there 
are  many  excellent  universities,  some  of  which  have 
large   endowments,  while   some  have  received  some 
public  aid  under  local  arrangements.     In  addition  to 
endowments  the  cost  of  public  education  is  met,  first, 
by  a  rate  upon  land,  and,  second,  by  a  poll-tax  upon 
the   people.     By  these   means    sufficient   funds    are 
provided  in  the  Northern  States  ;  but  in  the   South 
the  funds  are  very  deficient,  though  the  system  has 
been  more  or  less  introduced  there  also.     There  are 
a  good  many  grumblers  in  America,  as  there  are  with  us 
— a  good  many  people  who  complain  of  the  highness  of 

D   2 


36       BIRD'S-EYE  VIEW  OF  THE   UNITED   STATES. 

the  rates,  and  who  say  that  they  should  not  be  taxed 
to  teach  a  labourer's  daughter  to  play  upon  the  piano. 
Now,  about  the  piano  I  won't  say  whether  I  agree 
with  them — perhaps  I  am  rather  heretical  on  musical 
subjects  ;  but  I  am  impressed  with  the  belief,  not 
only  that  we  should  make  education  as  cheap  and 
free  as  possible  to  the  poorer  classes,  but  also  that 
the  public  may  fairly  do  something  for  the  middle 
and  higher  education,  both  in  view  of  the  fact  that 
the  middle  classes  pay  largely  to  the  education  rates, 
and  that  a  ladder  may  be  provided  by  which  the  poor 
may  mount  upwards.  In  America  the  children  of 
the  well-to-do  classes,  merchants  and  professional  men 
and  such  like,  habitually  attend  the  public  schools, 
girls  as  well  as  boys  ;  indeed,  the  higher  schools  are 
much  more  used  by  girls  than  by  boys,  for  the  boys 
go  early  into  business,  while  the  girls  continue  their 
education.  I  did  not  find  the  character  of  the  higher 
education  to  be  so  much  reformed  as  I  should  have 
expected.  There  is  still  a  good  deal  of  Latin  and  Greek 
taught ;  and  there  is  not  so  universal  a  system  of  in 
struction  in  the  useful  sciences  as  I  looked  for ;  but 
much  is  done  in  special  colleges,  and  improvements 
are  being  effected  which,  no  doubt,  will  soon  become 
general. 

Meantime  I  think  it  may  be  said  that  the  Ame 
ricans  owe  their  great  success  in  certain  branches 
of  mechanical  manufacture  to  their  own  ingenuity 
and  energy,  rather  than  to  any  public  system  of 
technical  instruction.  They  certainly  are  marvel 
lously  clever  as  inventors.  They  have  a  patent 


CHARACTERISTICS  OF  THE  AMERICAN  PEOPLE.    37 

law,  and  consider  it  to  be  much  better  than  ours. 
They  examine  and  test  patents  before  they  are  passed, 
and  have  a  great  patent  show  at  Washington.  I  am 
not  qualified  to  tell  you  anything  of  their  manu 
facturing  processes,  and  indeed  was  not  on  this  oc 
casion  long  enough  in  the  North-Eastern  States  and 
cities  to  see  much  of  these  things  ;  but  they  are  readily 
accessible  to  any  of  you  who  choose  to  go  there.  The 
Americans  certainly  show  immense  energy  in  all 
mercantile  and  manufacturing  operations,  and  leave 
no  stone  unturned  to  develop  the  resources  of  the 
country. 

I  have  often  been  asked,  '  How  about  American 
rascality  ?  Are  people  there  worse  than  our  direct 
ors?  '  I  can  only  say  that  I  think  they  are  about 
the  same.  The  fact  is  that  American  law  is  entirely 
founded  on  English  law,  and  the  safeguards  against 
new-fashioned  rascality  offered  by  a  law  designed 
only  to  meet  a  rascality  which  is  not  new-fashioned 
are  about  as  great  in  America  as  in  this  country — as 
great,  I  think,  but  not  greater.  There  is  a  great  deal 
of  mercantile  rascality  there  as  well  as  here  ;  but  I 
have  heard  it  said  that  some  people  are  rather  jealous 
of  the  directors  of  the  Glasgow  Bank  for  having  done 
a  ' bigger  thing'  than  they  have  done.  As  is  the  case 
with  us,  a  great  many  fraudulent  people  escape  the 
punishment  which  they  merit ;  and  there  have  been 
some  great  scandals,  not  only  in  joint-stock  affairs 
but  in  municipal  affairs.  I  think,  however,  that  we 
must  not  judge  of  the  American  people  by  what  has 
taken  place  in  the  New  York  Municipality ;  that  is, 


38       B1ED*S-EYE  VIEW   OF  TIIE   UNITED   STATES. 

I  believe,  exceptional.  Most  of  their  towns  are  as 
well  managed  as  ours.  My  impression  is  that  when 
they  do  take  fraudulent  people  in  hand  they  are 
more  thorough  in  their  proceedings  than  we  some 
times  are,  and  that  a  more  adequate  punishment  is 
sometimes  dealt  out. 


PROTECTION  AND  RECIPROCITY. 

In  these  days  of  commercial  distress  and  pro 
phecies  of  down-going  you  will  probably  expect  me  to 
say  a  word  about  free  trade  and  reciprocity  and  such 
like  matters;  for  whereas  in  this  country  we  have  been 
for  a  good  many  years  the  upholders  of  free  trade,  in 
America  I  have  been  among  a  people  who  have  become 
the  strenuous  upholders  of  protectionist  doctrines. 
They  protect  everything  and  everybody,  and  if  there 
are  any  objectors  they  silence  them  by  giving  them 
protection  too ;  so  that  the  protection  of  one  thing- 
leads  to  a  dozen  others.  I  am  no  expert  in  commercial 
matters,  and  cannot  pretend  to  sit  in  judgment  where 
doctors  disagree.  I  am,  also,  no  rabid  i  political  eco 
nomist,'  if  I  may  so  express  it.  I  do  not  treat  the 
dogmas  of  political  economists  as  if  they  were  emana 
tions  from  on  high;  and  I  also  am  not  one  of  those 
people  who  think  that  when  Englishmen  differ  from 
the  rest  of  the  world  Englishmen  must  necessarily 
be  in  the  right.  I  cannot  say  whether  there  are  any 
circumstances  in  which  a  certain  amount  of  protection 
really  might  be  beneficial,  in  the  sense  in  which  a 
glass  cover  is  beneficial  in  certain  stages  of  a  growing 


PROTECTION  AND  RECIPROCITY.  39 

plant;  but  of  this  I  am  sure,  that  if  there  are  any  such 
uses  of  protection,  very  great  abuses,  much  exceeding 
the  uses,  speedily  supervene.  It  is  hard  to  persuade 
people  in  America  that  they  have  not  greatly 
benefited  by  protection.  They  point  to  the  exten 
sion  and  improvement  of  their  manufactures.  I  never 
admitted  that  that  was  due  to  protection ;  but  that 
there  has  been  a  vast  improvement  in  America  within 
the  last  few  years  no  man  can  doubt.  On  the  other 
hand,  one  sees  at  every  turn  great  evils  resulting  from 
the  abuse  of  protection — one  of  the  most  prominent 
I  can  mention  being  the  American  shipping  trade, 
which  has  been  absolutely  annihilated  by  protection. 
Only  yesterday  I  read  an  account  of  the  carrying 
trade  in  China,  which,  when  I  was  round  there  a 
few  years  ago,  was  very  largely  carried  in  American 
ships ;  but  now  American  shipping  has  almost  dis 
appeared  from  that  trade,  because  the  Americans 
will  neither  allow  the  materials  for  shipbuilding  to 
be  imported  without  an  enormous  duty  being  placed 
upon  them,  nor  will  they  allow  an  American  citizen  to 
bring  a  ready-made  ship  from  the  Clyde. 

Some  of  the  protectionist  duties  are  quite  useless, 
as  they  act  in  an  almost  prohibitory  way  on  things 
not  produced  in  America.  And  some  seem  of  a 
wantonly  injurious  character,  as,  for  instance,  a  very 
high  duty  on  quinine,  so  much  wanted  as  a  remedy 
for  the  prevalent  '  fever  and  chills  '  of  America.  I 
think  no  one  denies  that  the  details  of  the  tariff 
should  be  reformed. 

Then  I  have  no  doubt  that  the  system  of  protection 


40       BIRD'S-EYE  VIEW   OF  THE   UNITED  STATES. 

followed  in  the  United  States  does  in  many  ways 
enhance  the  cost  of  living,  both  directly,  by  enhancing 
the  price  of  commodities,  and  indirectly,  by  pandering 
to  that  disposition  to  prefer  high  gains  and  lavish 
expenditure  to  moderate  gains  and  careful  expendi 
ture,  which  is  the  bane  of  the  country.  Our  people 
are  open  to  the  reproach,  often  levelled  against  them, 
that  if  they  make  more  they  spend  more  and  save 
less  than  the  people  of  some  other  countries  ;  but  in 
this  respect  the  Americans,  or  at  any  rate  large 
classes  of  Americans,  much  exceed  them.  The  cry 
there  is  always  for  great  profits  and  high  wages,  but 
economy  of  living  is  not  studied.  One  notices  in  the 
smallest  things  how  much  more  the  distributors  are 
allowed  to  appropriate  than  with  us.  You  can't  buy 
a  two-cent  paper  in  the  street  for  less  than  five  cents; 
and  in  a  country  where  apples  are  so  abundant  that 
you  may  almost  pick  them  up  for  nothing  they  are 
retailed  in  the  towns  dearer  than  in  London. 

Not  only  is  the  system  of  protection  popularised 
by  its  universality,  but  no  doubt  people  get  used  to, 
and  do  not  fully  realise,  any  indirect  impost.  The 
excuse  for  the  Indian  salt  duty  of  2,000  per  cent, 
is  that  people  get  accustomed  to  it.  So  it  is  that 
the  Americans  hardly  realise  the  burdens  which 
they  bear.  They  argue  that  theirs  is  not  a  narrow 
protection,  since  their  country  is  so  large  and  contains 
so  many  States,  with  varying  climates,  peoples,  and 
industries,  that  there  is  within  the  limits  of  the  Union 
abundantly  active  competition,  affording  ample  stimu 
lus  to  progress.  They  rely  on  the  recent  enormous 


PROTECTION   AND   RECIPKOCITY.  41 

improvement  of  their  manufactures  as  showing  the 
success  of  their  system.  When  one  comes  to  parti 
culars,  too,  it  is  somewhat  difficult  to  make  out  a 
strong  case  against  them.  The  daily  wants  of  the 
ordinary  population  are  food,  houses,  clothing,  and 
such  luxuries  as  tea  and  coffee,  spirits  and  tobacco. 
Now,  food  and  the  materials  for  houses  are  certainly 
cheaper  in  America  than  with  us  ;  the  taxes  on 
alcoholic  drinks  and  tobacco  are  lighter  than  ours  ; 
tea  and  coffee  are  free.  Even  as  regards  clothing  I 
was  so  constantly  assured  as  to  be  almost  persuaded 
that  their  cotton  goods — especially  what  are  called 
'  domestics ' — are  as  cheap  as  and  better  than  ours  ; 
and  though  woollen  goods  are  dearer,  they  say  that  the 
lower  class  of  woollens,  made  all  over  the  States  from 
native  wool,  and  a  class  of  mixed  goods,  much  used 
by  the  Southern  and  Western  populations,  are  not 
materially  dearer.  It  is  in  the  better  description  of 
clothing  used  by  the  upper  classes,  the  finer  woollens 
and  -silks,  and  all  ladies'  clothing,  that  there  is  an 
enormous  difference — the  cost  of  these  in  America  is 
nearly  double,  and  people  who  go  to  Europe  almost 
pay  the  expenses  of  the  trip  by  saving  in  the  stock 
of  personal  clothes  they  bring  from  thence  and  get 
through  the  Custom  House  free  of  duty.  As  regards 
linens  the  Americans  are  behind,  and  I  hope  even 
protection  will  not  enable  them  to  dispense  with 
Kirkcaldy  goods.  Iron  and  steel  are  a  good  deal 
dearer  than  in  England ;  but  when  we  throw  in  the 
cost  of  carriage,  &c.,  the  difference  is  not  so  great. 
It  seems  to  be  conceded  that  the  classes  employed  in 


42       BIRD'S-EYE  VIEW  OF  THE  UNITED   STATES. 

this  branch  of  industry  in  the  States  have  already  suf 
fered  so  much  from  bad  times,  and  are  so  dangerous, 
that  it  would  not  be  possible  to  establish  free  trade 
in  the  iron  trade  till  times  are  more  prosperous.  The 
Americans  certainly  possess  magnificent  coalfields  and 
immense  deposits  of  iron,  and  they  are  advancing 
greatly  in  the  manufacture.  I  am  afraid  our  iron 
masters  will  never  obtain  that  market  again.  The 
anthracite  coal,  of  which  we  have  heard  so  much,  is 
confined  to  certain  very  limited  localities  in  one  part 
of  Pennsylvania;  but  throughout  vast  tracts  in 
Pennsylvania  and  other  Eastern  States,  and  again  in 
the  AYestern  States,  the  fields  of  soft  coal  are  almost 
unlimited. 

There  is  no  denying  that  in  some  departments 
the  ingenuity  of  the  Americans  has  enabled  them  to 
rival  us  in  foreign  markets  to  some  degree,  notwith 
standing  the  greater  dearness  of  some  of  their  materials. 
I  believe  it  is  the  fact  that  they  have  been  exporting 
railway  engines,  not  only  to  Russia,  but  to  our  own 
Australian  colonies  ;  their  agricultural  implements  are 
now  sent  all  over  the  world  ;  and  even  their  watches 
are  exported  to  the  Continent  of  Europe — to  countries 
hitherto  supplied  by  the  Swiss.  On  the  other  hand, 
our  Sheffield  goods,  such  as  knives  and  scissors, 
cannot  be  rivalled  in  America,  arid  hold  their  own 
there  in  spite  of  protection. 

There  is  little  hope  that  the  Americans  will  soon 
adopt  free  trade  principles,  unless,  indeed,  they  con 
tinue  their  present  rapid  improvement  in  manufactures 
so  far  as  to  become  a  large  exporting  people.  Then 


PROTECTION  AND   RECIPROCITY.  43 

no  doubt  it  will  suit  their  book,  and  they  will  become 
free  traders.  Their  idea  is  to  raise  their  enterprise 
in  the  hothouse  atmosphere  of  protection  at  home 
until  it  gets  so  large  and  strong  that  they  may  knock 
away  the  glass  and  let  it  spread  over  the  outer  world. 
Whether  they  will  accomplish  that,  time  only  will 
show  ;  but  I  am  quite  sure  that  the  people  of  this 
country  should  not  give  in  to  them.  Though  free 
traders  as  such  now  hardly  exist  in  America,  there  is 
in  some  parts  of  the  country  a  feeling  that  a  tariff 
more  designed  for  revenue  might  be  the  means  of 
relieving  the  several  States  of  the  internal  revenue 
system  of  which  they  complain  as  being  both  ex 
pensive  and  harassing.  I  heard  a  Virginian  complain 
that  the  tobacco  duty  raised  on  the  manufacture  there 
makes  the  internal  taxation  of  the  State  heavier  than 
that  of  other  and  richer  States;  and  the  Southern 
highlanders  of  the  Alleghanies  say  that  they  would 
get  on  very  well  if  it  were  not  for  the  i  whisky  block 
ade,'  which  interferes  with  their  honest  industry  in 
that  article.  It  is  likely  enough  that  the  tariff  may 
be  modified  to  get  rid  of  some  useless  and  injurious  re 
strictions,  "and  to  increase  the  customs  revenue  to  some 
degree,  but  free  trade  there  will  not  be  for  the  present. 
There  still  remains  the  reciprocity  question.  It 
is  said,  and  I  myself  have  no  doubt  it  is  true,  that  if 
all  nations  would  accept  free  trade,  and  all  barriers 
were  broken  down,  it  would  be  best  for  all  parties ; 
but  then,  some  people  add,  since  almost  all  other 
nations  do  impose  heavy  protective  duties,  'Would 
it  not  be  well  for  us  to  impose  moderate  duties,  such, 


44       BIRD'S-EYE  VIEW   OF  THE   UNITED   STATES. 

at  all  events,  as  to  equal  the  taxes  which  are  paid  by 
our  own  manufacturers,  the  workmen  who  live  in  this 
country  and  produce  their  goods  at  home  ?  '  Here  also 
I  will  not  pretend  to  decide  upon  grounds  of  political 
economy  ;  but  I  put  this  practical  question  to  you,  '  if 
you  admit  that  doctrine,  what  goods  would  you  tax 
on  their  import  into  this  country  ?  '  I  don't  myself  see 
what  you  could  tax.  We  export  manufactures,  and  we 
import  food  and  the  raw  materials  for  manufacture ; 
and  because  America  taxes  your  manufactures  would 
you  tax  the  food  of  the  people — the  wheat,  the  beef, 
and  the  bacon  which  come  from  America  ?  It  is  im 
possible  ;  the  people  would  not  submit  to  anything  of 
the  kind.  Then,  would  you  tax  the  raw  materials  of 
your  manufactures  ?  You  know  very  well  that  that 
would  be  cutting  your  own  throat.  And  so  I  bring 
it  to  this,  what  would  you  tax  ?  There  might  be  a 
few  luxuries  which  it  might  be  right  enough  to  tax, 
but  practically  there  is  no  great  trade  which  you 
could  tax  ;  and  it  is  on  that  ground  I  say  that  reci 
procity  is  a  mere  theory,  and  not  a  practical  question. 
Then  some  people  recommend  restriction  of  production 
as  the  remedy.  That  seems  to  me  also  to  be  a  most 
suicidal  system.  True,  in  times  of  prosperity  and 
excessive  trade  it  may  be  well  to  say  to  capitalists, 
'  Take  care ;  don't  overdo  it ;  don't  try  to  make  more 
money  than  the  trade  will  justify  ;  don't  run  up 
wages  to  a  point  at  which  they  cannot  be  maintained.' 
But  when  you  come  to  hard  times  and  bad  trade  it 
seems  to  me  that  capitalists  will  be  ready  enough  to 
contract;  and  as  contraction  of  production  means 


THE  DRINK  QUESTION.  45 

contraction  of  employment  for  the  workpeople,  it  is 
the  worst  possible  thing  for  them.    I  have  seen  a  good 
deal  of  many  countries,  and  I  am  quite  convinced  of 
this,  that  the  only  chance  of  our  maintaining  our  su 
premacy  is,  that  we  should  do  that  which  we  have 
done  in  the  past,  namely,  make  our  goods  as  many, 
as  cheap,  and  as  durable  as  possible,  and  try  to  under 
sell  all  foreign  countries  in  what  we  may  call  the 
neutral  markets  of  the  world  ;  that  is,  the  countries 
which  do  not  manufacture  for  themselves.     There  are 
still  quite  enough  of  them  to  maintain  our  trade,  and 
we  may  still  live,  if  we  can  occupy  them  and  beat 
the  protectionists.    We  shall  have  to  look  sharp  to  do 
even  this.    The  Americans  have  not  yet  very  seriously 
rivalled  us  in  foreign  markets,  but  they  have  begun  to 
do  it  to  a  small  extent ;  and  we  shall  not  keep  them 
out  unless  we  can  undersell  them,  and  undersell  them 
without  deteriorating  the  quality  of  British  goods. 
We  must  produce  good  articles  in  enormous  quan 
tities,   and  cheaper  than  anyone  else,  if  we  are  to 
remain  ahead  of  the  rest  of  the  world. 

THE  DRINK  QUESTION. 

Of  all  the  questions  affecting  the  low- Teuton  coun 
tries  I  think  none  is  really  so  important  as  the  drink 
question,  and  I  paid  a  good  deal  of  attention  to  it  when 
I  was  in  America.  I  was  not  in  Maine,  and  did  not  go 
into  the  well-worn  question  of  the  Maine  Liquor  Law  ; 
but  I  noticed  the  ordinary  practice  in  the  States  through 
which  I  travelled,  and  found  it  pretty  uniform. 


46       BIRD'S-EYE  VIEW  OF  THE   UNITED   STATES. 

The  first  thing  that  I  noticed  in  travelling  was 
the  remarkable  feature  in  the  American  meals,  that 
people  drink  no  alcoholic  liquors  at  all  ;  it  seems  to 
be  contrary  to  their  habits,  and  I  may  almost  say  to 
good  morals  and  good  manners,  to  do  so — in  public  at 
least.  In  a  great  American  hotel,  where  you  meet 
hundreds  of  people,  you  will  probably  not  see  one 
who  takes  anything  stronger  than  tea  and  coffee  with 
his  meals  ;  or  if  you  do  he  is  a  foreigner.  They  drink  a 
great  deal  of  milk  and  such  innocent  things,  but 
neither  beer,  nor  wine,  nor  spirits.  Wine  is  very 
dear,  and  that  may  be  one  reason  why  it  is  not  seen. 

I  know  it  is  said,  '  Ah,  that  is  all  very  well,  but 
the  men  go  and  drink  afterwards .  at  the  bars.'  Some 
of  them  do  so,  but  I  am  bound  to  say  that  I  was 
exceedingly  surprised  to  find  how  little  frequented 
these  bars  are.  If  you  want  first-class  American 
drinks  you  must  go  to  the  cafes  on  the  Boulevards  of 
Paris — for  you  won't  get  them  in  America.  That  is 
my  experience.  In  some  parts  of  the  country  it  is  a 
common  form  of  civility  to  invite  a  friend  or  a  stranger 
to  '  take  a  drink  '  and  to  treat  him  at  the  bar ;  and  there 
are  some  men's  evening  parties  at  which  wine  is  in 
troduced,  but  one  does  not  see  much  of  this  kind  of 
thing. 

Among  the  people  at  large  the  public  and  evi 
dent  drinking  is,  I  think,  less  than  with  us,  and  if  a 
good  deal  is  consumed  it  is  done  in  a  more  decent 
kind  of  way.  I  have  not  been  able  to  compare  the 
statistics  exactly  with  respect  to  the  amount  of  drink 
consumed.  A  great  deal  of  whisky,  no  doubt,  is 


THE  DRINK  QUESTION.  47 

drunk  ;  but  the  revenue  derived  from  alcoholic 
liquors  is  not  so  large  as  in  this  country,  and  it  cer 
tainly  is  the  case  that  one  sees  much  less  drunken 
ness.  I  am  told  that  this  is  very  much  due  to  the 
climate.  People  say  that  whereas  in  Scotland  some 
Scotchmen  with  strong  constitutions  drink  a  good 
deal  of  whisky  all  their  lives  and  die  in  their  beds  at 
eighty — not  many  of  them,  I  believe — a  man  cannot 
possibly  do  that  kind  of  thing  in  America.  He 
would  be  killed  in  a  very  short  time.  Thus  neces 
sity  begets  a  certain  moderation.  I  am  told  that  there 
is  nowhere  in  America  the  state  of  things  said  to 
prevail  in  some  English  places,  where  a  large  pro 
portion  of  some  classes  are  so  drunk  upon  a  Sunday 
that  they  take  Monday  to  recover,  and  don't  return 
to  work  till  Tuesday.  However,  I  hope  that  is  an 
exaggeration.  There  is  a  Sunday-closing  law  almost 
everywhere,  with  no  exception  for  bond  fide  travellers 
or  anyone  else.  It  is  more  or  less  strictly  observed 
by  the  natives,  and  certainly  a  stranger  can  get 
nothing.  I  was  myself  reformed  in  consequence  in 
a  very  fortunate  manner.  I  used  to  think  a  little 
whisky-and-water  good  to  make  me  sleep  ;  but  not 
being  able  to  get  it  on  Sundays,  and  finding  that  I 
slept  quite  as  well,  I  did  without  it  on  other  days  too, 
to  my  great  benefit. 

I  fear  the  drink  question  is  not  one  which  can  be 
very  effectually  dealt  with  by  law  in  the  present  state 
of  feeling.  We  must  always  have  greater  reliance  upon 
moral  and  social  means.  One  result  of  what  I  have 
seen  and  experienced  in  America  is  to  make  me  believe 


48       BIRD'S-EYE  VIEW   OF  THE   UNITED   STATES. 

that  it  is  much  better  to  go  in  for  total  abstinence 
than  temperance.  It  seems  to  me  that  drink  is  like 
gambling,  it  is  very  easy  to  abstain  altogether  ; 
abstinence  does  no  harm,  and  very  soon  one  does 
not  feel  the  want  of  it.  But  if  you  drink  in  modera 
tion  it  is  like  gambling  in  moderation — you  are  very 
apt  to  go  on.  Some  people  are  not  much  tempted  to 
excess,  but  some  constitutions  are  tempted,  and  they 
do  go  on  to  excess.  The  Americans  have  found  out 
this,  and  no  doubt  it  is  for  this  reason  that  it  has 
become  so  much  the  practice  of  the  better  classes 
among  them  to  abstain  altogether.  I  must  say, 
then,  that  my  advice  to  those  in  this  country  who 
are  sincerely  anxious  to  cure  their  less  restrained 
fellow-countrymen  of  bad  habits  is,  that  they  should 
rather  show  an  example  of  abstinence  than  simply 
preach  temperance  to  their  neighbours  and  try  to  cur 
tail  the  public-houses.  People  never  do  have  very 
much  influence  who  do  not  practise  what  they  preach. 
My  strong  belief  is  that  if  the  well-to-do  classes,  the 
moral,  religious,  and  evangelical  classes,  were  to  ba 
nish  wine  from  their  tables  and  take  to  milk,  they 
might  with  much  greater  advantage  and  effect  try 
to  put  down  the  public-houses  of  the  poorer  classes. 
Then,  as  regards  legislation  on  the  subject,  a  man 
who  becomes  convinced  of  that  which  he  had  believed 
before  becomes  very  thoroughly  convinced  indeed, 
and  that  is  pretty  much  the  case  with  me  on  this 
drink  question.  I  have  been  always  inclined  to 
suspect  that  the  matter  should  be  dealt  with  in  a  way 
which  has  not  many  advocates  in  this  country,  and  I 


THE   DRINK  QUESTION.  49 

have  been  agreeably  surprised  to  find  that  in  America 
the  practice  is  actually  that  to  which  my  own  opinion 
inclined.  I  believe  that  it  is  a  very  great  mistake 
to  deal  with  the  matter  simply  by  limiting  the 
number  of  public-houses,  because  the  result  is  to 
create  a  monopoly  and  vested  interest  in  those  public- 
houses  which  remain.  I  should  say  that  in  this 
matter  there  has  been  a  kind  of  alliance  between 
those  who  serve  God  and  those  who  serve  Mammon — 
between  the  good  people  who  wish  to  put  down  public - 
houses  and  the  public -house  keepers  who  do  not  wish 
any  more  houses  to  compete  with  them.  Thus  the 
worshippers  of  God  and  the  worshippers  of  Mammon, 
being  united,  have  been  so  strong  that  they  have 
carried  everything  before  them,  and  the  result  is  that 
a  great  monopoly  interest  has  been  created.  Now,  I 
entirely  admit  that  in  rural  places  where  there  never 
has  been  a  public-house  it  is  a  very  great  evil  that 
one  should  be  set  up,  and  that  there  should  be  some 
local  power  of  veto  on  it  ;  but,  on  the  other  hand,  I 
believe  that  if  you  have  half  a  dozen  public-houses 
in  a  street,  no  reason  exists  why  two  or  three  more 
should  not  be  allowed,  if,  in  the  way  of  free  trade,  they 
are  established.  On  the  contrary,  it  is  the  existence 
of  a  valuable  monopoly  on  the  part  of  the  restricted 
number  of  houses  which  makes  practically  impos 
sible  any  public  action  whatever — whether  the  pro 
hibition  of  sales,  the  Gothenburg  system,  or  anything 
else.  I  think  the  first  step  towards  any  great  measure 
of  reform  is  to  make  the  trade  free,  paradox  as  that 
may  seem ;  for  when  you  have  abolished  monopolies 

E 


50       BIRD'S-EYE   VIEW  OF  THE   UNITED   STATES. 

and  vested  rights  which  have  no  right  to  be,  you  are 
then  free  to  act  in  the  public  interest.  This  is  the 
view  taken  by  the  Americans.  The  laws  of  different 
States  are  different — I  cannot  answer  for  all — but  I 
inquired  in  several,  and  in  none  of  them  did  I  find 
that  there  was  that  disgraceful  and  demoralising  con 
test  for  licenses  which  takes  place  to  such  an  excessive 
degree  in  England,  and  to  some  degree  in  Scotland 
too.  In  places  where  the  sale  is  permitted  at  all 
there  is  no  privilege,  all  the  citizens  being  treated 
equally  ;  the  manufacture  is  taxed,  the  sale  is  taxed, 
licenses  to  sell  are  very  heavily  taxed ;  but  any  man 
of  good  character,  who  submits  to  the  rules  and  keeps 
the  rules,  gets  the  license  under  a  regular  system, 
without  making  it  a  matter  of  canvassing,  or  argu 
mentation  by  lawyers.  On  the  other  hand,  in  certain 
localities  the  sale  of  spirituous  liquors  is  prohibited, 
not  merely  the  retail  in  public  houses,  but  all  sales 
whatever  ;  and  that  seems  to  me  a  much  more  logical 

'  O 

process.  I  never  could  reconcile  myself  to  closing 
the  poor  man's  club  and  leaving  open  the  shops 
where  the  better  classes  or  any  other  class  may  sup 
ply  themselves  with  liquor  to  consume  at  home  ;  nor 
could  I  see  any  reason  for  giving  one  grocer  a  license 
and  prohibiting  another.  If  you  prohibit  at  all,  I 
think  you  should  prohibit  all.  The  Americans  have 
not  got  Sir  Wilfrid  Lawson's  Permissive  Bill.  I 
could  not  ascertain  very  exactly  the  reason  for  the 
course  which  they  take,  but  hi  many  different  States 
they  follow  the  same  course,  which  is  this — that  when 
there  is  a  very  strong  wish  to  prohibit  the  sale  of 


THE   DRINK  QUESTION.  51 

liquors  in  any  particular  locality  a  bill  for  that  pur 
pose  is  brought  in  and  passed  by  the  local  State 
Legislature.  I  presume  that,  being  so  treated,  the 
question  does  not  absolutely  turn  upon  a  mere  local 
majority,  but  if  there  are  objectors  they  have  an 
opportunity  of  being  heard,  after  which  the  Home 
Rule  Parliament  of  the  particular  State  decides  as 
it  thinks  best  ;  and  it  is  undoubtedly  the  case  that 
in  almost  every  State  in  which  I  inquired  a  number 
of  such  bills  are  passed,  and  under  them  the  sale  of 
liquors  is  prohibited  in  considerable  localities.  Some 
times,  but  not  very  often,  the  bill  takes  the  shape  of 
giving  an  option  to  the  particular  locality  to  be  deter 
mined  by  vote.  My  own  opinion  tends  very  much 
to  prohibition,  though  I  feel  that  the  world  generally 
is  not  ripe  for  it  yet.  I  should,  however,  be  very 
glad  to  see  an  experiment  made  in  particular  localities 
which  are  pretty  well  united  in  wishing  for  it.  On 
that  ground  I  would  gladly  see  some  measure  em 
bodying  the  principle  of  vesting  a  power  somewhere 
to  stop  the  sale  of  liquors  in  particular  localities 
when  the  general  sense  of  the  population  desires  it ; 
although  Ldo  not  know  that  I  would  let  a  mere 
majority  impose  such  a  measure  on  a  large  and 
reluctant  minority. 

RELIGION. 

I  had  expected  to  find  America  overrun  by  new 
fangled  ideas  in  religion,  but  it  did  not  appear  to  be 
so.  By  far  the  larger  portion  of  the  people  adhere 


E  2 


52       BIRD'S-EYE   VIEW  OF  THE   UNITED   STATES. 

to  the  good  old -fashioned  Churches,  or  perhaps  in 
many  eases  I  should  say  to  an  old-fashioned  Congrega 
tional  system,  for  there  seems  to  be  a  great  disposition 
to  Congregationalism  in  the  United  States.  The  Epis 
copalians  are  hut  a  small  minority.  The  most  impor 
tant  sects  are  the  Presbyterians,  Methodists,  and  Bap 
tists;  but  it  seems  to  me  that  in  America  there  is  much 
inclination  among  religious  sects  which  do  not  differ 
in  essentials  to  come  together  on  common  ground. 
The  Young  Men's  Christian  Associations — which  are, 
I  believe,  unsectarian — are  widely  spread  in  the  coun 
try,  and  do  excellent  work.  The  number  of  Irish 
who  go  to  America  is  so  great  that,  added  to  a  num 
ber  of  Southern  Germans,  they  make  a  considerable 
Catholic  population.  But  I  do  not  think  that  that  re 
ligion  is  suited  to  the  genius  of  the  people  of  America, 
white  or  black.  The  Catholics  do  not  make  progress. 
The  blacks  do  not  at  all  accept  them.  In  their  own 
way  these  blacks  are  an  exceedingly  religious  Christian 
people  ;  but  it  strikes  me  as  a  sad  thing  that  the  black 
and  the  white  Churches  are  now  entirely  separated 
from  one  another.  The  blacks  have  now  everywhere 
set  up  black  preachers,  who  do  not  preach  at  all  badly. 
Their  congregations  sing  exceedingly  well,  and  they 
are  more  in  earnest  than  most  white  people. 

Although,  as  I  have  said,  one  sees  very  little  of 
the  very  new-fangled  religions,  there  are  a  good 
many  divisions  and  subdivisions  of  the  old  sects  in 
different  parts  of  the  country.  In  the  great  hotels 
in  the  cities  of  the  interior  one  sees  a  board  with  a 
list  of  the  various  Churches,  and  they  are  certainly 


RELIGION.  53 

pretty  numerous.  However,  one  recognises  most  of 
them.  The  only  prevalent  sect  (especially  in  the 
West)  which  struck  me  as  novel  was  one  called  simply 
*  Christians,'  or  sometimes  '  Campbellites,'  having  been 
founded  by  a  Campbell.  They  claim  to  be  unsec- 
tarian  Christians.  I  thought  I  should  like  to  belong 
to  that  persuasion. 

I  was  anxious  to  know  how  people  get  on  in  Ame 
rica  without  an  Established  Church — whether  they 
are  the  worse  for  that  want.  We  have  all  been  a  good 
deal  exercised  on  that  subject.  I  have  had  much 
difficulty  in  making  up  my  mind  on  it.  I  have  had 
an  old  affection  for  the  Scotch  Establishment  which  I 
cannot  very  easily  surrender.  It  is  not  that  I  have 
had  any  high-flying  ideas  about  the  union  of  Church 
and  State  and  the  advantage  of  clothing  the  Church 
in  purple  and  fine  linen,  and  making  her  a  ruler  of 
men  ;  I  believe  that  nothing  could  be  more  contrary 
to  the  Spirit  of  Christianity,  nothing  worse  for  the 
Church  or  worse  for  the  State  than  that;  and  if  I  had 
any  doubt  about  that,  what  I  have  seen  on  the  Con 
tinent  of  Europe  has  quite  solved  all  those  doubts. 
But  I  have"  thought,  and  I  think  still,  that  if  we  were 
all  of  one  religion  it  might  be  much  better  to  combine 
to  maintain  a  common  minister  paid  by  rates — and 
teinds  or  tithes  are  nothing  but  an  old  form  of  rates 
— -just  as  we  find  it  better  to  maintain  a  common 
school  by  rates — rather  than  allow  ministers  to  depend 
upon  the  bounty  of  their  congregations,  and  especially 
of  the  richer  among  their  congregations.  We  in 
Scotland  seem  to  have  satisfied  ourselves  that  this 


54       BIRD'S-EYE  VIEW   OF  THE  UNITED   STATES. 

is  the  best  and  most  economical  system  in  regard  to 
schools. 

Now,  formerly,  in  America,  the  people  took  very 
much  the  view  which  I  have  indicated — the  original 
New  Englanders  did  establish  their  ministers  in  the 
way  which  I  have  mentioned  ;  they  did  not  leave 
their  support  to  individual  zeal,  but,  being  generally 
in  each  settlement  of  one  persuasion,  they  rated  them 
selves  for  the  purpose  ;  and  in  truth  that  was  exactly 
what  was  done  by  the  early  Reformers  in  Scotland. 
That  was  a  system  which  was  very  successful  for  a 
very  long  period  ;  and  if  circumstances  had  not 
changed  I  think  no  one  would  have  sought  to 
change  it.  But  circumstances  have  changed — have 

o  o 

changed  in  America,  and  have  changed  in  Scotland  ; 

O  o  7 

and,  owing  to  the  progress  of  modern  thought  and 
modern  freedom,  it  has  come  to  pass  that  the  people 
in  New  England  are  not  all  of  one  sect  of  religion, 
and  the  people  of  Scotland  are  not  all  of  one  sect. 
There  is  a  division  among  the  people  on  religious  sub 
jects,  and  that  division  is  not  unattended  with  con 
siderable  jealousy  and  rivalry,  and,  I  am  afraid  I  must 
say,  sometimes  some  bad  feeling.  Now,  in  America 
as  soon  as  it  was  found  that  people  were  no  longer 
unanimous,  but  that  there  was  considerable  division, 
the  course  they  took  was  to  abolish  all  State  aid  to 
all  Churches,  and  to  let  every  sect  make  their  own 
arrangements  with  regard  to  their  religious  establish 
ments.  I  have  watched  this  subject  with  very  great 
interest.  In  order  to  ascertain  how  this  system 
worked  I  made  it  my  duty  to  see  whether  the 


RELIGION.  55 

interests  of  religion  suffered,  or  whether  any  other 
evils  had  attended  the  free  system  in  America.  I 
was  entirely  satisfied  that  religion  had  in  no  degree 
suffered ;  on  the  contrary,  the  people  of  America  are 
to  the  full  as  religious  as  any  people  in  the  world 
— as  religious  as  the  people  of  Scotland,  and  that 
is  saying  a  great  deal.  Not  only  is  this  so  in  the  old 
settled  States  of  New  England,  New  York,  and  Penn 
sylvania,  but  I  found — I  confess  somewhat  to  my  sur 
prise — that  it  is  so  also  in  the  Western  and  Southern 
States.  We  have  an  idea  that  in  the  West  people  are 
rather  rough,  and  I  had  half-expected  to  find  that 
after  a  certain  point  they  had  left  a  good  deal  of  their 
religion  behind  them,  but  it  really  is  not  so.  In  St. 
Louis  and  Kansas,  in  the  West,  and  Carolina  and 
Georgia,  in  the  South,  they  are  very  decorous  and 
religious  people,  with  abundance  of  churches.  The 
only  drawback  is  that,  as  with  us,  there  are  some 
times  three  or  four  different  churches,  when  one 
would  suffice,  if  people  would  only  all  agree  to  go  to 
it ;  but  as  they  don't  agree  I  don't  see  that  any  great 
harm  comes  from  their  having  separate  churches — 
though  I  am  not  without  hope  that,  as  liberal  feelings 
progress,  they  may  agree,  and  unite  on  the  original 
simple  principles  of  Christianity,  getting  rid  of  theo 
logical  dogmas  and  difficulties. 

Well,  then,  if  religion  does  not  suffer  in  America 
for  want  of  Establishments,  I  am  quite  sure  that 
peace  and  good-will  greatly  benefit.  I  was  immensely 
struck  by  the  entire  elimination  of  religion  from 
politics  in  that  country,  and  the  absolute  want  of 


56       BIRD'S-EYE  VIEW  OF  THE   UNITED   STATES. 

any  inclination  to  hate  one's  neighbour  on  account  of 
religion.  Every  man  does  as  to  him  seems  best,  and 
no  other  man  hates  him,  worries  him,  or  avoids  his 
society  on  that  account.  Politically  and  socially 
America  is  not  divided  by  religious  cliques.  Politics 
have  no  streak  of  religion  in  them ;  a  man  lives  as 
he  likes,  without  being  troubled  by  his  neighbour  ; 
and  dies  as  he  likes,  without  his  neighbour  inquiring 
to  what  persuasion  he  belonged.  I  confess,  then,  I 
now  feel  that  I  should  like  to  see  religion  separated 
from  politics.  I  should  be  glad  to  see  that  done  in 
this  country,  when  it  can  be  done  without  creating 
an  amount  of  disturbance  and  bad  blood,  which 
would  make  the  cure  worse  than  the  disease.  But 
I  also  feel  this,  that  the  existing  Establishment  in 
Scotland  is  the  least  offensive  religious  establishment 
in  the  world,  and  is  not  an  overwhelming  evil.  I  can 
perfectly  well  sleep  in  my  bed  with  the  knowledge 
that  the  Church  of  Scotland  still  exists.  I  daresay 
the  day  is  not  very  far  distant  when  the  thing  may 
be  done  without  the  great  change  and  great  evils 
which  some  people  seem  to  apprehend.  I  met  a  dig 
nitary  of  the  English  Church  in  Canada — a  Church 
which  was  disestablished  by  our  countryman,  Lord 
Elgin — and,  I  said  to  him, '  How  do  you  get  on  in  your 
disestablished  character?'  'Well/  he  said,  'we  did 
not  like  it  at  all  at  first ;  we  thought  ourselves  very 
ill-used ;  but  now  we  have  come  to  like  it,  and  are 
quite  convinced  that  it  is  best.  Formerly  there  was 
great  jealousy  and  dislike  of  us  on  account  of  our 
position  ;  now  all  that  has  passed  away.  Everyone 


POLITICAL   SYSTEM  OF   THE  UNITED   STATES.      57 

is  most  friendly.  We  were  disestablished  on  liberal 
terms ;  we  have  done  the  best  we  can  for  ourselves, 
and  we  get  on  very  well  indeed.' 


THE    POLITICAL  SYSTEM  OF  THE  UNITED  STATES. 

I  cannot  properly  explain  to  you  in  a  few  words 
the  political  system  of  the  United  States,  nor  can 
I  quite  compare  the  Congress  with  our  Parliament. 
The  functions  of  the  two  bodies  are  really  quite 
different.  As  I  have  already  said,  the  United  States 
are  not  one  country,  but  forty  countries,  and  the  civil, 
criminal,  and  domestic  laws  of  all  sorts  do  not  apper 
tain  to  the  central  authority,  but  to  the  separate 
States,  each  having  its  own  laws.  Till  one  visits  the 
country  perhaps  one  hardly  realises  how  completely 
this  is  the  case.  Neither  in  regard  to  marriage 
and  inheritance,  or  the  punishment  of  crimes,  or  the 
management  of  railways,  or  anything  else,  is  there 
any  general  law  whatever  ;  the  laws  of  each  State 
are  made  by  the  separate  Legislature  of  that  State. 
Consequently,  the  Congress  of  the  United  States,  hav 
ing  nothing  to  do  with  these  things,  is  confined  to  the 
few  functions  which  the  Constitution  vests  in  it,  and 
which  are,  in  fact,  mainly  financial ;  for  it  is  necessary 
to  raise  a  sufficient  revenue  to  support  the  army  and 
navy,  and  diplomatic  service,  and  to  pay  the  interest 
of  the  debt.  The  necessity  of  raising  a  customs  re 
venue  involves  the  question  of  the  Tariff  and  the 
whole  question  of  free  trade  or  protection,  which  thus 
conies  before  Congress.  The  coinage  and  currency  are 


58       BIRD'S-EYE  VIEW  OF  THE  UNITED   STATES. 

common  to  all  the  States,  and  are  managed  by  Con 
gress,  which  has  also  established  common  patent  and 
copyright  laws.  It  has  power  to  establish  a  general 
bankruptcy  law,  and  did  pass  a  temporary  law  of  the 
kind  after  the  war,  but  it  has  expired,  and  there  is  none 
now.  The  Post-office  is  almost  the  only  institution 
beyond  these  which  is  common  to  all  the  States.  I 
should  mention,  however,  that,  in  connection  with 
foreign  commerce  and  the  customs  revenue,  the 
United  States  undertake  the  charge  of  the  principal 
harbours  and  the  great  rivers,  and  the  expenditure 
connected  with  them — a  circumstance  which  gives 
rise  to  a  good  deal  of  rivalry  of  local  interests,  and 
to  considerable  opportunities  for  exercising  influence 
by  means  of  the  public  purse. 

The  revenue  of  the  United  States  is  mainly  de 
rived  from  three  sources :  the  sea-customs  and  two 
great  internal  taxes,  that  on  spirituous  liquors  and 
that  on  tobacco. 

The  laws  of  all  the  States,  except  the  old  French 
colony  of  Louisiana,  are  based  on  the  common  law 
of  England,  to  which  reference  is  constantly  made, 
although  a  great  and  varying  body  of  statute  law 
has  been  built  up  over  it  in  the  various  States.  Still 
very  much  of  the  old  English  system  remains,  and 
one  is  surprised  to  find  old  English  institutions, 
which  have  been  swept  away,  modified,  or  threat 
ened  in  England,  still  surviving  in  most  of  the 
States.  The  reason  is  that  some  of  the  oldest  of  the 
English  legal  institutions  and  maxims,  such  as  the 
grand  jury,  trial  by  jury  in  all  cases  indiscriminately, 


POLITICAL   SYSTEM  OF  THE  UNITED   STATES.      59 

(civil  as  well  as  criminal),  unanimity  of  the  jury,  the 
non -ex animation  of  the  accused,  and  such  like,  have 
been  preserved  in  the  American  Constitutions,  which 
are  considered  to  be  much  more  sacred  than  ordi 
nary  laws.  The  United  States  have  a  written  Con 
stitution,  and  each  State  has  its  Constitution.  The 
State  Constitutions  have  been  revised  and  changed 
pretty  often  by  special  Conventions  empowered  to  do 
so,  but  that  of  the  United  States  has  been  very  little 
changed — in  fact,  never  revised,  only  added  to  at  rare 
intervals  ;  and  as  all  the  subordinate  Constitutions 
must  fit  into  that  of  the  United  States,  a  certain 
amount  of  sameness  and  continuity  of  old  maxims  is 
preserved.  These  Constitutions,  too,  make  the  situa 
tion  different  from  ours ;  for  the  Constitutions  are, 
as  it  were,  above  the  laws,  and  the  judges,  having  the 
power  to  interpret  the  Constitutions,  may  and  often 
do  declare  laws  illegal ;  so  that  Congress  and  the  State 
Assemblies  are  not  so  omnipotent  as  our  Parliament. 
Although  no  State  laws  nor  even  those  of  Con 
gress  can  violate  the  United  States  Constitution, 
each  State  is  recognised  as  a  sovereign  power,  and 
does  not  admit  that  any  judicial  tribunal  can  enforce 
judgments  against  it.  For  instance,  by  the  United 
States  Constitution  no  law  can  be  passed  impairing 
the  obligation  of  contracts,  and  any  attempt  to  tam 
per  by  law  with  State  debts  is  at  once  set  aside ;  but 
when,  as  is  now  the  case  in  some  States,  the  people 
find  themselves  unable  to  pay,  the  Legislature  simply 
fails  to  make  provision  for  payment,  and  there  are  no 
means  of  enforcing  claims. 


60       BIRD'S-EYE   VIEW  OF  THE   UNITED   STATES. 

I  think  a  great  many  people  in  this  country  have 
the  idea  that  the  Americans  have  generally  reduced 
their  law  to  regular  codes,  but  this  is  quite  a  mistake. 
Something  has  been  done  in  that  direction  in  New 
York  and,  I  rather  think,  something  in  Louisiana  ; 
but,  generally  speaking,  the  laws  are  just  as  in 
England — common  law  plus  the  statutes.  But  there 
is  a  very  useful  system  of  digesting  the  laws  common 
in  America.  Every  few  years  the  statute  law  is 
revised  and  reprinted  by  some  competent  man,  and 
after  examination  the  volume  is  passed  by  the  Legis 
lature  and  issued  by  authority.  These  very  useful 
volumes  are  called  Revised  Codes,  but  they  are  only 
collections  of  unrepealed  laws.  There  is  the  Revised 
Code  of  the  L^nited  States  and  the  Revised  Code  of 
almost  every  State.  These  volumes  are  certainly  a 
great  convenience — almost  a  necessity  where  people, 
having  far-extended  dealings  or  the  management  of 
great  enterprises,  have  to  do  with  a  number  of  States 
with  different  laws.  I  very  much  wish  our  law 
could  be  put  in  as  popular  a  form.  We  particularly 
want  that  in  Scotland,  for  the  Scotch  law  seems  to  be 
a  sealed  book  to  everyone  but  a  lawyer. 

Before  going  farther  I  will  mention  a  few  points, 
common  both  to  the  general  Government  and  to  the 
particular  States,  in  which  the  American  political 
system  differs  from  ours. 

The  Americans  have  no  Ministries  dependent 
on  Parliament,  and  going  in  and  out  as  they 
possess  or  lose  the  confidence  of  Parliament.  Great 
executive  power  is  vested  in  the  President  of  the 


POLITICAL   SYSTEM  OF  THE  UNITED   STATES.      61 

United  States  and  in  the  Governors  of  the  particular 
States,  who  are  elected  by  the  people  (directly  or 
indirectly),  for  fixed  terms  of  four  or  two  years,  and 
hold  office  for  their  term,  whether  they  agree  with 
their  Legislature  or  whether  they  do  not.  The 
Ministers  (if  not  similarly  elected,  as  they  are  in 
most  States)  are  the  nominees  of  the  President  or 
Governor,  cannot  sit  in  the  Legislature,  and  are 
altogether  free  from  Parliamentary  control.  Thus 
the  Executive  is  not  the  creature  of  Parliament, 
but  an  altogether  independent  power.  True,  both 
powers  are  derived  from  the  same  sources,  but  then 
it  often  happens  that  an  Executive  elected  at  one 
date  and  in  one  way  is  opposed  to  a  legislative 
majority  elected  at  another  date.  There  are  always 
two  Houses  of  the  Legislature.  As  in  the  United 
States  so  in  each  State  there  is  a  Senate  as  well  as 
an  Assembly.  The  latter  in  some  degree  corres 
ponds  to  our  House  of  Commons,  but  the  Senate  is 
very  different  from  our  House  of  Lords.  The  State 
Senate  is  elected  by  the  people,  the  United  States 
Senators  by  the  Legislative  body  of  each  State ; 
the  members  of  the  Senate  hold  office  for  longer 
periods — for  four  or  six  years — and  besides  an  equal 
power  in  the  Legislature  have  a  considerable  control 
over  the  Executive  in  regard  to  high  appoint 
ments  and  some  other  matters.  Thus  the  position 
of  a  Senator  is  one  of  much  power  and  dignity,  and 
is  much  sought  after.  I  understand  that  the  place  of 
a  United  States  Senator  elected  for  six  years  (and 
eligible  for  re-election),  with  a  considerable  salary 


62       BIRD'S-EYE  VIEW  OF  THE  UNITED   STATES. 

and  a  good  deal  of  power  and  patronage,  is  generally 
preferred  to  that  of  Governor  of  a  State. 

Every  State  determines  for  itself  the  question  of  the 
franchise  and  the  qualification  of  electors.  Universal 
suffrage  is  no  part  of  the  Constitution  of  the  United 
States,  and  in  fact,  till  a  comparatively  recent  date,  was 
by  no  means  the  general  rule.  It  is  only  provided 
that  the  members  of  the  United  States  Congress  shall 
be  returned  by  the  same  constituency  as  the  most 
popular  branch  of  the  Legislature  of  the  State 
returning  the  members.  In  practice,  however,  man 
hood  suffrage  has  come  to  be  the  common  rule, 
the  only  exception  which  I  noticed  being  in 
Massachusetts,  where  there  is  still  an  educational 
franchise.  No  man  can  vote  unless  he  can  read  and 
write,  and  when  I  was  there  the  Irishmen  were  being 
1  coached  up  '  to  enable  them  to  vote  for  General 
Butler. 

Woman  suffrage  does  not  find  much  favour  in 
America  ;  there  is  nothing  of  the  kind  in  any  of 
the  old  settled  States,  and,  so  far  as  I  could  gather,  any 
agitators  for  it  were  even  less  successful  than  with 
us.  In  some  of  the  far-Western  Territories,  however, 
something  of  the  kind  has  been  tried,  and  I  came 
across  an  enthusiastic  gentleman  from  the  Territory 
of  Wyoming,  up  in  the  Eocky  Mountains,  where,  it 
seems,  all  political  distinctions  between  the  sexes  have 
been  abolished,  and  women  are  eligible  to  all  public 
offices.  He  wanted  to  convert  the  other  States  to 
that  system,  and  told  of  a  case  in  which  a  husband 
and  wife  went  to  the  poll  against  one  another  as  rival 


POLITICAL   SYSTEM  OF  THE   UNITED   STATES.      63 

candidates  without  the  slightest  disturbance  of  their 
domestic  harmony  and  good  feeling.  I  confess, 
however,  that  I  was  not  convinced  of  the  advantage 
of  the  system,  nor  are  the  American  people.  They 
show  by  their  practice  that  women  may  have  many 
privileges,  and  even  usefully  practise  many  pro 
fessions,  without  seeking  political  power,  or  at  all 
events  without  obtaining  it. 

You  have  all  heard  of  the  caucus  system  which 
prevails  in  America  in  regard  to  elections ;  that  is, 
before  going  to  the  poll  each  party  decides  within 
itself  who  is  to  be  its  candidate.  In  fact,  this  system 
seems  to  have  become  almost  universal.  Everywhere 
there  are  what  are  called  the  i  primary '  elections — 
i.e.,  the  unofficial  elections  within  the  party,  before 
the  real  election — and  these  primary  elections  are 
often  conducted  with  at  least  as  much  heat  and  bit 
terness  as  the  real  election,  sometimes  much  more 
so.  There  are  various  modes  of  arranging  the 
caucus  :  sometimes  the  primary  election  is  in  the 
form  of  a  ballot  by  the  voters  of  the  party  to  elect 
the  candidate  direct,  but  generally  they  elect  de 
legates,  who  meet  in  caucus  and  elect  the  candi 
dates  ;  and  it  is  among  these  caucus  delegates  that 
jobbery  and  trickery  is  said  often  to  prevail,  the  more 
as,  these  elections  being  unknown  to  the  law,  abuses 
cannot  be  controlled  by  the  law  and  the  Courts. 
People  are  generally  very  much  alive  to  the  evils  of 
their  own  system,  and  I  certainly  heard  in  America 
more  abuse  of  the  caucus  system  than  praise  of  it. 
It  was  said  that  the  best  man  was  often  ousted  in  the 


64       BIRD'S-EYE  VIEW  OF  THE   UNITED   STATES. 

caucus  by  a  system  of  jobbery  and  underhand  ma 
nagement,  and  that  many  independent  men  much 
preferred  an  appeal  to  the  constituencies  direct.  I 
confess  I  was  not  able  in  my  short  visit  to  get  to 
the  bottom  of  the  subject  or  to  make  up  my  mind 
about  it. 

A  general  election  took  place  while  I  was  in 
America,  and  I  noticed  that  in  several  States  there 
were  a  good  many  l  Independent '  candidates,  who  set 
at  defiance  the  caucuses  and  went  in  against  their 
nominees  ;  and  they  not  unfrequently  won.  This 
was  the  more  practicable,  because  at  present  parties 
in  America  are  in  a  very  peculiar  position.  There 
are,  as  with  us,  two  parties  who  have  long  existed 
under  different  names,  and  have  for  a  good  many 
years  been  known  as  Republicans  and  Democrats. 
But  I  failed  to  identify  these  two  parties  with  our 
Liberals  and  Conservatives.  At  one  time  they  were  a 
good  deal  ranged  on  the  question  of  Centralisation 
versus  State-rights,  the  Republicans  representing  what 
we  might  call  the  Imperialist  party,  and  the  Demo 
crats  the  State-rights  party ;  now  that  question 
has  been  fought  out  and  settled  (as  regards  the 
claims  of  the  Southern  States  and  the  institution  of 
slavery),  and  it  has  nearly  ceased  to  have  practical 
importance.  It  so  happens  that  on  the  questions  of 
the  present  day — the  Tariff,  the  Currency,  and  some 
others — each  of  the  regular  parties  is  divided  within 
itself,  and  it  seems  inevitable  that  there  must  be  a 
new  deal.  It  will,  I  should  say,  be  a  very  good 
thing  if  it  is  so,  for  in  some  things  the  system  of 


POLITICAL   SYSTEM  OF  THE  UNITED   STATES.       65 

party  government  is  carried  much  further  than  with 
us,  especially  as  regards  appointments  to  offices  which 
we  call  permanent  and  treat  as  such.     A  custom  has 
sprung  up  in  modern  times  of  turning  out  all  the 
officials  when  there   is   a   change  in  the  Executive 
Government,  and  putting  in  the  men  of  the  incoming 
party.     And  to  this  has  been  added  a  horrible  sys 
tem  of  raising  a  regular  tax  by  a  tariff  levied  on 
the  salaries    of  all   officials,  towards   defraying   the 
election  expenses  of  the  party;  for -I  am  sorry  to  say 
that  the  practice  of  spending  money  on  elections  is 
growing  rapidly — following  our  evil  example.     The 
subordinate  office-holders  under  this  system  become 
the  principal  election  agents,  and  political  struggles 
become  to    a  great  degree  a  contest   between  rival 
factions   of  placemen   and   would-be   placemen  to   a 
much  greater  degree  than  with  us.     The  greatness  of 
this  evil  is  felt  and  acknowledged.     But  there  is  an 
extreme  difficulty  in   getting   rid  of  it  when   once 
introduced,  because,  one  party  having  put  in  all  their 
own  men,  it  would  require  superhuman  virtue  in  the 
other  party  to  leave  them  permanently  in  possession. 
The  thing-  can  only   be   settled    by   a   compromise, 
which  the  present  President  is  anxious  to  effect,  and  a 
new  deal  of  parties  will  be  the  best  opportunity  for  it. 
At  present  parties  in  Congress  are  so  evenly  balanced 
that  it  is  very  difficult  to  put  the  placeman  question 
out  of  sight. 

The  same  division  of  parties  is  carried  into  many  of 
the  State  elections,  and  into  some  of  the  municipal  elec 
tions  in  the  great  cities.  But  I  was  happy  to  observe 

F 


66     BIRD'S-EYE  VIEW  OF  THE  UNITED  STATES. 

that  in  other  States  the  divisions  are  on  other  questions 
and  other  lines  than  the  mere  struggle  between  Re 
publicans  and  Democrats,  and  I  hope  that  this  is  a 
sign  that  a  better  state  of  things  may  be  arrived  at. 

I  specially  remarked  two  things  as  giving  to 
American  legislators  a  character  different  from  our 
members  of  Parliament. 

First,  they  are  all  paid.  This  payment  chiefly 
affects  the  members  of  Congress.  They  receive  a 
handsome  salary  of  1,000/.  per  annum  each — members 
of  the  Senate  and  Assembly  equally — for  their 
attendance  during  a  portion  of  the  year  ;  so  that 
each  Congressman  is  a  regular  salaried  placeman. 
The  members  of  the  State  Legislatures,  on  the  other 
hand,  only  receive  a  moderate  daily  allowance  for 
their  expenses  during  the  time  of  their  actual  at 
tendance,  which  in  very  many  States  is  only  once  in 
two  years  ;  and  they  can  hardly  make  much  by  the 
transaction  ;  so  that  they  are  not  placemen  in  the 
same  sense,  and  not  so  much  professional  politicians. 

Second,  it  is  a  very  important  practical  feature  in 
the  situation  that  in  most  cases  American  Legislatures 
do  not  meet,  like  our  Parliament,  in  a  great  social 
and  commercial  capital,  where  the  great  and  grand 
and  rich  gather  together  for  other  purposes,  and 
where  fashionable  swells  and  millionaire  plutocrats 
are  equally  ready  to  add  M.P.  to  their  names,  in  one 
phase  of  their  lives,  and  to  migrate,  in  another,  to  a 
higher  if  not  better  place  in  the  Upper  House.  As 
you  know,  the  United  States  Congress  meets  at 
Washington,  which  is  in  no  sense  a  commercial  city, 


POLITICAL   SYSTEM  OF  THE   UNITED   STATES.       67 

and  had  no  social  attractions,  but  was  founded  as  a 
political  centre  only.  Considerable  amenities  have 
lately  been  created  there,  but  it  can  never  be  a  capital 
in  the  sense  of  any  great  European  capital,  and  people 
go  there  neither  for  pleasure  nor  for  private  business, 
but  for  political  business  only.  So  it  is  in  most  of 
the  States.  The  Legislatures  meet  in  rural  towns,  in 
a  central  position,  not  in  the  commercial  capitals — for 
instance,  the  Legislature  of  New  York  at  Albany, 
that  of  Pennsylvania  at  Harrisburg,  that  of  Illinois 
at  Springfield,  and  so  on.  Boston  is  the  only  great 
city  that  came  under  my  observation  in  which  a 
State  Legislature  meets.  Richmond,  in  Virginia,  has 
now  grown  into  a  considerable  town,  but  is  scarcely 
a  great  city;  and  in  most  other  States  very  secondary 
places  have  been  selected.  Consequently  a  man  who 
goes  to  a  United  States  Legislature  goes  either  for 
love  of  country  or  for  love  of  place  and  power,  not 
for  social  privileges ;  and  when  he  does  go  he  goes  to 
work,  not  to  give  to  legislation  the  time  he  can  spare 
from  other  avocations. 

It  is  this  character  and  position  of  the  members 
that  renders  possible  the  feature  which  most  dis 
tinguishes  the  working  of  the  American  Legislatures 
from  our  own,  viz.,  that  most  of  the  work  is  done 
in  great  committees,  which  practically  amount  to  the 
House  sitting  simultaneously  in  several  separate 
divisions  at  the  same  time.  All  the  members  having 
come  in  as  working  men  of  business,  and  having 
nothing  else  to  do,  are  able  to  devote  themselves 
regularly  and  systematically  to  work  of  this  kind  in 


68       BIRD'S-EYE  VIEW  OF  THE   UNITED   STATES. 

a  way  that  would  not  be  possible  to  many  of  our 
much -occupied  or  lightly -occupied  members,  who  can 
only  give  to  legislation  occasional  parts  of  evenings, 
or,  if  they  do  sit  on  special  committees,  attend  or  stay 
away  as  they  please. 

The  work  which  with  us  is  done  by  the  whole 
House  being  in  America  threshed  out  and  settled  in 
these  committees,  is  in  most  cases  accepted  by  the 
House  at  large  Avithout  much  further  discussion. 
This  is  especially  the  case  in  the  State  Legislatures, 
the  maj  ority  of  which  meet,  as  I  have  said,  only  once 
in  two  years,  and  the  sitting  of  which  is  generally 
limited  by  the  Constitution  to  a  moderate  period — 
sometimes  as  little  as  fifty  or  sixty  days,  and  generally 
not  more  than  three  or  four  months.  Yet  it  seemed 
to  me,  looking  over  the  volumes  of  the  legislation  of 
each  session  in  several  different  States,  that  they  get 
through  quite  as  much  legislation  as  our  Parliament, 
and  my  impression  of  the  system  is  altogether  favour 
able. 

The  word  '  politician '  is  used  in  a  bad  sense  in 
America,  as  applied  to  people  who  make  politics  a 
profession,  and  are  skilled  hi  the  arts  of  '  wire-pulling ' 
and  such  practices.  In  this  country  you  certainly  do 
not  offend  a  man,  or  even  a  woman,  if  you  say,  '  I 
believe  you  are  a  great  politician  ?  '  But  if  you  say 
that  in  the  States,  the  person  you  address  fires  up  and 
assures  you  he  is  nothing  of  the  kind.  I  think  this 
use  of  the  word  is  what  has  given  rise  to  the  idea,  so 
prevalent  in  this  country,  that  none  of  the  best  men 
in  the  States  will  have  anything  to  do  with  politics, 


POLITICAL   SYSTEM  OF  THE   UNITED   STATES.       69 

and  leave  that  to  inferior  persons  ;  but  it  seemed  to 
ine  that  the  fact  is  not  really  so.  It  may  be  true  as 
regards  a  good  many  plutocrats  in  New  York  and 
elsewhere,  who  can  make  more  money  in  the  great 
cities  than  by  serving  their  country  in  out-of-the-way 
places;  and  in  New  York  (only,  I  think,  in  that  city) 
there  is  springing  up  a  class  who  live  on  realised 
wealth,  and  whose  young  men  affect  the  jennesse 
doree — drive  four-in-hands,  and  so  on.  But  it  seemed 
to  me  that  the  great  majority  of  the  best  Americans, 
while  disclaiming  the  character  of  '  politicians  '  in 
the  American  sense,  take  quite  as  much  interest  in 
politics  as  Englishmen  do.  Indeed,  so  far  from  the 
mass  of  educated  people  abstaining  from  politics,  it  is 
proverbial  that  there  is  an  extraordinary  craving  for 
office  ;  that  is,  principally  local  office.  All  offices  are 
elective,  and  elections  are  continually  going  on.  The 
salaries  are  not  large,  but  it  is  generally  said  that  as 
soon  as  a  boy  ceases  to  play  at  marbles  he  begins  to 
aspire  to  office.  No  doubt,  for  reasons  which  I  have 
already  given,  a  good  many  men  such  as  would  in 
this  country  accept  a  seat  in  Parliament  cannot  or 
will  not  ge  into  Congress  at  Washington  ;  but  many 
other  good  men  of  business,  such  as  do  not  here  get 
into  Parliament,  there  get  into  Congress  or  into  the 
State  Legislatures.  Lawyers  are  more  numerous  and 
prominent  in  the  American  Legislatures  than  with  us, 
but  the  better  class  of  American  lawyers  are  generally 
able  and  good  men  ;  and  there  being  little  of  a  con 
centrated  bar  or  legal  head- quarters  at  Washington, 
the  provincial  lawyers  are  probably  of  a  higher  class 


70       BIRD'S-EYE  VIEW  OF  THE   UNITED   STATES. 

than  are  usually  found  in  our  provinces.  I  am  in 
clined,  then,  to  believe  that  there  is  a  great  amount  of 
ability  in  the  United  States  legislative  bodies;  but 
no  doubt  there  is  with  this  ability  a  great  infusion  of 
the  i  politician  '  element  and  character.  Comparing 
the  personnel  and  working  system  of  Congress  with 
our  Parliament,  I  should  judge  in  a  general  way  (for 
I  had  no  opportunity  of  watching  the  actual  working 
of  Congress)  that  there  are  advantages  and  disad 
vantages  on  either  side.  The  American  Congress 
men  are,  probably,  on  the  average  more  able  men. 
Being  paid  men,  bound  to  work,  they  do  work  harder, 
and  by  their  system  of  committees  work  more  effec 
tually  ;  but  they  are  not  more  honest,  and  are,  on 
the  contrary,  more  open  to  the  imputation  of  jobbery 
and  wire-pulling.  I  think  that  the  American  mode 
of  electing  the  Executive  authority  and  making  it 
independent  of  Congress  is  inferior  to  our  Ministerial 
system,  and  the  political  character  of  the  appointments 
to  subordinate  civil  posts  is  an  evil  of  a  very  grave 
character.  On  the  other  hand,  I  am  inclined  to  sup 
pose  that  the  great  principles  handed  down  by  the 
founders  of  the  Republic,  and  embalmed  in  the  Con 
stitution,  have  really  given  a  high  tone,  a  continuity 
of  purpose,  and  a  national  dignity  to  the  political 
system,  in  whatsoever  hands  it  may  be.  American 
statesmen  steer  by  permanent  sailing  directions,  as 
it  were  ;  and  in  this  respect  their  work  contrasts 
favourably  with  our  hand-to-mouth  haphazard  sort 
of  want  of  system.  Their  successful  efforts  to  reduce 
their  public  debt  stand  in  favourable  contrast  to  oar 


POLITICAL   SYSTEM  OF  THE   UNITED   STATES.       71 

puny  reductions  ;  and  in  regard  to  such  questions  as 
the  public  land,  local  government,  and  others  which 
could  be  named,  there  has  been  for  generations  a  con 
tinuity  of  policy  which  we  may  well  envy.  This  it 
is,  I  think,  which  preserves  the  character  of  American 
society,  and  prevents  the  plutocrat  of  to-day  from 
becoming  the  aristocrat  of  to-morrow. 

Apart  from  the  general  Government  of  the  United 
States,  I  had  a  special  interest  in,  and  paid  particular 
attention  to,  the  State 'Governments  and  system  of 
local  administration,  constituting  what  I  may  call 
Home  Rule  in  America.  I  was  the  more  anxious  to 
see  the  character  of  this  Home  Rule,  because  I  am 
entirely  convinced  that  the  work  of  the  British  Par 
liament  is  more  and  more  overpassing  the  working 
power  of  the  machinery  ;  that  things  are  rapidly 
coming  to  a  serious  block,  if  not  a  dead-lock,  and 
that  something  must  be  done.  The  number  of  sub 
jects  with  which  Parliament  deals  has  immensely 
increased,  while  the  working  power  has  not  increased, 
but  has,  on  the  contrary,  considerably  decreased,  on 
account  of  Irish  questions  and  other  causes.  There 
has  long  been  most  undeniable  ground  of  complaint 
that  our  Scotch  business  is  not  done — or,  so  far  as 
done,  is  done  in  the  small  hours  of  the  morning — in  a 
way  that  is  scarcely  fair.  I  wanted  to  know,  then, 
if  such  things  are  better  done  in  America.  While 
what  I  have  said  of  the  general  administration  of 
the  United  States  compared  with  ours  goes  to  show 
that  after  all  there  is  but  a  balancing  of  pros  and 
cons,  on  the  other  hand,  as  regards  this  Home  Rule 


72       BIRD'S-EYE   VIEW  OF  THE  UNITED   STATES. 

I  am  bound  to  say  that  the  result  of  very 
careful  inquiry  has  been  to  convince  me  that  the 
Americans  have  a  very  great  advantage  over  us. 
It  seemed  to  me  that  the  State  Legislatures  are 
most  useful  institutions  and  that,  through  them, 
a  very  large  amount  of  work  is  done,  to  the  great 
benefit  and  satisfaction  of  their  citizens,  very  much 
which  with  us  is  left  undone  altogether  being 
there  got  through  without  hitch  or  difficulty.  The 
members  of  these  local  Legislatures  appear  to  be 
very  respectable  citizens.  They  are  men  sent  up 
from  among  the  people  of  the  States,  acting  before 
and  within  the  cognisance  of  their  own  fellow- 
countrymen.  Their  laws  are  not  always  and  alto 
gether  of  the  highest  style  of  jurisprudence,  but 
they  are  'practical  and  useful,  and  if  anything  does 
not  work  well  it  is  easily  set  right.  They  have  an 
especial  advantage  in  dealing  with  those  local  and 
minor  matters  which  we  class  under  the  head  of 
private  bill  legislation,  and  which  with  us  is  done  in 
a  very  expensive  and  somewhat  uncertain  and  un 
satisfactory  way. 

I  had  an  opportunity  of  seeing  and  carefully  noting 
the  proceedings  of  one  of  the  State  Legislatures — not 
one  of  the  most  important  States  in  the  Union,  but  still 
a  large  State,  and  perhaps  the  best  of  the  Southern 
States — and  I  was  much  pleased  by  what  I  saw.  I 
have  already  mentioned  several  of  the  peculiarities 
of  the  American  Legislatures  which  are  common 
both  to  Congress  and  to  the  State  Assemblies,  and  I 
understand  that  in  its  forms  and  procedure  the  State 


POLITICAL   SYSTEM   OF  THE   UNITED   STATES.       73 

Legislature  which  I  saw  very  much  resembled  the 
Congress,  and  may  be  taken  as  a  minor  edition  of  it. 
The  origin  of  the  procedure  is  evidently  English,  but 
the  practice  has  now  much  varied  from  ours,  not  only 
in  the  system  of  committees  which  I  have  mentioned, 
but  also  in  the  use  of  the  previous  question,  or  cloture, 
and  in  other  ways.  They  have  rules  regarding  the 
length  of  speeches  and  such  matters  which  very  much 
abbreviate  the  proceedings  when  it  is  the  general  wish 
that  a  decision  should  be  arrived  at.  The  members 
of  the  Legislature  seemed  to  be  very  sound,  good, 
practical  men,  the  senators  being  in  every  way  equal 
to  the  men  who  might  fill  such  a  situation  in  most 
other  countries  with  which  I  am  acquainted ;  while 
the  Assembly,  containing,  besides  a  good  many  men 
of  a  high  class,  some  rather  rough  farmers  and  such 
practical  men,  was  apparently  very  well  qualified  to 
deal  with  the  work  before  it.  All  seemed  to  go  into 
their  work  with  a  will,  and  to  get  through  it  in  a 
rapid,  practical  manner.  Their  speeches  were  short 
and  to  the  point,  and  there  was  very  little  declaim 
ing.  As  a  stranger  I  was  received  with  very  great 
courtesy,  and  was  most  obligingly  put  in  the  way  of 
seeing  and  understanding  what  was  going  on.  I 
shall  always  retain  a  very  pleasant  recollection  of 
that  experience  of  an  American  Home  Eule  Legis 
lature  in  actual  operation  and  doing  its  ordinary 
daily  work. 

You  may  well  imagine  what  an  American  State 
Legislature  is  like  if  you  suppose  that  here  in  Scotland, 
instead  of  altogether  uniting  our  Legislature  with  that 


74       BIRD'S-EYE  VIEW  OF  THE   UNITED   STATES. 

of  England,  we  had  only  sent  delegates  to  London  to 
deal  with  matters  of  Imperial  concern,  and  had  re 
tained  a  Scotch  Parliament  at  Edinburgh,  to  make 
all  our  Scotch  laws  and  control  a  Scotch  adminis 
tration.  Scotland  is  just  about  the  size  and  popu 
lation  of  a  good  American  State,  say  Pennsylvania 
or  Ohio.  I  think  the  Americans  have  very  well  hit 
off  about  the  right  size  for  their  States  and  Home  Rule 
Legislatures — they  are  so  large  as  to  be  free  from  the 
imputation  of  a  petty  parish -vestry  kind  of  character, 
and  at  the  same  time  not  so  large  as  to  be  unmanage 
able  and  incapable  of  dealing  with  details  and  local 
matters. 

I  am  inclined  to  suppose  that,  looking  back  into 
history,  it  is  really  the  case  that  all  successful  re 
publican  governments,  as  in  Greece,  Italy,  Switzerland, 
and  the  United  States,  have  consisted  of  small  states 
joined  together  in  union,  and  not  of  great  central 
ised  states.  My  own  impression  is  that  in  England 
and  France  we  have  attempted  to  centralise  too 
much  ;  and  on  that  account,  if  we  were  to  begin 
again,  I  should  probably  be  much  in  favour  of  sepa 
rate  Legislatures  for  the  different  parts  of  the  empire. 
It  would  be  much  more  difficult  to  institute  any 
thing  of  the  kind  now.  Xo  doubt  the  country  is  hardly 
prepared  for  it.  The  Irish  do  not  seem  at  all  agreed 
what  they  want  in  this  respect.  I  wonder  they  have 
never  proposed  to  take  as  their  model  one  of  the  States 
of  the  American  Union;  but  if  they  did,  and  got 
something  of  the  kind,  I  am  afraid  that  they  would 
fight  among  themselves.  Ireland  would  have  to  be 


POLITICAL   SYSTEM  OF   THE  UNITED   STATES.       75 

divided  into  at  least  two  States.  Instead  of  another 
Heptarchy,  we  must  probably  be  content  with 
dividing  Parliament  into  Grand  Committees,  or  some 
such  scheme,  when  we  get  an  Administration  inclined 
to  deal  radically  with  the  matter,  and  not  merely  to 
nibble  at  its  fringes.  If  this  were  done,  one  grand 
committee  might  take  up  Scotch  business,  another 
North  Irish,  another  South  Irish,  another  Welsh,  and 
two  or  three  more  the  several  departments  of  English 
and  Imperial  business. 

All  American  States  are  divided  into  counties, 
the  counties  being  generally  numerous  and  smaller 
than  ours — often  as  many  as  100  counties  in  a  State ; 
but  there  are  no  representative  bodies  in  the  counties  ; 
they  are  only  judicial  and  administrative  divisions ; 
and  the  chief  interest  is  the  periodical  elections  of 
the  judges,  magistrates,  and  county  officers. 

Then  in  New  England  and  other  Northern  States 
we  have  the  well-known  division  of  the  whole  country 
into  townships,  corresponding  to  French  and  German 
communes  or  Indian  village  communities  ;  these 
have  been  well  described  by  De  Tocqueville.  It 
must  not  be  supposed,  however,  that  this  institution 
is  universal  in  America  ;  it  was  wholly  wanting  in 
the  Southern  States,  where  there  was  only  a  loose 
sort  of  English  parish  system  ;  and  recent  efforts  of 
Northerners  in  power  in  the  South  to  introduce  the 
township  system  there  have  not  been  successful.  In 
the  North  the  system  is  still  in  full  vigour,  and  by  all 
accounts  answers  admirably,  both  for  administrative 
purposes  and  for  the  political  education  of  the  people. 


76       BIRD'S-EYE   VIEW   OF  THE   UNITED   STATES. 

The  townships  have  certain  officers  with  certain  func 
tions,  but  they  do  not  delegate  their  powers  to  town 
councils  or  any  representative  body.  Every  impor 
tant  matter  is  decided  by  the  citizens  at  large  in 
public  meeting  assembled,  much  as  in  ancient  Greece. 
Besides  the  popular  and  pleasant  character  of  the 
institution  it  supplies  a  system  of  rural  administra 
tion  on  a  small  scale  which  is  much  wanted  in  this 
country. 

As  respects  the  government  of  towns  and  groat 
cities  things  seemed  to  be  in  most  cases  about  on  a 
par  with  this  country.  I  have  before  alluded  to  the 
great  abuses  in  New  York,  a  municipality  of  immense 
size,  and  full  of  half-settled  foreigners,  and  which  is 
not  to  be  taken  as  a  fair  specimen  of  American  ma 
nagement.  On  the  whole  people  are  probably  more 
enterprising  and  go-ahead  in  American  towns,  and 
per  contra  oftener  come  to  grief ;  but  in  other  respects 
I  believe  the  administration  is  in  most  cases  pretty 
well  conducted.  Ambitious  enterprises  and  improve 
ments  have  in  some  cases  led  to  very  heavy  local 
taxation  in  the  towns,  from  which  you  would  do  well 
to  take  warning.  It  is  dangerous  to  pile  up  too  much 
upon  posterity  in  order  to  obtain  present  improve 
ments  :  there  are  often  two  sides  to  these  things,  and 
they  must  be  well  considered.  The  speculative  charac 
ter  of  men  and  things  in  America  and  the  temptations 
offered  by  successful  ventures  and  sudden  rises  are  such 
that  defalcations  of  town  treasurers  and  such-like  mis 
fortunes  are  certainly  more  common  than  they  are  with 
us,  I  am  glad  to  say ;  and  these  scandals  have  tended 


POSITION   OF   CANADA.  77 

to  give  us  a  bad  idea  of  American  honesty ;  though,  as- 
I  have  already  said,  I  do  not  think  that  in  the  main 
there  is  much  more  rascality  than  in  other  countries. 
Certainly  the  outward  appearance  of  the  towns,  espe 
cially  the  second-rate  country  towns,  gives  one  the 
idea  of  successful  management. 


THE  POSITION  OF  CANADA. 

I  only  passed  through  a  part  of  Canada,  and  had 
no  opportunity  of  studying  Canadian  institutions  on 
the  spot ;  but  I  heard  a  good  deal  about  Canada,  not 
only  from  Canadians  whom  I  met,  but  also  from 
many  people  in  the  States,  who  seem  much  impressed 
with  the  well-doing  of  Canada,  and  what  is  called  the 
loyalty  to  the  English  connection.  In  truth,  I  believe 
that  this  connection  really  is  extremely  beneficial  to 
the  Canadians.  There  has  sprung  up  among  them  a 
considerable  feeling  of,  I  will  not  call  it  jealousy  and 
antagonism,  but  at  least  of  rivalry  and  emulation,  to 
wards  the  United  States ;  and  being  a  smaller  people 
in  close  contact  throughout  a  very  long  and  little- 
separated  border  with  a  greater  people,  with  whom 
difficult  questions  not  unfrequently  arise  (e.g.,  the 
existing  fishery  question),  they  naturally  set  much 
store  on  English  alliance  and  support.  Moreover, 
their  Government  does  seem  to  combine  to  a  great 
degree  the  advantages  of  the  American  and  the  English 
systems.  The  Dominion  Union  of  Canadian  States  is 
based  on  an  effective  Home  Rule  system  very  similar 
to  that  of  the  United  States;  but  the  Canadians  havey 


78        BIRD'S-EYE  VIEW  OF  THE   UNITED  STATES. 

I  think,  an  advantage  in  the  adoption  of  our  system 
of  ministerial  responsibility  as  compared  with  the 
American  mode  of  appointing  the  executive  autho 
rities.  That,  however,  has  not  saved  them  from  some 
financial  scandals  and  abuses,  and  from  a  Protective 
system  much  less  excusable  than  that  of  the  Ame 
ricans,  inasmuch  as  their  own  production  is  much 
narrower  and  less  varied,  and  by  their  protective 
system  they  wound  in  the  tenderest  point  the  Power 
to  which  they  look  for  support.  It  is  a  decided  ad 
vantage  to  the  Canadians  that,  while  absolutely  and 
entirely  independent  so  far  as  their  own  Legislature 
and  Government  is  concerned,  and  owning  no  allegiance 
whatever  to  the  British  Parliament,  they  are  saved  the 
agitation  and  difficulties  of  the  American  elections  for 

o 

President,  by  the  appointment  of  a  British  Governor- 
General,  always  a  selected  and  impartial  man,  taking- 
no  part  in  their  politics,  but  a  useful  arbitrator  and 
mediator  in  case  of  difficulty.  The  Governor-General 
is,  in  fact,  a  very  cheap  constitutional  king,  not  subject 
to  the  accidents  of  heredity,  but  always  a  picked  man 
— like  a  perpetual  Leopold  of  Belgium,  for  instance. 
Canada,  not  having  participated  in  the  American 
war,  is  not  subject  to  so  heavy  a  taxation  as  that 
which  the  war  has  brought  on  the  United  States ;  but 
then  the  Americans  have  by  that  war  settled  their 
political  system,  and  find  themselves  on  their  own 
continent  a  united  people,  without  an  equal  or,  in 
point  of  population  and  power,  a  rival ;  whereas  in 
the  presence  of  so  much  greater  a  Power  the  troubles 
of  the  Canadians  may  have  yet  to  come. 


TAXATION  IN  THE  STATES.  79 

Altogether  I  am  not  at  all  surprised  that  the 
Canadians  are  thoroughly  loyal  to  the  British  con 
nection — it  suits  them  admirably.  But  it  should  be 
understood  that  they  only  own  loyalty  and  allegiance 
to  the  British  Crown,  not  by  any  means  to  the  British 
Parliament  and  the  British  people.  We  need  not 
flatter  ourselves  that  Canada  any  more  belongs  to  us 
than  Hanover  did  when  it  was  subject  to  the  British 
Crown.  My  only  doubt  is,  whether  the  connection 
is  beneficial  to  us.  I  cannot  quite  see  what  we,  the 
people  and  taxpayers  of  Great  Britain,  get  for  the 
political  and  military  responsibilities  which  it  imposes 
on  us.  I  observe  that,  in  opening  the  Canadian 
Parliament  the  other  day,  Lord  Lome  says,  in  his 
official  Speech  from  the  Throne  :  '  By  the  readjustment 
of  the  tariff,  with  a  view  to  increasing  the  revenue  and 
developing  and  encouraging  the  industries  of  Canada, 
you  will,  I  trust,  be  able  to  restore  the  equilibrium, 
and  aid  in  removing  the  commercial  and  financial  de 
pression?  That  means  that  the  British  Governor- 
General  sent  from  this  country,  is  compelled  by  his 
position  to  recommend  in  so  many  words,  protection 
for  protection's  sake — a  policy  which,  right  or  wrong, 
is  utterly  opposed  to  the  universal  and  most  strong 
feeling  of  this  country.  I  confess  that  I  think  that 
it  is  somewhat  humiliating  to  us  to  continue  the 
connection  on  these  terms. 

TAXATION. 

There  is  a  good  deal  of  disposition  among  us  to 
suppose  that  the  Americans  suffer  from  a  very  heavy 


80        BIRD'S-EYE  VIEW  OF  THE   UNITED   STATES. 

taxation.  I  hardly  think  this  is  so,  except  in  particular 
localities.  Of  course  the  burden  left  by  the  war  was 
enormous — that  has  disturbed  everything,  and  made  it 
necessary  for  a  people  formerly  about  the  most  lightly 
taxed  in  the  w^orld  to  submit  to  considerable  taxation 
— the  more  as  that  taxation  has  been  imposed,  not  only 
to  pay  the  interest  of  the  debt,  but  to  pay  off  the 
capital.  But,  after  all,  the  general  taxation  levied  by 
the  United  States  is  not  extremely  onerous — not  so 
much  so  as  that  which  we  raise,  and  much  less  than 
that  raised  in  France  and  other  countries.  I  have 
already  mentioned  what  it  consists  of — an  excise  more 
moderate  than  our  excise  and  tobacco  duties,  and  a 
customs  revenue  which  is  only  very  burdensome  be 
cause  it  involves  protection,  and  consequent  enhance 
ment  of  prices  of  a  good  many  articles.  The  exemption 
of  tea  and  coffee  from  all  duty  is  a  notable  concession  by 
the  Americans  to  the  l  free-breakfast-table  '  view  of  life. 
No  doubt  the  United  States'  taxation  excludes 
provision  for  the  local  courts  of  justice  and  some 
other  things  which  are  provided  by  the  States' 
Governments  ;  but  the  cost  of  those  Governments, 
(other  than  that  incurred  for  railways  and  canals) 
is  not  large  ;  on  the  contrary,  they  are  very  economi 
cally  administered ;  and  the  State  tax  is  generally  not 
heavy,  except  in  some  of  the  Southern  States.  A  good 
many  charges  are  thrown  on  the  counties,  as  is  the 
case  with  us.  But  the  county  rates  are  also  as  a  rule 
not  very  heavy.  Nor  are  those  of  rural  townships 
and  villages  or  small  towns  excessive.  It  is  only,  I 
think,  in  some  of  the  large  cities,  such  as  New  York 


TAXATION  IN  THE  STATES.         81 

and  Chicago,  that  the  rate  is  very  heavy,  amounting 
sometimes  to  as  much  as  2i  to  3  per  cent,  on  capital 
value,  all  charges — State,  county,  and  city — included ; 
in  fact,  to  six  or  eight  shillings  in  the  pound  of  the 
rental — a  rate  which  naturally  very  much  enhances 
the  cost  of  living  and  doing  business  in  those  cities. 
On  the  other  hand,  we  must  remember  that  in  some  of 
our  towns  all  our  rates  added  together  come  to  a  good 
many  shillings  in  the  pound  ;  and  if  to  these  be  added 
a  large  part  of  our  Excise,  stamp  revenue,  Imperial 
income-tax  and  house-tax,  and  other  items  not  paid 
in  America,  it  may  be  doubted  whether,  even  in  the 
cities,  an  American  contributes  more,  in  proportion  to 
his  means,  to  the  public  administration  of  one  kind 
and  another  than  an  Englishman  does  ;  while  it  may 
be  affirmed  that  out  of  those  cities  he  contributes  less. 
But,  in  addition  to  the  prominence  given  to  the 
taxation  of  some  of  the  large  cities  of  which  foreigners 
see  most,  what,  I  think,  makes  Americans  cry  out  and 
foreigners  think  them  oppressed  by  taxation  is,  that 
almost  all  taxation  of  all  kinds  below  that  of  the 
United  States  is  in  the  form  of  a  direct  tax  on  pro 
perty.  Tlrus  the  Americans  have  less  indirect  taxa 
tion  and  as  much,  or  perhaps  more,  direct  taxation 
on  the  whole  than  we  have ;  and  as  direct  taxation 
is  always  more  felt,  their  burdens  are  more  evident 
and  conspicuous,  and  have  been  especially  felt  at  a 
time  when  property  has  been  universally  depreciated, 
both  by  the  after-effects  of  the  war  and  by  the  com 
mercial  depression,  while  taxation  has  been  increased 
to  meet  debts  and  pay  for  great  works  undertaken  in 

G 


82        BIRD'S-EYE  VIEW  OF  THE  UNITED   STATES. 

prosperous  times.  In  the  Southern  States  particularly, 
property  has  been  very  greatly  depreciated,  for  the 
slaves  were  in  themselves  an  immensely  valuable  pro 
perty,  and  the  land,  though  as  well  cultivated  as  before, 
does  not  yet  sell  for  high  prices.  There  the  taxation 
is  often  much  complained  of,  and  State  debts  are  in  a 
good  many  cases  not  met. 

By  the  constitutions  of  almost  all  the  States  all 
taxation  must  be  imposed  on  all  property  equally, 
and  consequently  the  direct  taxation,  State,  county, 
and  local,  all  takes  the  single  form  of  a  tax  on 
property,  both  real  and  personal.  There  is,  as  a  rule, 
no  tax  on  incomes  as  distinguished  from  property ; 
the  capital  value  of  the  property  must  be  returned, 
and  then  the  taxes  are  a  percentage  on  that.  A  war 
income-tax  was  at  one  time  imposed  by  the  United 
States,  but  that  has  been  given  up,  and  there  is  now 
no  such  tax,  except  in  some  of  the  Southern  States 
which  are  in  financial  difficulties. 

There  is  no  doubt  that  all  real  property  is  effec 
tively  taxed,  but  the  question  is  how  far  personal 
property  is  fully  reached.  I  gather  that  the  assess 
ment  is  carried  out  with  very  various  degrees  of 
thoroughness.  I  was  not  able  to  go  into  the  mat 
ter  exhaustively,  but  I  understood  that  there  is  more 
or  less  evasion.  Considering  the  enormous  realised 
wealth  of  New  York,  the  proportion  of  personal 
property  returned  in  that  State  seems  surprisingly 
small — much  less  than  in  either  Massachusetts  or 
Ohio.  But  the  morality  of  New  York  City  is,  no 
doubt,  below  the  average  of  America,  and  the  ad 
ministration  there  has  been  corrupt  and  lax. 


TAXATION  IN  THE  STATES.  83 

While  we,  I  think,  go  to  one  extreme  in  taxing  the 
most  precarious  professional  incomes  at  the  same  rate  as 
incomes  derived  from  realised  property,  the  Americans 
seem  to  go  to  the  other  extreme,  in  exempting  alto 
gether  incomes  derived  otherwise  than  from  property. 
For  instance  lawyers  and  other  professional  men  are 
not  taxed  on  their  receipts. 

Then  there  is,  in  most  States,  a  poll-tax  for 
education,  to  which  I  have  before  adverted  ;  it  ranges 
from  one  to  two  dollars  per  head  on  ablebodied  males, 
but  is  strictly  confined  by  the  Constitution  to  special 
purposes- — generally  altogether  to  education.  A  tax 
generally  the  resort  of  tyrannical  governments  is 
thus  given  a  popular  character.  A  burning  question 
in  America  is  the  imposition  of  a  dog- tax.  It  is 
alleged  that  sheep  and  other  animals  suffer  terribly 
from  the  depredations  of  dogs  ;  but  the  tax  being 
obnoxious  to  much  popular  objection,  it  is  provided 
that  where  it  is  imposed  for  preventive  purposes  it 
also  is  to  go  for  education. 

I  think  there  is  nothing  in  the  Constitution  to 
prevent  the  imposition  of  local  taxes  of  an  indirect 
character  for  State  purposes,  except  that  nothing  may 
be  done  which  involves  anything  of  the  character  of  a 
transit  duty  or  interferes  with  trade  and  commerce ; 
but  generally  speaking  nothing  of  the  kind  is  attempted. 
In  some  States — as,  for  instance,  Virginia — a  State  tax 
on  the  sale  of  intoxicating  liquors  has  been  imposed 
in  addition  to  the  United  States  Excise  tax.  But 
such  revenues  are,  I  think,  quite  exceptional. 


G    "2 


84        BIRD'S-EYE   VIEW   OF  THE   UNITED   STATES. 

THE  LAND   SYSTEM. 

I  omitted  to  mention  one  very  important  subject 
which  is  reserved  for  the  Central  Government,  viz., 
the  disposal  of  the  unoccupied  lands.     The  original 
States  of  the  Union  had  and  retained  the  disposal  of 
their  own  lands ;  and  the  great  new  State  of  Texas, 
on  coming  into  the  Union,  made  a  bargain  that  it 
should  retain  a  similar  power  ;  but  with  this  excep 
tion  all  the  vast  lands  west  of  the  Alleghanies,  and 
out  of  which  so  many  great  new  States  and  Territories 
have  been  formed,  were  considered  to  belong  to  the 
people  of  the  United   States  as  a  whole,  and  are  by 
them  offered,  not  only  to  their  own  citizens,  but  to 
all   foreigners   who   are  willing  to  come  and  settle 
among  them.     It  is  under  the  system  adopted  by  the 
central  authority  that  wise  rules  have  been  passed 
and  precautions  taken  to  which  I  have  already  alluded, 
and  under  which  land-jobbing  and  the  monopoly  of 
great  areas  is  prevented.     Great  populations  of  free 
and  independent    small   farmers  owning   their   own 
land  have  been  thus  attracted  to  the  soil  of  America. 
Only  in  exceptional  cases  and  for  special  reasons  is 
any  public  land  sold  in  an  unrestricted  manner.     It 
is  reserved  for  lona  fide  settlers.     Every  citizen  and 
every  man  willing  to  become  a  citizen  of  the  United 
States  is,  under  the  homestead  law,  entitled  to  a  free 
grant  of  80  or  160  acres,  according  to  the  situation, 
provided  he    settles  upon   it    and  fulfils    conditions 
ensuring  that  it  is  taken  up  for  real  cultivation,  and 
not  for  speculation  and  sale.     Or,  again,  he  may  buy 


THE   LAND   SYSTEM.  85 

a  similar  plot  or  a  larger  one  up  to  320  acres  at  five 
or   ten  shillings   per  acre   (according  to  situation), 
under  less  restrictive  conditions,  but  still  subject  to 
precautions    against  land -jobbing.      Where   peculiar 
circumstances  exist — as,  for  instance,  where  large  irri 
gation  works  are  necessary  to  profitable  cultivation 
— the  land  is  sold  in  large  blocks.     And  there  has 
been  a  good  deal  of  outcry  of  late  regarding  what  is 
supposed  to  be  a  departure  from  the  principle  of  the 
American  land  system  in  the  grant  of  great  quantities 
of  land  to  railway  companies.     Though  there  may 
have    been   a   good   deal   of  jobbing   in   particular 
instances,  I  doubt  whether  the  general  complaint  is 
very  well-founded.     I  have  alluded  to  the  want  of 
roads  in  America.      In  the  deep  black    soil  of  the 
Western  Prairie  States  roads  are  not  only  absent  but 
most  difficult  and  expensive  to  make.      Railways  are 
the  very  life  of  the  country.     Vast  new  tracts  have 
been  and  are  being  opened   up  by  railways  which 
otherwise  could  not  have  been  approached,  and  value 
less  land  is  made  valuable  by  railways,  that  close  to 
the  line  being,  of  course,  infinitely  more  valuable  than 
that  away"  from  it.     Hence,  the  value  being  created 
by  the  railways,  I  think  it  was  far  from  an  unwise 
system  to  pay  for  the  construction  of  railways  into 
unoccupied  countries,  where  no  one  would  otherwise 
make   them,  out  of  the   value   thus   created.      The 
system  adopted  was  to  grant  to  those  who  made  the 
railways  every  alternate  square  mile  block  along  the 
line,  the  other  alternate  blocks  being  reserved  for  sale 
at  an  enhanced  rate,  or  for  homestead  grants  of  smaller 


86        BIRD'S-EYE  VIEW  OF  THE  UNITED   STATES. 

area  than  elsewhere.  Certainly  the  opening  out  of 
the  country  has  been  thus  secured,  and  I  don't  gather 
that  a  very  large  amount  of  land-jobbing  has  resulted; 
for,  the  custom  of  the  country  being  favourable  to 
real  settlement  and  small  farms,  the  railways  have 
generally  laid  out  their  lands  with  that  object,  and 
disposed  of  them  to  bond  fide  farmers  in  lots  of  40, 
80,  160,  or  320  acres.  I  saw  a  good  deal  of  the 
country  thus  occupied  along  the  Illinois  Central 
Railway,  the  best  known  case  in  which  the  system 
of  railway  grants  was  adopted,  and  certainly  the 
result  has  there  been  a  very  excellent  settlement  of 
such  farmers  on  farms  suited  to  their  means.  It  is 
only  in  some  of  the  outlying  tracts  in  the  Far  West 
that  a  few  great  estates  have  been  got  together  and 
that  one  hears  of  farms  on  a  magnificent  scale ; 
but  I  gather  that  they  are  rather  made  to  sell  than 
anything  else,  and  that  the  magnificent  descriptions 
of  them  which  have  been  circulated  are  of  the  nature 
of  advertisements,  with  a  view  to  their  disposal  in 
moderate  lots.  In  Texas  and  some  of  the  Far 
Western  States  land  not  suited  for  agriculture  is,  I 
believe,  held  in  large  grazing  farms.  In  California 
the  land  was  claimed  in  large  blocks  under  old 

o 

Spanish  titles,  which  the  United  States  Courts  have 
declared  to  be  valid,  and  by  purchase  of  these  titles 
large  estates  have  been  acquired,  so  that  the  tenure 
of  land  and  structure  of  society  is  different  there  from 
other  parts  of  the  United  States. 

The  system  of  survey  and  registration  of  all  the 
lands  settled  under  the  system  which  I  have  described 


THE   LAND   SYSTEM.  S7 

is  admirable.  The  whole  country  is  accurately  sur 
veyed  and  lotted  off  into  square  mile  sections  of  640 
acres,  with  rectangular  road-spaces  dividing  them. 
These  are  again  divided  into  quarter  sections  of  160 
acres,  and  these  again,  as  occasion  requires,  into  80  and 
40  acre  sections ;  so  that  every  40-acre  plot  can  be 
accurately  stated  and  traced  by  the  use  of  a  very  few 
figures  in  the  simplest  possible  manner. 

After  a  few  years'  bond  Jlde  settlement  and  cultiva 
tion  all  land  is  freely  transferable,  so  that  there  is  not 
the  least  practical  difficulty  in  acquiring  large  farms, 
or  even  large  estates,  if,  for  purposes  of  large  and 
high  cultivation  or  systematic  management,  anyone 
wishes  to  acquire  such  by  fair  purchase,  and  not 
by  mere  land -jobbing  and  forestalling.  In  the  older 
States  plenty  of  large  tracts  are,  in  fact,  in  the 
market;  so  that  it  is  not  for  want  of  opportunity  if 
the  large  culture  system  is  not  often  followed. 

The  system  of  direct  taxation  which  prevails  in 
the  United  States  is,  on  the  other  hand,  very  effectual 
to  prevent  large  quantities  of  land  being  kept  waste 
for  jobbing  or  speculative  purposes,  since  all  private 
property  of  this  kind  is  taxed,  whether  it  is  cultivated 
or  not. 

Thus  the  land  system  of  the  United  States  is  in 
great  contrast  to  that  of  most  of  our  colonies,  where 
not  only  are  great  quantities  of  land  monopolised  by 
squatters  and  jobbers,  but  such  tracts  have  been  held 
almost  exempt  from  taxation.  In  Australia  these 
land  questions  seem  to  be  very  prominent ;  but  mean 
time  it  appears  that  there  the  public  land  is  being 


88        BIRD'S-EYE   VIEW  OF  THE   UNITED   STATES. 

very  rapidly  sold  away  and  the  proceeds   spent  as 
revenue. 

In  the  United  States  not  only  is  the  public  land 
reserved    and   local    jobbing   and   improvident   sale 
prevented,  but,  although  free  self-governing  institu 
tions  within  certain  limits  are  given  to  the  settlers  in 
new  territory,  they  by  no  means  at  once  obtain  the 
complete   self-government   which  our   colonies   now 
usually  have.     As  soon  as  there  is  a  moderate  popu 
lation  what  are  called  Territories  are  formed.     But 
these  Territories  are  under  governors  appointed  by 
the  President,  the  laws  passed  by  their  Legislatures 
are  subject  to  the  approval  of  Congress,  and  they  are, 
as  it  were,  kept  in  leading-strings  till  they  arrive  at 
a  tolerable  maturity,  when  they  are  converted  into 
States,  and  admitted  into  the  Union  as  such. 

Besides  the  public  lands,  the  central  Government 
reserves  the  function  of  dealing  with  the  Indians,  the 
old  possessors  or  roamers  over  these  lands  ;  and  con 
siderable  tracts  (in  one  quarter  what  amounts  to  the 
area  of  a  State,  comprising,  it  is  said,  as  good  land 
as  any  in  the  Union)  have  been  reserved  for  them. 
In  Canada  I  believe  that  some  of  the  tame  Indians 
have  been  turned  into  tolerable  farmers,  and  the  wild 
ones  keep  up  amicable  relations  with  the  Government. 
Tame  squaws  knit  stockings  about  the  Niagara  Falls, 
In  the  States  one  sees  very  little  of  tame  Indians. 
A  number  of  young  Indians  from  the  West  are  being 
trained  in  a  college  in  Virginia,  who  are  to  be  sent 
back  to  carry  civilisation  to  their  tribes  ;  but  mean 
while  these  Western  tribes  are  extremely  trouble- 


THE   CURRENCY  QUESTION.  89 

some.  Though  unwilling  to  settle  down  to  work,  they 
are  far  from  deficient  in  energy,  and  show  very 
decided  talent  in  the  use  of  firearms  ;  in  fact,  I  be 
lieve  they  are  the  best  marksmen  in  America.  They 
give  an  immense  amount  of  very  harassing  occupation 
to  the  United  States  troops.  Many  people  in  America 
say  they  have  been  very  ill-used,  and  I  believe  that 
is  so — not  by  the  Government,  but  by  people  whom 
the  Government  cannot  restrain  ;  and  so  they  are 
driven  into  rebellion.  At  any  rate,  the  moral  is  to 
show  how  troublesome  a  few  savages  can  be  when 
they  learn  the  use  of  good  firearms.  The  conditions 
of  the  savage  world  are  already  very  much  changed 
from  what  they  were  but  a  few  years  ago,  and  are 
rapidly  changing  still  more  now  that  free  trade  in 
troduces  cheap  firearms  everywhere.  We  must  take 
full  account  of  this  in  dealing  with  barbarian  popu 
lations. 

THE   CURRENCY  QUESTION. 

The  Currency  question  is  so  burning  and  impor 
tant  in  the  United  States,  and  of  so  much  interest  on 
this  side  of  the  Atlantic,  that  I  will  attempt  to  ex 
plain  briefly  how  it  stands. 

The  dollar — on  which  the  United  States  monetary 
system  is  based — was  originally  a  silver  coin,  the 
currency  having  been  founded  on  the  Mexican  silver 
dollar.  But  almost  ever  since  the  Revolution  the 
American  system  seems  to  have  been  in  strictness 
bimetallic ;  that  is,  both  silver  and  gold  were  coined  in 
any  quantity  for  all  persons  who  brought  these  metals 


90        BIRD'S-EYE  VIEW  OF  THE  UNITED   STATES/ 

to  the  Mint,  and  both  silver  and  gold  coins  were 
equally  a  legal  tender.  The  debtor  had  the  option  of 
paying  either  in  silver  or  in  gold  ;  and,  as  is  neces 
sarily  the  case  under  such  a  rule,  he  of  course  always 
paid  in  the  coin  which  happened  to  be  cheapest  at  the 
time.  The  silver  dollar  of  this  coinage  is  the  '  dollar 
of  our  daddies,'  weighing  41 2  i  grains  troy,  of  which 
one-tenth  is  alloy  ;  and  that  is  still  the  American 
silver  dollar.  But  I  gather  that  in  times  before  the 
war  the  Mexican  dollar  was  more  current  than  any 
coin  of  the  United  States. 

That,  then,  was  the  state  of  things  up  to  1862, 
the  debtor  having  the  option  of  paying  in  silver  or  in 
gold,  and  on  that  basis  all  contracts  were  made  and 
loans  contracted.  In  1862,  in  consequence  of  the 
war,  a  very  important  change  took  place — the  legal 
coins  remained  the  same  as  before  in  theory,  but  in 
that  and  the  following  years  very  large  quantities  of 
inconvertible  paper  notes  were  issued  and  made  legal 
tender  equally  with  coin  i  in  payment  of  all  debts, 
public  or  private,  except  duties  on  imports  and 
interest  on  the  public  debt.'  These  were  the  famous 
greenbacks.  Legally  debtors  could  then  pay  either  in 
silver,  gold,  or  greenbacks  ;  but,  as  greenbacks  were 
speedily  depreciated,  and  became  cheaper  to  the 
debtor,  all  payments  (save  those  excepted)  were 
made  in  greenbacks.  Practically  coin  was  not  seen 
again  in  the  United  States  till  January  1  of  the  pre 
sent  year  (1879),  excepting  only  a  small  currency 
reintroduced  of  late  years  for  small  payments  only. 
There  was  no  term  for  payment  of  the  greenbacks  in 


THE  CURRENCY  QUESTION.  91 

coin  ;  but  the  constitutional  legality  of  the  Greenback 
Act  having  been  disputed  in  the  Courts,  the  Supreme 
Court  decided  that  it  was  legal  only  under  the  neces 
sity  of  war,  and  it  seemed  to  result  that  the  notes 
must  be  repaid  as  soon  as  the  necessities  caused  by 
the  war  permitted.  To  make  this  clear  an  Act  of 
March  1869  declares  that  'the  faith  of  the  United 
States  is  solemnly  pledged  to  the  payment  in  coin  or 
its  equivalent  of  all  the  United  States  notes,'  and  '  to 
make  provision  at  the  earliest  practicable  period  for 
the  redemption  of  the  notes  in  "  coin."  No  more 
exact  time  was  specified.  Thus,  then,  the  holders 
were  solemnly  promised  payment  as  soon  as  possible 
in  '  coin;1  that  is,  either  silver  or  gold. 

Meantime  the  interest  of  the  interest-bearing  debt 
had  remained  payable  in  coin  of  one  or  the  other 
description.  But  the  gold  discoveries  had  rendered 
gold  the  cheaper  metal,  and  the  consequence  was  that 
everything  payable  in  coin  was  as  a  rule  paid  in  gold. 

This  was  the  state  of  things  when  a  new  coinage 

o  o 

Act  was  passed  in  1873.  Silver  was  not  demone 
tised — the  existing  dollars  still  remained  a  legal 
tender  ;  but  the  new  Act  (looking,  no  doubt,  to  the 
prevalent  use  of  gold,  so  far  as  any  coin  was  used) 
dropped  the  silver  dollar  out  of  the  new  coinage,  re 
taining  only  smaller  silver  pieces,  the  legal  payment 
of  which  was  limited  to  a  small  amount.  As,  in 
truth,  for  most  of  the  ordinary  business  and  transac 
tions  of  life,  no  coin  at  all  was  then  used  in  the  United 
States,  little  visible  effect  was  produced  by  the  new 
Act.  But  as  very  few  silver  dollars  were  in  existence, 


92        BIRD'S-EYE   VIEW  OF  THE   UNITED   STATES. 

and  no  new  ones  were  to  be  coined,  the  effect  certainly 
was  that,  in  case  of  resumption  of  specie  payments, 
gold,  and  not  silver,  must  be  the  coin  used.  The  Act 
of  1873  seems  to  have  been  put  into  the  form  in 
which  it  was  ultimately  passed  at  the  last  moment, 
and,  under  the  circumstances  of  the  time,  was  not  of 
the  highest  interest,  nor  did  it  create  any  excitement. 

Two  years  later  (in  1875)  the  Act  for  the  resump 
tion  of  specie  payments  was  passed,  providing  that 
the  United  States  notes  should  be  redeemed  on 
January  1,  1879,  in  coin — nothing  was  said  of  the 
description  of  coin. 

But  about  this  time  a  great  change  began  to  take 
place  in  the  relative  value  of  gold  and  silver.  Gold 
relatively  went  up  in  value  and  silver  went  down,  as 
we  all  know.  Then  it  was  seen  what  a  disturbance  of 
existing  arrangements  would  be  caused  by  the  Act  of 
1873.  An  agitation  on  the  subject  soon  commenced, 
and  prolonged  and  excited  discussions  took  place. 
It  was  not  till  February  1878  that  the  Act  to  restore 
the  old  silver  dollar  to  the  coinage  received  the 
President's  assent.  Even  then  it  was  restored  in 
principle  rather  than  in  immediate  practice.  It  was 
feared  that  if  an  unlimited  coinage  of  silver  dollars 

o 

were  at  once  permitted  the  holders  of  silver  would 
establish  monopoly  prices  and  get  all  the  profits,  and 
therefore  it  was  determined  to  bring  in  the  silver 
dollar  gradually.  The  Treasury  were  to  purchase  not 
less  than  2,000,000  nor  more  than  4,000,000  dollars' 
worth  of  silver  monthly,  and  to  coin  it  for  cir 
culation.  The  Act  also  provided  that,  while  silver 


THE   CURRENCY  QUESTION.  93 

dollars  should  be  a  legal  tender,  an  exception  should 
be  made  '  where  otherwise  expressly  stipulated  in  the 
contract.' 

A  great  outcry  was  made  against  this  Act  by  the 
moneyed  interests  in  the  Northern  cities  and  in  Eng 
land,  on  the  ground  that  it  deprived  them  of  the  dear 
gold  coins  which  they  expected  to  receive,  and  put  them 
off  with  cheap  silver  coins.  I  must  say  that  for  the 
most  part  I  cannot  see  that  this  reclamation  was  well- 
founded.  It  seems  to  me  that  none  of  the  holders  or 
creditors  whose  bonds  date  prior  to  the  Act  of  1873 
can  complain,  for  they  certainly  get  exactly  what  they 
bargained  for — viz.,  coin,  either  gold  or  silver — and 
this  includes  the  whole  of  the  public  obligations  of 
the  United  States.  The  only  people  who  might  seem 
to  have  a  fair  case  are  those  who  made  contracts  or 
lent  money  between  1873  and  February  1878 ;  but 
morally  even  they  do  not  seem  to  have  much  case  of 
hardship — they  dealt  in  or  lent  greenbacks,  which  in 
1875  were  at  a  discount  of  12  to  15  per  cent.,  but 
which  the  Act  of  that  year  prospectively  restored  to 
coin  value.  In  1876  the  value  of  the  greenback  was 
rising  very  slowly,  and  throughout  that  and  the  follow 
ing  year  while  the  Act  for  restoring  the  silver  dollar 
was  under  discussion,  it  was  evident  enough  that  it 
would  be  restored,  the  particular  form  of  the  measure 
only  being  doubtful ;  so  that  there  was  no  surprise. 

Moreover,  there  has  for  the  present  come  to 
the  aid  of  the  creditors  the  provision  limiting  the 
coinage  of  silver.  The  President  and  his  advisers 
are  unfavourable  to  the  silver  coinage,  and  I  believe 


94       BIRD'S-EYE  VIEW  OF  THE  UNITED   STATES. 

they  have  coined  as  little  as  the  law  allows  them ; 
consequently  up  to  this  time  there  is  so  little  silver 
in  circulation  that  it  cannot  take  the  place  of  gold. 
Resumption  has  been  in  practice  effected  in  dear  gold ; 
and  the  greenback  of  the  past  seventeen  years  has 
now  become  worth  its  nominal  value  in  gold. 

Practically,  then,  the  United  States  are  at  present 
in  the  same  position  as  the  States  of  the  Latin  Union, 
France  and  the  rest  ;  that  is  to  say,  although  gold 
and  silver  coins  are  both  legal  tender,  the  quantity 
of  silver  coined  is  so  restricted  that  gold  is  the  real 
measure  of  value,  and  silver  coin,  so  far  as  it  cir 
culates  (and  we  know  that  it  circulates  largely  in 
France),  bears  an  artificial  value  far  above  its  real 
intrinsic  value.  But  there  is  this  important  differ 
ence,  that  whereas  the  Latin  Union  fix  a  total  limit 
to  their  silver  coinage,  the  United  States  have  only 
fixed  the  amount  to  be  coined  monthly.  If  the 
present  law  stands,  silver  coin  must  go  on  accu 
mulating,  and  in  the  end  it  must  inevitably  bring 
down  the  value  of  the  dollar  of  account,  cheap  silver 
dollars  displacing  dear  gold  dollars.  Under  the  ex 
isting  law  this  is  a  mere  question  of  time. 

To  realise  the  importance  of  this  question  we 
must  remember  that  it  is  not  only  a  question  of  the 
currency,  or  of  the  payment  of  the  public  debts  and 
obligations,  but  of  all  private  debts  and  obligations. 
Every  man  who  borrowed  a  dollar  in  1864  must  now 
pay  back  a  dollar  two  and  a  half  times  more  valuable. 
Every  man  who  borrowed  a  dollar  in  1868  (after  the 
war  was  well  past  and  over)  must  pay  back  nearly  one 


THE   CURRENCY  QUESTION.  95 

and  a  half  times  ;  every  man  who  borrowed  in  1875  or 
1876  must  pay  10  to  15  per  cent,  more  ;  every  man 
who  borrowed  in  1877  must  pay  2  to  6  per  cent.  more. 
No  doubt  this  is  a  heavy  tax  on  debtors,  and  a  great 
increase  in  the  value  the  creditors  can  claim.  There 
are  so  many  debtors  in  the  States  that  it  is  no  wonder 
there  is  a  strong  feeling  on  the  subject,  the  more  so 
as  the  debtors  are  the  mass  of  rural  proprietors  and 
others  throughout  the  country,  while  the  creditors 
are  the  capitalists  in  the  large  towns  and  in  England. 

It  is  most  unfortunate  that  the  Act  of  1873  was 
ever  passed.  If  it  had  not  been  for  that  there  could 
have  been  no  ground  of  complaint,  and  the  debtors 
would  have  had  the  benefit  of  the  cheap  silver  to  which 
the  law  under  which  they  incurred  the  debts  entitled 
them.  Then,  again,  if  at  the  time  of  the  passing  of  the 
Eesumption  Act  of  1875  provision  had  at  the  same 
time  been  made  for  coining  the  silver  dollar,  no  one 
could  have  reasonably  complained.  The  greenback 
being  then  at  about  15  per  cent,  discount,  it  could  be 
no  hardship  to  make  it  payable  in  silver  coin,  accord 
ing  to  the  original  contract,  for  even  that  would  have 
enhanced  its  existing  value.  There  would  thus  have 
been  a  happy  and  easy  transition  from  greenbacks  to 
silver  worth  a  little,  but  not  very  much  more,  than  the 
greenbacks  of  1875,  without  disturbance  or  difficulty. 
As  it  is  the  creditors  claim  their  pound  of  gold  under 
the  Act  of  1873,  and  denounce  the  Act  of  1878, 
which  only  returns  to  the  state  of  things  prior  to 
1873,  as  spoliation. 

It  was  the  real  hardship  to  debtors  of  a  return 


96        BIRD'S-EYE   VIEW  OF  THE   UNITED   STATES. 

to  a  gold  standard,  excluding  the  old  silver  option, 
which  produced  the  recent  unreasonable  and  unsuc 
cessful  agitation  for  a  return  to  greenbacks  ;  but  it 
curiously  shows  how  much  the  question  is  one  be 
tween  the  farmers  and  people  on  one  side,  and  the 
capitalists  on  the  other,  that  the  strength  of  the  agi 
tation  was  not  so  much  in  the  indebted  and  depressed 
South  as  in  the  rich  State  of  Massachusetts  and  the 
steady  agricultural  State  of  Maine,  both  model  New 
England  States. 

The  return  to  silver  money  would  be  the  less  a 
hardship  on  creditors,  as  the  authorised  standard  in 
America  puts  gold  to  silver  at  about  16  to  1,  instead 
of  15^  to  1,  the  European  standard  ;  consequently 
the  present  cheapening  of  silver  is  a  smaller  departure 
from  the  old  standard  by  upwards  of  3  per  cent. 

I  may  mention  that  one  is  apt  to  be  puzzled  by 
the  existence  of  another  authorised  dollar  coined  in 
the  U.S.  mints,  called  the  'trade  dollar.'  It  is  larger 
than  the  standard  dollar,  weighing  420  grains,  and 
is  not  a  legal  tender,  being  coined  for  use  in  China 
and  Japan,  where  it  was  supposed  that  a  dollar  of 
that  kind  would  be  preferred.  I  believe  it  is  not 
very  successful.  The  present  state  of  things  has 
brought  about  this  curious  result,  that  the  larger 
trade  dollar,  not  being  a  legal  tender,  is  not  worth  a 
dollar  in  America,  while  the  smaller  standard  dollar, 
enhanced  in  value  by  its  scarcity,  passes  for  the  value 
of  a  dollar  in  gold.  That  is  quite  an  artificial  state 
of  things,  and  can  hardly  last. 


EMIGRATION  AND   INVESTMENT.  97 


AMERICA   AS  A  FIELD  FOR   EMIGRATION  AND 
INVESTMENT. 

It  may  be  of  interest  to  some  of  you  that  I  should 
tell  you  something  of  what  I  have  gathered  on  the 
subject  of  emigration  to  America.  I  should  be  sorry 
to  see  you  go,  of  course,  but  at  the  same  time  there  is 
this  to  be  said  in  favour  of  America,  that  to  any  man 
who  goes  there,  and  especially  to  a  Scotchman  or 
an  Irishman,  that  country  is  not  in  any  degree  a 
foreign  country.  There  are  some  peculiarities,  but 
they  are  all  on  the  surface,  and  you  would  soon  get 
over  them.  It  is  wonderful  how  soon  one  adapts 
oneself  to  local  customs  and  habits  when  the  people 
and  language  are  really  identical  with  those  of  our 
own  country.  The  manners  of  the  Americans  are 
our  manners,  their  ways  are  our  ways,  and  their  hearts 
and  sympathies  are  the  hearts  and  sympathies  to  which 
we  are  accustomed. 

When  we  come  to  consider  the  question  whether 
it  is  a  good  thing  to  emigrate  to  America,  I  would 
say,  as  a  general  rule,  it  is  a  country  only  for  those 
who  are  willing  to  work  with  their  hands,  and  work 
very  hard  indeed.  It  is  not  the  place  for  a  man  who 
looks  to  earn  his  bread  by  his  brains  only,  and  with  a 
moderate  amount  of  work.  No  doubt  if  a  man  is  ex 
traordinarily  clever  he  may  get  on  in  any  part  of  fche 
world  ;  and  if  such  a  one  is  well  fitted  to  get  on  in 
this  country,  he  may  not  improbably  also  get  on  in 
America,  if  he  begins  early.  In  America  there  is 

H 


98     BIRD'S-EYE  VIEW  OF  THE  UNITED  STATES. 

much  greater  room  for  extension  than  here  ;  but  as  a 
rule  the  people  who  earn  their  bread  by  their  brains, 
instead  of  their  hands,  are  not  so  well  paid,  and 
therefore  average  people  of  that  class  I  would  recom 
mend  not  to  go  to  America.  I  have  been  surprised 
at  the  low  salaries  paid  there,  and  at  the  extent  of  the 
head-work  done  at  a  low  rate  of  remuneration,  al 
though  no  doubt  some  people  make  large  fortunes.  If 
a  man  is  not  ready  to  work  hard  with  his  hands,  if  he 
hopes  to  earn  his  bread  by  his  education  and  by  head- 
work,  I  think,  on  the  whole,  unless  he  is  very  smart 
indeed,  he  had  better  stay  at  home  or  go  to  some  of 
our  colonies,  and  not  try  to  rival  the  Americans,  where 
the  educated  class  are  very  keen  and  smart.  After 
all  if  a  man  has  moderate  ideas  and  does  not  look  to 
be  a  millionaire,  some  of  the  educated  professions 
seem  to  be  not  yet  over- stocked  in  this  country — for 
instance,  medical  men  are  hardly  procurable  for  Her 
Majesty's  service — and  there  are  many  employments 
of  various  kinds  throughout  Her  Majesty's  dominions. 
To  the  man  of  the  well-to-do  classes  with  a  few 
thousand  pounds  I  would  say  that  the  land  and  the 
products  would  be  somewhat  strange  to  him,  going 
from  this  country,  and  therefore,  unless  he  lays  out 
his  money  very  judiciously,  he  might  gain  his  ex 
perience  by  losing  it,  the  result,  in  a  good  many  cases, 
of  young  men  going  out  with  money.  If  a  man  has 
money  he  should  take  care  to  look  about  him  before 
he  invests  in  America.  There  is  a  view  taken  by 
some  of  my  acquaintances  that  a  fine  young  man, 
who  does  not  care  for  indoor  work,  might  farm  in 


EMIGRATION  AND   INVESTMENT.  99 

America,  and  might  thus  make  sure  of  an  indepen 
dent  position.  Now,  in  this  respect  there  is  a  great 
deal  of  delusion.  I  do  not  think  America  is  the  place 
for  every  man  who  wishes  to  be  a  gentleman-farmer ; 
the  majority  of  that  kind  of  whom  I  have  heard  have 
been  unsuccessful.  Land  is  cheap,  but  it  cannot  be 
used  till  houses  have  been  built  on  it,  fences  erected, 
and  the  land  itself  improved  in  a  great  many  ways ; 
and  there  is  this  fact,  that  labour  is  so  dear  that  large 
farms,  as  a  rule,  do  not  pay.  There  are  some  large 
cattle  farms  which  have  paid,  but  these  are  the  ex 
ceptions,  and  have  been  of  a  speculative  character. 
The  only  farms  which  surely  pay  are  small  farms 
worked  by  men  who  are  willing  to  work  with  their 
own  hands,  and  really  to  work  hard.  To  men  of 
that  class  I  believe  there  is  no  country  better  than 
America,  in  which  they  may  acquire  an  independent 
position,  such  as  they  would  not  have  in  this  country, 
at  a  small  cost,  and  with  a  small  capital.  Comparing, 
however,  the  condition  of  farmers  in  this  country  and  in 
America,  I  must  give  it  as  my  opinion  that  the  average 
man  who  cultivates  here  500  or  1,000  acres  had  better 
stay  at  home,  or  go  somewhere  else  than  to  America. 
No  doubt  there  is  much  room  for  improved  farming 
in  America ;  at  least  many  very  competent  Americans 
think  so  ;  and  a  very  energetic  man  who  takes  a  lead 
in  that  way  may  make  it  succeed  ;  but  he  will  be  a 
sort  of  pioneer — he  will  not  find  things  cut  out  to  his 
hand.  A  man  who  takes  to  farming  in  America  will 
not  have  the  same  comforts  and  society  and  civilised 
distractions  that  he  has  here.  The  distances  are  great, 

H  2 


100  BIRD'S-EYE  VIEW  OF  THE  UNITED  STATES. 

country  neighbours  few  and  rough,  and  servants 
scarce  and  dear.  I  have  heard  of  many  instances  of 
ex-officers  of  the  army  and  others  who  have  taken 
to  farming  hi  America  who,  and  still  more  whose 
wives,  have  had  to  go  through  hardships  and  hard 
work  which  they  little  thought  of  in  their  own 
country.  On  the  other  hand,  some  very  pushing  and 
energetic  men  have  no  doubt  been  successful  as  cattle- 
breeders  and,  in  some  of  the  far-away  States,  as  wheat- 
farmers  on  a  large  scale.  In  the  wheat-growing 
tracts  of  the  Red  River  of  the  North  (in  the  far  North- 
West  of  the  States)  and  in  the  valleys  of  California, 
where  great  tracts  of  very  rich  and  unmcumbered 
prairie  land  have  been  obtained  from  railway  com 
panies,  Spanish  grantees,  and  otherwise,  the  system  is 
to  lay  in  a  great  stock  of  machinery  and  keep  a  few 
men  to  take  care  of  it ;  then  at  so  wing- time,  and  again 
at  harvest-time,  to  hire  great  gangs  of  casual  labourers, 
lumber-men  out  of  work  and  others,  to  plough  and 
sow  in  spring,  and  reap  in  summer,  in  great  fields  miles 
long.  This  is,  however,  a  style  of  farming  which  is 
quite  exceptional,  and  will  not,  I  think,  last  very  long. 
On  the  other  hand,  I  would  advise  the  small 
farmer  with  a  little  means — to  whom  I  especially  re 
commend  America — not  to  be  too  much  led  away  by 
the  prospect  of  getting  a  homestead  grant  for  nothing 
in  the  farther  parts  of  the  country.  I  doubt  whether 
such  allotments  can  be  taken  up  with  advantage  by 
men  new  to  the  country  and  climate,  such  as  our  coun 
trymen  of  the  class  I  describe.  Successful  settlements 
are,  I  believe,  made  by  Scandinavians  and  Germans, 


EMIGRATION  AND  INVESTMENT.  101 

who  are  accustomed  to  a  sort  of  communal  arrange 
ments  and  to  a  very  rough  life ;  but  a  man  who  goes 
from  this  country,  and  who  wishes  to  begin  at  once 
as  an  independent  farmer,  would,  I  think,  do  better  to 
buy  a  ready-made  farm.  He  may  probably  get  a  good 
one,  with  house  and  everything  to  his  hand,  at  from 
21.  to  5/.  per  acre.  The  most  common  size  is  40,  80,  or 
160  acres,  and  he  may  enlarge  that  afterwards,  if  he  is 
prosperous.  If  he  has  sons  he  may  work  a  tolerable 
sized  farm  with  his  own  family ;  if  not,  he  may  hire 
one  or  two  farm  labourers,  and  that  class  are  readily 
enough  procured,  and  do  not  receive  very  monstrous 
wages. 

Even  the  small  farmer  must  not  be  too  sanguine 
of  a  very  brilliant  success.  The  fact  is  that  agriculture 
is  now  so  largely  spread  and  production  is  so  enormous 
that,  happily  for  the  dwellers  in  older  lands,  food-stuffs 
are  exceedingly  cheap ;  and,  unless  a  farmer  has  a 
special  success  in  breeding  or  otherwise,  he  must  be 
content  to  make  a  living  by  the  sweat  of  his  brow. 
But  at  any  rate  he  will  have  a  rough  plenty — he  need 
not  want  for  a  tolerable  house  and  good  food.  He 
may  well  be  an  independent  and  self-respecting  man. 
His  children  will  be  easily  provided  for,  and  he  may 
enlarge  his  holding  gradually.  To  a  man  not  too 
ambitious  and  not  in  too  great  a  hurry  to  be  rich  I 
believe  that  the  life  of  a  respectable  farmer,  owning  his 
own  land,  in  a  country  where  he  need  call  no  man  his 
superior,  is  happy,  useful,  and  creditable. 

Now  I  come  to  the  case  of  the  labouring  man 
willing  to  work  hard  for  a  good  living.  Any  man 


102      BIRD'S-EYE  VIEW  OF  THE   UNITED  STATES. 

accustomed  to  farm  labour,  or  willing  and  able  to  take 
to  that  kind  of  work,  can  be  sure  of  such  a  living  in 
America.  I  have  said  that  in  these  times  labourers 
do  not  receive  very  extravagant  wages,  as  at  one  time 
they  did ;  but  still  they  can  earn  higher  wages  than 
they  do  here,  while  food  is  cheaper,  and  a  labouring 
man  has  better  food.  I  have  no  doubt  that  on  the 
whole  such  a  man  is  immediately  better  off  than  he 
is  at  home ;  and  if  he  is  prudent  and  saving  he  has 
certainly  much  better  opportunities  to  rise.  He  may 
well  hope  to  become  an  independent  farmer  after  a  time 
— a  position  to  which,  I  fear,  fewer  and  fewer  farm- 
labourers  rise  in  this  country.  The  labourer,  how 
ever,  must,  like  the  farmer,  be  prepared,  if  need  be,  to 
go  far  afield,  and  must  not  grumble  if  he  finds  himself 
obliged  to  rough  it  a  good  deal  for  a  time.  He  may 
have  a  good  deal  to  learn,  and  experience  some  change 
in  climate  and  habits.  He  must  not  expect  to  carry 
into  remote  parts  all  the  ways  to  which  he  may  have 
been  accustomed. 

As  regards  the  class  of  mechanics  and  others  not 
willing  to  work  on  the  land — artisans,  navvies,  miners, 
iron-workers,  mill-workers,  &c. — they  are  generally 
better  off  in  America  than  in  this  country ;  but, 
owing  to  the  depression  of  recent  years,  their  posi 
tion  there  is  not  so  assured  as  that  of  those  who 
are  willing  to  labour  on  the  land.  During  the  bad 
times  many  American  works  have  been  stopped,  and 
many  good  men,  as  well  as  a  very  great  many  indiffer 
ent  and  bad  men,  have  been  thrown  out  of  employment 
and  suffered  much  hardship.  A  good  many  of  them 


EMIGRATION  AND   INVESTMENT.  103 

have  given  up  their  trades  and  taken  to  work  on  the 
land ;  and  business  being  now  a  little  better,  there  is 
by  no  means  so  conspicuous  a  want  of  employment 
as  there  was.  But  still  I  could  not  advise  people 
of  the  classes  to  which  I  refer  to  go  to  America  at 
present,  unless  employment  has  been  assured  to  them. 
I  may  say,  while  I  am  on  this  subject,  that  the 
successful  artisan  in  America  has,  I  think,  much 
greater  facilities  for  owning  a  nice  home  and  garden 
of  his  own  than  in  this  country. 

There  is  one  class  of  people  who  are  in  great  de 
mand  in  America,  viz.,  domestic  servants.  I  do  not 
mean  male  servants — I  think  domestic  service  is  not 
the  work  for  men — we  require  all  the  thew  and  sinew 
of  the  nation  for  other  work.  But  there  is  no  doubt 
that  America  is  a  paradise  for  female  servants.  They 
are  treated  there  as  helps  rather  than  servants ;  and 
though  it  is  necessary  for  them  to  work  hard,  still 
their  employment  is  certain,  and  a  really  good  servant 
may  almost  make  her  own  terms. 

I  have  said  that  in  recent  years  times  have  been 
somewhat  hard  in  America,  but  I  think  there  is  a 
degree  of  exaggeration  in  that,  because,  though  wages 
have  been  reduced,  yet,  on  the  other  hand,  the  absolute 
necessaries  of  life  are  so  much  cheaper  than  they  were 
as  almost  to  make  up  for  the  difference.  The  ordinary 
labouring  man,  who  in  this  country  might  earn  2s.  6d. 
or  3.5.  a  day,  would  in  America  earn  a  dollar ;  a  me 
chanic  who  gets  from  5s.  to  6s.  a  day  here  would,  if  he 
succeeded  in  getting  employment,  earn  considerably 
more. 


104    BIRD'S-EYE  VIEW  OF  THE  UNITED  STATES. 

I  am  afraid,  however,  that  much  of  the  advantage  is 
lost  owing  to  the  extravagant  habits  of  the  Americans 
in  regard  to  spending.  The  obligatory  expenses,  or 
even  those  necessary  to  the  ease  and  comfort  of  a 
working  man,  are  not  so  heavy  as  in  this  country ; 
but  there  is  no  doubt  that  all  classes,  high  and  low, 
have  been  to  some  degree  spoiled  by  former  prosperous 
times,  and  that  they  have  not  learned  saving  as  they 
ought.  Many  think  that  recent  hard  times  will  have 
a  very  good  effect  on  the  habits  of  the  American 
people,  and  in  this  I  speak  of  the  richer  and  more 
pretentious  classes  still  more  than  of  labouring  men. 
On  the  other  hand,  many  of  the  Germans  and  some 
other  classes  exhibit  wonderful  thrift,  and  are  a  model 
of  careful  and  successful  industry,  by  which  they 
improve  their  position  much  more  than  some  who 
may  earn  more  and  seem  of  a  higher  class. 

It  must  be  felt  that  the  absence  in  America  of 
that  wide  social  gulf  between  classes  which  so  much 
exists  in  England  is  a  great  advantage  to  a  working 
man  who  by  skill  and  prudence  rises  to  an  indepen 
dent  position  ;  and  the  political  system  is  certainly 
one  which  makes  him  feel  that  he  has  a  better  and 
more  recognised  place  in  the  commonwealth.  We 
cannot,  too,  shut  our  eyes  to  the  fact  that  this  is  a 
risen  country,  where  there  is  not  apparent  room  for 
so  much  further  rise  as  there  is  in  America,  with  its 
illimitable  opportunities  for  expansion ;  and  in  this 
respect  the  man  who  seeks  to  rise  has  probably  more 
to  look  to  on  the  other  side  of  the  Atlantic. 

At  the  same  time  I  cannot  too  often  impress  on 


EMIGRATION  AND  INVESTMENT.  105 

you  that,  while  America  is  the  place  for  the  man 
with  a  strong  arm  and  a  strong  will  to  work — for 
the  pushing  and  the  energetic — it  is  most  decidedly 
no  place  for  the  idle  or  the  easy-going,  or  for  men 
discontented  with  their  lot,  who  think  that  a  mere 
change  of  country  will  better  it.  There  are  too 
many  of  that  sort  in  America  already.  This  is  the 
class  which  has  suffered  most  from  the  want  of 
employment,  and  it  is  a  class  to  which  Americans 
are  not  inclined  to  be  very  tender.  Any  man  who 
is  not  thoroughly  self-reliant  had  better  stay  in  the 
older  and  perhaps  more  indulgent  country. 

There  is  this  important  consideration  with  respect 
to  emigration,  that  many  a  man  who  hardly  thinks 
that  his  own  lot  is  improved  by  transplantation,  and 
who  sets  against  the  advantages  much  that  comes 
rather  trying  in  the  change,  must  feel  that  his 
children  at  least,  growing  up  in  America,  will  greatly 
benefit  by  the  step  which  he  has  taken.  To  begin 
with,  to  the  parents  of  large  families  the  American 
educational  system  is  a  very  great  advantage.  In 
all  the  best  parts  of  America  there  is  offered  to  all 
an  excellent  education,  absolutely  free,  given  to  all 
children  without  distinction  ;  and  the  clever  boy 
may  not  only  thus  learn  the  'three  E's,'  but  may 
go  to  the  higher  education,  also  given  free,  and 
qualify  for  higher  work  and  a  higher  place  than  his 
father  ever  aimed  at.  If  the  son  of  a  poor  man  is 
very  ambitious  he  has  certainly  a  better  chance  of 
being  President  of  the  United  States  than  of  being 
Prime  Minister  of  England.  And  without  looking 


106    BIRD'S-EYE  VIEW  OF  THE  UNITED  STATES. 

so  high  as  that,  I  think  there  can  be  no  doubt  that 
not  only  the  son  of  the  energetic  Scotchman  and  the 
prudent  German,  but  also  the  son  of  the  poor  Irish 
man,  brought  up  as  an  American  citizen,  has  better 
prospects  than  in  his  own  country.  I  won't  say  that 
this  country  has  culminated  and  begun  to  go  down — 
we  have  not,  I  hope,  come  to  that — but  there  is  no 
doubt  that,  with  very  limited  land  and  immense  foreign 
competition  in  manufactures,  we  can  hardly  hope  to 
hold  a  place  relatively  so  far  in  advance  of  the  world 
as  we  have  in  the  past  generations.  We  shall,  I  hope, 
still  progress  in  many  ways,  but  it  is  almost  in  the 
nature  of  things  that  America  must  progress  faster. 

I  will  sum  up  my  views  in  regard  to  emigration 
to  America  as  follows — taking  the  case  of  the  average 
man,  not  the  exceptional  man. 

If  I  were  a  young  man  with  a  moderate  patrimony 
I  would  go  and  look  about  me  in  America,  but  would 
not  invest  my  fortune  there  rashly  ;  it  would  be 
principally  a  question  of  temperament,  and  a  choice 
between  the  safety  and  ease  which  such  a  man  may 
have  in  his  own  country,  or  the  adventure  and  the 
chance  of  making  his  mark  which  he  may  have  in 
America. 

If  I  were  a  well-educated  farm  labourer,  with  a 
large  family,  I  would  certainly  go.  If  I  were  an  un- 
incumbered  young  farm-labourer  or  a  young  maid 
servant  without  special  ties  in  this  country,  I  would  go. 
If  I  were  a  young  mechanic  or  mill -worker  I  think 
I  should  take  the  first  favourable  opportunity  of 
going,  and  would  take  my  chance  for  better  or  worse. 


EMIGRATION  AND  INVESTMENT.  107 

A  man  of  any  other  class  I  would  not  advise  to 
go,  unless  lie  feels  a  very  special  vocation  for  the 
adventure  of  American  life.  Clerks,  professional 
men,  shopkeepers,  elderly  mechanics  and  others  of 
the  working  classes  without  a  special  engagement  in 
America,  may  generally  with  greater  advantage  stay 
at  home. 

All  that  I  have  hitherto  said  has  principally  had 
reference  to  emigration,  and  to  the  investment  of 
capital  taken  out  by  those  who  themselves  emigrate  ; 
but  perhaps  I  may  say  one  word  regarding  the 
investment  of  capital  in  America  by  people  who  do 
not  emigrate,  though  that  is  a  very  difficult  subject, 
and  I  should  be  sorry  to  give  confident  advice  about 
it.  Xo  doubt  the  demand  for  money  is  greater  in 
America  than  it  is  here,  and  the  interest  is  higher  ; 
but  on  equal  security  the  difference  is  not  now  very 
great.  The  United  States  Government  can  borrow 
at  4  per  cent,  as  easily  as  we  can  at  3^ — the  security 
of  that  Government  is,  no  doubt,  as  safe  as  any  in 
the  world.  The  New  York  money  market  is  now  a 
very  large  one,  and  investors  there  are  glad  to  get 
moderate  interest  for  safe  investments.  I  think  not 
fully  5  per  cent,  is  to  be  got  on  first-class  railway 
bonds  and  such -like  securities,  which  give  about  4 
per  cent,  in  this  country.  The  difference  between  4 
and  4 1  may  about  express  the  degree  to  which  in 
terest  is  higher  in  America.  All  the  second  mort 
gages,  shares,  &c.,  which  bear  higher  interest,  are 
more  or  less  risky.  It  is  true  one  is  told  that 
first-class  mortgages  on  land  are  to  be  had  at  a 


108    BIRD'S-EYE  VIEW  OF  THE  UNITED  STATES. 

high  rate  of  interest,  but  there  is  a  good  deal  of  diffi 
culty  about  this — estates  are  not  large,  the  titles  are 
not  always  unconditional — most  States  reserve  rights 
of  wives,  without  whose  consent  the  homestead  can 
not  be  alienated,  and  sometimes  limited  homesteads 
cannot  be  alienated  at  all.     There  is  great  variety  in 
the  laws  of  different  States,  and  especially  it  should 
be  noticed  that  in  some  parts  of  the  country  there  is 
great  uncertainty  and  liability  to  variation  in  the  value 
of  property,  and  a  mortgage  on  estates  one  day  said 
to  be  immensely  valuable  may  more  than  exhaust 
the  whole  value  another  day.     Some  fine  estates  are 
made  to  sell,  and  I  should  be  sorry  to  be  the  mort 
gagee  of  a  house  in  Chicago  for  half  the  value  which 
it  bore  some  years  ago.     It  comes,  I  think,  to  this, 
that  if  a  man  with  a  good  deal  of  money  and  a  good 
knowledge  of  business  devotes  himself  to  the  subject, 
he   might  invest   his    money   well    in   this    way   in 
America  ;  or  if  you  have  a  friend  in  America  who  is 
both  competent  and  honest,  and  on  whom  you  can 
thoroughly  rely  (but  who  in   such  matters  can  rely 
on  anyone  in   these  days?),  he  may  make   a  good 
investment  for  you  ;  but  it  is  not  to  be  done  by  the 
ordinary  investor. 

As  regards  most  of  the  State  and  city  debts,  and 
a  variety  of  tempting  investments  of  that  kind,  they 
require  a  very  thorough  knowledge  of  American  po 
litics  and  finance,  and  I  think  that  a  man  who  has 
not  that  knowledge  had  better  not  touch  them. 


FEELING   TOWARDS  ENGLAND.  109 

FEELING   TOWARDS  ENGLAND. 

Let  me  now  say  one  word  more  before  I  have 
done  as  regards    the  feeling   in   the  United  States 
towards  England.     Upon  the  whole  I  am  quite   sure 
that  the  people  there  feel  kindly  towards  us  ;  in  fact, 
ninety-nine  out  of  the  hundred  do  so,  and  perhaps, 
the   hundredth   has  no   really  hostile  feeling.     But 
there  does  still  remain,  among  some  of  the  Americans, 
a  feeling  that  we  did  not  behave  well  or  kindly  to 
wards  them  during  their  great  Civil  War,  and  espe 
cially  some  of  these  men  are  persuaded  that  it  is  due 
to  our  conduct  that  their  mercantile  marine  has  been 
destroyed.     I  will  not  deny  that  our  miscarriage  in 
permitting  privateers  to  avail  themselves  of  our  ports 
and  prey  upon  the  commerce  of  the  United   States 
had  something  to  do,  for  the  time,  with  the  destruc 
tion  of  their  mercantile  marine  ;  but  we  have  paid 
heavy  '  smart  money  '  for  that ;  and  I  believe  that  the 
real  cause  of  the  continued  decadence  of  the  marine  is, 
not  what  was  done  by  the  '  Alabama,'  but  the  protec 
tive  system,  which  makes  it  impossible  for  a  citizen  of 
the  United  States  to  sail  a  ship  abroad  without  pay 
ing  for  it  a  great  deal  more  than  a  citizen  of  Great 
Britain  pays  for  his  ship.     However,  I  fear  it  is  the 
fact  that  in  connection  with  this  subject  a  sore  feeling 
does  in  some  quarters  exist.     I  am  afraid  that  there 
are  some  people  in  some  of  the  States  who,  in  case 
this  country  were  involved  in  war,  would  very  readily 
undertake   the   enterprise  and  excitement  of  priva 
teering  against  our  marin?.     I  do  not  believe  that 


110   BIRD'S-EYE  VIEW  OF  THE  UNITED  STATES. 

the  central  Government  would  willingly  permit  this ; 
but  that  Government  is  not  strong  enough  to  check 
all  its  citizens.  If  we  could  not  prevent  the  '  Alabama ' 
from  going  out  of  Liverpool  can  we  be  sure  that  the 
President  of  the  United  States  could  prevent  i  Ala- 
bamas  '  from  going  out  from  any  port  on  the  many 
thousand  miles  of  seaboard  of  the  United  States? 
This  actual  fact  is  certain,  that,  in  view  of  the  proba 
bility  or  possibility  of  war  with  us,  the  Emperor  of 
Eussia  has  had  several  first-class  cruisers  built  in 
Philadelphia,  though  he  must  have  paid  much  more 
heavily  for  them  than  they  would  have  cost  in  Europe ; 
and  the  other  day  these  cruisers  were  brought  out 
and  delivered  over  to  the  Russians  with  much  parade. 
Happily  this  was  after  the  immediate  danger  of  war 
with  Russia  had  passed.  But  that  the  vessels  should 
have  been  built  by  Americans  for  the  purpose  for 
which  they  were  intended  seems  to  me  to  point  to  a 
very  great  danger.  If  we  once  got  into  a  war  there 
is  no  saying  how  far  it  might  extend.  If  we  ever  go 
to  war  with  Russia  that  country  would  strain  every 
nerve,  by  means  of  such  cruisers,  to  involve  us  with 
the  United  States  ;  and  if  once  it  comes  to  privateering 
from  United  States  ports  there  is  all  too  much  fear 
that  sparks  leading  to  a  conflagration  might  be  struck 
at  any  moment.  I  sincerely  hope,  by  a  good  under 
standing,  so  terrible  a  calamity  may  be  rendered  al 
most  impossible  ;  and  the  word  I  say  in  conclusion 
is,  pray  cultivate  friendship,  good- will,  and  amity 
with  the  people  of  the  United  States  ;  come  to  know 
them  well,  and  encourage  them  to  know  us  well. 


THE     MANAGEMENT 

OF 

COLOURED  RACES. 


THE  paper  on  '  Black  and  White  in  the  Southern 
States/  which  follows  this,  has  appeared  in  the  i  Fort 
nightly  Review/  and  is  now  republished,  with  the  kind 
permission  of  the  Editor.  I  was,  as  I  have  there  stated, 
led  to  look  particularly  into  the  relations  between  the 
black  and  white  races  in  the  Southern  States,  for  the 
sake  of  the  lessons  that  might  be  learned  as  bearing 
on  our  management  of  British  possessions  where 
white  and  black  races  are  intermingled. 

I  do  not  here  speak  of  our  great  dependency,  India, 
where  our  system  has  been  to  rule  both  races  by  a 
Government  avowedly  absolute  and  despotic.  In  regard 
to  that  system  I  am  one  of  those  to  be  judged  rather 
than  to  judge  others;  but  this  at  least  I  may  claim,  that 
the  Indian  administration  of  the  past  cannot  be  ac 
cused  of  any  habitual  subordination  of  the  rights  and 
interests  of  the  coloured  races  to  those  of  the  whites. 

Of  our  Colonies,  beyond  a  few  very  casual  visits, 
I  have  no  personal  experience,  but  as  a  member  of 
Parliament,  and  also  in  connection  with  the  coolie 


112       THE   MANAGEMENT   OF  COLOURED  RACES. 

emigration  from  India  to  the  Colonies,  my  attention  has 
been  during  the  past  few  years  much  directed  to  the 
management  of  our  colonial  possessions  in  tropical 
and  semi-tropical  regions.  I  cannot  pretend  to  have 
mastered  the  details  of  the  various  colonies — the 
materials  are  not  available.  But  the  strong  and 
broad  glimpses  obtained  from  official  reports  and 
Parliamentary  papers  and  discussions  have  certainly 
led  me  to  an  unfavourable  opinion  of  their  adminis 
tration  as  regards  the  treatment  of  the  coloured  races. 
In  none  of  the  Colonies  does  the  Home  Govern 
ment  exercise  absolute  and  direct  control,  as  in  India ; 
in  every  case  the  colonists  are  admitted  to  some 
substantial  share  in  the  government,  whether  in  the 
shape  of  Constitutional  Assemblies  or  of  nominated 
Councils.  Except  to  a  limited  degree  in  a  portion  of 
the  Cape  Colony  proper  (where,  I  believe,  a  very  cre 
ditable  and  successful  commencement  has  been  made), 
there  is  no  attempt  to  admit  the  coloured  races  to 
any  share  of  political  franchise — where  there  is  any 
election  of  legislators  or  officials  the  election  is  in  the 
hands  of  the  white  colonists  only.  And  in  the  colonies 
called  Crown  Colonies  the  administration  is  almost 
as  much  in  the  hands  of  a  white  oligarchy,  for  the 
Councils  are  mainly  composed  of  the  leading  white 
colonists  ;  and  the  Colonial  system  is  such  (in  this 
respect  widely  differing  from  that  of  India)  that  a 
large  proportion  of  the  official  members  of  Council 
and  other  high  officials  are  intimately  connected  by 
blood,  business,  and  interest  with  the  dominant  race 
of  settlers.  Whenever  the  views  or  interests  of  that 


THE   MANAGEMENT   OF   COLOURED   RACES.       113 

race  conflict  with  those  of  the  labouring  population 
the  safe-guarding  of  the  latter  rests  principally  with 
the  Governor  sent  out  by  the  Colonial  Office.  Not 
only,  however,  is  he  in  many  cases  without  sufficient 
power,  but  also  the  atmosphere  and  surroundings  in 
which  he  lives  are  such,  and  the  public  opinion  which 
is  heard  of  beyond  the  colony  is  so  one-sided,  that 
it  requires  much  more  than  common  firmness  to 
do  justice  in  excited  times.  Some  governors  have 
nobly  done  their  duty ;  some  have  more  or  less 
failed  to  do  so.  I  think  one  might  point  to  cases  in 
which  the  latter  have  gone  off  in  a  blaze  of  popularity 
and  obtained  pleasant  promotion,  while  those  who 
have  taken  the  part  of  subject  races  have  fared  very 
differently. 

In  the  colonies  where  slavery  once  prevailed  there 
is  a  hankering  after  compulsion  to  labour,  which  has, 
I  think,  given  rise  to  injustice  in  many  cases  ;  and 
even  in  colonies  where  there  never  was  slavery,  and 
where  one  would  have  supposed  oligarchical  abuses 
the  least  possible,  recent  official  inquiries  have  dis 
closed  an  astounding  partiality  in  financial  matters. 
Not  only  to  this  day  have  the  revenues  of  Malta  and 
Ceylon  been  largely  derived  from  taxes  on  the  im 
ported  food  of  the  people  (while  the  rich  by  com 
parison  escape)  to  a  degree  with  which  the  worst 
days  of  protection  in  England  cannot  compare,  but  it 
appears  that  in  Ceylon  the  internal  cultivation  of 
paddy  or  rice,  the  food  of  the  poorest  of  the  people, 
is  subjected  to  a  special  tax  from  which  the  valuable 
products  of  the  rich  colonists  are  exempt. 

i 


114       THE  MANAGEMENT  OF  COLOURED   RACES. 

In  our  Colonies  the  disposition  to  compel  labour 
has  not  affected  the  emancipated  negroes  nearly  so 
much  as  in  those  of  some  other  European  countries. 
The  negro  has  been  to  some  extent  under  the  pro 
tection  of  a  powerful  philanthropic  party  in  this 
country;  and  he  himself,  though  good-natured  and 
submissive  up  to  a  certain  point,  has  shown  that  he 
can  break  out  in.  an  extremely  dangerous  way  when 
treated  with  injustice — we  have  had  some  experience 
of  that  in  Jamaica  and  elsewhere — and  it  is  patent 
that  the  last  negro  outbreak  in  the  Danish  island  of 
Santa  Cruz  was  caused  by  extreme  injustice  in  the 
attempt  to  limit  wages  and  prevent  free  movement  of 
the  labourers.  As  a  rule  our  colonists  have  probably 
more  frequently  failed  to  manage  and  utilise  the  free 
negro  than  greatly  oppressed  him.  My  own  atten 
tion  has  been  more  directed  to  the  condition  of  the 
Indian  labourers  who  have  been  substituted  for  the 
negro  labour  which  has  failed.  Several  inquiries  by 
competent  lloyal  Commissions  in  the  past  few  years 
show  that  they  have  been  treated  with  great  unfair 
ness  in  some  of  our  colonies. 

In  order  to  obtain  the  means  of  carrying  on  the 
coolie  emigration  the  Government  has  been  induced  to 
sanction  a  system  which  would  not  be  tolerated  in  the 
case  of  white  labourers.  In  consideration  that  the 
expense  is  borne  by  the  Colonies  or  the  colonists,  the 
labourers  are  bound  down  to  labour  for  a  term  of  years. 
They  do  not  engage  themselves  to  masters  whom  they 
know,  or  to  any  individual,  but  are  engaged  to  serve  in 
the  colony,  and  on  their  arrival  are  assigned  to  a  master. 


THE  MANAGEMENT   OF  COLOURED   RACES.       115 

They  are  afterwards  subject  to  be  re-assigned  and  trans 
ferred  from  one  master  to  another,  and  from  one  estate 
to  another,  during  the  term  of  their  indenture,  without 
their  own  consent  or  voice  in  the  matter.     In  short, 
call  it  as  we  may,  and  justify  it  as  on  the  whole  bene 
ficial,  if  we  can,  there  can  be  no  doubt  that  it  is  a 
temporary,  modified,  and  supervised  slavery,  so  long 
as  the  obligation  to  labour  lasts.    The  Indian  Govern 
ment   have   been  careful  to  ascertain  the  voluntary 
character  of  the  emigration,  the  fairness  of  the  con 
tracts,  and  the  adequacy  of   the    provision   for    the 
voyage  ;  but  so  soon  as  the  coolie  leaves  India   he 
passes  out  of  their  hands — the  due  execution  of  the 
contracts  and  the  treatment  of  the  coolie  henceforth 
rest  with  the  Colonial  Administrations.    It  is  evidently 
necessary  that  such  a  system,  carried  out  in  colonies 
where  the  masters  are  the  dominant  race,  should  be 
very  jealously  watched,  and  there  can  be  no  question 
that  the  Colonial  Office  in  England  has  always  been 
actuated  by  a  desire  to  protect  the  coolies.    But  there 
is  great  difference  in  the  management  of  different 
colonies,  and  while  some  are  good,  abuses  have  crept 
into  others.    The  Reports  of  the  Royal  Commissions, 
to  which  allusion  has  been  made,  show  that  in  some 
instances  the  contracts  made  hi  India  have  not  been 
fairly  carried  out,    and  that  in  several  respects  in 
justice  has  been  done.     Great  efforts  have  been  made 
to  remedy  these  evils,    and  I  do  not  propose   here 
to  discuss  the  advantages  and  disadvantages  of  the 
indenture    system.      What  I  have    always  strongly 
insisted  on  is,  that  at  any  rate  after  the  indenture  has 

i  2 


116       THE   MANAGEMENT  OF   COLOURED   RACES. 

expired,  the  coolie  is  entitled  to  be  treated  as  a  free 
man  on  a  par  with  any  other  of  Her  Majesty's  sub 
jects  ;  and  my  great  complaint  has  been  that  Colonial 
authorities,  under  the  guise  of  vagrancy  laws  and  the 
like,  have  curtailed  that  freedom  and  equality  to  the 
extent  of  making  the  emancipated  coolie's  life  un 
endurable  till  he  consents  to  re-indenture.     To  the 
disclosures   contained   in   the   Report  of  the  Royal 
Commission  on  the  coolie  system  in   the    Mauritius 
I  chiefly  refer,  as  showing  both  the  injustice  which 
may  be  done  under  Colon:al  law  and  the  insufficient 
power  of  the  English  Colonial  Office  to  control  and 
remedy    the  injustice.      Mauritius  is  the  colony  in 
which  the  system  of  coolie  emigration  is  oldest  and 
best  established.     It    is    no    inaccessible    place,   but 
thoroughly  well  known.     It  is  ranked  in  the  official 
Colonial  Office  list   as  a  Crown  Colony  of  the  first 
class,  '  in  which  the  Crown  has  the  entire  control  of 
legislation/     Yet  the  Report  shows  that  the  Colonial 
Legislature  (aided  by  a  Governor  who  took  the  side 
of  the    whites,   and  withheld  information  from  the 
Home  Government)  was  able  in  1867  to  pass   the 
most  monstrous  laws — not  disguised  as  general  laws, 

o  o 

but  expressly  directed  only  against  the  time-expired 
Indian  emigrants  who  refused  to  re-indenture  for 
long  terms.  These  people  were  treated,  not  as  free 
men,  but  (as  the  Colonial  Office  authorities  have  de 
scribed  it)  as  if  they  were  ticket- of-leave  convicts  of 
bad  character,  adscribed  to  their  localities,  subjected 
to  the  most  harassing  police  supervision  and  tyranny, 
heavily  taxed  for  the  benefit  of  Colonial  officials,  and 


THE  MANAGEMENT   OF   COLOURED   RACES.       117 

oppressed  by  Colonial  magistrates.  One  would  have 
thought  that,  if  this  be  really  a  Crown  Colony,  such 
disclosures  had  only  to  be  made  by  such  an  authority 
as  the  Royal  Commission  to  ensure  an  instant  sweep 
ing  away  of  these  injustices.  I  am  sure  no  man  ever 
presided  at  the  Colonial  Office  with  a  greater  desire  to 
do  justice  than  Lord  Carnarvon ;  he  immediately  set 
himself  to  do  so,  and  he  sent  as  Governor  an  old 
Indian  administrator  of  whose  desire  to  protect  all 
classes  there  can  be  no  question.  But  in  truth, 
though  Mauritius  be  a  Crown  Colony,  as  it  is  now 
constituted  the  Colonists  have  a  majority  in  the 
Legislative  Council,  and  Colonial  views  and  ideas  have 
much  weight  in  the  departments  of  the  Colonial  Office. 
Radical  measures  were  not  found  easy ;  it  was  deemed 
necessary  in  some  shape  to  obtain  the  consent  of  and 
to  act  through  the  Colonial  Legislature.  As  a  matter 
of  fact  several  years  passed  in  correspondence  about 
draft  b'.lls  ;  up  to  the  close  of  the  last  session  of  Parlia 
ment  the  reformed  legislation  had  not  been  passed; 
I  have  only  now  learned  that  at  last,  at  the  end  of  1878, 
the  oppressive  laws  of  1867  have  been  repealed,  and 
a  new  law  passed  which  is  a  very  great  improvement. 
But  even  now  the  law  does  not  treat  the  time- expired 
coolie  as  altogether  free  from  restraint — he  must  be 
protected  by  a  pass  and  by  a  photograph,  which  are 
to  be  surrendered  to  his  employer  whenever  he  takes 
service  ;  and  he  is  still  subject  to  certain  rules  and 
restrictions. 

While  I  write  a  very  bad  case  of  ill-treatment 
of  coolies   has  been   disclosed   by  papers  presented 


118       THE   MANAGEMENT   OF   COLOURED   RACES. 

to  Parliament  regarding    the  West   India  island  of 
Grenada.     A  new  Administrator  went  to  that  island 
in  1878,  and  a   new  Protector  of  Coolies  had  been 
appointed  on  probation  in  the  early  part  of  that  year. 
In  August  the  latter  not  only  reported  very  illegal 
and  cruel  treatment  of  a  recently  arrived  cargo  of 
coolies,  but  denounced  the  whole  system  prevailing 
in  the  island,  asserting  that  the  persons  in  charge  of 
the  estates  neither  took  care  of  the  coolies  nor  paid 
them,  nor  provided  for  them  when  sick,  and  worked 
them  to  such  a  pitch  that  few  would  survive.     He 
added  that  of  2,000  coolies  formerly  imported  very 
few  remained  ;  that  '  the  treatment  they  received  was 
iniquitous,'  and  that  it  was  '  sad  to  think  what  has 
become  of  the  bulk  of  them.'     The  complaints  of  the 
Protector  in  regard  to  the  newly-arrived  coolies  were 
fully  confirmed.     The  Administrator  took  energetic 
and  praiseworthy  measures  to  rescue  the  survivors, 
but  remarked  that  the  Protector  himself  was  not  free 
from  blame  for  having  allowed  this  state  of  things  to 
be  possible,  and  complained  of  '  the  spirit  which  seems 
to  actuate  him  as  evinced  by  his  report,  his  failure  to 
move  about  sufficiently,  and  his  not  going  to  live  in 
the  district  where  most  of  the  emigrants  are.'     He 
adds,  however  :  '  Indeed,  the  person  whose  house  I  had 
engaged  refused  to  give  possession  on  finding  who  it 
was  required  for.'     1  should  have  thought  the  refusal 
of  the  planters  to  let  the  Protector  live  among  them 
was  rather  a  ground  for  vigorous  measures  to  keep 
them  in  order.     But  the  Administrator  was  satisfied 
that  they  had  i  an  earnest  disposition '   to  do  what 


THE  MANAGEMENT   OF   COI.QUKED ..JJACES.      119 

was  required;  and,  i  as  they  are  very  anxious  to  have 
an  additional  supply  of  immigrants,  I  see  no  reason 
why  they  should  not  have  as  many  as  they  are  able 
to  pay  for.' 

It  is  stated  that  the  Protector  so  recently  appointed 
had  been  laid  up  by  an  accident.     The  Lieutenant- 
Governor  of  the  Windward  Islands,  on  the  matter  being 
referred  to  him,  thought  the  Protector  '  could  not  be 
altogether  exonerated  from  blame.'     '  But,'  he  added, 
*  he  is  in  many  respects  a  good  officer.     He  speaks 
Hindustanee,  and  is  trusted  and  liked  by  the  coolies. 
His  unpopularity  among  the  planters  is  in  itself  evi 
dence  that  he  discharged  his  duties  conscientiously.' 
However,  it  was  eventually  settled  to  get  over  the 
difficulty   by   superseding   the   obnoxious   Protector 
who  had  spoken  out  too  strongly.     As  he  was  only 
6  on  probation  '  he  had  no  opportunity  of  defending 
himself.     Xo  inquiry  was  made  into  his  allegations 
of  past  mismanagement;  but  a  new  ordinance  is  to  be 
considered  by  the  local  Legislature.     The  whole  pro 
ceeding  certainly  does  not  inspire  me  with  confidence. 
I  am  one  of  those  who  believe  that  since  we  have, 
on  one  hand,  in  India  great  agricultural  populations, 
docile,   intelligent,    and   industrious,    but   constantly 
pressing  on   the  means  of  subsistence,   and  on  the 
other  great  possessions,  which  only  require  for  their 
development  such  a  population  fitted  for  hot  climates, 
it  would  be  in  every  way  beneficial  from  both  points 
of  view  to  encourage  emigration  from  India,  provided 
it  be  carried  out    on  fair   terms    and   the  policy  be 
accepted  not  merely  to  use  the  coolies  as  a  substitute 


120      THE   MANAGEMENT   OF   COLOURED   RACES. 

for  slave  labour  under  planter-masters,  but  to  facili 
tate  their  free  colonisation  and  settlement  on  the 
soil  under  a  liberal  system  similar  to  that  adopted  in 
the  United  States.  Planters  might  then  trust  to  a 
good  free  population  for  voluntary  hired  labour.  It  is 
impossible  that  the  natives  of  India  should  distinguish 
between  the  British  Government  which  they  know  in 
India,  and  the  British  Government  of  each  colony; 
and  the  better  colonies  suffer  in  credit  and  popularity 
for  the  faults  of  the  bad.  I  hold,  then,  strongly  to  the 
view  that  we  are  not  justified  in  encouraging  and 
facilitating  this  emigration  till  we  have  much  greater 
security  for  the  treatment  of  the  emigrants  and  an 
effective  assurance  that  the  personal  freedom  which 
(as  distinguished  from  political  freedom)  they  enjoy 
in  India  in  an  eminent  decree  shall  not  be  abridged. 

o  o 

In  some  of  our  West  Indian  Colonies  there  have 
very  recently  been  important  questions  with  respect 
to  the  management  of  the  negro  labouring  population, 
but  it  is  in  the  African  Colonies  that  the  questions- 
relating  to  the  African  races  are  of  the  highest  im 
portance.  Eecent  events  have  attracted  very  great 
attention  to  the  subject,  and  have  been  the  occasion 
of  a  mass  of  official  information  published  in  Blue- 
books,  in  which  I  have  been  much  interested.  I  put 
aside  external  political  questions,  and  now  look  to 
the  matter  only  as  regards  the  treatment  of  the  large 
masses  of  indigenous  blacks  whom  we  either  have 
found  in  the  territories  which  we  have  acquired  or 
have  received  under  our  protection  and  immediate  or 
mediate  control ;  for  it  appears  that  disturbances  and 


THE  MANAGEMENT   OF   COLOURED   RACES.       121 

tyrannies  beyond  our  borders  have  led  to  migrations  of 
large  numbers  of  natives  and  the  settlement  of  many 
of  them  in  our  territories,  or  in  Boer  territory  which 
we  have  since  annexed.  The  great  and  long- 
debated  question  in  Africa  seems  to  be,  whether  the 
natives  who  occupy  large  tracts  almost  exclusively 
are  to  be  brought  under  civilised  law  or  allowed  to 
retain  their  own  laws,  more  or  less  administered  by 
their  own  chiefs.  My  own  prepossessions  have  been 
entirely  in  favour  of  allowing  the  indigenes  to  retain 
their  own  laws,  so  far  as  they  are  not  absolutely  in 
consistent  with  our  system.  That  has  been  the  prac 
tice  in  India,  in  almost  all  things  in  the  earlier  days 
of  our  rule — and  even  when  in  later  days  we  have  come 
to  regulate  many  things  by  codes  common  to  white 
and  black,  we  leave  to  every  native  class  their  own 
laws  regarding  marriage  and  inheritance,  religious 
and  social  rites,  and  suchlike  matters.  Since,  how 
ever,  I  have  looked  into  the  matter  carefully  I  have 
seen  reason  to  depart  from  this  view  as  regards  Africa, 
and  rather  to  incline  to  a  system  which  may  lead  us 
towards  the  state  of  things  now  found  in  America, 
where  the-  Africans  have  been  converted  in  manners, 
religion,  language,  and  clothing,  and  assimilated  to  the 
white  man's  standard.  The  accounts  we  have  of  the 
African  tribal  administrations  seem  to  be  very  un 
favourable  ;  and  though  they  are  very  often  drawn 
from  a  hostile  point  of  view,  I  must  say  that,  looking 
to  recent  official  summaries  of  native  laws,  as  now 
administered  in  our  Colonies,  I  do  not  think  that 
they  are  such  as  it  is  desirable  to  retain.  I  do  not  here 


122        THE  MANAGEMENT   OF   COLOURED  RACES. 

enter  on  questions  of  marriage  and  the  like  ;  but  cer 
tainly  as  regards  property  the  system  seems  to  nega 
tive  altogether  individual  ownership  in  a  way  which 
must  be  fatal  to  settlement  and  progress.  The  head 
of  the  kraal  and  of  the  house  seems  to  have  absolute 
control  over  all  the  property  of  the  community,  and 
that  power  descends  undivided  to  a  single  heir,  sub 
ject  only  to  the  customary  liabilities  in  respect  of  the 
maintenance  of  the  members  of  the  house.  Individual 
property  is,  it  would  seem,  not  recognised.  These 
people  are  not  the  possessors  of  an  old  civilisation 
and  ancient  laws,  under  which  they  have  learned  to 
manage  their  own  affairs  ;  they  are  in  no  degree  in  the 
position  of  Hindoo  and  Mahomedan  races  in  India. 
They  are  mere  barbarians,  with  some  ill-defined 
customs  which  we  have  reduced  to  law.  Even  their 
tribes  seem  generally  not  to  be  well-established  tribes 
under  chiefs  who  are  looked  up  to  as  the  hereditary 
heads  of  clans  and  who  carry  a  traditionary  influence 
with  them.  African  tribes  seem  to  be  mere  casual  ag 
gregations  of  people  under  the  chief  of  the  day.  We 
are  constantly  told  that  a  modern  people  have  been 
made  up  of  '  broken  tribes  '  and  fragments  of  all  sorts. 
I  should  judge,  then,  that  there  is  little  of  native  law 
or  rule  which  we  are  much  called  on  to  respect  when 
these  people  come  under  our  jurisdiction. 

On  the  other  hand,  if  we  would  adopt  the  method 
of  taming  and  civilising  these  people,  I  think  what  I 
have  seen  in  America  goes  far  to  show  how  much 
good  may  result.  The  situation  of  the  blacks  in 
Africa  is,  of  course,  very  different  from  that  of  their 


THE  MANAGEMENT   OF   COLOURED   EACES.       123 

congeners  in  America  ;  but  through  all  differences 
I  seem  to  recognise  the  same  radical  characteristics 
in  the  men  and  the  women  too.  There  seems  always 
to  be  the  capacity  for  making  excellent  labourers;  and 
the  tribes  whom  we  have  most  effectually  converted 
to  our  ways,  such  as  the  Fingoes,  appear  to  exhibit 
very  considerable  capacities  for  improvement  and 
civilisation.  Altogether  I  see  much  reason  to  sup 
pose  that  the  African  is  quite  at  his  best  when 
working  with  the  example,  guidance,  and  assistance 
of  white  men  and  following  their  ways.  Of  course  one 
cannot  have  long  experience  of  newly -acquired  terri 
tories  without  feeling  that  changes  must  not  be  too 
violent  and  sudden,  and  that  in  many  cases  we  must 
receive  people  to  a  certain  extent  on  their  own  terms, 
and  allow  them  to  retain  for  a  time  many  laws  and 
habits  which  we  do  not  ourselves  think  the  best. 
But  I  incline,  so  far  as  I  have  seen,  to  believe  that  in 
the  case  of  these  African  populations  our  ultimate 
aim  should  be,  not  to  govern  them  under  their  own 
laws  and  religions,  as  we  do  the  Indian  populations, 
but  to  assimilate  them  as  far  as  possible,  and  to 
make  them  a  good  agricultural  and  labouring  popu 
lation.  At  any  rate,  I  hope  that  what  I  tell  in  the 
following  pages  of  Africans  so  treated  in  America  may 
furnish  to  the  reader  some  material  for  forming  an 
opinion  on  this  point. 

I  am  greatly  disposed  to  think  that  if,  by  a  just 
and  equal  rule,  we  humanise  and  improve  these 
African  natives,  protecting  them  from  class  tyranny 
of  the  white  man  on  the  one  hand,  and  from  their 


124       THE   MANAGEMENT  OF   COLOURED   RACES. 

chiefs  on  the  other,  and  teaching  them  to  work  as 
free  men  with  the  white  man,  great  things  may  be 
achieved  by  these  large  populations  in  a  vast  country 
of  great  capabilities.  The  proof  that  South  Africa 
has  capacities  is,  that  colonists  can  now  afford  to  pay 
wages  which  seem  much  to  exceed  those  paid  in 
America.  We  may  well  hope  that  if  they  obtain 
a  very  large  supply  of  the  labour  of  humanised  natives 
great  prosperity  may  ensue  and  industry  may  be  im 
mensely  developed,  without  any  of  those  compulsory 
and  unfair  methods  to  which  whites  lording  it  over 
coloured  races  have  sometimes  been  tempted  to  resort. 
I  am  sure  no  one  can  compare  the  present  state  of 
these  African  populations  under  their  own  tribal 
system  with  that  of  civilised  Africans  in  America 
without  feeling  that  such  a  change  would  be  im 
mensely  beneficial  to  the  native  races  of  South 
Africa. 

From  a  selfish  point  of  view  I  think  we  might 
especially  look  to  such  a  consummation  as  beneficial 
to  this  country,  because  we  have  a  very  large  and 
increasing  class  for  whom  it  is  becoming;  more  and 

o  o 

more  difficult  to  provide :  I  mean  the  educated  classes, 
somewhat  above  mere  manual  labour.  I  have  said 
that  I  do  not  think  America  the  country  for  that 
class — there  I  put  it  that  the  only  farmer  sure  to 
succeed  is  he  who  holds  the  plough  himself.  After 
the  early  days  of  successful  squatting  have  passed  I 
suspect  that  most  of  our  temperate  colonies  approxi 
mate  to  a  similar  condition.  It  would  be  very  de 
sirable  that  there  should  be  somewhere  a  field  for  the 


THE  MANAGEMENT  OF  COLOURED  RACES.      125 

more  educated  and  enterprising  class,  who  are  more 
fitted  to  direct  and  utilise  labour  than  to  do  the  mere 
manual  work.  Such  a  field  might,  I  fancy,  be  found 
in  South  Africa,  if  we  could  humanise  a  great  labour 
ing  population  and  establish  a  state  of  things  such 
that  a  young  man  of  good  education,  good  tact,  and 
real  energy  might  successfully  work  a  large  farm  or 
other  enterprise  with  the  aid  of  native  labour. 

All  this,  however,  is  chiefly  speculation.  I  only 
throw  out  these  hints  as  showing  the  sort  of  problems 
I  have  had  in  my  mind  when  I  went  to  study  c  the 
nigger  question '  in  America,  with  the  result  set  out 
in  the  following  pages. 


•126       THE  MANAGEMENT  OF  COLOURED   RACES. 


BLACK    AND    WHITE    IN    THE 
SOUTHERN    STATES. 

DURING  a  recent  tour  in  the  United  States  I  was 
particularly  anxious  to  obtain  information  regarding 
the  relation  of  the  black  and  white  races,  not  only 
because  the  subject  is  in  itself  of  immense  interest  to 
commerce  and  humanity,  but  because  it  is  of  special 
interest  to  ourselves,  called  on  to  deal  with  masses  of 
the  black  race  in  South  Africa,  and  the  possessors  of 
many  lands  in  which  white  and  coloured  races  are 
intermingled.  In  some  of  our  colonies  it  has  been 
supposed  that  the  free  negro  has  shown  a  great 
indisposition  to  labour.  On  the  other  hand,  cotton, 
the  great  staple  of  the  Southern  States,  and  formerly 
almost  entirely  raised  by  slave  labour,  has  been  pro 
duced  in  larger  quantity  since  emancipation  than  ever 
it  was  before.  How,  I  sought  to  know,  has  that  been 
managed,  political  disturbances  and  difficulties  not 
withstanding? 

As  regards  political  questions,  too,  I  am  much 
impressed  with  the  belief  that  our  management  of 
territories  where  white  and  black  races  are  intermixed 
has  not  always  been  successful.  An  oligarchical 
system  of  government  generally  prevails  in  our 


BLACK  AND  WHITE  IX  THE   SOUTHERN  STATES.    127 

tropical  colonies,  under  which  considerable  injustice 
has,  I  think,  sometimes  been  done  to  the  East  Indian 
labourers  imported  to  take  the  place  of  the  emanci 
pated  negroes.  Except  in  the  Cape  Colony  proper 
no  political  representation  has  been  allowed  to  the 
coloured  races.  I  was,  then,  very  anxious  to  see  the 
effect  of  the  political  emancipation  of  the  negroes  in 
the  Southern  States  of  the  Union. 

In  the  course  of  my  tour  I  have  had  opportunities 
of  conversing  with  many  men  of  many  classes  (and 
quite  as  much  on  one  side  of  politics  as  the  other), 
who  have  had  the  greatest  experience  of  the  blacks 
in  various  aspects — educational,  industrial,  political, 
and  other.  I  am  indebted  to  them  for  information 
given  to  me  with  a  freedom,  frankness,  and  liberality 
for  which  I  cannot  be  sufficiently  grateful ;  to  none 
more  so  than  to  many  Southern  gentlemen  who  have 
gone  through  all  the  bitternesses  of  a  great  war  on 
the  losing  side  and  the  social  revolution  which  fol 
lowed — men  whose  good  temper  and  fairness  of 
statement,  after  all  that  has  passed,  commanded  my 
admiration.  I  have  visited  not  only  the  towns  but 
the  ruraL  districts  of  four  of  the  principal  States- 
formerly  slave-holding,  viz.,  Yirginia,  North  Carolina, 
South  Carolina,  and  Georgia  ;  and  it  so  happened 
that  I  was  in  South  Carolina  (the  ne  plus  ultra  of 
Southernism)  on  the  day  of  the  late  general  election. 
I  have  seen  and  conversed  with  the  negroes  in  their 
homes  and  in  their  fields,  in  factories,  in  churches, 
and  in  political  meetings,  and  I  think  I  have  also 
been  able  to  learn  something  of  a  very  prominent 


128        THE   MANAGEMENT  OF  COLOURED  EACES. 

part  of  the  population — the  negresses.  I  feel  that  a 
single  tour  must  still  leave  much  to  be  learnt,  but  I 
have  honestly  weighed  and  compared  all  the  infor 
mation  I  have  obtained  from  different  sources,  and 
submit  the  general  result  for  what  it  may  be  worth. 
If  my  conclusions  do  not  in  themselves  carry  much 
weight,  I  hope  that  I  may  perhaps  succeed  in  indica 
ting  some  points  worthy  of  inquiry  and  discussion. 


THE   CHARACTER  AND    CAPACITY  OF 
THE   NEGRO. 

The  first  and  most  difficult  question  is  the  capa 
city  of  the  negro  as  compared  with  other  races.  In  one 
sense  all  men  are  born  equal  before  God ;  but  no  one 
supposes  that  the  capacities  of  all  men  are  equal,  or 
that  the  capacities  of  all  races  are  equal,  any  more 
than  the  capacities  of  all  breeds  of  cattle  or  dogs, 
which  we  know  differ  widely.  There  is,  therefore,  no 
prima  facie  improbability  of  a  difference  of  capacity 
between  the  white  Aryan  and  the  negro  race,  though 
I  believe  there  is  no  ground  for  presuming  that  white 
races  must  be  better  than  black. 

It  is  unnecessary  to  try  to  distinguish  between 
differences  due  to  unassisted  nature  and  those  due  to 
domestication  and  education.  No  doubt  the  varieties 
of  wild  animals  found  in  different  countries  differ  con 
siderably  ;  but  the  differences  due  to  cultivation  seem 
to  be  still  more  prominent  in  the  animals  and  plants 
with  which  we  are  best  acquainted.  It  is  enough 
to  take  the  negro  as  he  is,  and  his  history  and  sur- 


BLACK  AND  WHITE  IN   THE   SOUTHERN   STATES.    129 

roundings  need  only  be  briefly  glanced  at  in  so  far 
as  they  afford  some  key  to  his  present  position  and 
immediate  prospects. 

The  negro  race  now  in  America  is  derived  from 
an  admixture  of  people  of  various  African  tribes,  pro 
bably  differing  considerably  among  themselves,  but 
all,  it  may  be  assumed,  in  a  more  or  less  savage  and 
little  civilised  condition.  They  have  all  passed  two 
or  three  generations  in  slavery  to  white  men,  during 
which  period  all  traces  of  their  various  origin  have 
been  lost,  as  well  as  their  original  languages  and 
habits.  And  now,  though  variety  of  breed,  affecting 
their  capacity,  may  still  to  some  degree  be  present, 
if  we  could  trace  it,  I  believe  that  it  is  impossible  to 
do  so,  and  that  we  must  deal  with  them  as  a  single, 
English-speaking  people.  They  are  also  now  all 
Christians ;  and  though  some  African  traditions  may 
linger  among  them,  they  have  for  the  most  part 
adopted  the  dress  and  manners  of  the:r  white  mas 
ters,  and  have  been  greatly  civilised.  In  this  latter 
respect  there  is,  however,  a  considerable  distinction. 
One  portion  of  the  negroes  has  lived  in  parts  of  the 
country  where  the  white  population  was  numerous — 
equal  to  or  more  numerous  than  the  blacks — and 
thus,  working  among  and  in  very  intimate  contact 
with  white  people,  has  very  thoroughly  learned 
their  ways,  habits,  and  ideas.  But  there  is  a  broad 
belt  round  the  outer  portion  of  the  Southern  States 
where  the  climate  is  very  injurious  to  the  white  man, 
and  almost  impossible  to  the  ordinary  white  labourer. 
In  this  tract,  containing  much  of  the  most  productive 

K 


130       THE  MANAGEMENT  OF   COLOURED  RACES. 

country,  the  whole  labouring  population  was  and  is 
negro,  the  few  white  men  being,  in  slave  times,  only 
the  masters  and  drivers,  and  in  no  degree  the  com 
rades  of  the  blacks.  In  these  tracts  we  have  a  thick 
population  not  so  completely  converted.  Their  lan 
guage  is  still  to  some  degree  a  sort  of  pigeon  or  negro 
English,  and  they  are  still  to  some  extent  a  peculiar 
people — perhaps  less  good  workers  than  those  more 
thoroughly  educated  by  contact  with  whites,  but  pro 
bably  as  a  rule  more  simple  and  docile.  It  should 
be  noticed,  however,  that  considerable  migrations 
have  taken  place  in  the  troubles  consequent  on  the 
war,  and  that  there  has  been  some  intermixture  of 
the  two  classes. 

At  the  time  of  emancipation  the  negroes  were 
destitute  of  education  to  an  excessive  degree.  Not 
only  were  means  of  education  wanting  to  them,  but 
after  some  local  troubles  which  alarmed  the  masters 
most  of  the  Southern  States  passed  laws  making  it 
highly  penal  to  educate  a  negro.  These  laws  endured 
to  the  last,  and  under  them  the  generation  upon  whom 
emancipation  came  grew  up  entirely  without  instruc 
tion.  The  only  educated  persons  of  the  race  were 
the  few  free  blacks  who  had  obtained  instruction  in 
the  North,  and  a  very  few  favourite  domestic  slaves, 
whom  their  mistresses  had  to  some  degree  educated, 
the  penal  laws  notwithstanding.  Since  emancipation 
a  good  deal  has  been  done  to  educate  the  negro. 
Many  schools  in  which  a  superior  education  is  afforded 
have  been  maintained  by  benevolent  Northerners,  and 
the  State  Governments  have  set  up,  and  continue  to 


BLACK  AND  WHITE  IN  THE   SOUTHERN  STATES.    131 

maintain,  several  colleges  in  which  the  more  ambitious 
and  aspiring  young  blacks  are  educated.  For  the 
education  of  the  masses  a  public  school  system  has 
been  started  in  all  the  States,  of  which  the  blacks 
have  a  fair  share.  Owing,  however,  to  financial 
difficulties  these  schools  are  extremely  imperfect, 
being  open  but  a  small  portion  of  each  year — in  some 
States  as  little  as  two  months,  and  in  none,  I  believe, 
more  than  about  four  months  on  an  average.  How 
ever,  this  is  better  than  nothing.  The  negroes  show 
a  laudable  zeal  for  education,  and  upon  the  whole  I 
think  that  as  much  has  been  done  as  could  be  expected 
under  the  circumstances. 

During  the  last  dozen  years  the  negroes  have  had 
a  very  large  share  of  political  education.    Considering 
the  troubles  and  the  ups  and  downs  that  they  have 
gone  through,  it  is,  I  think,  wonderful  how  beneficial 
this  education  has  been  to  them,  and  how  much  these 
people,   so  lately  in  the  most  debased  condition  of 
slavery,  have   acquired    independent   ideas,   and,    far 
from  lapsing  into  anarchy,  have  become  citizens  with 
ideas  of  law  and  property  and  order.    The  white  serfs 
of  European  countries  took  hundreds  of  years  to  rise 
to  the  level  which   these   negroes  have  attained   in 
a  dozen.     Such   has  been   the  thoroughness  of  the 
measures  adopted  in  America. 

Another  education  has,  I  think,  greatly  affected 
the  character  and  self-reliance  of  the  negroes.  I 
mean  what  I  may  call  their  religious  education. 
Like  most  primitive  races  (the  aborigines  of  India, 
for  instance)  they  are  inclined  to  take  Christianity  in 


K    2 


132      THE  MANAGEMENT  OF  COLOURED   RACES. 

a  more  literal  sense  than  their  more  civilised  fellow- 
Christians,  who  have  managed  to  explain  most  of  it 
away  to  their  own  satisfaction.  And  these  negroes 
are  by  temperament  extremely  religious  people  of  an 
emotional  type.  They  like  to  go  direct  to  God  him 
self,  and  are  quite  unwilling  to  submit  to  priests 
claiming  to  stand  between  them  and  God.  Hence  it 
is  that  the  Catholic  hierarchy  has  had  no  success  with 
them,  and  probably  never  will  have.  Every  man  and 
woman  likes  to  be  himself  or  herself  an  active  member 
of  the  Church.  And  though  their  preachers  are  in  a 
great  degree  their  leaders,  these  preachers  are  chosen 
by  the  people  from  the  people,  under  a  system  for  the 
most  pare  congregational,  and  are  rather  preachers 
because  they  are  leaders  than  leaders  because  they  are 
preachers.  In  this  matter  of  religion  the  negroes 
have  utterly  emancipated  themselves  from  all  white 
guidance — they  have  their  own  churches  and  their 
own  preachers,  all  coloured  men — and  the  share  they 
take  in  the  self-government  of  their  churches  really 
is  a  very  important  education.  The  preachers  to  our 
eyes  may  seem  peculiar.  American  orators  somewhat 
exaggerate  and  emphasize  our  style,  and  the  black 
preachers  somewhat  exaggerate  the  American  style ; 
but  on  the  whole  I  felt  considerably  edified  by  them. 
They  come  to  the  point  in  a  way  that  is  refreshing 
after  some  sermons  that  one  has  heard.  I  did  not 
witness  any  of  the  more  active  emotions  in  which  I 
understand  congregations  sometimes  indulge ;  but 
the  practice  of  emitting  in  a  hearty  way  a  sort  of 
responses  here  and  there  during  the  sermon  seemed 


BLACK  AND   WHITE  IN  THE   SOUTHERN  STATES.   133 

to  me  earnest  and  not  unbecoming.  I  witnessed  a 
convention  of  Baptist  ministers  (the  blacks  generally 
are  Baptists  or  Methodists),  in  a  rural  church,  and  it 
was  a  pleasant  sight.  The  ministers  by  no  means 
had  it  all  their  own  way.  The  whole  country-side 
seemed  to  have  come  in  to  assist,  both  men  and 
women — and  they  seemed  to  be  making  a  time  of  it 
— camped  about  for  the  day. 

The  prominent  position  taken  by  the  negro  women 
is  a  feature  in  which  they  are  distinguished  from 
some  Oriental  races.  No  doubt  this  has  some  ad 
vantages,  but  also  I  shall  have  to  note  some  attend 
ant  disadvantages — social,  industrial,  and  political. 
In  matters  matrimonial  the  women  are  somewhat  too 
independent  and  light-hearted ;  and  the  men  also  being 
on  this  subject  given  to  a  rather  loose  philosophy,  the 
marital  tie  is  not  so  binding  and  indissoluble  as  it 
might  be.  Those  who  take  an  unfavourable  view  of  the 
negro  character  are  in  the .  habit  of  speaking  of  these 
traits  of  their  character  in  severe  language,  and  dwell 
ing  much  on  their  immorality  and  want  of  family 
affection.  I  think,  however,  that  it  is  scarcely  fair  to 
judge  them  by  too  high  a  standard.  The  truth  is 
that  the  Aryan  family  has  hardly  yet  established 
itself  among  the  negroes,  and  it  is  not  surprising  that 
this  should  be  so.  In  Africa  we  know  that  nothing 
of  the  kind  exists ;  there,  no  doubt,  the  progenitors 
of  the  American  blacks  lived  under  the  loose  polyga- 
mistic  system  still  prevailing  there.  Under  slavery 
the  family  could  not  be  introduced — it  was  impossible 
that  there  could  be  much  permanency  of  marital  ar- 


134:      THE  MANAGEMENT  OF   COLOURED   RACES. 

rangements  when  the  parties  were  constantly  liable  to 
be,  and  very  frequently  were,  sold  away  like  cattle ; 
and  the  relation  between  parent  and  child  was  espe 
cially  weakened,  or  rather  not  created.     The  parents 
were  not  really  responsible  for  the  children ;  on  the  con 
trary,  the  women  were  sent  to  work,  and  the  children 
were  carefully  tended  by  persons  appointed  by  the 
masters  for  the  purpose,  like  calves  or  lambs  or  any 
other  valuable  stock.     Parents  had  little  affection  for 
children  thus   reared,  and  children  owed  no  respect 
and  obedience  to  parents.     The  family  as  we  know  it 
is,  in  fact,  a  novelty  to  the  negro  since  emancipation, 
and  such  institutions  are  not  perfected  in  a  day.     Still 
the  evil  is  a  very  grave  one,  especially  in  regard  to 
the  relations  between  parents  and  children.     I  have 
heard  many  authentic  stories  of  children  who  have 
deserted    or  neglected   their   parents    in  a  shocking 
manner,  and  the  more  than  American  liberty  of  the 
children  threatens  to  render  the  next  generation  less 
tractable  and  useful  than  their  fathers  bred  in  slavery. 
We  can  only  hope  that  time  and  religious  influences 
will   more  completely  establish   the   family   system. 
Though  the  exceptions  are  many,  there  seems  already 
to  be  much  that  is  good  and  kind  in  the  relations  of 
the  blacks  to  one  another.    If  in  some  respects,  other 
than  marital,  the  women  are  rather  troublesome,  it 
seems  that  in  this  as  in  other  things  they  have  rather 
exaggerated    American  ways    than   set    up  ways    of 
their  own.     Seeing  the  liberty,  equality,  and  privileges 
enjoyed  by  the  free  white  women,  the  negro  women 
insist  that  their  position  among  their  own  race  shall 
not  be  inferior. 


BLACK  AND   WHITE   IN  THE   SOUTHERN  STATES.    135 

One  great  difficulty  in  estimating  the  qualities  of 
the  negro  race,  as  tested  by  education,  &c.,  is,  that 
since  under  the  American  system  all  who  have  any 
share  of  black  blood  are  classed  with  blacks,  a  large 
proportion  of  those  who  have  received  the  most  edu 
cation  in  former  days,  and  wTho  most  frequently  be 
come  known  as  prominent  coloured  men,  are  mulattos 
of  mixed  blood ;  so,  in  fact,  are  many  of  the  students 
in  the  higher  schools.  Whatever  the  qualities  of 
those  whose  blood  is  mixed  in  various  degrees,  they 
are  evidently  no  safe  index  of  the  negro  qualities 
and  capacities,  and  it  is  necessary  to  be  constantly  on 
one's  guard  on  this  point  when  one  generalises  from 
experience  of  individuals. 

As  respects  the  mulattos  there  is  much  disposition 
to  disparage  them  ;  but  I  am  inclined  to  think  that  this 
is  in  great  part  due  to  their  peculiar  position — they  are 
rejected  from  all  the  society  of  the  w^hites,  and  have 
not  been  accepted  by  the  blacks  as  their  natural 
leaders.  The  same  tone  of  disparagement  has  gene 
rally  been  adopted  regarding  the  Eurasians,  the  people 
of  mixed  blood  in  India ;  yet  I  believe  their  failure 
is  more  due  to  an  unfortunate  position  than  to  want 
of  effective  qualities.  In  early  days  Skinners  and 
Gardeners  were  men  of  great  mark,  and  the  Eurasian 
drummer-boys  of  the  old  sepoy  regiments  were  physi 
cally  fine  men  and  good  athletes.  I  understand  that 
in  the  New  Orleans  country,  under  the  French  prac 
tice  (which  has  not  our  Anglo- Sax  on  antipathy  to 
intimacy  with  coloured  races),  many  Creoles  of  mixed 
blood  attained  a  far  higher  position  than  in  other 
parts  of  the  United  States. 


136      THE   MANAGEMENT   OF   COLOURED  EACES. 

Reverting  now  to  the  capacities  of  the  negro 
proper  as  we  find  him  in  America  under  the  circum 
stances  which  I  have  described,  the  general  opinion 
of  those  engaged  hi  the  education  of  the  race  is,  that 
while  the  younger  children  are  as  quick  and  bright 
as  white  children,  they  do  on  the  average  fall  off  in 
some  degree  as  they  get  older.  Yet  this  opinion  is  not 
given  without  some  consideration  and  qualification ; 
the  intellectual  gulf  between  the  two  races  does  not 
seem  to  be  very  wide  and  evident.  I  am  told  on  all 
hands  that  some  pure  negroes  show  an  educational 
capacity  quite  equal  to  that  of  good  whites.  Nothing 
is  more  difficult  than  to  estimate  accurately  qualities 
of  this  kind,  especially  when,  as  in  this  case,  the  two 
classes  are  not  taught  together,  but  separately;  and 
there  has  not  yet  been  time  to  see  much  of  the  results 
of  educating  the  blacks  on  a  large  scale ;  but  I  think 
that  in  general  terms  the  direction  in  which  all  ex 
perience  points  is  that  which  I  have  stated,  viz.,  that 
on  the  whole  they  are  behind,  but  not  very  far  behind. 

When  we  look  to  practical  success  in  life  appear 
ances  seem  at  first  sight  less  favourable  to  the  blacks. 
I  constantly  asked,  '  Have  any  individuals  among  them 
come  to  the  front  and  achieved  success  in  industrial 
pursuits,  in  commerce,  or  in  the  professions  ? '  and  I 
could  not  learn  that  they  have.  '  There  were,'  I  said, 
1  before  the  war  a  number  of  free  blacks,  many  of  them 
educated ;  have  none  of  them  distinguished  themselves 
in  practical  life?  And  since  emancipation  the  negroes 
have  for  years  had  the  upper  hand  in  some  of  the 
Southern  States ;  have  none  of  them  come  to  the 


BLACK  AND  WHITE   IN  THE   SOUTHERN   STATES.   137 

front  among  their  own  race  by  the  process  of  natural 
selection  which  has  raised  men  to  greatness  in  bar 
barous  and  Oriental  countries?'  Well,  as  I  have 
already  mentioned,  they  have  shown  some  capacity 
as  preachers,  and  they  seem  to  have  some  talent  for 
oratory  (though  I  believe  that  Frederick  Douglas 
and  one  or  two  other  well-known  men  are  mulattos, 
not  real  negroes).  As  politicians  some  of  them  have 
done  fairly  well,  and  are  now  good  and  popular 
representatives  of  their  race ;  but  I  don't  think  any 
of  them  have  made  a  great  mark.  The  politics  of 
the  Southern  States,  while  negro  majorities  prevailed, 
seem  to  have  been  in  reality  entirely  under  the 
guidance  of  the  white  '  Carpet-baggers.' 

For  the  rest  I  have  not  been  able  to  hear  of  a 
successful  negro  merchant — the  shopkeeping  business 
in  the  most  negro  districts  is  almost  entirely  in  the 
hands  of  whites.  I  have  scarcely  found  a  negro  who 
has  risen  in  the  mercantile  world  higher  than  an 
apple- stall  in  a  market.  Certain  professions  they 
almost  monopolise  throughout  the  Union — waiters- 
and  barbers,  and  in  some  parts  ship-caulkers  ;  but  I 
found  very  few  negro  lawyers,  and  no  doctors.  All 
over  the  world  it  is  curious  to  notice  how  ready 
people  are  to  entrust  the  care  of  their  souls  to  very 
unsafe  home-rulers,  and  how  much  less  trustful  they 
are  of  their  bodies. 

When  I  have  put  these  failures  to  the  friends  of 
the  negroes  they  reply  that  allowance  must  be  made 
for  very  great  disadvantages — even  in  the  North, 
they  say,  the  free  negroes  were  subjected  to  a  social 


138       THE  MANAGEMENT  OF  COLOURED   RACES. 

ostracism  which  made  their  success  in  commerce  and 
the  professions  almost  impossible.  And  as  regards 
the  South,  they  say,  '  Since  emancipation  how  short  a 
time  has  elapsed ! — people  enslaved  and  denied  educa 
tion  cannot  rise  in  a  day.'  In  all  this  there  is  much 
truth.  Still  I  cannot  help  thinking  that  if  the  race 
had  been  a  very  pushing  and  capable  one,  the  men 
educated  in  the  North  would  ere  this  have  made  more 
way  in  the  South.  l  Do  you  think,'  I  have  said,  '  that 
if  they  had  been  Chinamen  they  would  not,  in  spite  of 
all  these  disadvantages,  have  found  their  way  to  the 
front  in  some  directions?  '  I  think  it  is  admitted  that 
to  some  extent  this  is  so.  The  negroes  are  certainly 
not  a  race  remarkable  for  energy  and  force  under 
difficulties.  The  only  question  is  whether  they  are 
very  deficient  in  these  qualities.  As  respects  mer 
cantile  qualities,  we  may  remember  that  there  are 
many  excellent  races  who  show  no  aptitude  that  way 
and  permit  alien  races  to  usurp  the  mercantile  func 
tions.  In  the  Southern  States  the  white  Americans 
themselves  are  very  much  ousted  from  the  business 
of  small  storekeepers  by  the  Germans,  who  are  to 
the  manner  born. 

What  is  more  disappointing  is  the  failure  of  the 
negroes,  so  far,  as  superior  artisans  and  in  all  that 
requires  accuracy  and  care.  As  it  is  expressed,  they 
are  not  responsible — they  cannot  be  depended  on.  In 
slavery  times  some  of  them  AY  ere  pretty  good  artisans, 
and  many  of  them,  in  the  South,  are  now  fairly  good 
carpenters,  bricklayers,  and  blacksmiths.  But  they 
seem  hardly  to  have  progressed  in  this  respect  since 


BLACK  AND   WHITE   IN  THE   SOUTHERN   STATES.   139 

emancipation.     A  man  who  will  do  his  carpentry  so 

far  well  enough  will  not  fit   the  pieces    accurately; 

and  in  factories  which  employ  black  labour  they  do 

not   rise   to    the   higher   posts.     In   the   North   the 

trades  unions  are  so  strong,  and  the  jealousy  of  the 

negroes  on  the  part  of  foreigners,  Irish  and  others,  is 

so  great,  that  they  would  not  have  a  fair  chance ;  but 

in  the  South  they  labour  under  no  such  disadvantage, 

and  employers  rather  prefer   negro   labour  ;  yet  in 

practice  they  don't  seem  to  be  able  to  trust  the  blacks 

beyond  a   certain   point.     In  mechanical  shops  the 

blacks  do  the  manual  labour,  but  are  hardly  trusted 

to  work  engines.     '  Perhaps  a  negro  might  learn  to 

work  the  engine,'   an  employer   said  to  me,  '  but  I 

never  could  be  sure  that  he  would  not  go  to  sleep 

on  the  top  of  it.'     In  tobacco  factories  the  labour  is 

almost  exclusively  negro,  and  many  of  them  are  very 

well  paid  for  labour  requiring  considerable  skill ;  but 

I  noticed  that  for  certain  work,  the  weighing  and 

making  up  the  packages   and  such-like,  white  men 

were   always   employed.     I   was   in  all   these  cases 

assured  that  no  black  man  could  be  trusted  to  be 

accurate.  -  Yet  they  make  very  fair  cotton-farmers, 

and  much  of  their  handiwork  in  various  branches  of 

industry  is  quite  good. 

On  the  whole,  I  think  it  must  be  considered  that 
at  present,  whether  from  natural  defects  or  from  want 
of  cultivation,  they  are  to  a  certain  extent  inferior  to 
white  men  in  the  qualities  which  lead  to  the  higher 
grades  of  employment.  On  the  other  hand,  they 
have  a  very  remarkable  good  nature  and  good  temper, 


140      THE   MANAGEMENT   OF   COLOURED  RACES. 

much  docility,  and  great  physical  power  and  endu 
rance — qualities  that  admirably  fit  them  for  labourers. 
Considering  from  how  low  and  oppressed  a  condition 
they  have  been  lately  raised,  and  how  infinitely 
higher  their  position  now  is,  it  is  hardly  ground  for 
disappointment  that  they  do  not  immediately  rise  in 
large  numbers  to  the  higher  grades  of  society.  They 
have  now  opportunities  of  education  which  will  enable 
them  to  rise,  if  they  are  fitted  or  when  they  are  fitted 
for  it.  For  the  present  we  may  deal  with  them  in 
their  existing  position  as  the  labouring  population  of 
the  Southern  States. 


THE  NEGROES  AS  A   LABOURING  POPULATION. 

To  understand  the  relations  between  the  whites  of 
the  South  and  the  blacks,  as  labourers  and  farmers, 
we  must  go  back  a  little.  In  later  slave  times — in 
the  States,  at  least,  to  which  my  inquiries  were  chiefly 
directed — the  slaves  were  not  worked  out  like  omnibus 
horses  ;  in  fact,  the  capital  sunk  in  slaves  was  so 
heavy,  and  produce  had  become  so  cheap,  that  the 
principal  source  of  profit  was  what  was  called  the 
'  increase '  of  the  slaves — the  breeding  them  for  the 
market  or  for  new  plantations  opened  in  the  more 
Western  States.  As  in  breeding-farms  for  other 
kinds  of  stock,  the  human  stock  was  carefully,  and, 
on  the  whole,  kindly  treated  ;  and  although  the  sell 
ing  off  the  young  stock  as  it  became  fit  for  the  market 
was  a  barbarous  process,  still,  the  family  relations 
being  so  weak  as  I  have  described,  those  who  re- 


BLACK  AND  WHITE  IN  THE   SOUTHERN  STATS.       141 

mained  did  not  feel  it  so  much  as  we  should ;  and  I 
think  it  may  be  said  that  the  relations  between  the 
masters  and  the  slaves  were  generally  not  unkindly. 
One  old  gentleman  in  Carolina  dwelt  much  on  the 
kindness  and  success  with  which  he  had  treated  his 
slaves,  adding  as  the  proof  and  the  moral  that  they 
had  doubled  in  twenty  years. 

Then  it  must  be  remembered  that  in  all  the  older 
States  the  whole  of  the  land  was  private  property — 
there  was  no  unowned  land  available  to  squatters — 
and  through  all  the  political  troubles  the  rights  of 
property  have  been  maintained  inviolate  ;  neither  by 
mob  violence  nor  by  class  laws  have  they  been  inter 
fered  with.  In  some  limited  portions  of  the  Southern 
States,  occupied  early  in  the  war  by  United  States 
troops,  a  good  deal  of  the  property  of  absent  seces 
sionists  was  sold  for  non-payment  of  taxes  in  a  way 
which  the  Southerners  call  confiscation,  but  this  was 
done  by  the  authority  of  the  United  States  Govern 
ment.  The  Carpet-bagger  and  Negro  State  Govern 
ments  and  Legislatures  never  seriously  infringed  on 
the  rights  of  property. 

After  _the  war  the  Southerners  accepted  the  situa 
tion  as  few  but  Americans  can  accept  a  defeat,  and, 
instead  of  throwing  up  their  hands  and  crying  to 
heaven,  sought  to  make  the  best  of  the  lands  that  re 
mained  to  them.  It  seemed  not  impossible  that,  the 
property  in  slaves  being  written  off  as  lost,  the  land 
might  be  as  cheaply  and  effectively  cultivated  by 
hired  labour,  if  the  negroes  could  be  got  to  work ;  at 
any  rate  it  was  a  necessity  to  get  it  cultivated  some- 


142       THE  MANAGEMENT  OF  COLOURED   RACES. 

how.  The  negroes,  on  the  other  hand,  found  that  they 
must  work  or  starve ;  and  the  feeling  between  them 
and  their  former  masters  being,  as  I  have  said,  not  un 
friendly,  the  matter  was  arranged  in  one  way  or  another. 

Under  the  old  system  there  were  no  great  estates 
in  the  English  sense — that  is,  very  large  properties, 
let  to  tenants.  The  large  plantations  were  what  we 
should  call  large  farms,  several  hundred  acres — up  to, 
say,  a  thousand  or  fifteen  hundred — being  cultivated 
by  the  owner  with  slave  labour.  Some  of  the  old 
owners,  and  some  Northerners  and  Englishmen  who 
purchased  encumbered  estates  at  a  cheap  rate,  at  first 
tried  to  maintain  this  system  with  hired  labour,  but 
the  result  has  been  to  show  that,  as  in  almost  all  the 
States  of  the  Union,  large  farming  does  not  pay  as 
well  as  small  farming,  and  consequently  the  large 
farms  have  for  the  most  part  been  broken  up  or 
let  to  small  farmers. 

There  is  a  general  concurrence  of  opinion,  and  not 
of  opinion  only,  but  of  the  most  practical  experience, 
that  the  blacks  make  admirable  labourers  when  they 
are  under  sufficient  supervision.  On  public  works,  and 
all  undertakings  carried  on  under  professional  superin 
tendence,  nothing  can  be  better  or  more  effective  than 
their  labour.  They  are  physically  exceedingly  fine 
men  ;  they  stand  any  climate  and  any  weather,  and 
are  quite  ready  to  do  a  good  day's  work  for  a  mode 
rate  day's  pay,  provided  it  is  fairly  and  regularly  paid. 
I  heard  of  no  case  in  which  when  such  work  has  been 
offered  to  them  they  have  preferred  to  squat  down  in 
idleness  ;  that  allegation  against  the  negro  character 


BLACK  AND   WHITE  IN  THE   SOUTHERN  STATES.    143 

seems  to  me  quite  disproved  by  experience.  The 
worst  said  is  that  they  cannot  alway  be  depended  on, 
and  sometimes  after  labouring  for  a  time  will  go  off 
for  a  time.  There  may  be  some  cases  in  which,  work 
not  being  readily  available,  and  little  assistance  or 
guidance  forthcoming,  they  have  sunk  into  a  some 
what  degraded  condition,  but  such  cases  are  quite  rare 
and  exceptional.  I  came  across  none,  though  I  have 
heard  it  asserted  that  there  are  such.  On  small  farms, 
where  black  men  work  in  small  numbers,  in  company 
with  and  under  the  immediate  control  of  their  em 
ployers,  they  do  exceedingly  well ;  also  when  they 
work  on  their  own  account  they  do  very  well.  It  is 
only  where  they  are  employed  in  large  numbers,  under 
insufficient  supervision,  as  on  very  large  farms,  that 
they  are  apt  to  take  it  easy  and  idle  away  their  time 
as  is  the  case  with  most  such  races. 

Not  only  is  the  negro  labour  excellent,  but  also 
there  is  among  the  Southern  proprietors  and  leading 
men  accustomed  to  black  labour,  and  not  so  used  to 
whites,  a  disposition  greatly  to  rely  on  black  labour 
as  a  conservative  element,  securing  them  against  the 
dangers  and  difficulties  which  they  see  arising  from 
the  combinations  and  violence  of  the  white  labourers 
in  some  of  the  Northern  States ;  and  on  this  ground 
the  blacks  are  cherished  and  protected  by  democratic 
statesmen,  who  now  hold  power  in  the  South. 

As  in  other  parts  of  America,  wages  are  not  so 
high  as  they  were  ;  but  a  common  negro  labourer  in 
rural  districts  can  generally  earn  about  fifty  cents, 
say  two  shillings,  a  day ;  and  that,  with  food  so  cheap 


144       THE   MANAGEMENT  OF   COLOURED  RACES. 

as  it  is,  and  in  a  country  which  requires  little  fuel 
and  no  very  expensive  shelter,  is  a  very  good  wage. 
Nothing  so  much  brings  home  to  me  the  poverty  and 
lowness  of  living  of  our  Indian  population  as  to  hear 
these  wages  talked  of  as  low  ;  being,  as  they  are,  six 
or  eight  times  the  wages  of  a  coolie  in  India,  while 
food  is  scarcely,  if  at  all,  dearer.  In  truth,  the 
negroes  are  very  well  off. 

More  important  than  the  rate  of  wages  is  the 
question  whether  the  black  labourers  show  any  dis 
position  to  providence  and  saving.  There  is  a  good 
deal  of  discrepancy  in  the  evidence  on  this  subject, 
but  on  the  whole  I  am  afraid  it  must  be  said  that 
the  balance  of  evidence  is  decidedly  against  them.  It 
seems  pretty  clear  that  providence  is  as  yet  the  ex 
ception,  and  that  the  rule  is  a  light-hearted  way  of 
spending  their  money  as  they  get  it.  A  very  great 
scandal  and  evil  was  the  failure  of  the  Freedman's 
Bank,  in  which  so  many  were  induced  to  put  their 
savings  in  the  days  of  high  wages.  I  suspect  that  in 
the  case  of  the  negro,  as  of  other  races,  prudence  will 
not  come  but  with  the  growth  of  desires  and  ambitions 
only  to  be  satisfied  by  saving. 

In  some  parts  of  the  country  there  has  been  a 
considerable  lack  of  female  labour.  In  slave  days 
women  were  probably  worked  too  much  ;  now  they 
sometimes  work  too  little,  because,  in  the  parts  where 
they  are  much  mixed  with  whites,  the  negro  women, 
seeing  that  the  white  women  do  not  work  in  the 
fields,  and  being,  more  than  the  men,  inclined  to 
assert  equality,  refuse  out-door  work.  I.  have  no 


BLACK   AND   WHITE   IN   THE   SOUTHERN   STATES.    145 

sympathy  whatever  with  the  sentimental  feeling 
which  would  stigmatise  the  field  labour  of  honest 
Scotch  or  German  women  as  degrading,  and  I  do  not 
sympathise  with  negro  ladies  who  make  their  hus 
bands  work  while  they  enjoy  the  sweets  of  emancipa 
tion.  But  after  all  they  are  only  followTing  the  most 
usual  American  fashion  in  regard  to  out-door  labour ; 
and  both  in  the  more  negro  parts  of  the  country,  at 
all  times,  on  their  own  farms  at  cotton-picking  seasons, 
and  everywhere  at  in-door  labour,  the  negro  women 
work  well  enough. 

I  inquired  whether  the  black  labourers  have 
shown  any  disposition  to  violent  outbreaks  such  as 
have  occurred  in  several  West  India  islands,  but  I 
could  only  hear  of  one  such  case,  when  the  hired 
labourers  in  some  of  the  rice-plantations  of  South 
Carolina  struck  for  wages,  and  used  much  violence 
towards  non- strikers,  hunting  them  about  with  whips. 
The  whites  attempting  to  apprehend  the  rioters  were 
mobbed,  and  the  aifair  at  one  time  looked  very  serious; 
but,  by  the  aid  of  influential  black  politicians,  the 
matter  was  accommodated,  and  the  labourers  have 
since  worked  well  and  quietly.  I  am  told  that  though 
in  their  immediate  demands  the  blacks  were  in  the 
wrong,  they  had  much  ground  of  complaint,  owing 
to  the  practice  of  some  of  the  employers,  who,  not 
being  able  to  pay  the  wages  earned  and  due,  put  the 
labourers  off  with  checks  upon  stores  kept  on  the 
truck  principle.  So  here,  also,  there  was  some  in 
justice  at  the  bottom  of  the  affair.  But  it  shows  that 
when  stirred  up  there  is  always  this  element  of  ex- 

L 


146       THE  MANAGEMENT  OF  COLOUPtED  RACES. 

citability  and  potential  violence  in  the  negro  cha 
racter.  Here,  also,  I  understand,  the  women  came  to 
the  front.  The  men  might  have  been  managed,  but 
the  women  were  terribly  violent. 

The  great  majority,  I  take  it,  of  the  negroes  are 
not  employed  at  regular  wages,  but  work  more  or 
less  as  farmers  of  a  sort.  Not  only  are  large  farms 
generally  unsuccessful  in  America,  but  in  the  South 
there  is  very  great  deficiency  of  capital  to  work 
such  farms;  and  so  it  has  come  about  that  most  of 
the  land  is  cultivated  on  a  sort  of  co-operative  or 
Metayer-tenant  system.  Virginia  still  contains  a 
large  negro  population,  and  I  saw  one  instance  of  a 
large  estate  still  successfully  cultivated  by  hired  black 
labour,  under  a  proprietor  well  known  for  his  kind 
treatment  of  the  negroes  ;  but  others  doubt  his  pro 
fits,  and  say  that  his  success  is  due  to  large  private 
means,  and  that  there  are  not  many  such  instances. 
In  fact,  Yirginia,  not  being  a  cotton  State,  is  some 
what  unfortunately  situated.  The  influx  of  cheap 
cereals  from  the  West  makes  their  culture  in  the  East 
unprofitable;  and  in  the  culture  of  its  old  staple, 
tobacco,  Yirginia  has  been  surpassed  by  some  more 
Western  States.  Except  in  the  higher  tracts  in  the 
west  of  the  State,  where  excellent  pastures  support 
very  fine  cattle.  I  am  afraid  it  is  not  very  prosperous. 

From  North  Carolina  all  the  way  round  to  Texas 
there  is  a  belt  of  States  in  which  cotton  is  to  an  over 
whelming  degree  the  staple.  That  staple  is  certainly 
now  produced  in  greater  quantity  than  ever  it  was, 
and  it  cannot  be  said  that  this  tract  has  in  any  degree 


BLACK  AND    WHITE   IN  THE   SOUTHERN   STATES.   147 

receded  or  ceased  to  progress,  even  though  the  want 
of  money  resulting  from  the  war  and  its  consequences 
is  still  very  greatly  felt.  The  cotton  I  speak  of  is 
the  ordinary  short  cotton,  which  always  has  formed 
the  great  bulk  of  the  American  crop.  There  is  a 
narrow  belt  on  the  seacoast,  which  used  to  produce 
in  part  the  long,  or  Sea  Island  cotton,  and  in  part  rice, 
where  there  has  certainly  been  a  great  falling  off ; 
but  this  is,  I  believe,  chiefly  due  to  other  causes  than 
the  emancipation  of  the  slaves.  The  long-cotton 
plant  produces  but  a  fraction  of  the  quantity  that  the 
ordinary  cotton  yields,  and  requires  a  more  expensive 
and  careful  cultivation.  It  never  could  be  produced 
at  a  profit  except  at  a  price  several  times  greater  than 
that  of  ordinary  cotton.  Xow  that  Egyptian  cotton 
to  a  great  degree  supplies  the  wants  of  manufacturers, 
no  considerable  quantity  of  Sea  Island  will  fetch  this 
price  in  the  market,  and  consequently  its  production 
has  fallen  off.  So  as  regards  the  American  rice, 
which  was  once  in  great  demand.  It  is  now  so  un 
dersold  by  Indian  rice  that  it  is  not  exported,  and 
scarcely  holds  its  own  in  America  by  the  aid  of  a 
heavy  protective  duty.  I  did  not  see  the  sugar-lands 
of  Louisiana,  I  understand  that  the  sugar- culture  a 
good  deal  fell  off,  but  has  recovered  itself,  aided  as 
it  is  by  a  protective  duty.  It  is,  however,  at  a  great 
disadvantage  compared  with  the  West  India  sugar,-  the 
frosts  often  prematurely  killing  the  American  annual, 
while  the  West  Indians  get  two  or  three  crops  from 
one  planting.  I  doubt  if  sugar  will  ever  be  a  great 
American  staple. 

L  2 


148       THE   MANAGEMENT  OF   COLOURED  RACES. 

We  may  take,  then,  the  ordinary  cotton  as  the 
great  subject  of  black  labour  in  the  South.  For 
some  years  the  produce  has  begun  to  overtop  the 
best  years  before  the  war,  and  the  late  cotton-pick 
ing  season,  which  was  going  on  when  I  visited  the 
Southern  States,  very  far  exceeded  any  previous  crop, 
the  season  having  been  altogether  favourable  and  the 
late  autumn  unusually  favourable  to  cotton -picking. 
There  seemed  to  be  no  doubt  that  the  crop  would 
considerably  exceed  five  millions  of  bales ;  and  if  it 
had  not  been  for  the  extreme  stagnation  of  the  cotton 
manufacturing  trade,  and  consequent  lowness  of  prices, 
the  South  would  be  in  a  fair  way  to  recovery.  Let 
us  see,  then,  how  this  great  cotton  crop  is  raised. 
There  has  been  an  idea  prevalent  that  much  of  it  is 
due  to  white  labour,  and  there  is  some  truth  in  this, 
but  only  to  a  limited  degree.  It  has  now  been  dis 
covered  that  cotton  (really  a  very  hardy  plant)  will 
grow  very  well  on  the  high  red  soils  not  generally 
supposed  to  be  cotton-lands,  and  by  the  aid  of  stimu 
lating  fertilisers  it  is  brought  to  maturity  earlier  than 
formerly ;  consequently  it  has  advanced  some  distance 
north  of  its  former  limits  and  a  considerable  distance 
up  into  the  higher  parts  of  the  Southern  States  (along 
the  Alleghany  range),  where  small  white  farmers 
abound.  There  has  also  been  a  great  increase  in 
Texas,  where,  I  believe,  most  of  the  farmers  are  white, 
but  I  did  not  see  that  country.  In  the  Carolinas  and 
Georgia  it  is  certainly  the  case  that  a  good  deal  of 
cotton  is  raised  by  small  upland  white  farmers  who 
did  not  raise  it  before  ;  in  part  by  their  own  labour. 


BLACK  AND   WHITE  IN  THE   SOUTHERN   STATES.    149 

•and  in  part  by  the  aid  of  the  black  labourers  whom 
they  employ.  The  portion,  however,  of  the  crop 
wrhich  is  raised  exclusively  by  white  labour  is,  I  be 
lieve,  very  small ;  the  whites  generally  prefer  other 
crops;  cotton  culture  is  especially  suited  to  the  blacks. 
There  is  rather  a  change-  from  large  farmers  to  small, 
than  from  black  to  white  labourers.  Taking,  then, 
the  normal  condition  of  the  cotton  districts — white 
ownership  and v black  labour — the  owners  still  cul 
tivate  by  hired  labour  moderate  home-farms,  but 
the  greater  portion  of  their  lands  they  let  out  to 
blacks  on  a  variety  of  terms.  First  there  is  a  mere 
co-operative  arrangement  under  which  the  owner 
supplies  land,  seed,  mule,  implements,  and  all,  and 
exercises  a  general  supervision  over  the  culture, 
giving  the  labourer  a  share  of  the  crop  rather  than 
taking  a  share  from  him.  The  labourer's  share  is, 
moreover,  subject  to  deduction  for  food  supplied  to 
him  during  the  cultivating  season.  Then  we  have 
regular  Metayer  tenants,  who  themselves  find  the 
mule  and  implements,  the  crop  being  divided  with 
the  landlord  ;  and  again  many  tenants  who  pay  a 
fixed  rent  in  cotton — so  many  bales — and  a  few 
(comparatively  rare)  who  pay  money  rents.  Some 
times  white  men  rent  land  and  cultivate  with  negro 
labourers,  but  most  frequently  the  owner  deals  direct 
with  the  negro. 

I  have  said  that  the  cotton  cultivation  is  suited  to 
the  blacks ;  it  is  easily  carried  on  upon  a  small  scale 
— as  slaves  they  have  learned  to  raise  it.  A  single 
mule  and  a  light  plough  suffice  for  the  operations  of 


150       THE   MANAGEMENT  OF  COLOURED   RACES. 

a  small  farm.  The  cotton  gives  employment  almost 
all  the  year  round,  especially  at  the  season  unfavour 
able  to  white  labour.  After  preparing  the  ground, 
sowing  and  tending  it,  there  is  much  and  constant 
hoeing  and  clearing  to  be  done.  Then  at  picking- 
time  the  negro  family  turns  out,  and  much  work  is 
done  without  expense  which  would  be  very  expensive 
to  do  by  hired  labour.  And  after  the  cotton  is 
picked  many  hands,  especially  the  women,  find  em 
ployment  in  the  ginning  mills.  The  ginning  system 
makes  the  division  of  shares  much  easier  than  it  other 
wise  would  be.  The  hand-gins  have  completely  gone 
out.  All  the  cotton  must  of  necessity  be  brought  to 
the  mills.  After  being  ginned  it  is  divided,  and  the 
account  is  struck. 

The  cotton  is  then  produced,  and  things  go  on 
much  better  than  might  have  been  expected  under  the 
circumstances.  Yet,  after  all,  this  is  rather  attained 
by  make-shifts  the  result  of  necessity,  than  based  on 
a  settled  and  satisfactory  system.  Although  after 
the  war  the  proprietors  and  the  ex- slaves  came  to 
terms  to  carry  on  the  cultivation,  it  must  not  be 
supposed  that  the  former  slaves  have  generally  re 
mained  with  their  old  masters.  In  some  cases  no 
doubt  this  is  so,  but  it  is  the  exception.  Not  only 
have  war  and  revolution  caused  considerable  migra 
tions,  but  there  seems  to  have  been  a  general  feeling 
that  freedom  was  not  practically  realised  till  the 
slaves  had  left  their  masters,  if  it  were  only  for  a 
time.  Both  parties  seem  to  have  felt  that  it  should 
be  so ;  and  it  often  happened  that  while  remaining  on 


BLACK  AND  WHITE   IN  THE   SOUTHERN  STATES.    151 

quite  friendly  terms  with  their  old  masters,  and  even 
coming  to  them  for  advice  and  assistance,  A's  former 
slaves  would  prefer  to  cultivate  under  B,  and  B's 
slaves  under  A.  Altogether,  somewhat  migratory 
habits  were  set  up,  which  the  existing  system  of 
agriculture  has  not  tended  to  diminish.  Some  men 
whose  means  admit  of  a  liberal  system,  by  which 
assistance  is  rendered  to  the  cultivators,  are  well 
satisfied  on  the  whole  with  the  result  of  the  present 
method,  but  more  generally  it  is  found  that  there  is 
a  want  of  fixity  and  stability  about  it.  The  cultiva 
tion  is  carried  on  in  a  somewhat  imperfect  and  hand- 
to-mouth  sort  of  way,  and  the  negroes  frequently 
change  about  from  one  estate  to  another.  Except 
some  short  clearance  leases,  there  is  no  system  of 
leases  of  cleared  land ;  it  is  merely  held  from  year  to 
year,  and  there  is  no  system  of  compensation  for  im 
provements  under  which  the  tenant  might  improve 
his  house,  his  fences,  and  his  land,  and  settle  himself 
down.  On  the  contrary,  it  is  a  common  complaint 
that  much  land  is  allowed  to  run  out  into  ravines,  or 
is  otherwise  neglected  and  exhausted,  and  then  aban 
doned  by  the  tenant. 

Xo  doubt  the  purely  commercial  system  of  land- 
letting  succeeds  in  Scotland  and  parts  of  England, 
where  we  have  capitalist  landlords  and  large  capitalist 
farmers ;  but  I  am  more  and  more  convinced  by  all 
I  can  see  and  learn  in  various  countries  that  a  small- 
farm  system,  under  which  the  landlord  does  not  do  all 
the  improvements,  never  works  well  without  some 
sort  of  fixity  of  tenure.  In  America  there  is  no 


152       THE   MANAGEMENT  OF   COLOURED   RACES. 

system  of  tenant-right,  but  land  is  cheap,  and  through 
out  the  United  States  (with  perhaps  an  exception  in 
California,  on  which  I  need  not  here  dwell)  the 
agricultural  success  of  the  country  is  due  to  small 
farmers  owning  their  own  land.  I  have,  then,  sought 
with  very  special  interest  to  ascertain  whether  the 
black  small  farmers  of  the  Southern  States  have  to 
any  considerable  extent  purchased  their  farms,  or  are 
in  the  way  of  doing  so. 

I  freely  admit  it  may  well  be  that  if,  in  the  first 
instance,  there  had  been  confiscation  of  the  lands  of 
the  whites  and  every  enfranchised  black  had  been 
given,  what  they  are  said  to  have  expected,  twenty- 
five  acres  and  a  mule,  and  left  to  make  the  most  of  it, 
without  white  assistance  or  guidance,  the  result  might 
perhaps  have  been  disastrous.  The  people  might  pos 
sibly  have  relapsed  into  semi-barbarism  and  squatted 
down,  content  to  raise  a  low  subsistence  from  the 
land.  That  might  or  might  not  have  been  so.  But 
there  certainly  is  not  the  least  fear  that  anything  of 
the  kind  could  now  result  from  the  acquisition  of 
land  by  the  negroes  by  any  fair  methods.  They  have 
become  accustomed  to  independent  labour  and  to 
raising  valuable  staples  for  the  market.  So  far  from 
neglecting  these  latter  in  order  to  raise  a  low  and  lazy 
diet,  the  common  accusation  against  them  now  is  that 
they  cultivate  the  staples,  which  bring  money,  too 
much,  to  the  exclusion  of  food -supply.  I  have  heard 
much  said  of  the  folly  of  negro  farmers  in  buying 
Western  corn  and  bacon  instead  of  raising  these 
things.  This  is  partly  the  consequence  of  the  system 


BLACK  AND   WHITE   IN  THE   SOUTHERN   STATES.   153 

of  cotton-rents,  which  makes  a  large  cotton  cultivation 
obligatory;  but  also,  I  dare  say,  these  people  know 
by  experience  what  pays  them  best.  At  any  rate  it 
is  clear  that  they  are  not  now  inclined  to  lapse  into  a 
low  style  of  living;  their  fault  and  difficulty  is  just  in 
the  opposite  direction.  Unfortunately  they  live  too 
freely  and  generously,  and  do  not  save  money  to  buy 
land,  and  make  themselves  independent,  as  they 
might. 

This  is  the  general  rule,  I  fear,  but  not  the 
universal  practice.  Throughout  the  Southern  States 
there  are  already  a  good  many  negroes  (though  very 
few  compared  to  the  whole  number)  who  cultivate 
land  of  their  own,  and  there  are  very  many  more 
who  own  houses  and  small  patches,  especially  in  the 
vicinity  of  towns,  where  they  congregated  too  much 
at  first,  and  where  for  a  time  they  obtained  wages 
which  enabled  them  to  set  up  house.  It  is  generally 
said  that  most  of  the  negroes  who  were  superior 
servants  on  the  plantations,  and  above  the  ordinary 
level  in  the  days  of  slavery,  have  now  acquired  land. 
Though  the  old  proprietors  sometimes  cling  to  their 
land  when  their  means  do  not  justify  their  holding  it, 
and  in  some  places  there  is  a  feeling  against  letting 
the  land  pass  into  the  hands  of  blacks,  there  is  so 
much  land  for  sale  that  those  who  save  money  need 
have  no  difficulty  in  buying  it. 

The  statistics  which  most  of  the  States  are  now 
beginning  to  attempt  are  very  imperfect  and  unreliable, 
and  it  is  difficult  to  ascertain  how  much  agricultural 
land  is  now  owned  by  blacks  who  have  acquired  it 


154       THE   MANAGEMENT  OF   COLOURED   RACES. 

since  emancipation,  and  to  what  extent  they  are  now 
acquiring  land.  Even  when  there  are  any  sort  of 
figures  they  include  all  the  property  of  coloured 
people,  and  the  totals  are  swelled  by  the  property  of 
those  free  before  the  war ;  for  instance,  of  the  French 
mulatto  Creoles,  who  are,  I  believe,  found  to  some 
extent  in  Charleston  and  Savannah,  as  well  as  in 
New  Orleans.  But  from  personal  experience  and 
inquiries  I  ascertained  that  farms  owned  by  emanci 
pated  blacks  are  certainly  found  here  and  there  scat 
tered  about  the  country.  The  ice  has  been  broken, 
the  example  set. 

Georgia,  which  was  not  long  under  a  black  Legis 
lature,  but  which  early  adopted  liberal  principles  of 
white  rule,  has  been  held  out,  in  a  paragraph  which 
went  the  round  of  the  papers,  as  in  advance  of  other 
States  in  respect  of  negro  property  ;  but  on  examining 
the  latest  official  papers  I  think  they  somewhat  de 
tract  from  the  grounds  of  this  reputation.  Most  of 
the  property  attributed  to  coloured  people  consists 
of  household  furniture,  animals,  agricultural  tools,  &c. 
They  have  something  more  than  1^  million  dollars 
worth  of  land  out  of  about  86  millions  worth  in  the 
State.  But  some  of  the  largest  quantities  are  in 
counties  where  there  are  fewest  negroes,  and  can 
hardly  be  ordinary  small  farms.  I  fear,  too,  from  all 
I  can  learn,  that,  in  these  days  of  cheap  cotton,  the 
negro- owned  lands  are  not  now  much  increasing. 
Georgia  has  done  nothing  special  to  facilitate  the 
acquisition  of  land  by  the  negroes,  and  what  I  could 
gather  from  personal  inquiries  rather  led  me  to  think 


BLACK   AND   WHITE   IN  THE   SOUTHERN   STATES.   155 

that  in  this  respect  they  were  less  forward  there  than 
in  the  Carolinas. 

In  South  Carolina  more  has  been  done  for  them, 
and  I  think  they  have  done  more  for  themselves  than 
in  most  States.  During  '  carpet-bag '  rule  the  State 
Government  established  a  commission  to  buy  estates 
as  they  came  into  the  market  and  settle  freedmen 
upon  them  on  fair  terms  of  payment,  on  exactly  the 
plan  recomnlended  by  the  last  Parliamentary  com 
mittee  on  the  Irish  land ;  and  the  plan  promised 
success  if  it  had  not  been  interrupted  by  accusations 
of  fraud  and  embezzlement  against  those  charged 
with  the  management,  and  the  fall  of  the  Carpet-bag 
Government.  A  more  important  and  permanent  ex 
periment  was  made  on  the  lands  sold  by  the  United 
States  Government  for  taxes,  on  the  Coast  of  South 
Carolina.  These  lands  were  not  given  to  the  negroes, 
but  were  cut  up  into  ten  and  twenty  acre  lots,  and 
offered  to  them  for  purchase  on  reasonable  terms.  They 
were  taken  up  by  blacks,  who  by  paying  for  them 
showed  both  their  ability  to  help  themselves  and 
their  appreciation  of  the  opportunity  offered  to  them. 
I  visited  these  tracts,  and  was  very  greatly  interested 
in  the  independent  and  self-supporting  rural  com 
munities  which  I  there  found.  They  were  under 
considerable  disadvantages.  To  begin  with,  most  of 
them  were  those  low -country  negroes  who  have  been 
less  than  the  others  civilised  by  contact  with  the 
white  man.  Then  the  lands  on  which  they  are 
settled  are  those  which  have  been  more  and  more 
falling  into  decadence  owing  to  the  decline  in  long 


156       THE   MANAGEMENT  OF   COLOURED   RACES. 

cotton  and  rice  ;  so  much  so  that  the  white  proprietors 
of  large  portions  of  such  lands  have  suffered  them  to 
go  out  of  cultivation,  or  sold  them  for  a  song.  Xo 
other  money -fetching  staple  has  yet  been  found  for 
these  lands,  and  they  are  not  suitable  for  short  cotton. 
Hence  the  negroes  have  carried  on  the  long- cotton 
culture  at  a  very  great  disadvantage.  On  the  other 
hand,  they  had  this  considerable  advantage,  that  the 
able-bodied  men  can  do  much  to  make  the  two  ends 
meet  by  occasional  labour  at  the  ports,  and  especially 
on  the  great  phosphate  beds,  which  have  become  a 
large  source  of  industry  and  wealth  to  that  part  of  the 
country.  The  fact  that  the  men  readily  avail  them 
selves  of  the  opportunity  of  hard  and  remunerative 
work  and  make  most  admirable  labourers  at  it — as 
good,  I  am  told,  as  any  in  the  world — is  of  itself  a 
practical  answer  to  any  suggestion  that  they  are 
unwilling  to  work.  I  have  heard  it  suggested  that 
negroes  are  somewhat  unreliable  workmen  for  a  con 
tinuance,  and  apt  to  throw  up  work  and  go  off  when 
they  have  made  a  little  money  and  want  to  attend  a 
religious  camp-meeting  or  something  of  that  kind ; 
but  there  is  no  question  that  for  a  certain  time  no 
workman  can  be  more  steady  and  effective.  At 
seasons  when  no  very  hard  field-work  is  necessary 
these  men  leave  the  women  and  children  to  hoe  and 
look  after  the  crops,  while  they  earn  wages  by  diving 
for  and  cleaning  the  phosphates.  It  has  probably 
been  an  advantage  to  them  that  their  land  has  not 
been  such  as  to  enable  them  to  live  without  working 
hard,  men  and  women  too. 


BLACK  AND   WHITE   IN  THE   SOUTHERN   STATES.   157 

They  have  had,  too,  the  advantage  of  aid  from 
friendly  Northern  and  other  whites,  who  do  for  them 
those  things  which  they  cannot  do  for  themselves. 
Some  very  excellent  Northern  dealers  gin  and  buy 
their  cotton,  and  white  storekeepers  have  introduced 
among  them  a  wholesome  system  of  ready-money 
payment.  They  owe  very  much  to  the  devoted 
Northern  and  English  ladies  who  have  come  among 
them  to  educate  their  children.  It  is  somewhat 
difficult  to  reconcile  conflicting  statements.  While 
many  or  most  people  attribute  to  the  negro  race  some 
very  serious  social  and  other  faults,  those  who  have 
the  best  opportunity  of  knowing  these  land- owning 
negroes  represent  them  as  possessed  of  every  virtue  • 
not  only  those  ordinarily  conceded  to  the  race,  but 
those  usually  denied — thrift,  carefulness,  and  family 
affection.  They  are  said  to  save  in  order  to  buy 
farms  for  their  sons,  and  to  be  altogether  a  growing 
and  progressive  community,  unremunerative  prices 
notwithstanding.  Perhaps  some  allowance  must  be 
made  for  a  kindly  enthusiasm  ;  but  also  I  am  con 
vinced  that  these  people,  more  happily  and  inde 
pendently-placed  and  educated  to  that  craving  for  land 
which  of  all  things  leads  to  thrift,  really  are  much 
superior  to  the  average  of  the  negro  race.  I  could 
myself  see  that  their  homes  are  better,  and  that  they 
have  many  horses  and  light  carts  and  other  evidences 
of  comfort  and  well-doing. 

I  visited  some  of  these  people  with  a  coloured 
Congress-man  to  wThom  they  much  look,  and  was 
struck  by  the  eager  interest  with  which  they  (especially 


158       THE   MANAGEMENT   OF   COLOURED   RACES, 

the  women)  questioned  him  about  an  attack  on  the 
title  to  the  lands,  which  has  a  good  deal  disturbed 
them.  It  has  been  attempted  or  threatened  to  ques 
tion  in  the  Courts  the  legality  of  the  sales  by  United 
States  authority,  under  which  the  land  came  into  the 
hands  of  the  blacks.  No  doubt  it  seemed  at  the  time 
that  by  these  forced  sales  at  a  cheap  rate  the  lands 
were  sadly  sacrificed ;  and,  the  owners  being  in  re 
bellious  contumacy,  the  proceeds,  such  as  they  were, 
came  into  the  United  States  Treasury.  But,  in  truth, 
this  particular  class  of  land  has  fallen  to  so  low  a 
value,  that  if  the  sale  had  taken  place  now,  it  would 
perhaps  have  scarcely  realised  more  than  it  did  when 
sold  after  the  war.  If  the  money  in  the  Treasury 
were  restored  to  the  old  owners,  justice  tempered  with 
mercy  would  be  done  without  disturbance. 

Many  proprietors  in  South  Carolina  and  elsewhere, 
far  from  thinking,  as  some  of  our  colonists  seem  to 
think,  that  the  best  way  to  make  sure  of  hired  labour 
is  to  debar  the  labouring  population  from  any  in 
dependent  place  on  the  land,  have  followed  a  much 
wiser  course,  and  encourage  by  all  means  in  their 
power  the  settlement  of  the  negroes  on  small  holdings 
owned  by  themselves.  They  have  rightly  deemed 
that  this  is  the  best  way  to  fix  a  permanent  popula 
tion  from  which  they  can  draw  labour  when  needed. 
They  have  therefore  laid  out  parts  of  their  lands  in 
small  lots,  and  offered  facilities  to  negroes  willing  to 
purchase.  Once  the  blacks  are  settled  down  in  this 
way,  it  is  not  difficult  to  maintain  friendly  relations 
with  them.  They  are  still  a  good  deal  dependent  on 


BLACK  AND  WHITE   IN  THE   SOUTHERN   STATES.    159 

the  proprietor  of  the  estate  for  liberty  to  graze  their 
cattle  in  the  woods,  and  other  little  aids.  They  are 
a  good-natured,  easily-managed  race,  and  they  are 
always  ready  to  accept  a  good  spell  of  work,  for  a  time 
at  least.  Proprietors  so  situated  get  plenty  of  labour 
when  they  want  it  on  the  lands  they  cultivate  them 
selves,  and  for  any  improvements  and  operations  that 
they  may  undertake. 

On  the  whole  I  am  very  agreeably  surprised  to 
find  the  position  of  the  emancipated  blacks  so  good, 
and  the  industrial  relations  between  them  and  the 
whites  so  little  strained  and  difficult.  They  are,  as  a 
rule,  good  labourers  and  very  tolerable  cultivators. 
A  gentleman  who  has  had  much  experience  of  them, 
and  who  now  labours  among  them  in  one  of  the  most 
negro  parts  of  Virginia,  in  describing  their  character 
said  that  one  might  take  about  one-third  of  them  to 
be  really  good  and  progressive  ;  another  third  to  be 
so  far  well-inclined  and  well-doing  that,  with  good 
management  and  judicious  treatment,  they  may  be 
made  good ;  and  the  remaining  third  to  be  bad.  But 
I  am  inclined  to  think,  from  what  I  saw  and  learned 
elsewhere,  that  this  description  is  more  correct  of  a 
particular  tract,  in  which  many  of  the  best  and  the 
worst  of  the  race  congregated  during  the  war,  than  of 
the  country  generally ;  and  that  in  reality  both  the 
good,  thrifty  men  who  have  shown  a  capacity  for  in 
dependence,  and  the  bad,  who  prefer  idleness  and 
thieving  to  work,  are  far  less  than  this  saying  im 
plies,  the  great  majority  being  in  the  second  category, 
who  so  far  do  well  that  under  favourable  circumstances 


160       THE  MANAGEMENT  OF   COLOURED  RACES. 

they  will  settle  down  into  an  excellent  peasantry.  It 
seemed  to  me  that  the  present  situation  gives  very 
good  ground  of  hope,  and  I  am  sanguine  of  a  favour 
able  issue.  The  position  of  the  cultivators  is  such 
that  they  may  well,  with  a  little  kindly  aid,  become 
independent  farmers  ;  and  any  man  inclined  to  work 
honestly  and  well  can  earn  sufficiently  good  wages. 

All  that  is  now  wanted  to  make  the  negro  a  fixed 
and  conservative  element  in  American  society  is  to 
give  him  encouragement  to,  and  facilities  for,  making- 
himself,  by  his  own  exertions,  a  small  landowner ;  to 
do,  in  fact,  for  him  what  we  have  sought  to  do  for  the 
Irish  farmer.  Land  in  America  is  so  much  cheaper 
and  more  abundant,  that  it  would  be  infinitely  easier 
to  effect  the  same  object  there.  I  would  by  no  means 
seek  to  withdraw  the  whole  population  from  hired 
labour ;  on  the  contrary,  the  negro  in  many  respects 
is  so  much  at  his  best  in  that  function,  that  I  should 
look  to  a  large  class  of  labourers  remaining ;  but  1 
am  at  the  same  time  confident  that  it  would  be  a 
very  great  benefit  and  stability  to  the  country  if  a 
large  number  should  acquire  by  thrift  an  independent 
position  as  landowning  American  citizens. 

Supposing  things  to  settle  down  peaceably,  as  I 
hope  they  may,  I  go  so  far  as  to  say  that,  though 
nothing  is  perfect  in  this  world,  the  American  blacks 
are  in  a  fair  way  of  becoming  a  comfortable,  well-to-do 
population  to  a  degree  found  in  very  few  countries ; 
a  condition  which  may  compare  very  favourably  not 
only  with  the  Indian  ryot,  the  Russian  serf,  or  the 
Irish  tenant-farmer,  but  also  with  the  Dorsetshire 


BLACK  AND   WHITE  IN  THE   SOUTHERN   STATES.   161 

labourer.  I  doubt  whether,  on  the  whole,  a  better 
labouring  population,  more  suited  to  the  climate  and 
country  in  which  they  find  themselves,  is  anywhere 
to  be  found.  The  whites  certainly  cannot  do  without 
them  ;  already  the  great  drawback  to  the  Southern 
States  is  the  want  of  that  great  influx  of  foreign  po 
pulation  which  causes  the  North  and  West  to  progress 
in  a  geometrical  ratio.  Evidently  their  true  policy  is 
to  make  the  most  of  the  excellent  population  which 
they  have,  and  they  quite  see  it.  The  blacks,  again, 
certainly  cannot  do  without  the  whites ;  their  own 
race  is  not  sufficiently  advanced  to  fulfil  the  functions 
now  in  the  hands  of  the  whites. 

Newly-educated  classes,  among  races  hitherto  kept 
down,  are  apt  to  over-estimate  their  own  acquirements 
and  powers  ;  that  is  the  tendency  of  the  educated 
Hindoos  of  Calcutta  and  Bombay,  and  the  same  ten 
dency  shows  itself  among  the  educated  mulattos  and 
blacks  in  America.  It  is  scarcely  surprising  that  they 
should  chafe  against  the  social  ostracism  of  all  who 
have  dark  blood  in  their  veins,  and  should  long  for 
a  Utopia  in  which  educated  coloured  men  own  no 
superior  ;-  but  I  think  they  are  entirely  wrong  in 
preaching  as  they  now  do  to  their  countrymen  the 
advantages  of  emigration  to  Liberia — which,  however, 
they  do  not  themselves  practise.  Probably  there 
could  be  no  more  notable  example  of  the  want  of 
practical  ability  in  these  men,  than  their  management 
of  the  last  exodus  from  Charleston  to  Liberia.  The 
whole  thing  was  a  purely  coloured  movement,  and 
the  management  was  in  coloured  hands.  It  seems  to 

M 


162       THE  MANAGEMENT   OF  COLOURED   RACES. 

have  been  terribly  mismanaged  ;  and  the  result  was 
that,  after  much  loss  and  suffering  on  the  voyage, 
some  of  the  best  of  the  coloured  people  who  had 
accumulated  money  enough  to  set  them  up  most 
comfortably  in  farms  of  their  own  in  America,  were 
drained  of  everything  they  possessed  for  the  expenses 
of  the  voyage,  and  landed  in  a  country  where  they 
could  earn  as  labourers  about  half  what  they  could 
in  their  native  America,  the  cost  of  living  being  also 
infinitely  dearer.  My  advice  would  certainly  be — to 
the  blacks  in  America,  '  Stay  at  home,  and  make  the 
best  of  an  excellent  situation,' — to  the  whites,  '  Do 
all  you  can  to  keep  these  people,  conciliate  them, 
and  make  the  most  of  them.'  I  am  confident  that 
this  may  and  will  be  done,  if  only  political  diffi 
culties  and  unsettlements  do  not  mar  the  prospect, 
and  in  this  view  I  must  now  look  at  the  political 
situation. 


THE  POLITICAL  SITUATION  IN  THE  SOUTH. 

The  population  of  the  principal  Southern  States 
may  be  roughly  stated  to  be  about  half  black  and  half 
white;  that  is,  putting  aside  Tennessee,  Kentucky, 
Missouri,  and  such  intermediate  States.  Of  the  first- 
mentioned  States  the  blacks  are  in  a  considerable 
majority  in  South  Carolina  and  one  or  two  more ;  in 
the  others  the  whites  are  somewhat  more  numerous. 
Before  the  war  the  blacks  were  almost  all  slaves.  I 
think  the  idea  prevalent  in  Europe  was  that  the 


BLACK  AND   WHITE  IN  THE   SOUTHERN  STATES.     163 

Southern  whites  were  composed  of  an  aristocracy  of 
slave- owning  gentlemen,  refined  and  polished,  with 
their  dependent  slave-drivers,  and  a  large  number  of 
very  inferior  whites,  known  as  '  mean  whites,'  '  white 
trash,'  and  so  on,  who  were  rather  an  encumbrance 
than  otherwise.  It  seems  to  me  that  this  view  is  not 
justified.  The  population  was  very  much  divided 
geographically;  there  was  the  great  black  belt  on  the 
lower  lands,  where  a  few  whites  ruled  over  a  large 
slave  population  ;  and  there  was  a  broad  upper  belt 
in  the  hilly  country,  where  the  great  bulk  of  the 
population  was  white,  mostly  small  farmers  owning 
their  land.  No  doubt  education  was  much  more 
backward  in  the  South  than  in  the  North,  and  the 
people  were  probably  less  pushing  ;  but  I  have  been 
very  favourably  impressed  by  these  Southern  whites, 
many  of  whom  are  of  Scotch- Irish  (i.e.,  Northern 
Presbyterian  Irish)  or  Highland  Scotch  blood  ;  they 
seemed  to  be  a  handsome,  steady,  industrious  people; 
and  if  somewhat  primitive  in  their  ways,  and  humble 
in  the  character  of  their  houses  and  belongings,  they 
are  curiously  self- supporting  and  independent  of  the 
outer  world  ;  they  raise  their  own  food,  and  to  this 
day  their  wives  weave  their  clothes  from  their  own 
wool  and  cotton  ;  and,  if  not  rich,  they  have  few 
wants.  There  is,  no  doubt,  in  all  these  Southern 
States  a  large  intermediate  zone  in  which  white  and 
black  are  much  intermixed  ;  but  even  there  they  are 
a  good  deal  aggregated  in  patchwork  fashion,  the 
general  rule  apparently  being  that  the  rich  slave 
owners  have  occupied  the  best  lands,  and  the  poorer 

M  2 


164       THE  MANAGEMENT  OF  COLOURED   RACES. 

independent  whites  the  poorer  lands,  especially  much 
of  what  are  called  'pine  barrens/  though  they  are 
not  so  barren  after  all.  A  notable  population  in  this 
latter  country  is  the  settlement  of  Scotch  Highlanders 
who  came  over  after  '  the  '45,'  Flora  Macdonald  being 
one  of  them.  I  am  told  that  not  only  do  they  speak 
Gaelic  to  this  day,  but  the  few  black  slaves  they  had 
among  them  spoke  Gaelic  too.  In  truth,  then,  I 
gather  that  the  population  of  very  inferior  whites 
without  property  never  was  very  large.  There  were 
very  many  without  slave  property,  but  most  had 
more  or  less  land.  The  chief  justification  for  attri 
buting  lowness  and  meanness  to  the  poorer  whites 
seems  to  be,  that  some  of  the  inferior  central  tracts 
are  occupied  by  a  set  of  people  said  to  be  descended 
from  the  convicts  sent  out  in  former  days,  and  to 
this  day  very  unthrifty.  They  are  called  Sandhillers 
in  South  Carolina,  and  really  do  seem  to  be  an  inferior 
people. 

The  changes  favouring  small  farmers  have  tended 
to  improve  on  the  whole  the  condition  of  those 
Southern  whites  who  have  any  sort  of  property,  the 
losses  of  the  war  and  the  bad  times  notwithstanding  ; 
but  mere  labourers,  probably,  feel  the  competition  of 
free  black  labour  more  than  formerly.  I  saw  at 
places  black  and  white  labourers  working  together 
at  the  same  work,  and  on  the  same  wages,  in  a  way 
which,  to  our  Indian  ideas  of  the  dignity  of  the  white 
race,  is  somewhat  distressing.  But  I  did  not  detect 
anything  specially  bad  or  degraded  about  these  whites; 
and  in  the  Southern  cotton  mills  (very  prosperous 


BLACK  AND  WHITE  IN  THE   SOUTHERN  STATES.   165 

and  growing  establishments),  where  the  whites  have 
a  monopoly  of  the  employment,  they  are  very  good 
workers,  the  women  especially  being,  apparently,  as 
good  as  anywhere — the  men  not  so  good. 

The  real  weakness  of  the  Southern  party  during 
the  war  was  neither  any  want  of  gallantry  on  the 
part  of  the  slave- owning  classes,  nor  any  active 
disaffection  on  the  part  of  the  blacks,  but  the  entire 
want  of  sympathy  for  and  zeal  in  the  war  on  the  part 
of  the  majority  of  the  white  population  owning  no 
slaves,  who  considered  it  a  slave-owners'  war  for  the 
maintenance  of  slavery.  It  is  surprising  to  find  how 
many,  even  of  the  upper  classes,  say  that  they  were 
against  secession  and  war,  and  only  '  went  with  their 
State '  when  war  was  inevitable  ;  but  having  gone 
into  it,  the  whole  of  that  class,  and  all  connected 
with  them — professional  men,  doctors,  lawyers,  and 
everyone  else — went  into  it  with  a  will,  and  sus 
tained  losses  such  as,  perhaps,  no  civilised  people  ever 
bore  before.  So  long  as  they  were  successful  there 
was  little  active  opposition  by  the  poorer  whites';  but 
the  conscription  and  other  burdens  to  support  a  slave 
owners'  war  became  very  severe,  the  whites  not  in 
terested  in  that  cause  became  recalcitrant,  some  went 
into  active  opposition  ;  and  at  last  it  was  more  deser 
tion  and  disunion  than  anything  else  that  brought 
about  the  final  overthrow. 

After  the  war  the  results  of  the  victory  were 
summed  up  in  the  three  famous  amendments  to  the 
Constitution  known  as  the  13th,  14th,  and  15th,  com 
prising  the  abolition  of  slavery,  equal  privileges  for 


166       THE  MANAGEMENT   OF   COLOURED  RACES. 

all  citizens,  and  the  '  right  of  all  citizens  to  vote  not 
to  be  denied  or  abridged  in  any  State  on  account  of 
race,  colour,  or  previous  condition  of  servitude.'  The 
great  struggle  was  over  this  last,  or  15th  amendment, 
and  it  was  only  forced  on  the  Southern  States  by 
extreme  compulsion.  That  is,  in  fact,  still  the  bone 
of  contention.  At  the  first  election  under  the  new 
Constitution  many  of  the  whites  were  still  under 
political  disabilities  on  account  of  rebellion,  and  in 
several  States  the  leaders  of  the  lately  rebellious 
whites  deliberately  counselled  abstinence  from  poli 
tical  affairs  as  a  sort  of  protest.  Consequently,  in 
most  places,  the  black  vote,  under  the  guidance  of 
the  Northern  politicians  known  as  Carpet-baggers, 
carried  the  day  entirely.  The  result  was  that  a  very 
large  number  of  ignorant  negroes  were  sent  to  the 
State  Legislatures  ;  and  many  of  the  Carpet-baggers 
being  corrupt  adventurers,  there  was  much  corruption 
and  scandal.  This  has  brought  about  a  union  among 
the  Southern  whites,  for  those  who  were  unwilling  to 
fight  for  slavery  are  by  no  means  willing  to  be  ruled 
by  the  blacks,  or  even  very  freely  to  admit  their 
equality  ;  and  so  it  has  happened  that  parties  in  the 
South  are  ranged  into  black  and  white  much  more 
than  ever  they  were  before. 

In  most  States  the  white  leaders  soon  came  to 
their  senses,  and  perceived,  what  might  have  been 
seen  from  the  first,  that  a,  population  which  had  half 
the  numbers,  and  all  the  property,  influence,  and 
education,  must  prevail  over  the  black  half,  possessed 
of  none  of  these  advantages,  and  in  many  respects 


BLACK  AND  WHITE   IN   THE   SOUTHERN   STATES.    167 

dependent  on  the  propertied  classes.  They  therefore 
very  early  returned  to  the  electoral  charge,  and  by 
no  very  unfair  means  regained  possession  of  most  of 
the  State  Governments  and  the  control  of  the  State 
Legislatures.  Fortunately,  taught  by  adversity,  the 
white  leaders  so  restored  to  power  took  a  reasonable 
and  moderate  course,  honestly  accepting  the  situation 
and  the  great  constitutional  amendments.  In  these 
States  it  is  a  great  gain  that,  in  order  to  introduce 
certain  amendments  of  a  moderate  character,  the 
people,  under  white  leadership,  have  recently  passed 
revised  editions  of  their  State  constitutions  (embody 
ing  the  war  amendments,  which  no  one  can  gainsay  as 
not  being  real  and  voluntary  ;  whereas  the  first  con 
stitutions  imposed  after  the  war  were  certainly  the 
work  of  very  one-sided  conventions,  acting  under  the 
protection  of  United  States  bayonets.  Besides  the 
management  of  their  own  States,  the  white  party 
have  been  more  and  more  gaining  the  great  majority 
of  the  Southern  seats  in  the  United  States  Congress, 
and  things  have  been  more  and  more  tending  to  that 
democratic  '  Solid  South '  of  which  we  have  lately 
heard  so- much.  In  some  of  the  States  this  was  in 
evitable,  and  I  doubt  if  it  can  be  said  that  in  most 
cases  any  very  unfair  means  have  been  used  to  great 
excess.  When  I  left  the  States  several  of  the  recent 
elections  were  still  disputed  ;  but  I  believe  there  is 
no  doubt  that  in  Virginia  and  North  Carolina  two  or 
three  Republican  members  have  been  returned  for 
the  districts  in  which  the  black  vote  is  in  a  very 
overwhelming  majority  ;  and  that  is  probably  as 


168       THE  MANAGEMENT  OF  COLOURED  RACES. 

much  as  could  be  expected  under  the  circumstances. 
In  Georgia  no  Republican  Congressmen  were  elected ; 
but  several  '  independent '  Democrats  have  been  re 
turned  under  circumstances  which  tend  much  to 
ensure  fair  dealing  towards  the  blacks,  inasmuch  as, 
the  whites  being  divided,  the  black  vote  has  been 
important.  The  Independents  justify  their  separa 
tion  from  the  regulars  of  their  party  by  denouncing 
the  evils  and  jobbery  of  the  '  caucus '  system ;  and 
they  go  on  to  say  that  it  was  a  sort  of  bargain  with 
the  blacks  that  if  they  quietly  yielded  the  reins  of 
power  to  the  whites,  they  should  be  fairly  treated, 
and  their  right  to  vote  should  be  honestly  recognised; 
whereas  if  the  whole  thing  is  settled  in  white  caucus, 
from  which  the  blacks  are  excluded,  they  are  practi 
cally  disfranchised. 

As  regards,  then,  what  I  may  call  the  moderate 
States,  I  see  no  ground  for  taking  a  gloomy  view  of 
the  situation.  Perhaps,  as  a  foreigner  writing  on  the 
other  side  of  the  Atlantic,  I  may  be  permitted  to  say 
(what  might,  if  I  were  nearer,  seem  presumptuous) 
that  the  men  who,  in  these  States,  as  governors  now 
wield  the  large  powers  entrusted  to  the  executive  in 
America,  seemed  to  be  very  able,  sound,  moderate 
men,  from  whose  judgment  and  discretion  I  should 
expect  much  benefit.  My  only  doubt  is  as  regards 
one  constitutional  amendment  which  most  of  these 
States  have  adopted.  I  do  not  seriously  quarrel  with 
that  which,  as  with  us,  deprives  of  the  franchise  those 
who  have  not  paid  their  taxes.  But  it  must  be  fairly 
worked.  There  is  generally  a  direct  poll-tax,  jus- 


BLACK  AND  WHITE  IN  THE   SOUTHERN  STATES.    169 

tified  by  its  application  to  popular  education,  of 
which  the  masses  are  so  much  in  need ;  and  there  is  a 
question  of  a  tax  on  dogs,  the  slaves  of  the  ex -slaves. 
If  any  laxity  is  shown  in  the  collection  of  taxes  from 
poor  and  ignorant  people  about  election -time,  or  the 
date  of  payment  is  put  near  election-day,  very  many 
may  be  disfranchised,  who  must  soon  pay  the  money 
nevertheless.  The  provision  in  the  new  Constitution 
which  I  most  fear  is  that  which  permanently  dis 
franchises  all  who  are  convicted  of  crime,  unless  the 
governor  remits  the  sentence.  In  principle  exception 
can  hardly  be  taken  to  this  ;  but  I  have  some  doubt 
whether,  in  the  matter  of  justice,  the  negroes  are 
quite  secure  of  fair  play;  and  it  is  somewhat  danger 
ous  if  a  nearly  balanced  constituency  may  be  affected 
by  a  rigorous  administration  of  the  criminal  laws. 
It  is  certain  that  the  prison  populations  are  composed 
of  blacks  in  a  proportion  greater  than  the  general 
population  to  an  overwhelming  degree.  Whatever 
the  degree  of  their  criminality,  there  is  a  disposition 
to  cure  it  by  a  strictness  in  penal  management  which 
requires  watching,  seeing  how  much  the  administra 
tion  of  justice  is  now  in  the  hands  of  the  whites.  The 
magistrates  and  judges  are  either  elected  or  nominated 
by  the  white  rulers.  English  law  is  the  basis  of  most 
American  institutions,  and  the  English  law  regulating 
the  selection  of  juries  has  always  been  very  lax.  I 
found  that  in  the  Southern  States  there  is  little  regard 
to  the  principle  of  selecting  de  medietate  linguce  in 
cases  between  black  and  white.  Very  few  blacks  are 
admitted  on  juries ;  in  Virginia,  I  believe,  none  at  all. 


170       THE   MANAGEMENT  OF  COLOURED  RACES. 

Then,  as  regards  'punishment,  flogging  is  very 
freely  used  in  Virginia  ;  but  further  South  the 
system  of  chain-gangs^ — i.e.,  extra-mural  labour — is 
universal.  The  convicts  are  not  only  employed  on 
public  works,  railways,  and  the  like,  but  are  very 
usually  let  out  to  private  speculators,  and  they  are 
made  a  source  'of  profit  instead  of  an  expense.  It 
comes  simply  to  this,  that  the  punishment  for  crime 
is  reduction  to  the  old  state  of  slavery  in  a  form  not 
very  widely  differing  from  the  old  form.  I  ani  told 
that  the  people  most  often  convicted  and  sent  to  the 
chain-gang  are  the  undisciplined  young  negroes  who 
have  grown  up  since  the  days  of  slavery.  I  have 
even  heard  it  said  by  reliable  men  that  they  employ 
no  man  so  readily  as  one  who  has  come  out  of  the 
chain-gang,  because  he  has  there  learnt  discipline. 

In  nothing  have  I  encountered  greater  discre 
pancies  of  statement  than  in  regard  to  the  criminality 
of  negroes.  Many  people  represent  them  as  most 
inveterate  thieves,  whom  nothing  but  severity  will 
reform.  Others  say  they  have  lived  among  them  for 
years  and  never  had  occasion  to  lock  a  door  ;  and  of 
this  last  I  have  had  personal  experience.  I  tried  very 
hard  to  sift  the  truth,  and  I  believe  it  to  be  this. 
The  negro  is  not  much  given  to  violent,  and  very 
little  to  what  I  may  call  vicious,  crime.  In  this 
respect  he  really  stands  above  most  other  races.  But 
he  has  brought  from  slavery  times  a  sort  of  childish 
want  of  respect  for  property  in  certain  things.  It  is 
hardly  deemed  a  theft,  but  merely  a  misconduct,  when 
a  child  is  caught  taking  a  spoonful  of  jam.  A  slave 


BLACK   AND   WHITE  IN  THE   SOUTHERN   STATES.   171 

used,  it  is  said,  to  reason  thus:  'I  am  my  master's,  so 
is  this  chicken.  If  I  catch  and  eat  the  chicken  I  take 
nothing  from  my  master.'  These  things  depended 
much  on  individual  management.  So  it  is  now ;  in 
well-managed  establishments  and  on  well-adminis 
tered  estates  things  go  on  smoothly  enough,  but  in 
many  places  there  is  a  good  deal  of  disposition  to 
petty  picking  and  stealing,  which  needs  to  be  checked 
by  moderate  measures.  I  gather,  however,  that  some 
things  thought  very  venial  in  slave  times  are  now 
severely  dealt  with.  On  the  whole  I  am  inclined  to 
think  that  there  is  some  foundation  for  the  assertion 
sometimes  put  forward  by  friends  of  the  blacks,  that 
a  much  harder  justice  is  dealt  to  one  class  than 
to  another  ;  that  for  all  the  outrages  and  murders 
committed  by  the  whites  in  the  troubled  years  after 
the  war  very  little  condign  punishment  has  been  ex 
ecuted,  while  justice  and  something  more  is  done 
on  the  blacks.  One  thing  did  astonish  me  during 
my  tour,  and  that  is,  to  find  how  much  k  Judge  Lynch ' 
survives,  especially  when  the  accused  are  blacks.  I 
imagined  he  was  a  thing  of  the  past,  but  I  found  that 
several  lynching  cases  of  atrocity  occurred  before  I  had 
been  many  weeks  in  the  States  ;  that  is,  hanging  by 
popular  movement  without  the  intervention  of  judge 
and  jury.  This  is  generally  the  case  when  there  is 
any  alleged  assault  of  any  kind  by  a  black  on  a  white 
woman.  The  blacks  are  popularly  said  to  be  prone 
to  that  kind  of  crime  ;  with  what  justice  I  cannot 
say.  An  experienced  judge  told  me  he  had  known 
many  accused  and  many  hanged,  but  none  convicted 


172       THE  MANAGEMENT  OF  COLOURED  RACES. 

•on  trial.  The  mere  suggestion  that  a  black  man 
would  like  to  do  something  of  the  kind  if  he  could 
seems  enough  to  hang  him. 

Hitherto  I  have  principally  spoken  of  those  States 
which  I  have  called  i  moderate/  but  there  are  two  or 
three  others  where  moderate  counsels  have  not  pre 
vailed,  and  where  the  difficulties  are  much  greater. 
Happily  they  are  but  a  small  minority.  My  personal 
inquiries  were  limited  to  South  Carolina ;  but,  known 
as  it  is  as  the  '  Petrel  State  J  there  is  probably  no  more 
typical  instance  of  the  difficulties  of  reconstruction. 
So  I  shall  confine  myself  to  stating  the  case  as  I  have 
gathered  it  in  connection  with  that  State. 

Partly  owing  to  the  greater  numerical  preponde 
rance  of  the  blacks,  and  partly  to  the  less  disposition 
of  the  whites  to  accept  measures  of  moderation  and 
compromise,  the  black  predominance  in  the  Legisla 
ture  and  the  Carpet-bag  rule  were  carried  further  and 
lasted  much  longer  in  South  Carolina  than  in  the 
surrounding  States.  The  great  majority  of  the 
legislators  were  blacks ;  and  though  some  of  them 
were  fair  representative  men,  with  some  education,  no 
doubt  most  of  them  were  absurdly  ignorant  and  out 
of  place,  and  there  was  some  colour  for  the  nickname 
of  '  the  Monkey  House,'  which  their  enemies  applied 
to  the  Assembly.  They,  however,  indulged  in  no 
violent  class-legislation,  but  were  very  completely 
guided  by  the  white  men  who  had  obtained  the 
government — principally  Northern  Carpet-baggers. 
Whatever  violence  and  disturbance  there  was  (and 
there  was  a  good  deal),  was  not  on  the  part  of  the 


BLACK  AND  WHITE  IN  THE  SOUTHERN   STATES.   173 

black  majority,  but  of  the  white  minority,  who,  in 
stead  of  trying  constitutional  methods  to  regain 
power,  preferred  Ku  Klux  organisations  and  such 
violent  methods,  committing  many  murders  and 
creating  much  terror.  The  strong  arm  of  the  United 
States  authority  was,  however,  used  to  aid  in  putting 
down  the  Ku  Klux,  and  by  the  time  the  elections  of 
1876  approached  the  whites  had  begun  to  see  that 
with  two -fifths  of  the  population  and  all  the  property, 
and  much  physical  and  moral  force,  it  was  easier  to 
win  elections  than  to  continue  the  contest  by  uncon 
stitutional  means.  Accordingly,  in  1876  the  whites 
got  the  best  of  it  in  the  elections  for  the  State  Le 
gislature,  though  three  black  men  were  still  sent  to 
Congress.  As  regards  the  very  important  question 
of  the  election  of  State  Governor,  and  the  conse 
quent  control  of  the  Executive,  the  election  was  dis 
puted  between  Chamberlain,  the  former  Carpet-bag 
Governor,  and  Wade  Hampton,  the  very  popular 
Democrat,  who  was  put  up  on  moderate  and  com 
promise  principles,  and  from  whose  moderation  and 
conciliation  much  was  expected.  As  we  know  in 
regard  to  a  more  important  election  and  subordinate 
issues  arising  out  of  it,  there  is  an  extreme  difficulty 
in  deciding  disputes  of  this  kind  in  the  United  States. 
On  this  occasion  no  mode  of  settlement  was  arrived 
at,  and  in  the  beginning  of  1877  two  rival  govern 
ments  were  for  months  actually  face  to  face,  each 
claiming  to  exercise  the  executive  function.  That  the 
question  was  not  settled  by  an  appeal  to  arms  was 
due  partly  to  a  certain  forbearance,  and  partly  to  the 


174       THE  MANAGEMENT  OF  COLOURED  RACES. 

presence  of  United  States  troops ;  but  these  latter 
were  powerless  to  settle  the  matter,  and  a  good  deal 
of  disturbance  took  place  under  their  noses  which 
they  could  not  put  a  stop  to.  It  was  at  this  time 
that  President  Hayes  decided  to  withdraw  the 
garrisons  which  had  hitherto  been  posted  in  the 
Southern  States,  and  to  give  the  moderate  Southern 
politicians,  who  had  everywhere  come  to  the  front,  a 
fair  chance  of  carrying  out  in  good  faith  the  constitu 
tional  amendments,  and  bringing  about  a  moral  and 
political  instead  of  a  mere  military  restoration  of  the 
Union.  He  was  probably  well  aware  that  the  result 
must  be  to  restore  the  Southern  Democrats  to  power, 
and  deliberately  preferred  to  let  South  Carolina  pass 
under  the  government  of  the  moderate  Wade  Hamp 
ton,  rather  than  abet  a  continuance  of  the  struggle. 
Certainly  that  was  the  immediate  effect  of  the  with 
drawal  of  the  troops.  I  believe  the  question  never 
was  formally  decided  at  all ;  but  as  soon  as  the 
United  States  troops  went,  the  Democrats  being 
evidently  the  strongest  physically,  the  other  party 
collapsed,  and  Wade  Hampton  quietly  assumed  the 
government  without  further  dispute. 

It  is  marvellous,  under  the  circumstances,  that 
there  has  been  so  little  of  armed  collision  in  the 
Southern  States ;  for,  after  all,  the  so-called  United 
States  garrisons  were  mere  detachments  at  a  few 
places,  carrying  with  them  the  moral  power  of  the 
United  States  Government,  but  nothing  more.  Very 
many  of  the  blacks  were  armed  and  taught  to  fight 
during  the  war.  There  has  been  no  attempt  at  any 


BLACK  AND  WHITE   IN   THE   SOUTHERN  STATES.    175 

general  disarmament  of  the  Southern  States ;  on  the 
contrary,  the  Constitution  insures  to  all  citizens  the 
right  to  possess  arms,  and  all  are  entitled  to  serve, 
if  they  will,  in  the  National  Militia  of  each  State.  At 
one  time  arms  were  very  freely  distributed,  and  very 
large  numbers  of  the  blacks  belonged  to  the  popular 
military  force  which  it  sought  to  establish  under  the 
name  of  '  National  Guards  ; '  but  the  regiments  so 
formed  were  very  ragged  and  irregular  indeed,  and 
on  the  ground  (fairly  enough  established)  of  total 
inefficiency  their  arms  were  taken  from  them,  and 
the  State- armed  Militia  was  confined  to  the  companies 
which  came  up  to  a  moderate  standard  of  efficiency — 
a  practice  consonant  enough  with  that  of  other  States 
of  the  Union.  The  negroes  have  a  good  deal  of 
military  zeal,  and  in  many  of  the  larger  towns  they 
have  very  creditable  Volunteer  Militia  companies ; 
sometimes,  I  am  told,  a  good  deal  better  drilled  and 
more  efficient  than  the  white  companies ;  but  they 
are  required  to  provide  their  own  uniforms  and  incur 
expenses  which  the  rural  negroes  cannot  afford. 
And  so  it  happens  that  the  black  Militia  are,  on  the 
whole,  small  in  number  compared  with  the  whites. 
Moreover,  hi  some  States — and  South  Carolina  is  one 
of  them — the  whites  have  rifle  clubs,  outside  and 
beyond  the  recognised  and  inspected  Militia,  which 
constitute,  in  fact,  a  sort  of  armed  political  organisa 
tion.  Between  Militia  and  rifle  clubs  and  volunteer 
artillery  they  can  always  make  a  show  of  armed  force, 
and  indulge  in  an  amount  of  cannon-firing  and  so  on 
which  is  not  encouraging  to  opponents  of  weak  nerves. 


176        THE  MANAGEMENT  OF   COLOURED   RACES. 

For  much  that  was  done  in  troubled  times,  and 
much  that  has  been  done  since  (to  which  I  shall 
come  presently),  the  excuse  is,  that  the  Carpet-bag 
rule  was  so  utterly  detestable,  wicked,  and  impossible 
that  it  was  an  absolute  necessity  to  get  rid  of  it  by 
fair  means  or  foul.  I  have,  then,  sought  to  learn 
what  were  the  terrible  things  suffered  under  this  rule. 
There  seems  to  be  a  general  agreement  that  very  great 
abuses  did  exist  under  it,  and  before  I  went  South  I 
certainly  expected  to  find  that  the  Southern  States 
had  been  for  a  time  a  sort  of  Pandemonium  in  which 
a  white  man  could  hardly  live.  Yet  it  certainly  was 
not  so.  I  have  said  that  the  Kepublican  State  Go 
vernments  made  no  attack  on  the  rights  of  pro 
perty,  and  I  have  been  able  to  discuss  the  whole 
labour  and  land  question  without  having  occasion  to 
allude  to  political  events  as  a  very  disturbing  influ 
ence.  It  is  in  truth  marvellous  how  well  the  parties 
to  industrial  questions  were  able  to  settle  them  while 
there  was  so  great  political  unsettlement.  When  I 
went  to  South  Carolina  I  thought  that  there  at  least 
I  must  find  great  social  disturbances  ;  and  in  South 
Carolina  I  went  to  the  county  of  Beaufort,  the 
blackest  part  of  the  State  in  point  of  population,  and 
that  in  which  black  rule  has  been  most  complete  and 
has  lasted  longest.  It  has  the  reputation  of  being  a 
sort  of  black  paradise,  and,  per  contra,  I  rather  expected 
a  sort  of  white  hell.  There  I  thought  I  should  see  a 
rough  Liberia,  where  the  blacks  ruled  roughshod  over 
the  whites.  To  my  great  surprise  I  found  exactly 
the  contrary.  At  no  place  that  I  have  seen  are  the 


BLACK  AND  WHITE  IN  THE   SOUTHERN  STATES.    177 

relations  of  the  two  races  better  and  more  peaceable. 
It  is  true  that  many  of  the  whites  have  suffered  very 
greatly  from  the  war,  and  from  the  tax -sales  by 
United  States  authority  to  which  I  have  before 
alluded,  and  I  am  afraid  that  there  are  numerous 
cases  of  poverty  and  sad  reverse  of  fortune  among 
them ;  but  that  comes  of  the  war  which  is  past. 
Those  whose  fortunes  or  professions  have  in  any 
degree  survived  have  nothing  serious  to  complain  of. 
The  town  of  Beaufort  is  a  favourite  summer  resort  for 
white  families  from  the  interior.  All  the  best  houses 
are  in  the  occupation  of  the  whites — almost  all  the 
trades,  professions,  and  leading  occupations.  White 
girls  go  about  as  freely  and  pleasantly  as  if  no  black 
had  ever  been  in  power.  Here  the  blacks  still 
control  the  elections  and  send  their  representatives 
to  the  State  Assembly ;  but  though  they  elect  to 
the  county  and  municipal  offices  they  by  no  means 
elect  blacks  only.  Many  whites  hold  office,  and  I 
heard  no  complaint  of  colour  difficulties  in  the  local 
administration.  The  country  about  is  partly  the 
land  on  which  black  proprietor- farmers  have  been 
settled,  with  white  traders,  teachers,  &c.,  in  the  suc 
cessful  manner  which  I  have  already  described; 
partly  similar  lands  of  white  proprietors  who  let  them 
out  and  manage  amicably  with  a  black  tenantry; 
partly  rice  plantations,  which,  on  account  of  the 
works  of  protection  and  irrigation  required,  are 
worked  in  large  farms  by  hired  labour ;  partly  the 
land  and  water  in  which  the  phosphates  before  al 
luded  to  are  found ;  partly  forest  and  sandhills ;  but 

N 


178       THE   MANAGEMENT   OF   COLOURED   RACES. 

whatever  the  tenures  and  circumstances,  I  say  em 
phatically  that  nowhere  are  the  relations  between 
blacks  and  whites  better,  and  nowhere  does  a  tra 
veller  see  fewer  signs  that  political  difficulties  have 
been  fatal  to  settlement. 

t  Well,  then,'  I  have  gone  on  to  ask,  '  did  the 
black  Legislatures  make  bad  laws  ? '  My  informants 
could  not  say  that  they  did.  In  truth,  though  many 
of  the  Carpet-baggers  were  in  some  sense  the  scum  of 
the  Northern  armies,  the  leading  spirits  among  them 
seem  to  have  been  men  of  decided  education  and 
ability,  and  the  work  done  under  their  direction,  and 
a  good  deal  adapted  from  Northern  models,  is  not  at 
all  below  the  average  of  American  State  legislation. 
What,  then,  is  the  practical  evil  of  which  complaint 
is  made?  The  answer  is  summed  up  in  the  one 
word  '  corruption.'  It  is  alleged  that  under  Carpet 
bag  rule  the  most  monstrous  and  inconceivable 
corruption  was  all  but  universal,  and  that  not  only 
were  the  available  public  funds  made  away  with,  but 
the  States  were  burdened  with  terrible  debts  by  those 
who  pretended  to  represent  them,  so  as  to  have 
brought  them  to  the  brink  of  insolvency.  I  believe 
there  can  be  no  doubt  at  all  that  a  great  deal  of 
corruption  did  prevail — much  more  than  the  ordinary 
measure  of  American  corruption ;  it  was  inevitable 
that  it  should  be  so  under  the  circumstances,  but  to 
what  degree  it  was  so,  it  is  very  difficult  to  tell. 
The  fact  is  there  is  no  denying  that  corruption  does 
to  some  degree  exist  in  American  politics,  and  is  not 
confined  to  the  South.  If  we  are  to  believe  the 


BLACK  AND   WHITE   IN  THE   SOUTHEBN   STATES.    179 

common  language  of  Americans  themselves,  and 
have  regard  to  their  opinions  of  the  motives  and 
character  of  'politicians,'  their  every-day  accusations, 
and  the  staple  of  their  caricatures  and  farces,  this 
corruption  must  be  very  widespread  indeed.  On  the 
other  hand,  I  am  inclined  to  suppose  that  such  ac 
cusations  are  the  ordinary  form  of  throwing  dirt  at 
any  man  who  is  in  disgrace,  and  that  while  some  are 
true  a  good  many  are  not  well-founded.  Of  course  I 
am  not  qualified  to  speak  with  any  confidence,  but 
the  general  impression  I  have  brought  away  is,  that, 
as  the  leading  men  in  America  seem  to  be  constantly 
oscillating  between  high  political  office  and  the 
management  of  railways,  life  insurance  companies, 
and  other  joint-stock  undertakings,  many  of  them 
have  carried  into  politics  what  I  may  call  joint- stock 
morals,  and  are  no  better  and  no  worse  than  our  own 
directors.  All  the  Carpet-bag  Governors  are,  as  a 
matter  of  course,  accused  of  the  grossest  personal 
corruption ;  and  as  soon  as  they  fall  from  power  it  is 
almost  a  necessity  that  they  should  fly  from  criminal 
prosecutions  instituted  in  the  local  courts  under 
circumstances  which  give  little  security  for  a  fair 
trial.  Several  Democrats  of  high  position  in  Georgia 
have  assured  me  they  believe  that  the  Northern 
gentleman  of  good  antecedents,  who  was  Governor 
there,  was  innocent  of  the  things  of  which  he  was 
accused;  in  fact,  I  believe  he  came  back,  stood  his 
trial,  and  was  acquitted.  In  South  Carolina  I  was 
given  the  report  of  the  Committee  of  Investigation 
disclosing  terrible  things,  and  said  to  be  most 

K  2 


180       THE  MANAGEMENT  OF   COLOURED  RACES. 

impartial  and  conclusive.  The  general  result  was  to 
leave  on  one's  mind  the  belief  that  undoubtedly  a 
very  great  deal  of  pilfering  and  corruption  had  gone 
on,  but  the  tone  of  the  report  was  far  too  much  that 
of  an  indictment,  rather  than  of  a  judgment,  to 
satisfy  me  that  it  could  be  safely  accepted  in  block. 
The  Governor  of  Massachusetts  has  refused  to  render 
up  the  ex-Governor,  who  asserts  his  innocence  and 
his  readiness  to  stand  his  trial  if  a  fair  trial  be 
assured.  As  regards  the  State  debts,  I  believe  those 
shown  to  be  fraudulent  and  unjustifiable  have  been 
repudiated  long  ago ;  and  the  Southern  States  having 
also  had  the  advantage  of  writing  off  all  debts 
incurred  during  the  war,  I  understand  that  by  far 
the  greater  portion  of  their  existing  debts  were 
incurred  before  the  war.  The  debts  which  Virginia 
and  North  Carolina  find  it  necessary  to  '  adjust ' 
were,  I  am  told,  very  largely  incurred  for  somewhat 
reckless  subventions  to  railways  and  other  public 
works.  But  the  railways  at  any  rate  exist,  and  are 
the  making  of  the  country.  In  South  Carolina  the 
whole  debt  is  not  large — only,  I  think,  about  one 
and  a  half  millions  sterling,  all  told. 

On  the  whole,  then,  I  am  inclined  to  believe  that 
the  period  of  Carpet-bag  rule  was  rather  a  scandal 
than  a  very  permanent  injury.  The  black  men  used 
their  victory  with  moderation,  although  the  women 
were  sometimes  dangerous,  and  there  was  more 
pilfering  than  plunder  on  a  scale  permanently  to 
cripple  the  State. 

To   return    to   the   history   of    South   Carolina. 


BLACK  AND   WHITE   IN  THE  SOUTHERN  STATES.    181 

After  the  withdrawal  of  the  United  States  troops  the 
Carpet-baggers  were  entirely  routed  and  put  to  flight, 
and  Wade  Hampton  assumed  the  undisputed  govern 
ment.  He  has  certainly  had  much  success.  His 
party  claim  (I  believe  with  justice)  that  he  has  done 
much  to  restore  the  finances,  promote  education,  and 
protect  blacks  and  whites  in  the  exercise  of  peaceful 
callings.  As  regards  political  matters,  his  policy 
amounts,  I  think,  to  this ; — it  is  in  effect  said  to  the 
blacks  :  l  If  you  will  accept  the  present  regime,  follow 
us,  and  vote  Democratic ;  we  will  receive  you,  cherish 
you,  and  give  you  a  reasonable  share  of  representa 
tion,  local  office,  &c. ;  but  there  shall  be  nothing  for 
those  who  persist  in  voting  Republican.'  Some  of 
them  accept  these  terms,  but  to  vote  Democratic  is 
the  one  thing  which  the  great  majority  will  not  do. 
They  may  be  on  excellent  terms  with  white  men 
with  whom  they  have  relations,  will  follow  them  and 
be  guided  by  them  in  everything  else,  but  they  have 
sufficient  independence  to  hold  out  on  that  point  of 
voting,  even  when  they  have  lost  their  white  leaders 
and  are  quite  left  to  themselves.  They  know  that 
they  owe  their  freedom  to  the  Republicans,  and  it  is 
to  them  a  sort  of  religion  to  vote  Republican.  I 
think  it  was  in  Georgia  (where  they  have  not  held 
out  so  stoutly)  that,  talking  to  a  small  black  farmer, 
an  ex- slave,  as  to  the  situation,  I  asked  him  about 
the  black  vote.  '  Well,'  he  said,  '  some  wote  straight, 
and  some  don't ;  some  is  'suaded  and  some  is  paid, 
but  I  wote  according  to  my  principles,  and  my  prin 
ciples  is  Republican.'  In  South  Carolina  that  is  the 


182       THE   MANAGEMENT  OF   COLOURED   RACES. 

view  of  the  great  body  of  the  blacks,  as  the  Democrats 
fully  admit.  Stories  are  told  of  personal  dependants 
of  the  present  Governor  who  owe  everything  to  him 
and  would  do  anything  else  in  the  world  for  him,  but 
who  will  yet  openly  vote  against  him.  Such,  then, 
was  the  state  of  things  when  the  elections  of  No 
vember  1878  came  on. 

It  seemed  to  be  well  known  beforehand  that  the 
Democrats  were  determined  to  win  everything  in  the 
South.  It  was  said  to  be  a  necessity  finally  to 
emancipate  all  the  States  from  the  scandal  of  black 
and  Carpet-bag  rule,  and  so  far  one  could  not  but 
sympathise  with  the  feeling ;  but  so  much  had  been 
already  achieved,  and  there  was  not  the  least  risk  of 
a  reaction.  On  the  contrary,  the  power  of  the  native 
whites  was  thoroughly  re-established.  In  South 
Carolina  Wade  Hampton's  re-election  was  not  opposed, 
and  there  was  no  question  whatever  that  by  moderate 
means  the  Democrats  could  retain  a  very  decided 
majority  in  the  State  Legislature.  But  they  were 
not  content  with  this ;  they  aimed  at  an  absolute 
possession  of  everything,  leaving  no  representation 
to  their  opponents  at  all,  and  especially  at  a  '  solid 
South,'  in  the  United  States  Congress.  '  They  are 
determined  to  win,'  I  was  told.  '  They  will  get  the 
votes  by  fair  means,  if  they  can;  and  if  not  I  am 
sorry  to  say  they  will  steal  'em.'  And  that  is  just 
what  was  done  in  South  Carolina. 

To  understand  what  took  place  we  must  look  at 
the  election  law  prevailing  in  the  United  States.  It 
seems  to  me  that  if  the  law  had  been  designed  to 


BLACK  AND   WHITE  IN  THE   SOUTHERN   STATES.    183 

facilitate  fraud,  make  detection  difficult,  and  render 
the  settlement  of  disputed  elections  impossible,  it 
could  not  have  been  more  skilfully  devised.  There  is 
something  to  be  said  for  open  voting  and  something 
for  a  well-managed  ballot,  but  the  pretended  ballot  of 
the  United  States  seems  to  combine  all  the  evils  of 
both  systems.  It  may  be  just  possible  for  an  indepen 
dent  man  connected  with  no  party,  who  manages  the 
thing  skilfully,  to  conceal  his  vote  ;  but  if  he  con 
sents  to  make  it  known,  there  can  be,  and  in  practice 
there  is,  no  secrecy  whatever.  There  are  no  official 
ballot-papers,  numbered  and  checked,  so  as  to  be 
afterwards  traced,  as  with  us  ;  every  man  may  deposit 
in  the  box  any  ballot-paper  he  chooses,  written  or 
printed  in  whatever  form  he  chooses.  In  practice 
voters  use  papers  in  a  particular  form  supplied  by 
their  own  party,  so  that  there  can  be  no  mistake 
which  way  they  vote.  There  being  no  means  of 
identifying  the  papers  so  cast,  everything  depends  on 
the  honesty  and  fair  dealing  of  those  who  have  the 
official  management  of  the  polls.  In  all  things  the 
executive  Government  has  much  greater  power  in 
America  than  with  us,  and  the  party  which  has  the 
executive  power  has  also  the  control  of  the  ballot- 
boxes.  They  appoint  returning  boards  and  election 
managers  at  each  polling-place,  who,  when  party 
spirit  runs  high,  are  in  the  interest  of  the  dominant 
majority.  This  was  carried  to  an  excess  in  South 
Carolina  during  the  recent  elections.  The  United 
States  officers  are  entitled  to  take  certain  precautions 
to  see  that  the  United  States  election  law  is  fairly 


184       THE   MANAGEMENT  OF  COLOURED   RACES. 

carried  out,  but  they  could  only  be  present  at  the 
principal  places,  and  sent  very  subordinate  agents  to 
the  other  polling-places,  where  they  were  hustled  and 
treated  with  no  respect  whatever.  Under  these  con 
ditions  the  elections  were  held  in  South  Carolina. 

There  is  a  remarkable  frankness  and  openness  in 
speaking  of  the  way  in  which  things  were  managed, 
and  I  believe  I  violate  no  confidences,  because  there 
was  no  whispering  or  confidence  about  it.  There 
was  not  a  very  great  amount  of  violence  or  intimi 
dation.  Some  Republican  meetings  were  violently 
interfered  with  before  the  election,  and  on  the  day 
of  the  election  there  was  at  some  places  a  certain 
amount  of  galloping  about,  firing  guns,  and  such-like 
demonstration  by  men  in  red  shirts ;  but  any  intimi 
dation  used  was  rather  moral  than  physical.  In  all 
districts  where  the  parties  in  any  degree  approach 
equality  perhaps  there  would  be  no  very  strong 
grounds  for  disputing  the  victory  of  the  Democrats. 
It  is  in  the  lower  districts,  where  the  Republicans  are 
admittedly  in  an  immense  majority,  that  great  De 
mocratic  majorities  were  obtained  by  the  simple  pro 
cess  of  what  is  called  l  stuffing  the  ballot-boxes.' 
For  this  purpose  the  Democrats  used  ballot-papers  of 
the  thinnest  possible  tissue-paper,  such  that  a  number 
of  them  can  be  packed  inside  of  one  larger  paper  and 
shaken  out  as  they  are  dropped  into  the  box.  These 
papers  were  freely  handed  about ;  they  were  shown 
to  me,  and  I  brought  away  specimens  of  them.  I 
never  heard  a  suggestion  that  these  extraordinary 
little  gossamer-web  things  were  designed  for  any 


BLACK  AND  WHITE  IN  THE   SOUTHERN  STATES.   185 

other  purpose  than  that  of  fraud.  Of  course  the 
result  of  such  a  system  was  that  there  were  many 
more  ballot-papers  in  the  box  than  voters.  At  one 
place  in  the  Charleston  district,  where  not  above  one 
thousand  persons  voted,  there  were  found,  I  believe, 
three  thousand  five  hundred  papers  in  the  box.  In 
such  case  the  practice  (whether  justified  by  law  or 
not,  I  know  not)  is  that  the  election  managers  blind 
fold  a  man,  who  draws  out  and  destroys  the  number 
of  papers  in  excess  of  the  voters.  Of  course  he  takes 
care  to  draw  out  the  thick  papers  of  the  opposite 
party,  and  to  leave  in  the  thin  papers  of  his  own 
party  ;  so  when  the  process  is  completed  the  Demo 
crats  are  found  to  be  in  a  great  majority,  and  the 
return  is  so  made  by  the  returning  board.  There  are 
some  other  grounds  of  complaint.  In  some  of  the 
black  districts  the  number  of  polling-places  has  been 
so  reduced  that  it  is  impossible  for  all  who  wish  to 
poll  to  do  so  in  the  time  allowed.  At  one  or  two 
places  the  ballot-boxes  were  stolen  and  carried  off. 
At  one  place  of  which  I  have  personal  knowledge  the 
appointed  election  managers  simply  kept  out  of  the 
way,  and  "had  no  poll  at  all.  Hundreds  of  blacks 
who  came  to  vote  were  told  they  must  go  elsewhere, 
when  it  was  too  late  to  do  so.  In  short,  I  have  no 
hesitation  in  saying,  as  matter  within  my  own  know 
ledge,  that,  if  these  elections  had  taken  place  in 
England,  there  were  irregularities  which  must  have 
vitiated  them  before  an  election  judge  a  hundred 
times  over. 

The  result  of  these  elections  was  that,  except  in 


186       THE  MANAGEMENT  OF   COLOURED   RACES. 

the  single  county  of  Beaufort,  not  one  Republican  or 
Independent  was  returned  to  the  State  Legislature ; 
nor,  I  believe,  was  a  single  office-bearer  of  those 
persuasions  elected.  The  dominant  party  took  every 
thing,  and  the  Republican  members  of  Congress  were 
all  ejected.  South  Carolina  returns  a  solid  Demo 
cratic  representation  to  the  next  Congress. 

I  have  throughout,  on  the  spot,  as  I  do  now,  ex 
pressed  the  opinion  that  there  is  no  excuse  whatever 
for  the  lengths  to  which  the  triumph  of  the  Demo 
crats  has  been  pushed.  Granting  that  they  were 
fairly  justified  in  vigorous  measures  to  give  them  the 
control  of  the  Government  and  Legislature,  and  that 
they  were  in  a  position  thus  to  obtain  a  good  working 
majority,  there  could  be  no  reason  for  unfairly  de 
priving  their  opponents  of  a  certain  representation. 
It  was  bad  policy,  too,  for  the  things  that  have  been 
done  have  roused  the  indignation  of  the  North,  and 
it  is  believed  that  the  somewhat  unexpected  Republi 
can  successes  in  the  North  were  in  great  degree  due 
to  the  feeling  excited  by  unfair  attempts  to  make  a 
solid  South.  Perhaps,  for  the  time,  it  may  not  be  a 
matter  of  the  very  first  importance  whether  the 
Democrats  have  only  a  good  majority  in  the  Southern 
State  Legislatures,  or  almost  the  whole  representa 
tion  ;  but  in  the  present  state  of  parties  in  Congress 
two  or  three  sea£s,  or  say,  including  Louisiana  and 
Florida,  half  a  dozen  seats,  won  by  extreme  and  pal 
pable  irregularities  and  fraud,  make  a  great  differ 
ence  ;  and  the  question  of  these  elections  raises  very 
large  and  difficult  issues.  Not  only  are  nearly- 


BLACK  AND  WHITE  IN  THE  SOUTHERN  STATES.    1ST 

balanced  parties  very  much  affected,  but,  in  case  of  a 
struggle  over  the  next  Presidential  election,  these 
votes  might  just  turn  the  scale  ;  and  the  question 
whether  there  is  any  remedy  practically  available  to 
redress  wrongs  which  are,  I  may  almost  say,  admitted, 
puts  in  issue  the  wider  question  whether  the  15th 
Amendment  of  the  United  States  Constitution,  se 
curing  equal  electoral  rights  to  the  blacks,  is  really  to> 
be  enforced,  or  whether  it  may  be  set  aside  in  practice 
by  the  action  of  individual  States.  Is,  in  fact,  the 
settlement  at  the  end  of  the  war  to  be  maintained  or 
surrendered  ?  The  excuse  made  by  the  Southern 
whites  for  their  proceedings  is,  that  throughout  the- 
United  States  elections  are  not  pure  and  free  from 
fraud  ;  that  there  has  been  as  much  of  it  in  New 
York  as  in  the  South  ;  that  the  laws  admitting  of 
such  things  were  made  by  their  enemies  to  crush 
them  ;  that  the  Presidency  was  '  stolen  '  from  them 
by  fraud  ;  and  that  they  are  justified  in  reprisals.  I 
have  no  doubt  that  it  is  an  absolute  necessity  that 
the  election  laws  should  be  improved.  But  besides 
this  there  is  need  of  a  final  laying  of  the  issue 
between  "North  and  South,  depending  on  a  due 
execution  of  the  war  settlement.  To  see  how  this 
stands  we  must  glance  at  the  relations  between  the 
United  States  and  the  States  of  the  Union  as  things 
now  exist. 

When  the  United  States  Constitution  was  origi 
nally  framed,  after  the  Revolutionary  War,  there  was 
much  need  of  union  and  much  necessity  for  taxation, 
for  which  it  provided  the  means.  But  as  time  passed 


188       THE  MANAGEMENT  OF  COLOURED   RACES. 

and  the  condition  of  the  States  rose  with  peace  and 
prosperity,  the  external  customs  revenue  sufficed, 
and  more  than  sufficed,  for  all  common  purposes. 
No  internal  revenue  was  raised  for  the  general 
government,  and  scarcely  any  interference  of  any 
kind  was  exercised.  We,  who  are  accustomed  to 
speak  of  the  United  States  as  one  country,  hardly 
realise  how  entirely  as  respects  internal  affairs  the 
Union  was,  and  for  most  purposes  still  is,  not  one 
country,  but  a  league  of  many  countries.  The  do 
mestic  administration  is  peculiar  to  each  State,  and 
under  no  common  control  whatever.  The  United 
States  Courts  of  the  original  Constitution  were  few, 
and  confined  in  practice  to  larger  matters.  As  I 
heard  a  Democratic  orator  say  (with  truth,  I  believe), 
'  You  hardly  knew  that  there  was  a  United  States 
Government,  except  when  you  went  to  the  Post-office 
for  your  letters/ 

After  the  war  the  clauses  providing  for  the  aboli 
tion  of  slavery  and  the  equality  of  race  and  class  were 
the  only  amendments  which  it  was  necessary  to  in 
troduce  into  the  Constitution;  but,  nevertheless, 
there  was  in  addition  a  very  great  practical  change 
carried  out  under  provisions  of  the  old  Constitution, 
which  had  long  been  almost  dormant.  The  great 
debt  rendered  necessary  a  heavy  taxation,  and  an 
entirely  new  system  of  internal  revenue  was  put  in 
force ;  whisky,  tobacco,  and  some  other  things  being 
subjected  to  a  heavy  excise  duty  to  the  general 
Government,  which  rendered  necessary  a  strong 
executive  control  by  United  States  officers  in  every 


BLACK  AND  WHITE   IN  THE   SOUTHERN   STATES.    189 

corner  of  the  States.  Both  revenue  questions  and 
many  other  questions  raised  by  the  events  of  the  war 
necessitated  a  great  extension  of  the  United  States 
Courts,  and  brought  them,  as  it  were,  to  every  man's 
door.  These,  and  some  other  changes,  were  common 
to  all  the  States.  In  the  South  there  was  further 
required  some  measure  of  precaution  to  give  effect  to 
the  changes  affecting  the  blacks.'  Besides  the  mili 
tary  occupation  for  a  time,  the  central  Legislature  was 
empowered  to  pass  laws  to  give  effect  to  the  new 
electoral  equality,  and  to  station  officers  to  watch  the 
working  of  those  laws.  Under  these  laws  the  central 
authority  has  in  theory  power  to  deal  with  the  elec 
tion  abuses  which  I  have  mentioned ;  but  in  practice 
it  is  not  so  easy.  Like  our  Parliament,  Congress 
can  deal  with  disputed  elections  to  its  own  body ;  and 
when  the  new  Congress  meets,  some  months  hence, 
some  of  these  elections  will  no  doubt  be  brought 
before  it;  but  it  will  require  a  great  exercise  of  virtue 
on  the  part  of  Democratic  members  to  do  a  justice 
which  will  convert  their  narrow  majority  into  a 
narrow  minority.  Meantime  the  President  may  pro 
secute  in  the  United  States  Courts  those  who  have 
broken  the  election  laws.  But  the  first  difficulty 
is  that,  as  such  actions  will  be  resisted  by  every 
means,  the  conduct  of  the  prosecutions  will  be  very 
expensive ;  and  they  cannot  be  carried  through  with 
out  an  appropriation  for  the  purpose  by  a  House  in 
which  the  Democrats  have  the  majority.  Then  the 
local  people  resist  in  another  way :  as  fast  as  prose 
cutions  are  instituted  the  United  States  subordinate 


190      THE  MANAGEMENT  OF   COLOURED   RACES. 

officers  are  arrested  and  dragged  before  the  local  State 
magistrates  on  all  sorts  of  charges ;  and  the  witnesses 
for  the  prosecution  are  arrested  for  perjury  and  com 
mitted  for  trial  before  the  local  State  Courts.  The 
President  is  much  urged  to  vigorous  and  decisive 
action ;  but  his  position  is  very  difficult.  Apparently 
a  Committee  of  Congress  to  inquire  into  electoral 
abuses  has  been  appointed,  but  the  terms  of  refer 
ence  seem  to  be  so  wide  that  it  may  be  difficult  to 
bring  it  to  a  practical  issue. 

There  never  can  be  peace,  quiet,  and  safety  in  the 
United  States  till  a  mode  of  settling  disputed  elec 
tions  is  arranged,  and  this  question  of  the  black  vote 
is  definitely  laid  at  rest.  There  is  a  curious  cross  of 
opinion  and  interest  on  this  latter  question.  Before 
the  war,  the  blacks  having  no  votes,  the  electoral 
representation  of  the  South  was  diminished  on  that 
ground.  Since  all  have  had  votes  the  South  has  a 
full  representation  according  to  population,  and  thus 
sends  many  more  members  to  Congress  than  ever  it 
did  before  ;  and  so,  an  almost  solid  South  having 
been  returned  on  the  Democratic  side,  it  curiously 
happens  that  the  very  measure  of  enfranchising  the 
negroes,  which  was  expected  to  have  an  opposite 
effect,  has  now  given  the  Southern  Democrats  greatly 
increased  power.  Seeing  this,  and  the  difficulty  of 
dealing  with  the  question,  some  of  the  Northerners 
have  inclined  to  settle  the  matter  by  disfranchising 
the  blacks  and  diminishing  the  representation  in 
proportion;  but  this  the  Southerners  stoutly  resist. 
They  say,  i  You  gave  the  blacks  votes,  and  now  they 


BLACK  AND   WHITE  IN  THE  SOUTHERN  STATES.    191 

shall  not  be  deprived  of  them.'  In  truth,  disfran- 
chisement  cannot  now  be  the  remedy.  I  venture  to 
agree  with  those  thoughtful  Northern  statesmen  who 
say  that,  whatever  temporary  inconveniences  may 
attend  the  policy,  deliberately  adopted,  it  must  be 
adhered  to ;  for,  they  say,  under  our  political  system 
the  only  security  that  every  class  shall  be  fairly 
treated  is,  that  they  should  have  votes.  They 
instance  the  case  of  the  Chinese  in  California,  who, 
in  their  view,  are  unfairly  treated  because  they  have 
no  votes.  A  man,  they  say,  who  has  a  vote,  even 
if  he  carries  no  weight  now,  is  sure  to  be  courted  by 
some  party  sooner  or  later.  The  whites  must  have 
divisions  among  themselves,  and  then  they  will  be 
civil  to  the  blacks.  I  think  the  experience  of  our 
own  Colonies  is  entirely  in  favour  of  this  view.  Un 
represented  blacks,  and  other  unrepresented  classes, 
are  always  liable  to  be  treated  unfairly  under  labour 
laws,  vagrant  laws,  and  revenue  laws.  I  am  told 
that  in  the  interval  between  the  war  and  the  adoption 
of  the  black-vote  clause  of  the  Constitution  some  of 
the  Southern  Legislatures  showed  a  disposition  to 
adopt  similar  laws  ;  and  though  they  now  are  honestly 
free  from  such  ideas,  such  proposals  would  probably 
spring  up  again  if  the  blacks  were  not  represented. 

It  must  be  remembered  that  the  Constitution  of 
the  United  States  imposes  no  obligation  whatever  to 
give  universal  suffrage  to  all  blacks ;  all  that  is  re 
quired  is  that  there  shall  be  the  same  rule  for  black 
and  white.  The  Southern  States  are  perfectly  at 
liberty  to  impose  any  general  property  qualification, 


192       THE   MANAGEMENT  OF   COLOURED   RACES. 

household  qualification,  or  anything  else  they  please 
— they  might  very  well  impose  an  education  qualifi 
cation  such  as  exists  in  Massachusetts  to  this  day. 
With  this  exception,  in  Massachusetts,  however, 
universal  manhood  suffrage  has,  I  think,  become  a 
sort  of  custom  of  all  the  States,  and  perhaps  they 
would  find  it  difficult  to  depart  from  it. 

What  makes  it  more  especially  desirable  that  the 
question  of  the  black  vote  should  be  settled  is,  that  in 
reality  there  are  no  other  great  questions  whatever  to 
divide  North  and  South,  or  black  and  white.  Such 
is  the  conclusion  to  which  I  have  come  after  very 
careful  inquiry. 

Free  trade  is  no  longer  a  question  between  North 
and  South — in  fact,  if  the  truth  must  be  told,  it  is 
not  now  a  question  in  the  United  States  at  all.  The 
system  is  to  disarm  opposition  by  protecting  every 
thing  and  everybody.  The  sugar  and  rice  of  the 
South  are  protected  to  conciliate  the  South.  Dwell 
ing  on  the  good  management  of  Georgia,  a  man  of 
position  said  to  me,  '  Look  at  Georgia  ;  instead  of 
talking  nonsense  about  free  trade  they  have  gone  in 
manfully,  established  most  successful  cotton  manufac 
tures,  and  taken  the  benefit  of  protection.' 

Well,  then  there  is  the  more  burning  question, 
lately  the  Greenback  question — still  the  question  of 
debts  on  the  former  footing  or  enhanced  debts,  and  of 
cheap  silver  dollars  against  dear  gold  dollars.  That  . 
question  may  be  very  exciting  indeed,  but  it  is  also 
not  one  in  which  the  dividing  lines  will  lie  between 
North  and  South,  or  black  and  white.  True,  the 


BLACK  AND   WHITE  IN   THE   SOUTHERN   STATES.    193 

Southerners  owe  a  good  deal  of  money  and  want 
cheap  money  very  badly ;  but  the  strong  movement 
in  that  direction  came,  not  from  the  South,  but  from 
New  England.  So  far  from  this  being  a  question  in 
which  the  black  vote  is  dangerous,  the  fact  is  that  the 
blacks  have  divided  most  impartially  on  the  subject, 
and  it  has  more  than  anything  else  given  promise  of  a 
new  political  shuffling  of  the  cards,  after  which  there 
will  be  no  longer  black  and  white  sides,  but  a  whole 
some  intermixture. 

It  is  true  that  the  old  question  of  State  rights 
as  against  centralisation  is  now  an  active  factor  in 
American  politics ;  but,  so  far  as  I  have  been  able  to 
learn,  the  present  vitality  of  the  question  entirely 
hinges  on  the  disputed  black  vote.  All  else  that  has 
resulted  from  the  war  the  Southerners  have  honestly 
and  fully  accepted.  Most  of  the  States  have  accepted 
even  the  black  vote  and  made  the  best  of  it.  There 
is  no  rancour  and  no  secessional  spirit  left.  The 
temper  of  the  South  is  for  the  most  part  admirable. 
But  two  or  three  States  still  maintain  the  struggle 
as  regards  the  free  exercise  of  the  black  vote.  It 
is  that  and -that  only  which  raises  the  question  of 
coercion,  irritates  the  North,  and  leads  to  talk  of  the 
return  of  the  i  man  on  horseback/  If  that  were 
out  of  the  way  I  can  discern  nothing  in  regard  to 
which  the  South  has  any  greater  interest  in  the 
maintenance  of  State  rights  than  the  North  and  West. 
All  would,  no  doubt,  be  glad  to  be  rid  of  Federal 
taxation  and  the  interference  of  Federal  officers. 
The  North  and  West  would  enjoy  cheap  tobacco 

o 


194       THE   MANAGEMENT  OF   COLOURED   RACES. 

just  as  much  as  the  South.  If  it  could  be  so  ar 
ranged,  all  the  States  would  be  most  glad  to  appro 
priate  the  drink  revenue  to  their  own  purposes,  and 
so  dimmish  the  weight  of  direct  taxation  (for  State  and 
local  purposes)  of  which  they  complain.  In  no  other 
respect  is  there  any  question  of  infringing  the  State 
rights  of  domestic  legislation  and  management  in  the 
South  more  than  anywhere  else.  It  was  slavery  that 
raised  the  question  of  State  rights  and  brought  on  the 
war;  it  is  this  sequela  of  slavery  that  keeps  the  ques 
tion  alive. 

THE  CASTE   QUESTION. 

There  is  one  more  view  in  which  we  must  look  at 
the  question  of  black  and  white :  I  mean  the  separa 
tion  of  the  people  of  America  into  two  castes,  which 
is  becoming  more  pronounced  than  ever.  Since  the 
North  has  insisted  that  the  blacks  should  be  admitted 
to  political  equality  neither  North  nor  South  has 
made  any  movement  whatever  towards  admitting 
them  to  social  equality ;  in  fact,  the  movement  has 
been  rather  the  other  way.  A  certain  friendly  fami 
liarity  and  association  was  possible  and  common, 
more  especially  in  the  South,  when  the  parties  met 
on  acknowledged  terms  of  superiority  and  inferiority. 
Now  the  whites  assert  their  superiority  by  social 
exclusion;  and  the  blacks  themselves,  unwilling  to 
accept  the  old  situation  in  social  matters,  have  much 
withdrawn  themselves  from  associating  with  the 
whites  on  occasions  which  formerly  brought  the  two 


BLACK  AND   WHITE   IN   THE   SOUTHERN   STATES.    195 

races  together.  This  is  particularly  noticeable  in  the 
churches.  I  am  told  that  in  former  days  almost 
every  church  had  a  recognised  '  black  quarter ; '  now 
the  black  churches  are  almost  entirely  separate  from 
the  white  churches.  It  was  not  unnatural  that  this 
should  have  happened  at  first,  but  one  might  have 
hoped  that  prejudices  would  have  been  gradually  got 
over.  After  all  it  is  only  matter  of  habit  and  custom, 
and  that  such  a  habit  can  be  very  completely  over 
come  is  shown  by  the  case  of  the  public  conveyances, 
especially  the  tramway-cars,  so  universal  in  America. 
I  believe  it  is  not  long  since  no  black  could  venture 
to  intrude  himself  among  whites.  Now  the  habit  has 
been  established,  and  the  humblest  black  rides  with 
the  proudest  white  on  terms  of  perfect  equality,  and 
without  the  smallest  symptom  of  malice  or  dislike 
on  either  side.  I  was,  I  confess,  surprised  to  see  how 
completely  this  is  the  case ;  even  an  English  Radical 
is  a  little  taken  aback  at  first. 

There  is  generally  no  bad  feeling  or  incivility 
attending  the  caste  separation ;  on  the  contrary,  I  saw 
nothing  but  good  feeling  and  good  temper  in  the 
daily  relations  between  the  classes  ;  only,  like  separate 
Hindoo  castes,  they  do  not  intermarry,  or  worship 
or  eat  together.  I  fear  there  is  not  at  present  much 
appearance  of  any  abatement  of  this  caste  feeling ;  it 
is  maintained  and  perpetuated  by  the  separation  of 
the  children  in  the  public  schools.  It  has  become 
almost  the  universal  rule  of  the  United  States  that 
none  of  the  schools,  high  or  low,  are  common  to  the 
two  races ;  the  whites  have  their  schools,  and  the 

o  2 


196       THE   MANAGEMENT   OF   COLOURED   RACES. 

blacks  have  their  schools,  but  there  is  no  intermixture. 
The  question  was,  I  believe,  much   debated,  and  in 
some  States   it  was  not   settled  without  much  diffi 
culty;  but  I  understand  that  the  general  feeling  of 
the   blacks   themselves    was   in   favour   of    separate 
schools.     They  hardly  felt  that  their  children  could 
hold  their  own  against  the  prejudices  of  the  whites,  if 
they  were  obliged  to  go  to  the  white  schools,   and 
they  preferred  to  have  public  schools  established  for 
their  special  benefit.     This  is  now  the  case  wherever 
the  blacks  are  sufficiently  numerous ;  and  the  separa 
tion  is  complete  in  the  higher  schools  and  colleges  as 
well  as  in  the  lower  schools.     The  curious  part  of  it 
to  the  eye  of  a  stranger  is  the  effect  on  children  really 
white  but  tainted  with  some  heredity  of  black  blood. 
One  sees  some  extremely  fair   children — sometimes 
fairer  than  the  average  of  white  children — among  the 
ebony,  woolly-headed  negroes.     It  seems  hard ;  but 
when  one  says  that,  one  is  told  that  they  are  entirely 
accustomed  to  be  so  treated,  and  do  not  feel  it.     It  is 
hardly  to  be  expected  that  children  brought  up  in 
ideas  of  caste  will  readily  get  rid  of  them  when  they 
grow   up.     Just   like    Hindoos,    they    maintain   the 
separation  in    some  things,  but  not  in    others.     In 
many  places  I  saw  white  and  black  children  running 
freely  about  in  one   another's  houses,  and  apparently 
on  very  good  terms ;  but   still  they  know  where  to 
draw  the  line.     In  India  we  have  managed  to  bring 
the  different  castes  together  in  the  same  schools ;  but 
it  is  not  so  in  America. 

must,  then,  accept  the  caste  system  as  a  fact. 


BLACK  AND   WHITE   IN  THE   SOUTHERN   STATES.  197 

I  won't  here  discuss  the  advantages  or  disadvantages 
of  its  complete  abolition,  to  the  extent  of  permitting 
what  is  called  miscegenation.  It  has,  I  believe,  been 
suggested  that  forty  millions  of  somewhat  nervous 
and  over -energetic  American  whites,  in  danger  of 
wearing  out  their  physique,  as  the  sharp  sword  wears 
out  the  scabbard,  might  be  improved  by  the  small 
amalgam  of  four  millions  of  easy-tempered,  light- 
hearted  blacks  in  the  formation  of  a  people  of  the 
future,  fitted  permanently  to  thrive  on  the  soil  and  in 
the  climate  of  America ;  but  the  most  pronounced 
philo-negro  in  the  Northern  States  would  recoil  from 
such  an  idea ;  so  we  need  not  mention  it.  Christianity 
may  effect  much  to  bring  the  races  together,  but  not 
quite  that  for  the  present.  As  it  is,  intermarriage 
is  now  positively  prohibited  by  law  in  most  of  the 
States — an  extraordinary  state  of  things  among  a 
people  putting  the  equality  of  man  at  the  head  of  all 
their  Constitutions !  Another  suggestion  much  more 
frequently,  and,  indeed,  quite  persistently  made  by 
very  many  people  is,  that,  the  races  remaining  se 
parate,  it  is  not  the  whites  but  the  blacks  who  will 
die  out.  '  They  cannot  take  care  of  themselves/  it 
is  said  ;  i  they  can  neither  take  care  of  their  children, 
nor  manage  themselves  in  sickness,  nor  bring  them 
selves  to  sanitary  laws  and  habits,  now  that  the  be 
nevolent  eye  of  the  slave- owner  is  withdrawn.  It 
is  a  mere  matter  of  time ;  they  must  die  out  in  the 
end.'  It  is  really  quite  surprising  how  seriously  this 
is  said,  when  it  is  so  directly  contrary  to  fact.  No 
doubt  in  the  terrible  disturbance  and  unsettlement 


198       THE   MANAGEMENT  OF   COLOURED   RACES. 

due  to  the  war  there  was  much  negro  suffering  and 
a  good  deal  of  negro  mortality  in  many  places ;  and 
even  yet  the  increase  of  the  coloured  population  is 
probably  not  so  rapid  as  it  was  in  the  days  of  skilful 
and  careful  slave-breeding,  or  as  it  will  be  when  the 
negro  family  system  is  better  established  and  the 
negro  population  is  more  settled  and  independent. 
But  all  statistical  figures  available  show  that  when 
ever  a  new  census  has  been  taken  it  is  found  that  the 
negroes  are  not  diminishing,  but  increasing  more  or 
less  fast.  It  is  patent  to  the  eye  that  they  are  not  a 
people  who  have  the  least  intention  of  dying  out ;  on 
the  contrary,  there  seems  every  prospect  that  as  they 
settle  down  they  will  multiply  with  great  rapidity, 
and  will  supply  the  population  still  so  much  want 
ing  properly  to  occupy  the  Southern  States.  They 
are  an  inevitable  fact,  and  it  is  incumbent  on  every 
well-wisher  of  America  to  make  the  best  of  them, 
instead  of  supposing  that  heaven  will  remove  the 
difficulty. 

To  me,  accustomed  to  see  great  communities  in 
India,  where  varieties  of  caste  do  not  interfere  with 
union  in  a  common  social  system — •  where,  on  the  con 
trary,  caste  but  represents  a  variety  of  occupations 
and  functions  in  that  system — the  existence  of  two 
castes  in  America  does  not  seem  to  present  any 
insuperable  obstacle  to  well-being.  In  an  Indian 
village  there  may  be,  and  generally  is,  a  caste  of  pro 
prietors,  a  caste  of  herdsmen,  a  caste  of  labourers,  a 
caste  of  money-lenders  and  shopkeepers,  a  caste  of 
blacksmiths,  and  a  caste  of  carpenters,  who  all  live 


BLACK  AND  WHITE   IN  THE   SOUTHERN   STATES.    199 

very  well  together,  and  support  one  another  by  each 
contributing  their  functions  to  the  village  existence. 
It  is  hard,  then,  if  in  the  United  States  two  castes 
cannot  co-exist,  supposing  that  means  of  amalga 
mating  them  are  not  found.  No  doubt  it  does 
seem  cruel  that  no  black  or  mulatto  of  the  highest 
merit  can  overstep  the  line  which  condemns  him  to  a 
society  socially  inferior.  But  very  much  is  open  to 
such  a  man ;  there  is  a  great  black  population  among 
whom  he  may  fulfil  great  functions.  Till  the  blacks 
of  the  South  are  able  to  find  among  their  own  race 
professional  men,  merchants,  traders,  and  other  oc 
cupants  of  the  higher  places  now  almost  entirely 
monopolised  by  the  whites,  it  cannot  be  said  that  a 
coloured  man  fitted  to  rise  has  no  field  in  which  he 
may  do  so. 

My  own  view,  then,  is  extremely  sanguine.  I 
cannot  see  why  the  black  difficulty  in  America 
should  not  be  settled,  and  well  settled,  and  why  this 
great  people  should  not  retain  among  them  a  settled, 
industrious,  and  progressive  coloured  population, 
fitted  to  fill  the  portions  of  the  country  not  adapted 
for  the  white  race,  and  there  to  contribute  to  the 
wealth,  the  greatness,  and  the  resources  of  the  com 
mon  country. 


SOME  OF  THE  CONTENTS  OF 
MY  JOUKNAL. 


SOME  OF  THE  CONTENTS  OF 
MY  JOURNAL. 

THE  ATLANTIC  AND  NEW  YORK. 

I  LEFT  England  in  the  beginning  of  September.  From  my 
own  experience,  and  what  I  have  learned,  I  think  it  is  better 
not  to  go  much  earlier  than  this.  Many  people  make  the 
mistake  of  going  too  early,  and  find  it  exceedingly  hot  in 
America  in  the  months  of  July  and  August,  or  sometimes 
even  in  the  beginning  of  September.  I  had  it  quite  cool 
from  the  time  of  my  arrival,  and  altogether  found  the 
uutumn  season  a  delightful  time. 

I  started  from  London  very  early  in  the  morning,  to 
arrange  about  my  passage  and  get  the  steamer  at  Liverpool, 
but  found  on  arrival  that  I  need  not  have  been  in  quite  such 
a  hurry.  The  steamers  are  timed  to  leave  Liverpool  in  the 
afternoon,  but  they  always  take  their  final  departure  with 
the  mails  from  Queenstown,  in  the  Cove  of  Cork,  the  following 
afternoon."*  They  have  to  wait  at  Queenstown  for  the  mails, 
and  are  therefore  in  no  hurry.  A  man  who  wishes  to  save 
time,  instead  of  starting  in  the  morning  may  take  the  mail 
train  to  Dublin  in  the  evening,  and  go  on  with  the  mails  to 
Cork  and  Queenstown,  and  so  make  sure  of  catching  the 
steamer  there  ;  but  it  is  rather  hard  travelling.  I  took  my 
passage  by  the  steamer  Germanic,  one  of  the  finest  of  the 
White  Star  line.  This  line  is  certainly  the  most  modern, 
and  the  quickest.  The  passage-money  is  not  excessive,  and 
there  is  a  great  saving  in  taking  a  return  ticket ;  this  costs 
thirty  guineas,  which  includes  your  board  and  lodging  for 


204  MY  JOURNAL. 

eighteen  or  twenty  days — so  it  is  not  so  very  expensive 
travelling  after  all.  I  was  very  civilly  treated.  Passengers 
go  on  board  by  a  tug  steamer,  and  find  the  large  steamer 
lying  out  in  the  Liverpool  river.  We  got  to  Queenstown 
the  next  day,  and  started  again  with  the  mails  at  4  P.M. 
The  length  of  the  voyage  from  Queenstown  to  Sandy  Hook, 
the  entrance  to  New  York,  is  2,800  nautical  miles,  and  with 
good  weather  the  White  Star  steamers  do  the  distance  in 
eight  days ;  but  we  must  expect  to  meet  some  share  of  bad 
weather  in  the  Atlantic  pretty  often.  That  was  my  experi 
ence.  For  three  days  we  had  a  heavy  sea,  which  much  retarded 
the  vessel.  Then  it  calmed  down,  and  finally  we  had  two  or 
three  fine  days,  during  which  the  vessel  made  from  360  to 
380  miles  per  diem  ;  that  is,  from  15  to  16  miles  per  hour 
on  an  average.  She  did  that  easily,  without  apparent  effort, 
and  in  some  voyages  she  has  not  unfrequently  done  400 
miles  in  a  day.  I  had  never  been  in  so  fast  a  steamer  before, 
and  was  surprised  to  find  the  ease  with  which  these  vessels 
go  that  pace.  I  thought  the  Germanic  a  very  fine  vessel, 
and  the  arrangements  regarding  meals  and  attendance  were 
excellent.  The  food  was  quite  good.  Things  were  mostly 
arranged  upon  the  American  plan.  Passenger  accommoda 
tion  is  principally  in  the  middle  and  forward  part  of  the 
ship ;  there  is  a  good  smoking-room,  and  a  ladies'  cabin,  but 
no  general  drawing-room  or  writing-room.  The  ship  was 
quite  full.  Almost  all  the  passengers  were  Americans  or 
else  people  going  on  business  to  America.  I  was  fortunate 
enough  to  make  acquaintance  with  some  very  agreeable 
people,  several  of  whom  I  afterwards  met  in  the  States. 
After  a  voyage  of  eight  days  and  some  hours  from  Queens- 
town  we  reached  the  Bar  at  the  mouth  of  the  river  at  Sandy 
Hook,  and  found  we  had  to  wait  several  hours  to  get  over 
it — there  is  not  enough  water  at  all  times  of  the  tide.  Then 
after  we  were  over  we  were  again  stopped  at  the  Quaran 
tine  Station.  They  seem  to  be  particular  about  sanitary 
inspection  in  America.  Thence  to  New  York  is  a  very  short 
distance.  We  arrived  there,  and  went  straight  alongside  the 
wharf,  being  a  little  more  than  8^  days  from  Queenstown 


NEW   YOKK.  205 

and  9|-  from  Liverpool.  It  was  a  fine  day,  and  the  sight 
approaching  New  York  very  pretty.  There  is  comparatively 
little  tide  on  the  American  coast,  the  ordinary  rise  being  only 
five  or  six  feet — just  enough  to  keep  the  harbour  sweet  and 
clean,  and  not  so  much  as  to  give  all  the  trouble  that  our 
tides  give  us.  There  is  deep  water  all  alongside  New  York, 
and  ships  lie  close  in,  without  the  necessity  for  wet  docks  or 
other  expensive  arrangements.  We  landed  without  delay, 
and  found  the  Custom  House  not  by  any  means  troublesome, 
everything  being  done  in  a  quiet  and  orderly  way.  There 
was  nothing  to  be  seen  in  the  way  of  cabs  except  great  two- 
horse  hackney  coaches,  exceedingly  expensive  ;  but  the  hotel 
omnibus  presently  turned  up,  and  we  were  beset  by  £  ex 
presses  ' — that  means  in  America  light  carts  for  forwarding 
luggage.  After  a  little  delay  I  reached  the  Windsor  Hotel, 
where  I  stayed  while  in  New  York.  It  is  a  very  good  hotel 
-perhaps  the  best  specimen  of  an  hotel  conducted  on  the 
American  principle ;  that  is,  of  charging  so  much  per  diem 
for  board  and  lodging.  For  a  residence  for  a  little  time  in 
New  York  I  should  certainly  recommend  the  Windsor  ;  but 
for  a  passing  traveller  it  is  a  little  far  off,  in  the  fashionable 
quarter,  the  New  York  Belgravia ;  and  the  well-known  Fifth 
Avenue  Hotel  might  be  more  central  and  convenient.  The 
charge  at  the  Windsor  is  $4  (say  16s.)  per  diem;  and,  con 
sidering  the  character  of  the  food  and  the  accommodation,  I 
thought  the  charge  quite  moderate.  Some  of  the  hotels  at 
New  York  and  Boston  charge  a  little  more  and  others  less ; 
the  hotels  in  the  interior  of  the  country  generally  $%\  or  $3. 
About  $Z\  to  $4  a  day  may  be  taken  as  the  average  cost  of 
board  and  lodging  at  first-class  hotels.  You  may  have  a 
room  with  a  bath-room  attached,  but  that  is  always  charged 
a  dollar  a  day  extra.  With  this  exception,  there  are  very 
few  extras,  especially  if  you  fall  into  the  custom  of  the 
country  and  do  not  drink  wine ;  if  you  do  you  will  have  to 
pay  high  for  it.  If  a  man  is  content  to  find  his  way  about 
by  the  aid  of  tramways  and  other  native  methods,  he  may 
live  very  well  at  a  pound  a  day,  all  expenses  included.  Then 
say  ten  shillings  a  day  for  travelling — that  would  make  about 


206  MY  JOURNAL. 

thirty  shillings  a  day  for  obligatory  expenses.  Of  course  he 
may  spend  money  beyond  this,  but  really  there  is  not  so  much 
temptation  to  do  so  as  in  Europe.  I  should  say  that  for 
1501.  a  man  may  make  an  extremely  good  three  months' 
tour  to  America.  Besides  the  hotels  on  the  American  plan 
which  I  have  mentioned,  there  are  a  few  in  the  large  cities 
which  are  conducted  on  the  European  principle — charging 
for  what  you  have ;  and  I  believe  that  if  people  do  not  want 
to  be  overfed,  and  manage  economically,  they  may  live  in 
such  hotels  almost  as  cheaply  as  in  those  conducted  on  the 
American  plan  ;  but  they  will  have  more  trouble  ;  and  if 
they  want  private  rooms  and  such  special  accommodation, 
they  have  to  pay  very  heavily  indeed  at  such  hotels  as  the 
Brunswick  and  Brevoort,  at  New  York.  At  the  Windsor 
the  waiters  are  white  men,  which  is  contrary  to  the  usual 
practice,  most  hotels  having  black  waiters.  I  found  the  food 
really  very  good  indeed — a  great  deal  better  than  that  which 
I  afterwards  obtained  at  most  American  hotels.  My  only 
complaint  was  that  feeding  was  rather  overdone  :  you  were 
expected  to  eat  too  much  ;  and  the  waiters  did  not  seem  to 
have  any  mercy  on  you  if  you  did  not  comply. 

Most  of  the  beds  in  America  have  mosquito-curtains,  and 
I  was  terrified  by  the  fear  of  encountering  those  old  Indian 
enemies.  Happily  at  the  season  when  I  was  in  America  I 
did  not  suffer  much  ;  but  at  some  seasons,  I  believe,  the 
mosquitos  are  very  bad  there. 

On  the  afternoon  of  my  arrival  I  '  did '  the  Central  Park 
of  New  York — an  immense  place,  ever  so  many  miles 
long,  and  very  well  kept ;  called  <  Central '  because  it  is  a 
long  way  off.  Parks  are  very  much  the  fashion  in  America  ; 
now  almost  every  great  town  has  a  fine  park.  A  long 
stream  of  carriages  of  all  kinds  was  going  towards  the  park, 
but  they  tailed  off  and  became  rare  in  the  further  parts.  T 
noticed  even  on  Sunday  a  large  number  of  vehicles  going  out 
there ;  but  I  am  told  that  these  are  chiefly  filled  by  the 
foreign  population  of  New  York,  which  is  very  large.  I 
should  say  that  the  park  is  a  kind  of  cross  between  Regent's 
Park  and  the  Bois  de  Boulogne.  In  the  evening  everything 


NEW   YORK.  207 

seemed  very  dull.  There  are  no  books  in  the  hotels;  the 
streets  are  but  indifferently  lighted,  and  nothing  seemed  to 
be  going  on.  There  was  none  of  the  liveliness  of  a  great 
European  city  in  the  evening.  The  following  day  I  looked 
about  the  town,  and  delivered  some  letters  of  introduction, 
being  very  kindly  received  by  some  very  agreeable  people. 
That  evening  I  dined  with  a  very  pleasant  and  hospitable 
old  banker,  who  struck  me  as  wonderfully  English  in  his 
manners  and  conversation  as  well  as  in  his  table  and  arrange 
ments.  I  was  much  surprised  to  find  that  he  had  never  been 
in  Europe — which  is  a  rare  thing — but  he  had  been  very 
much  in  contact  with  Englishmen. 

The  appearance  of  the  city  of  New  York  did  not  strike 
me  as  being  very  different  from  European  cities.  There  are 
some  fine  buildings,  but  I  should  not  say  that  the  place 
impresses  one  very  much.  Upon  the  whole  it  is  less  un- 
English-looking  than  I  expected. 

The  principal  points  in  New  York  ways  which  struck  me 
were  the  following: — The  way  of  serving  the  dishes,  the 
cookery,  the  food,  and  the  arrangements  altogether  at  the 
hotels.  The  rectangular  streets,  which  one  soon  learns  to  find 
a  great  convenience,  the  number  of  the  street  giving  you  at 
once  the  clue  to  its  whereabouts.  Then  the  vehicles  used, 
which  are  different  from  ours.  The  ladies'  carriages  are  not 
very  different;  they  are  not  particularly  smart  nor  well 
set  up — the  fine  ladies  are  generally  content  with  coachmen, 
without  footmen.  But  the  light  traps  and  everything  that 
goes  under^  the  name  of  '  buggy '  in  America  are  very  smart 
and  fast  vehicles  indeed,  with  a  great  many  fast-trotting 
horses.  I  was  taken  by  surprise  to  find  that  the  spider-like 
vehicles  which  we  rather  suppose  to  be  an  American  eccen 
tricity  are  in  every-day  use,  not  only  in  the  towns  but  still 
more  in  the  country  and  over  the  unmade  country  roads. 
They  are  made  of  hickory-wood,  are  wonderfully  light,  and 
seem  to  be  exceedingly  strong,  judging  by  the  work  which 
they  endure.  They  last  quite  as  well  as  our  heavy  vehicles, 
and  I  cannot  imagine  why  we  do  not  follow  the  example  in 
getting  such-like  traps. 


208  MY  JOURNAL. 

The  tramways  puzzle  one  rather  at  first ;  they  seem  slow, 
and  difficult  to  understand  ;  but  before  one  has  been  very 
long  in  America  one  becomes  quite  accustomed  to  them,  and 
uses  them  continually.  My  only  wonder  is  that  such  a 
high-pressure  people  as  the  Americans  can  stand  such  a  slow 
mode  of  conveyance,  for  they  are  very  slow.  Really  people  in 
America  do  not  give  you  the  idea  of  being  in  a  hurry. 

One  of  the  newest  things  to  me  was  the  Elevated  Railway 
which  has  recently  been  started  in  New  York.     It  seemed  a 
most  admirable  arrangement.    New  York  is  a  very  long  city- 
eight  or  ten  miles  long — avenues  running  the  whole  length  of 
it.    The  plan  is  to  establish,  on  two  or  three  of  these  avenues, 
selected  for  the  purpose,  these  elevated  railways,  which  run 
upon  iron  girders  above  the  heads  of  the   people  and  the 
ordinary  traffic,  and  are  an  enormous  convenience  to  those 
who  have  to  go  the  long  distances  that  New  York  people  go 
between   their  homes   and   their   places   of  business.     The 
astonishing  thing  is,  how  they  could  have  got  on  to  the  year 
1878  without  having  anything  of  the  kind.     They  must  have 
spent  a  large  portion   of  their  lives  travelling  five  or  six 
miles  backwards  and  forwards  in  the  trams.     The  Elevated 
Railway  is,   I  think,   infinitely   cheaper  and  easier,  and  it 
is  certainly   very   much    lighter   and   more    airy  than   our 
underground  railways;   and  the  facilities  for  travelling  are 
quite  as  great,  the  only  difference  being  that  passengers  go 
upstairs  to  the  railway  where  we  go  down.     There  is  no  dif 
ficulty  in  carrying  the  lines  along  the  long  straight  avenues ; 
but  when  you  get  into  the  older  parts  of  New  York  (which 
are  built  more  like  European  towns,  and  where  the  avenues 
are  not  continuous)  there  is  much  more  difficulty.     I  was 
astounded  to  see  how  the  difficulty  of  going  round  corners  is 
overcome.     The  makers  of  the  Elevated  Railway  have  not 
gone  to  the  expense  of  taking  up  large  blocks  of  houses  to 
make  the  way  for  their  line  ;  they  go  sharp  round  right- 
angled  corners,  taking  up,  perhaps,  only  part  of  one  house  at 
the  corner,  and  going  round  that  in  a  way  marvellous  to 
behold ;  but  they  do  it  without  accident.     The  great  outcry 
against  the  Elevated  Railways  was  the  damage  to  the  amenity 


THE  NEW  YORK   COUNTRY.  209 

of  the  houses  in  the  streets  through  which  they  pass.  The 
Americans  do  things  in  a  more  energetic  manner  than  we 
do ;  and  having  got  the  sanction  of  the  New  York  Legislature 
for  the  railway,  they  made  it  first  and  thought  about  com 
pensation  for  the  owners  of  property  afterwards.  No  doubt 
it  is  not  a  pleasant  thing  some  day  to  find  that  a  railway 
is  running  before  your  drawing-room  windows,  but  it  will 
probably  be  found  in  the  end  that  the  character  of  the  houses 
on  the  line  is  changed,  not  their  value ;  they  will  become 
places  of  business  rather  than  residences ;  but  for  business 
purposes  the  railway  may  add  to  their  value.  So  perhaps 
the  Americans  are  wiser  than  if  they  had  given  enormous 
compensation  first,  according  to  our  plan.  When  I  arrived 
the  only  experience  of  the  elevated  railways  having  been  in 
summer,  when  they  were  not  so  much  needed,  the  cry  of  the 
aggrieved  householders  seemed  to  be  more  heard  than  the 
praises  of  the  passengers  by  the  line ;  but  when  I  came  back, 
in  winter,  the  immense  advantage  and  convenience  to  the 
general  public  of  the  railway  had  been  so  much  appreciated 
that  praise  altogether  predominated  over  complaints.  I  am 
very  much  impressed  with  the  belief  that  elevated  railways 
of  this  kind  in  Oxford  Street  and  Piccadilly  and  such-like 
thoroughfares  would  admirably  supplement  the  accommoda 
tion  afforded  by  the  metropolitan  lines,  which  cannot  be 
multiplied. 

When  I  had  spent  a  day  or  two  in  New  York  I  accepted 

the  kind  invitation  of  Mr.  0 to  visit  his  place  on  the 

Hudson  River,  near  West  Point,  but  on  the  opposite  side. 
I  had  a  most  agreeable  visit,  and  was  charmed  with  the 
country  I  saw.  I  had  expected  to  find  the  city  of  New 
York  a  fine  place,  but  had  hardly  looked  for  the  charming 
country  which  I  found  in  the  neighbourhood.  We  went  up 
by  railway,  and  immediately  on  getting  clear  of  the  city 
came  upon  a  very  pretty,  undulating,  and  green  country, 
abounding  in  summer  residences.  I  understand,  however, 
that  this  is  an  unusually  green  season,  and  that  in  most 
years  the  grass  is  a  good  deal  burnt  up  for  a  few  weeks  in 
summer.  However,  grass  is  very  much  the  characteristic  of 

P 


210  MY  JOURNAL. 

the  country  near  New  York.  It  is  mostly  a  dairy  country — 
not  flat,  but  abounding  in  pretty  hills  and  undulations.  In 
the  country  within  easy  reach  of  New  York  the  wealthy 
citizens  have  beautiful  places — not  exactly  of  the  nature  of 
country  seats  in  our  style,  but  rather  like  large  cottages,  with 

abundance   of   pretty   grounds   about   them.     Mr.    0 's 

place  is  really  a  beautiful  one,  as  are  some  other  places  in 
the  neighbourhood.  I  never  saw  anywhere  a  prettier  country 
or  nicer  houses.  In  the  afternoon  Mr.  0  —  -  took  me  over 
to  the  West  Point  Military  Academy — very  pleasantly 
situated.  It  seems  that  the  cadets  go  through  a  very  long 
and  very  scientific  course  of  education  for  the  American 
army,  and  are  turned  out  accomplished  officers  to  a  far 
greater  degree  than  can  be  the  case  under  our  military 
arrangements,  where  a  boy  is  hardly  a  year  at  Sandhurst. 

The  next  day  Mr.  0 took  me  a  drive  through  a  pretty 

country,  very  undulating,  and  even  hilly.  I  enjoyed  it  very 
much  indeed,  as  I  did  my  visit  in  every  way.  In  the 
morning  I  returned  to  New  York  by  the  steamer  on  the 
Hudson  River.  The  river  is  very  pretty  indeed,  and  is  much 
more  in  the  style  of  a  Scotch  loch  than  a  river.  I  again 
occupied  myself  for  a  day  or  two  doing  the  sights  of  New 
York,  and  among  them  one  of  the  magnificent  steamers, 
which  runs  to  Providence.  It  is  impossible  to  imagine 
anything  more  luxurious  than  the  American  steamers  made 
for  inland  waters.  They  are  enormous  buildings,  with  cabins 
tier  upon  tier ;  and  things  are  generally  so  arranged  that  you 
go  on  board,  have  supper,  go  to  bed  as  comfortably  as  if  you 
were  in  your  own  house,  and  arrive  at  your  destination  in 
the  morning. 

I  was  invited  to  pay  another  visit,  in  the  country  near 

New  York,  to  Mr.  H ,  a  distinguished  member  of  the 

American  Legislature,  who  lives  there  with  his  charming 
family,  and  has  something  much  more  like  a  great  English 
estate  than  you  often  find  in  America.  It  is  an  old  property, 
on  which  many  free  blacks  have  been  settled  for  generations. 

Mr.  H took  me  about  the  place,  and  I  had  my  first  sight 

of  the  labouring  population  of  America  at  home,  both  white 


A  SCAMPER  THROUGH  THE  NORTH  AND  WEST.   211 

and  coloured.  The  latter  were,  however,  of  more  or  less 
mixed  blood,  and  several  of  them  have  Indian  blood,  being  a 
cross  between  negroes  and  Indians.  All  seemed  fairly  well- 
to-do,  the  coloured  people,  perhaps,  of  a  somewhat  lower  class 
than  the  whites,  but  not  very  much  so ;  and  they  seem  to 
live  quite  sociably  together,  the  white  and  black  children 
running  into  one  another's  houses ;  only  they  do  not  inter 
marry.  This  is,  however,  a  very  exceptional  estate.  We 
drove  a  considerable  distance  into  the  country,  and  saw  some 
of  the  farms  and  farmers.  There  is  little  but  dairy  farm 
ing  in  this  part  of  the  country.  Mr.  H and  others 

have  also  some  good  trotting  stock,  and  part  of  the  New 
York  country  produces  this  stock,  I  understand,  largely. 
The  farmers  whom  we  saw  universally  owned  their  own 
farms,  although  a  good  many  have  mortgages  upon  them. 
The  farms  seemed  to  average  about  one  hundred  acres, 
mostly  pasture,  with  some  woodland  attached  to  each. 
There  is  a  great  deal  of  wood  all  about  this  part  of  the 
country.  The  farmers  seem  a  very  good,  plain,  hard-working 
style  of  men.  One  farm  was  a  good  deal  larger  than  the 
average,  and  the  people  seemed  superior,  the  daughter  of  the 
house  quite  ladylike.  The  farmers  principally  live  by  selling 
butter,  and  also  some  pigs  and  apples.  Apples  are  exces 
sively  abundant  in  all  this  country,  but  I  did  not  gather  that 
much  cider  is  made.  They  raise  corn  enough  for  their  own 
consumption,  but  not  for  sale.  I  was  struck  by  the  quiet, 
respectable,  handsome  look  of  some  tradesmen  assisting  a 
farmer  to  repair  his  house.  They  looked  quite  like  the  best 
artisans  in  England  5  there  was  nothing  American  about 
them. 


A  SCAMPER   THROUGH  THE  NORTH  AND    WEST. 

I  now  returned  to  New  York,  in  order  to  start  for  Boston 
by  the  New  York  Central  Eailway.  I  travelled  in  a  Wagner 
drawing-room  car.  On  each  of  the  main  lines  a  contractor, 
generally  either  Pullman  or  Wagner,  supplies  drawing-room 
and  sleeping-cars.  There  is  not  much  difference  between  the 

p  2 


212  MY  JOURNAL. 

contractors'  cars ;  there  seemed  rather  a  want  of  variety.  The 
railway  seemed  to  be  well  managed,  and  the  country,  as  we 
went  out  of  New  York,  much  like  what  I  had  seen  before  in 
the  other  direction.  We  ran  along  the  shore  across  the 
estuaries  and  harbours,  and  then  passed  through  Providence 
and  other  New  England  places,  where  there  seemed  to  be 
much  population  and  traffic,  and  all  the  signs  of  a  manu 
facturing  district.  It  was  dark  before  I  got  to  Boston, 
where  I  went  to  the  Brunswick  Hotel,  which  I  found  com 
fortable,  but  very  expensive — a  good  deal  more  so  than  the 
New  York  hotels. 

Next  morning  I  did  part  of  Boston.  It  seemed  a  fine, 
substantial  town,  with  good  stone  buildings  and  churches. 
After  breakfast  I  took  a  steamer  to  Nahant,  a  small 
watering-place,  frequented  by  the  Boston  people,  where  I 
made  the  acquaintance  of  a  delightful  family,  from  among 
whom  a  distinguished  member  of  the  late  Liberal  Adminis 
tration  was  almost  in  the  act  of  taking  to  himself  a  wife,  who 
will  be  a  great  acquisition  to  our  country.  I  was  pleased 
with  this  little  American  watering-place  and  the  style  of 
life  there.  The  cottages  seemed  to  be  real  cottages,  with 
verandahs  and  creeping  flowers  and  all  sorts  of  pretty  things. 
I  was  the  more  glad  to  see  this,  as  I  had  not  time  to  go  to 
Newport,  the  fashionable  seaside  watering-place  of  the  New 
York  and  New  England  people.  I  am  told  that  it  is  really 
a  beautiful  place,  and  that  many  of  the  rich  Americans  have 
very  fine  houses  of  their  own  there.  In  short,  I  gathered 
that  the  place  must  be  much  superior  to  any  of  our  watering- 
places — putting  aside  Brighton,  which  is  a  great  town,  and 
not  a  watering-place,  and  as  ugly  as  Newport  is  said  to  be 
pretty.  Americans  seem  to  go  to  the  seaside  a  good  deal 
more  than  we  do  ;  it  is  almost  a  necessity  to  them  in  the  hot 
summer  months,  when  the  sea-breezes  seem  wonderfully  to 
temper  the  heat.  In  point  of  society  Newport  seems  to 
stand  far  above  any  other  place  ;  but  I  gather  that  there  is  a 
great  want  of  occupation  for  men.  The  season  only  lasts 
through  the  summer.  The  famous  Saratoga  is  an  inland 
place,  and  has,  I  understand,  become  far  less  select  than 


BOSTON.  213 

Newport.  In  the  latter  part  of  the  season,  however,  Saratoga 
has  become  a  great  resort  for  '  politicians '  and  their  families. 
All  sorts  of  conventions  are  held  there  ;  and  it  might  be  a 
very  likely  place  at  that  time  for  visitors  who  want  to  learn 
something  of  American  politics  and  institutions  from  very 
able  men — and  many  of  the  American  '  politicians  '  are  very 
able  men.  At  Boston  I  was  kindly  and  hospitably  admitted 
to  the  Somerset  Club,  a  very  comfortable  institution.  Clubs 
have  become  very  much  an  American  institution ;  I  found 
them  at  all  the  considerable  towns  that  I  visited,  and  the 
members  are  always  most  kind  in  admitting  strangers. 
Thus  admitted  one  has  both  many  social  advantages  and  the 
run  of  English  books  and  magazines ;  sometimes  even  English 
newspapers,  and  that  is  a  great  treat,  for  throughout  the 
United  States  there  is  nothing  so  difficult  as  to  get  an 
English  newspaper  of  any  sort  or  kind.  I  sometimes 
suffered  for  weeks  together  from  a  sort  of  c  news-famine  ; '  that 
is,  as  regards  everything  excepting  the  sensational  paragraphs 
telegraphed  to  the  American  papers. 

Boston  and  Boston  Common  and  all  about  them  have 
been  so  often  described  that  I  need  not  dwell  upon  the  place. 
I  shall  only  say  that  I  found  the  character  which  it  has  for 
English-like  people  and  English-like  hospitality  and  kindness 
fully  maintained.  I  went  out  by  tram  to  Cambridge,  to  see 
the  Harvard  College  there.  The  students  have  rooms  in 
college,  but  are  not  compelled  to  dine  there,  and  their  dis 
cipline  altogether  does  not  seem  to  be  very  strict.  Boston 
Free  Library-is  a  wonderful  institution — by  far  the  largest  in 
the  world,  I  believe — and  said  to  be  very  successful.  All  over 
New  England  the  free  library  is  a  great  institution ;  but  I 
found  that  in  Pennsylvania  and  other  parts  of  the  country 
they  do  not  seem  to  see  the  advantage  in  the  same  light.  I 
am  told  that  almost  all  the  mills  and  manufacturing 
establishments  in  New  England  are  joint-stock  concerns. 
They  are  said  to  be  successfully  managed,  and  to  be  afflicted 
by  few  frauds.  They  continue  to  divide  about  5  per  cent, 
even  in  bad  times.  They  say  that  the  best  and  most  thrifty 
working  people  are  Irish  and  French  Canadians.  Americans 


214  MY  JOURNAL. 

are  neither  so  strong  nor  so  industrious ;  they  want  to  live 
by  the  head,  and  not  by  the  hand.  I  think,  however,  that 
this  chiefly  applies  to  the  non-agricultural  Americans.  The 
American  farmer  is  a  very  good,  hard-working  man. 

There  are  a  large  number  of  distinguished  literary  men 
resident  in  and  about  Boston  and  Cambridge.  The  wealth 
of  the  Boston  people  is  also  large.  So,  combining  brains  and 
money  as  it  does,  no  wonder  it  is  a  pleasant  place.  The 
climate,  however,  is,  I  believe,  very  cold  in  winter.  I  was 
only  able  to  glance  at  the  place,  and  must  hope  to  return  to 
it  another  time. 

These  Eastern  cities  have  a  great  advantage  in  using  only 
anthracite  coal,  which  burns  without  blacks ;  and  so,  from  a 
combination  of  climate  and  coal,  they  are  very  clean  and 
bright. 

I  left  Boston  for  the  West  by  the  early  express  train 
through  Massachusetts.  The  country  seemed  hilly,  and  not 
very  fertile,  but  pretty  and  pleasant-looking,  with  many 
villages  and  factories.  Connecticut,  I  am  told,  is  a  good 
agricultural  country ;  Maine  is  also  a  good  farming  State. 
At  present  all  is  excitement  in  Maine,  on  account  of  the 
majority  given  to  the  Greenbackers.  General  Butler,  the 
great  Greenback  hero,  is  stumping  Massachusetts,  and 
alarming  all  the  solid,  old-fashioned  people.  I  saw  him  on 
the  stump — a  wild-looking  man.  As  we  got  on  Massa 
chusetts  becomes  quite  highland  and  picturesque.  The 
highland  country  seems  to  be  of  much  the  same  character 
all  the  way  from  Canada  to  the  Gulf  of  Mexico ;  the  only 
difference  is  that  in  the  Southern  States  there  is  a  large 
belt  of  flat,  swampy  country  between  the  hilly  country  and 
the  sea;  whereas  in  New  England  the  hills  come  down 
almost  to  the  sea.  As  we  pass  through  Massachusetts  and  get 
into  the  New  York  State,  approaching  Albany,  the  country 
becomes  more  flat  and  agricultural.  Beyond  Albany  are  the 
6  Sandy  Plains ' —  poor  and  sandy,  but  well  settled.  Hereabouts 
was  the  old  Dutch  settlement.  Further  on,  the  sandy  plains 
change  suddenly  for  a  fertile  and  green  country,  near  Sche- 
nectady ;  and  from  here  up  the  Valley  of  the  Mohawk  is  the 


THE  MOHAWK  VALLEY.  215 

finest  country  in  the  New  York  State,  and  the  seat  of  the 
great  cheese  manufacture.  The  cheese  is  all  made  on  the 
factory  system,  the  factories  generally  being  on  a  very  large 
scale.  The  milk  is  raised  by  the  farmers  around,  who  bring 
it  to  the  factories,  where  it  is  made  into  cheese.  I  stopped 
at  Schenectady — a  very  nice  country  town — with  the  ap 
pearance  of  which  I  was  much  pleased.  It  is  an  American 
habit  to  line  the  streets  of  country  towns  with  fine  trees. 
They  are  very  shady  and  pleasant ;  and  there  seemed  to  be 
a  great  abundance  of  fine  healthy  young  people,  especially 
girls,  about.  This  first  specimen  of  an  American  country 
town  very  favourably  impressed  me.  There  is  here  one  of 
the  many  excellent  colleges  which  abound  in  America.  I  was 

very  pleasantly  entertained  by  Dr.  P and  his  wife,  very 

pleasant  and  intellectual  people.  We  drove  a  long  way 
through  the  country.  It  seemed  a  good,  quiet,  agricultural 
district.  The  most  prominent  crop  at  this  moment  is  what 
is  called  '  broom-corn,'  out  of  which  brooms  are  made ;  a  very 
large  quantity  of  it  is  raised  in  America.  I  cannot  conceive 
how  the  world  can  consume  so  many  brooms.  The  Mohawk 
and  its  Valley  are  really  beautiful.  In  the  evening  I  met  a 
fine  old  lady,  the  widow  of  a  great  Abolitionist,  and  heard 
many  stories  of  the  '  Underground  Railway,'  and  the  ways 
by  which  the  Northern  people  enabled  many  slaves  to  escape 
into  Canada.  I  also  met  one  of  the  largest  farmers  about. 
He  has  nearly  300  acres,  and  seemed  a  very  intelligent  man. 
I  was  soon  quite  at  home  with  him.  He  might  have  been  a 
good  Scotch  farmer.  He  said  almost  all  the  farmers  own 
their  own  land.  There  is  a  very  strong  opposition  to  any 
renting  system  under  a  landlord.  A  good  many  large  pro 
perties  came  down  from  former  times  under  Dutch  and 
English  grants ;  but  the  proprietors  found  it  difficult  to  hold 
them  as  rented  estates ;  in  fact,  he  said,  in  the  case  of  one 
proprietor  in  that  part  of  the  country  who  tried  to  do  so,  and 
to  maintain  and  enhance  his  rents,  a  good  deal  of  burning 
took  place.  He  says,  however,  that  occasional  short  leases 
are  not  objected  to.  He  raises  and  fattens  much  stock,  and 
that  seems  to  be  a  very  growing  industry.  He  himself  goes 


216  MY  JOURNAL. 

in  for  pedigree  stock,  to  sell.  The  average  farms  hereabouts 
are  from  TOO  to  150  acres.  Some  of  the  Mohawk  Valley 
land  is  extremely  valuable.  He  talks  of  values  about  equal 
to  moderate  English  prices  for  land.  There  is  an  unusually 
fine  apple  crop  this  year,  and  apples  are  selling  almost  ab 
surdly  cheap. 

I  have  had  a  good  deal  of  talk  about  religious  sects  in 
America.  All  seem  agreed  that  Americans  of  different  per 
suasions  do  not  hate  one  another  on  account  of  religion. 
My  informants  much  doubted  black  students  being  equal  to 
white  ones  as  they  grow  up.  There  are  none  at  the  College 
here,  but  there  are  at  several  Northern  colleges. 

From  Schenectady  I  took  the  night-train  for  Niagara,  via 
Buffalo.  I  met  a  man  who  had  been  visiting  one  of  the 
famous  Agapemones  which  is  upon  this  line.  He  said  that 
they  affect  to  raise  human  stock  on  scientific  breeding  prin 
ciples  ;  but  the  whole  thing  he  thought  very  disgusting.  In 
the  morning  we  found  ourselves  in  the  country  near  Eochester. 
It  seemed  flat  and  more  agricultural  than  pastoral.  From 
thence  there  seemed  to  be  a  considerable  ascent,  and  then 
very  flat  again  towards  Buffalo.  Passing  Buffalo  we  ran 
down  Niagara  River  to  the  Falls.  There  seemed  to  be  very 
many  orchards  in  this  part  of  the  country,  principally  apples 
and  peaches.  I  stayed,  at  the  Falls,  at  the  International  Hotel, 
upon  the  American  side.  The  Clifton  Hotel,  on  the  Canada 
side,  has  by  far  the  best  view ;  but  then  Groat  Island  and  the 
best  points  for  seeing  the  Falls  from  near  can  only  be  ap 
proached  from  the  American  side,  and  it  is  a  long  way  from 
the  Clifton ;  so  I  think  it  is  best  to  stop  on  the  American  side 
and  go  over  to  see  the  view  from  the  other  side.  I  crossed 
by  the  ferry  under  the  Falls.  It  is  quite  easy,  and  there  is 
no  danger  or  difficulty ;  but  I  was  advised  not  to  give  in  to 
the  people  who  bother  one  to  go  down  behind  the  Falls.  I 
am  told  by  many  that  the  only  result  is  to  encounter  a  great 
deal  of  wet  spray  and  a  great  deal  of  mud,  and  that  there  is 
nothing  to  repay  one  for  it  all.  All  the  rest  I  did  in  quite 
the  correct  way ;  but  the  Falls  have  been  so  often  described 
that  I  need  not  go  over  it  all.  They  certainly  are  a  very 


CANADA.  217 

fine  and  unique  thing.  It  would  not  do  to  travel  in  the 
country  without  seeing  them.  One  day  is  amply  sufficient, 
if  the  sightseer  is  active.  From  the  other  side  I  went  a 
little  way  into  Canada.  It  seemed  a  pleasant  country.  The 
population  near  the  border  is  a  good  deal  mixed ;  but  I  am 
told  that  more  Americans  come  to  the  Canadian  than 
Canadians  go  to  the  other  side.  The  taxation  is  now  much 
lighter  in  Canada.  I  returned  by  the  fine  Suspension  Bridge 
— saw  a  good  many  Indian  women,  who  sat  and  knitted,  and 
apparently  are  part  of  the  show,  but  they  did  not  beg.  They 
look  more  fair  and  squat  and  Mongolian-like  than  I  had 
expected.  The  village  of  Niagara  is  full  of  shops  for  the  sale 
of  Indian  goods.  I  do  not  know  why  it  is  so  much  an  Indian 
centre. 

I  took  another  look  at  the  Falls  in  the  morning — they 
well  bear  looking  at  twice  certainly.  I  noticed  that  the 
hotel  bill  was  very  moderate.  To  be  sure  it  is  rather  late  in 
the  season  ;  but  perhaps  the  neighbourhood  of  Canada  brings 
down  prices.  Certainly  the  hack  carriages  on  the  Canadian 
side  are  very  moderate  compared  with  American  charges. 
From  Niagara  I  went  to  Chicago,  through  Canada,  by  the 
Great  Western  Kailway,  crossing  the  river  by  the  Suspension 
Bridge.  The  country  beyond  the  river  was  much  like  what 
I  had  already  seen.  We  passed  the  Welland  Canal ;  that  is, 
the  Canadian  canal,  by  which  ships  are  taken  round  the 
Niagara  Falls.  It  is  now  being  re-excavated  to  the  size  and 
depth  sufficient  to  carry  seagoing  ships  ;  so  that  vessels  may 
sail  direct  from  the  head  of  Lake  Superior  to  ports  in  Europe 
with  cargoes  of  grain  and  timber,  or  rather  will  soon  be  able 
to  do  so.  If  the  navigation  were  open  all  the  year  round 
this  route  would  have  an  immense  advantage,  but  unfortu 
nately  it  is  closed  by  ice  a  great  part  of  the  year.  I  stopped 
a  little  time  at  Hamilton,  in  Canada.  It  seemed  a  decent- 
looking,  newly-settled  town,  with  many  factories  for  agri 
cultural  implements.  It  is  at  the  head  of  Lake  Ontario,  but 
I  did  not  see  much  shipping.  I  went  to  a  fair  and  agricul 
tural  show  which  was  then  taking  place,  and  thought  it  really 
a  very  fine  show  indeed.  It  was  full  of  Scotch  people,  or  at 


218  MY  JOURNAL. 

any  rate  people  talking  very  decided  Scotch ;  indeed,  there 
was  so  much  of  the  Scotch  intonation  that  if  I  had  shut  my 
eyes  I  might  have  supposed  myself  in  Scotland.  I  am  told 
that  there  are  many  Irish  too  hereabouts,  and  in  one  part 
of  this  country  there  are  also  Dutch.  When  I  entered 
Canada  I  noticed  that  a  superior  class  of  coloured  people 
came  into  the  train.  There  seemed  to  be  several  parties  of 
them,  and  among  them  several  smart  black  ladies — very 
smart  indeed.  I  do  not  know  whether  it  was  an  accident 
seeing  these  people  just  as  I  entered  Canada,  or  whether 
there  are  many  well-to-do  descendants  of  old  refugees.  In 
all  the  crowd  at  the  fair  there  were  scarcely  any  coloured 
people.  I  only  saw  two.  All  the  rest  looked  very  British. 
I  was  much  interested  in  the  agricultural  show.  There  were 
plenty  of  good  cattle,  and  horses,  and  pigs,  but  no  sheep. 
But  going  away  in  the  train  I  saw  a  good  many  sheep.  Be 
sides  the  ordinary  food-grains  there  were  some  very  fine  man 
golds,  and  a  very  magnificent  show  of  apples,  some  pears,  and 
very  fine  grapes ;  but  I  am  told  that  most  of  the  grapes  are 
grown  under  glass.  There  was  a  great  variety  of  agricultural 
machinery.  A  man  was  exhibiting  and  much  praising  what 
he  called  sugarcane  grown  in  the  neighbourhood.  I  looked 
at  it,  and  found  it  was  only  sorghum,  and  that  what  was 
called  sugar  was  nothing  but  a  kind  of  molasses.  In  the  ba 
zaar  there  were  many  things  of  United  States  manufacture — 
watches  from  Illinois,  enamelled  ironmongery  from  St.  Louis, 
silver  from  Connecticut ;  but  furniture  was  mostly  Canadian, 
as  also  were  a  good  many  woollen  goods,  which  did  not  seem 
to  me  very  first-rate.  A  little  further  on  I  stopped  a  little 
while  at  London.  Here  again  another  fair  and  show  was 
going  on,  and  again  I  found  many  Scotch-speaking  people. 
I  am  sorry  to  say  that  one  or  two  with  whom  I  specially 
fraternised  turned  out  to  be  tipsy.  However,  that  little 
weakness  excepted,  they  seemed  a  good  sort  of  Scotch  people. 
I  do  not  know  whether  it  is  because  I  am  remarkably  sober 
myself,  but  I  seem  to  have  a  special  attraction  for  Scotchmen 
who  have  had  a  drop  too  much — when  I  go  abroad. 

There  was  an  hotel-car  attached  to  the  train  on  the  Great 


CANADA.  219 

Western  line,  and  in  it  I  had  far  the  best  travelling  meal  I 
have  yet  had — everything  warm  and  nice,  and  the  prices 
moderate.  These  hotel-cars  are  an  immense  convenience. 
It  is  a  great  blessing,  and  greatly  improves  the  digestion,  to 
be  able  to  take  your  meal  at  your  leisure,  without  the  con 
tinual  fear  of  being  left  behind.  Unfortunately,  however, 
the  hotel-cars  are  comparatively  rare,  and  are  only  found  on 
a  few  lines.  On  this  line  they  go  as  far,  I  think,  as  Omaha, 
but  they  do  not  now  run  (as  they  once  did)  to  San  Francisco. 
For  the  rest  of  the  journey  passengers  are  obliged  to  get 
their  meals  at  the  stations,  which  must  be  a  very  great  draw 
back  to  that  long  journey.  I  know  nothing  so  trying  in  the 
American  arrangements  as  the  stopping  and  the  starting  of 
the  trains.  There  are  no  porters  to  shout  and  no  slamming 
of  doors,  because  there  are  no  doors  to  slam,  and  most  fre 
quently  no  warning  is  given  whatever.  The  train  slides 
away  quite  silently,  and  until  I  gained  experience  I  was  once 
or  twice  almost  left  behind  whilst  standing  on  the  platform, 
because  I  thought  that  the  train  going  off  in  that  style  must 
be  only  shunting.  However,  you  are  always  at  liberty  to 
run  after  the  train  and  catch  it,  and  get  up  as  best  you  can. 
That  is  what  a  large  proportion  of  the  passengers  do. 

The  country  about  London  is  very  pretty  and  good ;  to 
my  idea  as  pleasant  and  home-looking  an  agricultural  coun 
try  as  I  have  seen  in  America.  It  is  undulating,  and  seemed 
to  have  much  good  grass,  grazed  over  by  fine  stock,  whereas 
in  much  of  the  New  York  country  I  gathered  that  the  grass 
was  much  qftener  cut  as  hay  than  grazed.  In  this  Canada 
country  there  is  much  fine  wood  and  many  stumps  in  the 
fields,  giving  it  a  very  newly-cleared  appearance.  Never 
theless  I  cannot  help  thinking  that  it  showed  more  signs  of 
good  Scotch  farming  than  anything  I  had  seen  in  the  States. 
In  the  night-train  to  Chicago  there  were  a  large  number  of 
sleeping-cars,  and  very  many  families  and  children  returning 
from  their  summer  outings.  Sleeping-cars  crowded  in  this 
fashion  are  not  the  coolest  and  pleasantest  places  in  the 
world ;  and  what  surprises  one  is,  that  whereas  in  America 
there  is  almost  always  separate  accommodation  for  ladies, 


220  MY  JOURNAL. 

^very  hotel  having  a  separate  ladies'  entrance,  and  even  every 
post-office  a  special  window  for  ladies,  in  the  sleeping-cars  there 
is  no  division  at  all — all  sexes  and  ages  are  accommodated 
promiscuously.  I  do  not  recommend  night-travelling  when 
there  is  a  special  run  upon  the  cars.  With  all  this  sleeping 
.accommodation  and  hotel-car  and  other  luxuries,  I  was  sur 
prised  to  find  there  was  no  smoking  accommodation  what 
ever,  except  a  very  filthy  car  filled  with  emigrants.  There  is 
much  less  provision  for  smokers  in  America  than  with  us. 
On  this  line  there  is  practically  a  third  class,  under  the  name 
of  '  emigrant  carriages.'  During  the  night  we  crossed  the  St. 
Lawrence  (or  whatever  the  river  is  here  called)  on  a  steamer 
without  being  at  all  disturbed.  The  train  is  taken  on  board 
and  everything  managed  in  the  quickest  and  easiest  manner. 
They  certainly  do  manage  these  things  capitally  in  America. 
Their  ferry-boats  are  much  superior  to  anything  to  be  seen  in 
Europe.  In  the  morning  we  found  ourselves  in  the  Michigan 
country,  near  the  lake.  It  seemed  there  somewhat  poor  and 
jungly,  and  on  the  borders  of  the  lake  there  were  great  sand 
hills.  As  we  got  on  the  country  became  somewhat  better, 
but  still  a  dead  flat,  with  a  great  deal  of  marsh,  and  many  of 
the  houses  built  on  piles.  The  lake  was  quite  smooth  :  there 
were  no  waves  beyond  ripples.  We  duly  arrived  at  Chicago. 
The  railway  station  was  burnt  down  in  the  great  fire,  and 
has  not  been  rebuilt.  The  town,  though  still  showing  a  good 
many  blanks,  has  been  rebuilt  in  a  wonderful  way,  and  is 
undoubtedly  a  very  fine  one,  but  rather  dirty  and  smoky — 
not  clean,  like  the  Eastern  cities,  where  they  burn  anthracite 
coal.  The  whole  country  about  is  a  dead  level.  The  town 
is  laid  out  on,  I  think,  rather  too  great  a  scale  ;  the  distances 
are  very  great.  Outside  each  quarter  is  a  great  park.  I 
went  to  the  Grand  Pacific  Hotel — not  the  largest,  but  it 
seems  very  good  and  well  situated,  and  I  was  comfortable  there. 

I  made   the  acquaintance  of  Mr.  A ,  the  President  of 

the  Illinois  Central  Kailway,  who  gave  me  much  assistance  ; 
and  I  found  one  or  two  friends  whom  I  had  before  met  on  my 
travels,  and  who  were  very  kind  to  me.  I  spent  the  day  in 
thoroughly  doing  the  town.  I  went  to  one  of  the  great  pig- 


CHICAGO.  221 

killing  establishments.  It  certainly  was  a  wonderful  sight. 
They  kill  and  dispose  of  8,000  pigs  per  diem.  It  takes 
three  or  four  days  to  convert  the  pigs  into  bacon,  but  they 
are  really  made  into  sausages  in  the  course  of  an  hour.  The 
bacon  is  put  into  railway  cars  in  layers,  without  any  further 
packing,  and  so  sent  to  the  Eastern  States.  I  drove  round 
the  parks,  which  are  not  quite  complete,  and  may  be  called 
the  parks  of  the  future ;  but  they  are  very  well  and  hand 
somely  laid  out.  There  is  a  pleasant  villa  suburb  called 
Hyde  Park.  Most  of  the  Western  cities  have  a  '  Hyde  Park. 
Here  also  there  was  an  exhibition  going  on,  which  I  went 
to  see.  American-made  goods  seemed  to  preponderate,  the 
agricultural  machinery,  as  usual,  very  prominent.  I  went  to 
see  one  of  the  great  elevators  by  which  grain  is  raised  by 
machinery,  stored,  and  shipped.  It  must  be  understood  that 
the  elevator  in  America  is  not  a  mere  machine  for  transferring 
the  grain  from  one  conveyance  to  another,  but  is,  in  fact,  a 
great  warehouse,  where  grain  is  stored  sometimes  for  months, 
especially  on  the  great  lakes,  where,  owing  to  the  suspension 
of  traffic  in  the  winter,  it  must  often  be  kept  for  a  consider 
able  period  in  store.  The  system  seems  to  be  one  under 
which  a  man  does  not  necessarily  receive  back  his  own  grain, 
but  only  a  like  quantity  of  grain  of  the  same  grade.  I  was 
not  quite  able  to  understand  the  nature  of  the  interference 
exercised,  but  I  found  that  at  Chicago,  and  I  believe  at  most 
American  commercial  centres,  the  produce  brought  to  market 
is  examined  by  official  inspectors,  who  class  the  grain,  and 
apparently  ..nothing  is  allowed  to  be  sold  without  being 
officially  classed. 

I  met  at  Chicago  and  had  much  talk  with  Judge  F , 

of  Tennessee,  a  gentleman  who  has  had  great  experience  in 
the  Southern  States ;  and  also  another  gentleman,  a  Chicago 
lawyer,  connected  with  the  railway,  a  very  clear-headed  man. 
He  told  me  that  in  all  the  States  except  Louisiana  the  law 
is  based  upon  the  English  law.  The  Illinois  Legislature 
meets  biennially.  The  State  Constitutions  are.  generally 
revised  by  a  Convention — say  about  once  in  every  twenty 
years  on  the  average,  but  there  is  no  fixed  time.  Each  State 


222  MY  JOURNAL. 

has  its  own  civil  and  criminal  law,  and  the  State  Judges  dis 
pose  of  all  cases  except  offences  against  the  United  States 
revenue  laws,  which  are  tried  by  the  United  States  Judges. 
After  the  war  there  was  a  general  bankruptcy  law  throughout 
the  whole  of  the  United  States,  but  it  has  now  expired,  and 
has  not  been  renewed.  There  is  a  local  insolvency  law  in 
some  States,  but  not  in  all.  In  all  States  there  seems  to 
be  a  regular  system  of  public  prosecution — a  prosecuting 
attorney  is  always  to  be  found,  corresponding  to  our  Scotch 
Procurator  Fiscals. 

Judge  F being   a   Southerner,   takes    a   somewhat 

Southern  view  of  things.  He  thinks  the  blacks  will  last  for  a 
time,  but  they  cannot  take  care  of  themselves,  and  will  die  out 
in  the  end.  Whether  by  nature  or  want  of  education,  they 
seem  to  have  a  lower  order  of  intelligence,  and  do  not  do  well 
work  requiring  a  fine  hand,  care,  or  thought ;  he  believes  they 
do  not  succeed  in  factories.  They  have  a  few  farms  of  their 
own,  but  very  few.  He  admits,  however,  that  they  are  the 
most  good-natured  of  mankind,  and  do  very  well  under  white 
superintendence.  Most  of  the  cotton  is  raised  by  negroes 
under  a  system  of  cultivation  upon  shares — that  is,  the  crops 
are  divided  between  the  proprietor  and  the  negro  who  does 
the  work,  the  negroes  being  well  looked  after.  The  larger 
estates  in  the  South  are  now  broken  up  into  smaller  farms, 
and  more  carefully  worked  than  they  used  to  be. 

I  went  to  see  a  great  dry  goods  store.  Dry  goods  are 
cloths  and  textile  fabrics  of  all  sorts,  and,  I  believe,  a  good 
many  other  things  besides ;  but  I  cannot  exactly  define  the 
term.  At  all  events  dry  goods  are  not  groceries  nor  iron 
mongery.  In  this  Great  Central  Chicago  Store  they  say 
that  half  or  perhaps  more  of  the  goods  are  of  American  make; 
Of  the  remainder,  perhaps,  one-third  are  English,  and  the 
rest  French  and  German,  or  from  other  foreign  countries. 
Cotton  goods  they  declare  to  be  as  cheap  as  in  Manchester  ; 
and  they  have  many  varieties  to  suit  American  taste,  but 
woollens  are  excessively  dear.  Woollen  clothes  cost  fully 
double  what  they  do  in  England ;  ladies'  silks  are  also  very 
dear.  Woollen  goods  are  now  manufactured  in  almost  every 


CHICAGO  TO   ST.   LOUIS.  223 

State  in  America.     The  Americans  evidently  are   pushing 
hard  to  come  up  to  us  in  that  trade. 

From  Chicago  I  took  the  night  train  through  Illinois  to 
St.  Louis.  This  time  we  had  the  Pullman  cars,  which  seemed 
cleaner  and  better  than  the  Wagner's,  in  which  I  had  before 
travelled.  In  the  morning  the  train  was  detained  for  a  time 
at  Decatur.  I  had  time  to  take  a  walk  and  look  about  the 
place  on  a  charming  morning,  and  I  was  much  pleased  with 
this  Illinois  country  place.  It  seemed  to  be  a  kind  of  cross 
between  town  and  country — large  streets,  laid  out  at  right 
angles,  and  lined  with  trees  in  the  usual  pleasant  manner ; 
nice  houses  scattered  about,  with  plenty  of  room.  Although 
there  is  little  natural  wood  in  Illinois  the  trees  when  planted 
grow  luxuriantly.  The  soil  seemed  a  rich  black  soil ;  there 
is  nothing  like  hills,  but  decided  undulations.  I  now  quite 
understand  the  rolling  land  we  hear  so  much  of.  There  was 
beautiful  grass  and  clover  in  many  of  the  fields,  and  plenty 
of  stock  of  all  kinds..  Many  apple-orchards  were  planted,  but 
they  do  not  seem  to  thrive  here  as  they  do  in  the  country 
further  north.  The  wind,  I  believe,  is  too  much  for  them. 
There  was  good  coffee  and  refreshment  at  the  station. 
There  seems  to  be  generally  some  sort  of  hotel  at  these 
country  stations.  At  last  we  started,  and  had  daylight  for 
the  run  onwards  to  St.  Louis.  I  was  much  interested  and 
pleased  with  the  country.  Much  of  it  is  rolling,  and  more 
or  less  raised.  There  were  occasionally  what  looked  like 
small  hillocks,  but  nothing  amounting  to  hills.  The  country 
through  which  I  travelled  all  consisted  of  what  once  was 
prairie,  but  is  now  cultivated  and  enclosed.  There  are  only 
a  few  belts  of  natural  wood  in  broken  ground  near  streams 
and  ravines,  especially  as  we  approached  the  Mississippi. 
All  the  land  seemed  well  cultivated.  The  great  crop  is 
Indian  corn.  It  is  now  standing  on  the  ground  ripe.  In 
some  of  the  barer  parts  the  crops  seemed  of  poor  growth 
and  the  weeds  very  strong  ;  but  other  parts  were  much  better 
cultivated,  and  the  crops  there  seemed  strong  and  good.  We 
passed  a  good  many  wheat-fields,  the  autumn  wheat  already 
up,  and  the  fields  clean  and  well  cultivated.  I  saw  no  root- 


224  MY  JOURNAL. 

crops;  and  throughout  most  of  the  country  at  this  season  there 
is  little  appearance  of  plentiful  grass — the  fields  seemed  pretty 
bare — but  a  great  deal  of  hay  was  stacked.  We  passed  many 
villages  and  small  towns.  The  people  at  some  of  these  places 
seemed  primitive  enough.  After  running  through  a  con 
siderable  belt  of  wood  we  came  to  the  Mississippi,  with  the 
city  of  St.  Louis  on  the  opposite  side,  and  crossed  by  the 
great  bridge,  a  very  fine  structure. 

I  went  to  the  Lindell  Hotel,  a  fine  and  large  one.  My 
first  day  at  St.  Louis  was  a  Sunday,  and  I  noticed  there  that, 
although  the  people  seemed  very  religious  and  church-going, 
they  were  somewhat  Continental  in  their  views  of  Sunday. 
Here  and  at  other  places  I  saw  the  eternal  American  game  of 
base-ball  being  played  on  Sunday.  There  was  a  boat-race ;  and 
the  Exhibition  grounds  (here,  as  everywhere,  an  agricultural 
exhibition  was  going  on)  were  very  full  of  people,  the  Sunday 
notwithstanding.  All  over  America  shops  are  closed  on  Sunday, 
as  with  us;  but  they  seem  to  have  no  shutters  to  the  windowsy 
so  that  they  have  not  the  same  closed  appearance.  I  stayed  at 
St.  Louis  long  enough  to  have  a  good  look  about  the  town. 
There  seemed  to  be  many  fine  buildings,  but  I  should  say  it 
is  hardly  so  pretentious  as  Chicago.  However,  it  is  almost  as 
large,  with  very  long  streets  running  out  into  the  country, 
and  a  large  park. 

I  noticed  in  the  St.  Louis  papers  that  in  this  State  of  Mis 
souri  parties  are  so  divided  that  the  negro  vote  seems  to  be  of 
consequence.  The  question  of  mixed  or  separate  schools  seems 
to  be  an  important  one  here,  and  the  advocates  of  mixed  schools 
hope  to  secure  the  votes  of  the  blacks.  I  went  down  to  have  a 
good  look  at  the  Mississippi,  that  great  river  of  America,  and 
I  was  certainly  disappointed.  After  having  seen  other  great 
rivers  I  was  not  particularly  struck  with  this  one.  It  may 
be  larger  than  the  others,  but  the  size  is  not  palpable ;  the 
breadth  is  not  excessive,  and  there  is  no  appearance  of  a  very 
strong  current.  According  to  the  register  it  is  now  seven 
feet  above  low- water  level,  which,  I  suppose,  is  rather  low. 
The  Mississippi  and  Missouri  join  a  few  miles  above  this. 
The  water  looks  muddy.  It  is  a  curious  thing  that  there 


ST.   LOUIS.  225 

seem  to  be  no  good  fish  in  the  Mississippi.  There  are  no 
river-fish  in  the  hotel  bills ;  those  that  they  have  come  over 
from  the  great  lakes  or  from  the  sea.  I  asked  about  it,  and 
they  said  only  a  few  inferior  fish,  called  cat-fish,  are  caught  in 
the  Mississippi. 

There  are  many  steamers  here,  but  none  equal  to  the 
great  inland  steamers  at  New  York.  I  took  two  trips  of 
some  miles  each  into  the  suburbs.  On  one  route  there  was  a 
park  and  a  great  many  good  villas,  and  on  the  other  there 
were  endless  streets  of  poor  men's  houses.  They  seemed  good 
of  their  kind.  The  country  rises  in  a  rolling  way ;  but  there  are 
no  hills  or  signs  of  the  mountains  yet.  I  noticed  that  the 
driver  of  the  tram  in  which  I  travelled  was  a  Frenchman, 
and  the  conductor  an  Irishman.  I  am  told  that  there  are  a 
good  many  French  here,  but  there  seem  to  be  more  Grerman 
signboards,  notices,  &c.  I  saw  very  little  peculiarly  Ameri 
can  about  the  dress  and  appearance  of  the  people,  and  did  not 
even  notice  very  much  in  their  voices.  In  crowded  tram- 
cars  scarcely  anyone  said  anything  to  anybody,  and  there 
was  no  roughness.  Wideawakes  are  certainly  more  common 
than  in  England  ;  chimney-pot  hats  are  comparatively  rare. 
In  the  Exhibition  I  saw  some  very  fine  fat  cattle.  In  the 
hotel  there  was  a  board  with  the  various  churches  grouped 
under  denominations.  Baptist,  Episcopal,  Methodist,  and 
Presbyterian  are  the  most  numerous.  Besides  Presbyterian 
there  are  also  a  few  '  United  Presbyterian  '  churches.  One 
of  the  largest  denominations  struck  me,  being  called  simply 
'Christians.'.,  On  inquiry  I  was  told  that  this  is  a  large 
persuasion  throughout  a  great  part  of  the  States.  They  are 
called  '  Christians '  or  '  Campbellites,'  being  founded  by  a 
certain  Bishop  Campbell ;  they  are  said  to  have  branched  off 
from  the  Baptists. 

After  doing  St.  Louis  I  started  for  Kansas.  The  first 
part  of  the  country  is  much  like  that  on  the  other  side  of  the 
river,  but  becomes  more  rolling  as  we  go  on.  On  all  the 
lands  formerly  prairie  a  good  deal  of  tree-planting  has  been 
done,  and  trees  are  now  nowhere  rare ;  but  they  are  not  yet 
available  for  timber.  The  timber  is  chiefly  imported  from 

Q 


226  MY  JOURNAL. 

the   lakes    into    Illinois    and    the    neighbouring    country. 
Hedges  are  becoming  very  common  as  fences.     Getting  on 
towards  Kansas  the  country  rolls  more  and  more,  and  a  good 
deal  of  stone  begins  to  crop  up.     I  was  surprised  to  see  the 
extent  of  cultivation.     There  is   still  nothing  that  can  be 
called  a  real  open  prairie,  though  there  are  some  grazing 
tracts.     The   grass   is   now  not  very  green ;    but  here  also 
immense  quantities  of  hay  are  stored.     Some  hemp  is  grown, 
and  also  tobacco  ;  and  bees  are  kept  to  a  considerable  extent. 
We  passed  a  large  bee-farm ;  and  in  a  very  inchoate  skeleton 
village  I  noticed   a  beehive  shop.     In  parts  natural  wood 
becomes  pretty  common,  principally  oak,  especially  near  the 
Missouri  Elver.     To  see  the  open  prairie  you  must  go  far 
back  from  the  railways.     I  am  told  that  far  away  out  in  the 
south-west  of  Kansas  State,  upon  the  Arkansas  Eiver,  is  a  very 
fine  country  of  big-rolling  prairie,  with  splendid  soil,  where 
a  great  wheat  cultivation  has  been  developed  during  the  last 
six  or  eight  years.     Sometimes  they  suffer  from  drought,  but 
usually  there  is  rain  enough  for  wheat.     From   all  I  can 
gather  I  understand  that  the  rise  to  the  foot  of  the  Eocky 
Mountains  is   quite  gradual,  and  that  even  when  you  come 
to  the  mountains  the  ascent  on  this  side  is  comparatively 
gradual.     Between  this  and  the  mountains  is  what  was  called 
the  Great  American  Desert ;  but  it  now  turns  out  that  the 
Desert  is  a  myth — that  there  is  no  desert  at  all.     Travelling 
along  here  I  did  not  see  very  many  cattle,  but  at  all  the 
stations  there  were  pens  and  inclines  for  shipping  cattle.     I 
noticed  a  good  many  horses  and  many  very  fine  mules ;  oxen 
do  not  seem  to  be  used  for  draught  in  this  part  of  the  country. 
The  cattle-drivers  and  farm-hands  ride  with  wooden  stirrups. 
You  may  see  a  man  on  horseback  fetching  in  a  cow.    I  stayed 
at  Kansas  City,  which,  by  the  way,  is  not  in  Kansas  State  at 
all,  but  in  Missouri,  on  the  borders  of  Kansas.     There  were 
many  vehicles  of  all  sorts,  well  horsed.     Everyone  seems  to 
keep  a  horse  ;  yet  the  price  of  a  hack  carriage  is  two  dollars 
the  first  hour,  and  one  dollar  for  every  subsequent  hour.     The 
proprietors  say  they  are  obliged  to  take  out  licenses,  which 
causes  conveyances  to  be  dear.     I  noticed  here  an  ordinance 


KANSAS.  227 

against  touting  and  soliciting  custom,  making  it  a  misde 
meanour.  Apparently  this  is  a  municipal  ordinance  published 
by  the  Mayor  and  signed  by  the  town  clerk.  The  innkeepers' 
notice  regarding  liabilities  for  losses  is  a  Missouri  State  Law 
(Revised  Statutes  of  Missouri,  chapter  79).  Kansas  City  is  on 
the  Missouri  River.  I  was  very  much  disappointed  with  that 
river ;  it  does  not  look  very  large.  It  is  like  an  Indian  river, 
with  sandbanks  in  it ;  but  I  understand  it  does  not  rise  so 
much.  There  are  no  steamers  and  apparently  no  navigation 
here,  except  a  few  mud-barges  and  small  boats  for  local  use. 
In  fact,  the  river  is  not  much  used  in  this  part  of  its  course, 
but  it  is  more  used  higher  up,  and  it  is  navigable  throughout 
more  or  less.  Occasional  steamers  pass  up,  and  can  go  up  a 
very  long  way — it  is  scarcely  known  how  far.  The  Govern 
ment  send  steamers  up  by  the  river  route  for  supplying  their 
far-away  outposts  in  the  far  North-West,  where  there  are  no 
other  means  of  communication.  Kansas  City  is  mostly  on 
high  ground.  It  seems  a  thriving  place,  nothing  very  remark 
able  about  it,  and  is  quite  modern  in  its  ways.  I  should  not 
have  known  I  was  so  far  West.  My  hotel  was  the  St.  James's, 
on  high  ground,  comfortable  and  moderate.  I  found  that 
no  paper  is  published  on  Monday  morning,  and  I  asked, 
'  Why,  are  people  too  good  to  print  upon  Sunday  ? '  The 
answer  I  got  was,  '  No,  but  they  drink  upon  Sunday.'  How 
ever,  I  did  not  see  much  of  that,  and  rather  think  that  my 
informant  was  unduly  severe  on  his  countrymen. 

In  the  afternoon  I  visited  the  stock-yards,  and  then  went 
on  the  Kansas  side  of  the  small  river  which  here  divides  the 
two  States.  There  were  many  cattle  in  the  yards,  and  most 
of  them  seemed  to  be  very  well-bred  animals — not  very  fat, 
but  tolerably  so.  I  understand  that  they  will  go  to  the 
American  butchers  at  once.  The  greater  number  come  from 
Texas,  many  also  from  Colorado.  The  cattle  raised  in  Colo 
rado  are  said  to  be  the  best-bred.  Much  good  short-horn 
blood  has,  I  believe,  been  introduced  of  late  years.  The 
cattle  come  here  by  rail.  There  is  no  grazing-ground  along 
which  they  could  be  driven  for  two  or  three  hundred  miles 
from  this.  They  are  driven  from  Texas  up  to  the  railway, 


228  MY  JOURNAL. 

and  then  trucked.  These  railways  have  certainly  led  to  the 
cultivation  and  civilisation  of  the  country  in  a  marvellous 
degree.  Where  a  few  years  ago  all  was  uncultivated  and  bar 
barous  now  things  are  almost  as  civilised  as  in  an  English 
town,  to  say  the  least.  The  bad  spirits  who  hover  on  the 
borders  of  civilisation  have  gone  farther  West.  To  see  the 
real  West  one  must  go  much  farther  than  Kansas  City ;  but 
as  my  inquiries  lie  chiefly  in  another  direction  I  have  not 
gone  farther. 

In  Kansas  City,  and  still  more  in  the  suburbs  in  Kansas 
proper,  the  negroes  are  much  more  numerous  than  I  have  yet 
seen.  On  the  Kansas  side  they  form  quite  a  large  proportion 
of  the  population.  They  are  certainly  subject  to  no  indignity 
or  ill-usage.  They  ride  quite  freely  in  the  trams  and  railways 
alongside  of  the  whites,  as  I  myself  experienced,  and  there 
seems  to  be  no  prejudice  whatever  against  personal  contact 
with  them.  I  did  not  hear  them  at  all  abused  or  slanged. 
Coming  along  in  the  tram-car  a  cart  was  found  standing  on 
the  line,  and  detained  us  some  time.  When  the  owner  at  last 
appeared  he  was  a  black  man.  A  white  waggoner  in  London 
would  certainly  have  been  most  unmercifully  slanged  by  a 
'bus-driver,  and  would  have  deserved  it ;  but  our  driver  said 
nothing  that  I  could  hear.  He  may  have  moved  his  lips  or 
said  something  low,  but  it  was  the  negro  I  heard  defiantly 
call  out,  c  What  do  you  say  ? '  Altogether,  for  such  a  place  as 
this,  there  is  surprisingly  little  shouting  or  slanging.  So 
many  crossings  on  a  level  would  lead  to  endless  bad  language 
in  London ;  but  people  in  America  seem  much  more  on  their 
good  behaviour.  The  blacks  are  civil  and  attentive  as  waiters 
in  the  hotels  and  railway-cars,  but  sometimes  ill-mannered. 
The  black  porter  in  the  Pullman  car  on  my  journey  here 
slept  on  the  passengers'  seats,  with  his  boots  on  the  cushions, 
in  a  way  that  not  every  passenger,  and  certainly  not  a  white 
guard,  would  venture  on ;  and  he  washed  his  own  dirty 
hands  in  the  passengers'  washhand-basin  before  my  face, 
before  doing  something  wanted.  The  white  railway  con 
ductors  are  generally  civil  and  well-behaved,  though  they  do 
not  expect  tips,  as  these  ill-mannered  blacks  do.  I  am  bound, 


KANSAS.  229 

however,  to  say  that  my  subsequent  experience  did  not  con 
firm  this  view  of  the  bad  manners  of  the  blacks. 

Here  the  negroes  seemed  to  have  quite  taken  to  work  at 
trades;  I  saw  them  doing  building  work,  both  alone  and 
assisting  white  men,  and  also  painting  and  other  tradesman's 
work.  On  the  Kansas  side  I  found  a  negro  blacksmith,  with 
an  establishment  of  his  own  ;  he  was  an  old  man,  and  very 
'negro,'  and  I  could  only  extract  a  little  from  him.  He 
.grumbled  just  like  a  white  man — he  made  a  living;  did 
pretty  well :  '  But  things  are  dear.'  ( Well,  they  are  cheaper 
than  they  were.'  '  But  then  you  are  expected  to  work  cheaper.' 
He  came  from  Tennessee,  after  emancipation ;  had  not  been 
back  there,  and  did  not  want  to  go.  Most  of  the  schools  here 
are  separate,  and  not  mixed.  '  Perhaps  that  suits  best.  Some 
black  boys  go,  and  some  don't.'  A  black  boy  of  about  ten 
was  standing  by.  That  boy  did  not  go.  Could  not  say  why. 
His  father  is  a  member  of  the  School  Board ;  and  though  he 
has  several  children,  never  sent  one  to  school.  I  also  saw 
black  women  keeping  apple-stalls,  and  engaged  in  other  such 
occupations.  In  these  States,  which  I  may  call  intermediate 
between  black  and  white  countries,  the  blacks  evidently  have 
no  difficulty.  I  am  told  that  they  work  tolerably  well,  but, 
as  it  was  put  to  me,  they  are  not  very  '  forehanded.'  They 
are  content  if  they  have  enough  for  the  time.  However,  my 
informant  said  there  were  a  good  many  blacks  in  the  further 
part  of  the  Kansas  State,  who  are  doing  pretty  well,  especially 
some  who  have  small  farms  of  their  own. 

The  suburban  cottages  seemed  to  me  very  nice  indeed, 
with  trees  and  orchards,  and  shrubs  and  gardens ;  but,  as  it 
generally  happens  in  the  interior  parts  of  America,  they  have 
not  gardens  such  as  our  gardens,  only  fruit-trees,  cabbages, 
Indian  corn,  pumpkins,  &c.,  but  very  few  flowers.  Things 
are  not  quite  so  smart  in  Kansas  as  in  the  larger  cities,  but 
quite  good  and  comfortable,  and  in  the  same  style.  There 
is  a  singular  uniformity  about  everything  in  America,  both 
in  the  food  and  style  of  the  dishes  and  everything  else. 
There  are  always  very  many  dishes  on  the  bill  of  fare ;  but 
in  all  places,  and  every  day,  they  seem  to  be  veiy  much  the 


230  MY  JOUENAL. 

same.  One  gets  sick  of  looking  at  the  list.  The  Americans 
seem  to  eat  their  meat  underdone  to  a  degree  which  some 
what  astonished  one.  I  was  always  rather  fond  of  underdone 
meat,  but  I  dare  not  ask  for  it  underdone,  or  '  rare,'  as  they 
call  it  here,  when  the  question  is  put  as  it  usually  is,  for  it 
is  far  beyond  me.  American  ladies  will  eat,  in  the  sweetest 
manner,  meat  which  I  could  not  touch.  Prices  here  in  the 
West  are  more  moderate  than  in  the  Eastern  cities.  Board 
and  lodging  is  only  two  or  two  and  a  half  dollars  a  day,  and 
a  single  meal  about  fifty  cents.  They  seem  very  fond  of 
English  names  ;  here,  too,  there  is  a  '  Hyde  Park.'  At  the 
hotel  here  the  mutton  is  called  c  Southdown,'  and  the  cheese 
c  English  dairy  cheese.' 

Next  morning  I  started,  on  my  return  to  Illinois,  by 
another  line,  the  Hannibal  and  St.  Joe.  This  is  one  of  the- 
many  competing  lines  which  run  east  and  west  in  this  part 
of  the  world.  It  is  surprising  how  many  of  them  there  arer 
and  how  difficult  it  is  to  choose  between  their  relative  merits. 
I  think  I  have  said  that  there  are  no  books  in  the  American 
hotels,  but  there  is  a  great  provision  of  railway  advertise 
ments,  each  railway  not  only  advertising  its  merits,  but  en 
forcing  them  by  a  map,  on  which,  by  taking  some  slight 
liberties  with  geography,  the  particular  line  is  shown  broad, 
straight,  tempting  in  every  way,  while  all  the  other  lines 
are  depicted  as  mean,  circuitous,  and  inconvenient.  In 
default  of  any  other  literature  one  is  driven  to  devote  one's 
evenings  to  the  study  of  these  railway  lines.  We  crossed 
the  Missouri  River  and  ran  through  the  interior  of  North 
Missouri.  The  river  still  looks  not  very  large  nor  interesting. 
There  are  many  bridges  on  both  the  Missouri  and  the  Mis 
sissippi  above  St.  Louis,  though  none  below  on  the  united 
streams.  On  crossing  the  Missouri  we  ran  througli  some 
fine  timber  and  some  good  green  pasture,  abounding  in 
cattle ;  then  through  a  good  deal  of  broken  ground  and  some 
swampy  tracts ;  then  a  long  tract  of  highish  prairie  country, 
very  flat,  with  little  roll,  mostly  cultivated ;  but  there  were 
some  large  natural  pastures,  generally  enclosed.  Near  the 
Mississippi  we  dropped  down  into  a  heavily-wooded  country, 


INTEKIOR  OF  ILLINOIS.  231 

and  through  that  to  the  river.  I  thought  it  beautiful.  It 
is  very  broad  and  large,  with  wooded  islands.  To  the  eye  it 
seemed  to  me  larger  than  the  Missouri.  There  were  a  good 
many  steamers  about,  and  I  understand  there  is  very  much 
more  navigation  than  on  the  Missouri.  The  river  is  na 
vigable  up  to  St.  Paul's.  We  crossed  it  on  a  good  light 
iron  bridge  to  Quincy,  in  Illinois,  which  seemed  a  good  and 
settled  town.  The  Illinois  country  near  it  is  quite  a  garden. 
I  noticed  besides  the  ordinary  crops  a  few  vineyards,  a  good 
deal  of  tobacco,  and  many  good  grass-fields.  As  we  went  on 
the  country  seemed  very  much  the  same  as  the  part  of 
Illinois  I  had  seen  before.  We  crossed  the  Illinois,  a  con 
siderable  river.  Springfield,  the  political  capital  of  the 
State,  seemed  a  sort  of  exaggerated  village,  with  rural-looking 
streets  and  houses.  The  roads  are  a  great  difficulty  in  these 
parts.  There  is  no  metal  to  be  got,  and  the  black  soil,  like 
the  Indian  soil  of  the  same  kind,  is  very  good  for  mud-roads 
in  dry  weather,  but  wholly  impracticable  in  wet  weather. 
This  accounts  for  the  immense  number  of  railways  in  this 
State.  As  long  as  we  were  in  Missouri  we  saw  a  good  many 
blacks.  At  one  place  the  black  passengers  dined  at  a  separate 
table  ;  but  in  Illinois,  in  a  country  settled  by  whites,  the 
blacks  are  rarely  found — only,  in  fact,  as  hotel  servants  and 
suchlike.  I  understand,  however,  that  in  the  southern  part 
of  Illinois  blacks  are  numerous.  At  Cairo  they  load  the 
vessels  and  do  such  work.  I  had  occasion  to  ask  at  the 
hotel  who  cleaned  the  boots,  that  I  might  tip  him.  c  There 
is  the  gentleman,'  said  the  landlord,  pointing  to  a  black,  and 
apparently  quite  in  earnest.  It  seemed  to  me  that  the  rule 
of  service  is  black  men  and  white  women.  At  the  stations 
at  meals  as  we  came  along  to-day  we  were  generally  waited 
upon  by  nice  quiet-looking  white  girls.  I  did  not  see  black 
women  much  employed  except  as  nurses ;  and  I  am  told 
that  they  make  good  cooks. 

Coming  along  the  Illinois  country  from  Quincy  to  Cham 
pagne  I  was  struck  by  the  large  number  of  passengers. 
There  were  many  junctions,  and  people  crowded  out  and  in. 
It  must  be  remembered,  however,  that  there  are  generally 


232  MY  JOURNAL. 

only  two  trains  in  the  twenty-four  hours.  At  Champagne,  a 
small  country  town,  there  was  a  very  decent  hotel,  very 
clean,  and  charges  moderate.  I  stayed  there  for  the  night. 

In  the  morning  I  found  that  Mr.  0 ,  President  of 

the  Illinois  Central  Railway,  had  come  down  in  his  car  with 

Mr.  A ,  the  British  Vice-Consul,  and  they  kindly  invited 

me  to  take  up  my  quarters  with  them.  We  went  to  see  the 
Illinois  Industrial  University  located  here.  It  seems  a  very 
flourishing  institution,  devoted  to  agriculture  and  other 
useful  arts.  The  President  showed  us  over,  and  I  was  called 
upon  to  make  a  little  speech.  Most  of  the  students  are 
young  men  ;  but  there  are  also  a  good  many  young  women. 
They  have  a  model  farm,  garden,  and  stock-farm  attached. 
The  professor  of  agriculture  gave  me  much  information. 
There  is  a  fine  museum,  with  botanical  schools  and  every 
thing  complete.  Talking  of  agriculture,  I  am  told  that  here, 
as  elsewhere,  it  pays  better  to  cultivate  a  small  farm,  carefully 
worked  and  looked  after,  than  a  large  one.  Only  stock-farms 
pay  on  a  large  scale.  In  California  land  has  got  into  the 
hands  of  great  holders,  who  cultivate  by  hired  labour.  There 
are  few  small  proprietors,  and  probably  to  that  is  due  the 
rowdyism  which  seems  to  some  extent  to  prevail  in  Cali 
fornia. 

All  over  this  part  of  the  country  there  is  a  disposition  to 
pay  much  attention  to  live  stock.  Farmers  pride  themselves 
on  their  grass-fields,  and  believe  that  their  grass  is  as  good 
as  ours.  They  raise  stock  here  for  the  cattle-market ;  but 
in  the  North  of  Illinois  there  are  many  dairy  farms  and 
cheese  factories.  Besides  hay  a  good  deal  of  corn  is  given  to 
the  cattle.  We  visited  a  small  American  farmer,  and  found 
his  name  to  be  Campbell.  I  noticed  that  he  and  his  family 
pronounced  it  in  the  orthodox  way,  sounding  the  B,  whereas 
all  the  higher  classes  of  Americans,  even  in  New  York,  in 
variably  pronounce  the  name  in  the  old  lowland  Scotch  fashion 
as  '  Cammel.*  They  appeal  to  the  poetical  authority  of  the 
song— 

'  The  Campbells  (Cammels)  are  coming.' 

This  is  one  of  those  cases  in  which  the  language  and  pro- 


INTERIOR  OF  ILLINOIS.  233 

nunciation  of  the  working  classes  in  America  are  more  modern 
than  that  of  the  higher  classes.  My  namesake  had  a  good 
new  barn,  but  a  very  poor  house.  They  say  that  all  thrifty 
farmers  build  an  improved  barn  first,  and  an  improved  house 
afterwards.  He  had  two  pairs  of  horses,  one  hired  servant, 
and  a  number  of  children.  Of  course  he  worked,  and  worked 
hard,  himself. 

We  slept  in  the  railway-carriage,  and  went  on  during 
the  night  to  Kanakee,  an  Illinois  country  town,  originally  a 
French  settlement.  There  seem  to  be  now  many  considerable 
towns  on  this  line  of  railway.  From  Kanakee  we  went  along 
a  new  branch  line  now  being  made  into  a  district  not 
hitherto  served  by  railway ;  and,  driving  some  miles  beyond 
the  point  now  reached  by  the  rail,  I  had  the  advantage  of 
seeing  a  good  deal  of  the  thoroughly  rural  class  of  Western 
farmers.  The  branch  line  is  being  made  very  cheap — it  is 
only  to  cost  1 ,200L  a  mile.  The  farmers  are  very  keen  to 
get  it ;  they  have  generally  given  the  land  required  free,  and 
many  of  them  have  promised  voluntary  contributions  to 
wards  the  undertaking,  for  which  they  have  given  notes  of 
hand.  When  the  time  comes  for  payment  they  are  said  to 
be  rather  difficult  to  settle  with ;  they  want  to  stipulate 
for  very  cheap  rates  and  other  advantages.  The  land  about 
here  is  mostly  rather  flat ;  a  great  deal  of  it,  and  indeed 
a  great  deal  of  Illinois  land  altogether,  stands  in  need  of 
drainage.  In  many  places  tile-drains  are  being  put  in. 
Altogether  this  country  seems  to  have  rather  too  much  than 
too  little  rain.  There  is  sufficient  slope  for  drainage  when 
it  is  attended  to.  A  great  deal  of  the  land  hereabouts  was 
originally  given  to  the  Illinois  Central  Railway,  and  by  them 
sold  to  farmers.  Most  farms  seem  to  be  small — a  good  many 
of  them  only  40  acres,  very  many  80  acres,  some  160  acres. 
Those  of  320  acres  are  comparatively  few.  The  buildings 
seem  generally  to  be  rather  poor — as  if  not  very  much  had 
been  done  to  them  since  they  were  built  by  the  first  settlers ; 
but  a  good  many  trees  have  been  planted,  good  hedges 
and  fences  set  up,  and  draining  and  other  improvements 
are  going  on.  The  farms  where  the  railway  had  been  long 


234  MY  JOURNAL. 

running  generally  had  improved  barns.  I  gather  that  the 
farmers  have  a  hard-working  time  of  it ;  and  unless  a  man 
has  very  special  advantages  he  scarcely  makes  money  very 
rapidly.  During  the  Civil  War  prices  were  very  high,  and 
much  money  was  made  ;  but  now  prices  are  far  too  low  to 
bring  much  profit.  The  maize  crop  fetches  but  a  very  low 
price,  and  the  farmers  have  not  any  very  paying  crops,  unless 
they  can  make  fat  cattle  pay ;  but  cattle  are  also  at  present 
very  cheap  in  America.  To  improve  very  much  it  would 
require  higher  farming,  which  involves  a  good  supply  of 
labour ;  but  the  continual  opening  up  of  new  countries  in 
the  West  takes  people  off  so  fast  as  greatly  to  interfere  with 
the  States  already  settled.  The  life  of  the  farmers  must  be 
rather  solitary  and  rough.  I  visited  a  German  farmer  who 
has  been  a  good  many  years  settled  in  America,  but  he  had 
lived  so  much  alone  that  he  still  speaks  English  very  im 
perfectly,  while  his  wife  and  mother  do  not  speak  it  at  all. 
I  found  a  good  many  farms  occupied  by  different  members  of 
a  Scotch  family  of  the  name  of  Bute.  They  claimed  descent 
from  '  Lord  Bute  ; '  but  that  is  a  bad  shot,  as  Lord  Bute's 
name  is  not  Bute.  Most  of  the  English-speaking  farmers 
seem  to  be  of  American  birth — generally  men  who  had  come 
from  older  States  and  taken  up  land  in  Illinois.  One  was  an 
Englishman,  originally  a  mechanic ;  he  had  come  from  Lan 
cashire  as  a  young  man,  had  worked  at  his  trade  in  the 
States,  then  tried  farming  in  several  places ;  eventually 
settled  in  Illinois ;  was  lucky  in  making  money  during  the 
war  and  in  the  possession  of  several  strong  sons — that  is  the 
best  wealth  in  America — daughters  don't  pay — this  man 
has  now  320  acres  here,  besides  a  farm  in  Indiana,  which  he 
has  rented '  on  shares  ; '  that  is,  to  a  man  who  pays  him  a  share 
of  the  crop.  He  seems  still  a  rough  sort  of  man.  I  did  not 
see  much  (here,  at  any  rate)  of  the  smart  farmers'  wives  such 
as  Mr.  Dale  lately  described,  but  there  are  a  few  large 
farmers  better  off  than  others.  They  say  that  the  Irish  do 
not  do  well  here  ;  those  who  have  farms  generally  rent,  and, 
as  it  was  put  to  me,  c  they  rent  them  too  cheap  to  work  them 
well.'  There  does  not  seem  to  be  the  same  objection  here  to 


INTERIOR  OF  ILLINOIS.  235 

renting  farms  as  there  is  in  New  York.  A  good  many  are- 
rented,  but  only  for  short  terms  and  upon  shares — generally 
paying  one-third  of  the  produce  to  the  owner.  There  are  no 
long  leases.  The  share  system  is  said  to  answer  well  enough. 
Such  rentings,  however,  are  only  what  I  may  call  casual ; 
there  is  no  such  thing  as  an  estate  bought  for  the  purpose  of 
leasing  out  in  farms.  Many  of  the  owners  are  in  debt,  and 
pay  about  8  per  cent.  There  is  very  good  provision  for 
educating  the  children  ;  the  law  requires  that  there  should 
be  a  school  every  two  miles.  The  schools  are  generally 
taught  either  by  women  or  by  young  men  just  out  of  college 
and  commencing  their  career.  Many  young  women  '  teach 
school '  before  they  get  married,  and  many  distinguished 
men  have  commenced  life  by  teaching  schools.  Some  say 
that  the  drawback  to  education  is  apparent  in  the  too  great 
number  of  young  men  who  seek  to  live  by  their  head  rather 
than  by  their  hands. 

The  land  here  is  all  marked  off  into  townships  of  six 
miles  square,  and  into  mile,  half-mile,  and  quarter-mile 
squares,  with  unmetalled  rectangular  roads  dividing  the 
squares,  and  generally  hedges.  The  houses  are  of  wood. 
The  farmers  have  not  much  machinery.  Indian  corn  is  not 
reaped  by  machine,  and  the  farmers  can  generally  hire  a 
machine  to  thrash  out  the  grain  when  they  require  it.  A 
very  common  institution  on  the  farms  here  is  the  small 
American  windmill ;  it  is  used  for  pumping  water,  bruising 
corn,  and  for  other  purposes.  Water  is  always  to  be  had 
from  wells  within  easy  distance  of  the  surface.  This  not  being 
a  fruit  country,  large  fruit  trains  come  up  from  Southern 
Illinois  in  the  season,  and  apples  come  from  the  North. 
Prairie  chickens  are  very  common  hereabouts;  they  by  no 
means  affect  remote  prairies  ;  on  the  contrary,  they  seem  a 
domestic  sort  of  creatures,  frequenting  the  neighbourhood  of 
roads,  farms,  &c.  The  small  American  rabbit  is  also  com 
mon  ;  the  large  Jack  rabbit,  or  hare,  is  found  only  in  the 
West.  There  is  a  great  abundance  of  wild  ducks  almost 
everywhere  in  America.  A  small  forty-acre  farmer  had  a 
little  sugar-mill,  such  as  the  ryots  have  in  some  parts  of 


236  MY   JOURNAL. 

India,  and  his  neighbours  brought  their  sorghum  to  be 
•crushed  into  molasses.  Most  of  the  farmers  grow  oats  for 
their  own  use,  but  I  did  not  see  anything  of  peas  and  beans ; 
that  is,  our  peas.  There  are  American  peas  and  beans  too, 
but  they  are  of  a  different  kind.  In  Canada  I  noticed  that 
the  best  bacon  was  described  as  pea-fed.  Barley  does  not 
seem  to  be  a  common  crop  in  any  of  the  States  which  I  have 
visited,  but  there  is  plenty  of  rye  and  buckwheat.  Illinois 
is  par  excellence  the  '  corn  State  ; '  that  is,  Indian  corn,  which 
is  always  meant  when  corn  is  spoken  of  in  America.  They 
have  wonderfully  improved  varieties  of  this  corn  here.  It 
shows  what  can  be  done  by  selection  and  cultivation.  The 
flat  or  rolling  black  soil  prevails  throughout  all  the  central 
parts,  and  indeed  over  most  of  the  State;  but  at  either  end  is  a 
country  of  a  different  character.  In  the  south  there  is  much 
rocky  and  uneven  ground,  some  of  it  poor  ;  but  much  wheat 
is  grown  in  the  south.  In  the  north  also  there  is  an  undu 
lating  country,  with  lead  mines  and  other  minerals.  There 
also  is  Elgin  (they  pronounce  it '  Eljin  '),  where  the  Illinois 
watches  are  made.  For  fat  cattle  the  Durham  short-horn 
breed  is  preferred.  For  milch  cows  here  and  all  over 
America  they  are  very  fond  of  small  Jerseys,  and  affect  that 
breed  much  more  than  is  usually  the  case  in  this  country. 

All  the  land  which  is  private  property  is  taxed  according 
to  its  value,  whether  it  is  cultivated  or  not;  that  is,  for 
State,  county,  and  local  purposes.  The  county  supports  some 
county  officers,  roads,  bridges,  and  the  poor.  I  have  been 
surprised  to  find  that  there  is  some  sort  of  poor  law  in 
almost  every  State  in  America.  The  fact  is,  the  law  being 
English  law,  the  English  poor  law  has  been  imported,  and  is 
only  more  or  less  modified.  The  townships  support  schools 
and  local  roads.  There  are  no  commons  properly  so  called; 
in  remote  parts  there  may  be  open  public  land  not  yet  ap 
propriated,  but  it  is  not  the  practice  to  reserve  any  common 
pasture  land  in  the  settled  townships.  The  townships  here 
are  merely  local  organisations  for  financial  and  adminis 
trative  purposes  ;  they  have  no  basis  of  common  property, 
like  the  European  and  Asiatic  townships  or  communes.  The 


INTERIOR  OF  ILLINOIS.  237 

counties  of  some  of  these  States  are  very  numerous — as  many 
as  a  hundred  or  more  in  a  State.  They  are  very  little  more 
than  areas  for  taxation,  and  seem  to  have  no  county  repre 
sentation  or  county  meetings.  The  townships  elect  trustees, 
who  correspond  to  the  'select  men'  of  the  Eastern  States,  and 
also  town  constables  and  some  other  officers.  There  is  no 
county  police;  only  in  large  towns  is  there  any  regular  police 
force.  When  occasion  requires  the  Sheriff  acts  with  a  '  posse.' 
Any  considerable  place  is  formally  incorporated  as  a  city, 
whilst  smaller  places  are  incorporated  as  villages.  The  people 
are  very  fond  of  meetings  of  the  citizens;  that  is,  gene 
rally  the  citizens  of  the  townships.  Oratory  is  taught  at  the 
Industrial  College.  They  have  also  there  a  mock  place  of 
business,  where  the  boys  and  girls  do  merchants'  work  with 
tokens  of  small  value,  and  so  learn  to  make  and  lose  money. 
On  looking  into  the  laws  of  this  State  I  find  that  it  is  op 
tional  with  each  county  to  organise  into  townships  for 
administrative  purposes.  They  generally  do ;  as  soon  as  the 
country  is  settled  the  township  system  comes  into  play.  In 
order  to  avoid  confusion  incorporated  towns,  as  distinguished 
from  the  district  called  a  township,  are  now  called  either  cities 
or  villages.  Any  populous  place  of  1,000  inhabitants  or  up 
wards  may  become  a  city  ;  any  place  of  300  inhabitants  or 
upwards  a  village. 

To  go  back  to  the  farmers  :  they  seem  to  me  a  quiet  and 
simple  but  shrewd  sort  of  men,  very  like  what  small  Scotch 
farmers  might  be.  They  generally  take  in  a  local  weekly 
paper  and  an  agricultural  paper.  Groing  into  the  houses, 
some  of  them  struck  me  as  really  very  poor  and  crowded  ; 
some  had  no  separate  living  room,  but  these  are  the  early 
houses  first  built  in  a  newly-settled  country,  and  they  will 
improve,  if  the  people  are  tolerably  prosperous. 

In  these  Western  States  I  notice  a  good  many  French 
names  of  places,  marking  a  time  when,  both  in  India  and  in 
America,  the  French  almost  outrivalled  us.  Ohio,  too,  which 
not  so  long  back  was  a  remote  and  unsettled  territory,  was 
the  scene  of  French  settlement  and  French  military  operations 
a  long  time  ago  ;  and  the  present  Pittsburgh,  the  great  iron 


238  MY  JOURNAL. 

centre  in  West  Pennsylvania,  was  the  Fort  du  Quesne  of  the 
French. 

After  this  visit  to  the  interior  of  Illinois  I  returned  to 
Chicago,  and  there  again  made  a  short  halt,  and  saw  some 
more  of  the  sights  of  that  famous  place. 

I  am  more  and  more  struck  by  the  absence  of  the  habit 
of  drinking  wine  amongst  the  Americans.  At  the  hotels 
here  one  sees  no  such  thing,  nor  do  they  even  have  on  the 
table  at  meals  the  lager-bier  which  is  common  in  the  country. 
The  bars  too  seem  little  frequented,  and  to  have  little 
variety  of  drinks.  At  some  of  the  railway  stations  in  Illinois 
nothing  was  to  be  got  to  drink  ;  the  sale  was  not  prohibited, 
but  '  Murphy  had  been  round.'  There  is,  in  fact,  a  strong 
movement  against  drink,  which  has  hitherto  been  much  taken 
by  the  lower  classes  in  the  shape  of  nips  at  odd  times.  Ap 
parently  this  abstinence  movement  has  had  much  success.  I 
gathered  that  most  of  the  intemperance  was  among  what  I 
may  call  the  loafing  population. 

Among  the  uniformities  of  American  ways  I  notice  a 
uniform  inferiority  and  saltness  of  butter.  Americans  do 
not  seem  to  know  bread-and-butter  in  our  sense,  and  that 
probably  affects  their  character.  They  are,  I  must  say,  very 
barbarous  in  their  fashion  of  eating.  They  seem  to  order  all 
their  little  dishes  at  once,  and  keep  digging  first  into  one 
•dish  and  then  into  another  —  mixing  fish  and  beefsteaks,  and 
swallowing  every  concoction  of  vegetables  together  at  the 


From  Chicago  I  went,  by  the  Chicago  Fort  Wayne  and 
Pittsburgh  Eailway,  to  Pittsburgh,  crossing  on  the  road  a 
portion  of  Indiana  and  the  northern  half  of  Ohio.  The 
railroad  seemed  a  capital  one,  in  excellent  order,  and  very 
smooth.  After  passing  the  flats  at  the  bottom  of  Lake 
Michigan  we  came  to  an  undulating  country,  with  a  good 
deal  of  wood  and  abundant  pasture.  We  passed  a  con 
siderable  town  called  Valparaiso,  the  seat  apparently  of  a 
thriving  woollen  manufactory.  Soon  after  the  ground  again 
became  very  flat  —  too  flat  for  drainage  —  and  so  continued  for  a 
very  long  way;  in  fact,  as  far  as  a  place  called  Crestline.  The 


INDIANA   AND   OHIO.  239 

ground  was  very  much  wooded,  and  only  partially  cleared, 
with  a  good  many  swamps,  but  no  prairie-ground,  except 
some  large,  open,  swampy  plains.  The  country  here  evidently 
suffers  from  too  much  moisture  and  want  of  drainage.  I  saw 
large  stacks  of  draining-tiles  at  the  stations.  Still  there  was 
a  good  deal  of  cultivation,  mixed  with  forest.  Some  of  the 
country  seemed  to  resemble  part  of  what  I  had  seen  in 
Canada.  There  were  some  nice-enough  looking  places,  and 
better  gardens  and  orchards  than  in  Illinois.  The  Indian 
corn  an  Illinois  man  thought  not  very  good.  There  was  a 
good  deal  of  wheat ;  cattle  pretty  plentiful,  sheep  few.  On 
some  of  the  clearings  I  saw  many  log-huts,  such  as  I  had  not 
yet  seen  in  real  life ;  but  some  of  the  towns  are  improving. 
They  get  a  great  deal  of  timber,  and  do  a  great  deal  of  wood 
work.  Evidently  in  all  this  part  of  America  there  is  very 
great  room  for  much  further  improvement.  The  country 
drains  so  far  as  it  drains  at  all  into  Lake  Erie,  but  there  is  a 
curious  absence  of  running  water.  Crestline,  where  I  stopped 
for  the  night,  is  about  the  highest  part  of  the  country,  and 
immediately  after  passing  it  the  drainage  goes  to  the  Ohio. 
I  found  a  comfortable  little  hotel  at  Crestline.  I  took  a 
walk  about  the  town.  It  seemed  a  nice,  clean  country  place, 
with  good  shops,  neat  villa- residences,  and  a  quiet,  decent- 
looking  people. 

In  the  morning  I  started  again.  Almost  immediately 
after  leaving  Crestline  the  ground  began  to  undulate,  and 
eventually  became  quite  hilly,-  with  a  good  many  streams, 
running  more  or  less,  but  for  the  most  part  somewhat 
sluggish.  This  is  the  character  of  the  country  till  we  get 
towards  Pittsburgh.  There  is  always  a  great  abundance  of 
natural  wood,  principally  hard  wood,  ash  and  suchlike,  but 
comparatively  few  pines.  A  very  large  proportion  of  the 
fields  had  still  stumps  in  them,  even  those  in  the  middle  of 
considerable  towns.  As  we  got  on,  however,  the  homesteads 
improved  and  became  better-looking  than  most  of  those 
that  I  had  seen  in  Illinois.  Much  of  the  route,  with  fine 
woods  scattered  about,  is  extremely  park-like,  and  the  autumn 
.foliage  is  very  pretty ;  indeed,  altogether  it  seemed  as  smiling 


240  MY  JOURNAL. 

a  country  as  one  could  wish  to  see  ;  that  is,  for  a  country  only 
partially  cleared  and  cultivated.  I  began  to  realise  the  beauty 
of  the  American  autumn  foliage  of  which  one  has  heard  so 
much.  The  leaves  certainly  turn  to  very  bright  and  showy 
colours,  such  as  one  never  sees  in  Europe.  I  saw  some  very 
good  specimens  of  this  kind  of  thing  ;  but  in  this  particular 
respect  I  am  told  that  I  am  not  fortunate  in  the  season,  as 
there  has  not  been  the  sudden  change  to  frost  which  causes 
the  most  brilliant  hues. 

PENNSYL  VANIA. 

In  the  latter  part  of  this  journey  we  entered  the  State 
of  Pennsylvania.  As  we  came  along  towns  and  villages 
became  more  and  more  populous  ;  in  fact,  the  last  hundred 
miles  or  so  into  Pittsburgh  was  full  of  manufacturing  places 
forming  what  might  be  called  an  American  Sheffield  country 
joined  to  an  American  Birmingham  at  Pittsburgh.  The  coun 
try  here  becomes  very  hilly.  We  came  into  the  valley  of  the 
Beaver  Eiver,  then  into  that  of  the  Ohio,  then  a  little  way  up 
the  Alleghany  river,  crossing  which  we  came  into  Pittsburgh. 

In  the  train  I  met  a  talkative  old  Pennsylvania  gentle 
man,  very  like  an  Englishman  in  voice  and  manner — I  think 
Pennsylvanians  are  often  so.  He  had  just  come  back  from 
Iowa,  which  he  thinks  a  good  country  ;  but  he  saw  there  a 
good  many  emigrants  moving  further  West,  with  their 
waggons,  families,  and  household  goods.  He  considers  Penn- 
sylvanian  farming  first-rate  ;  but  good  land  there  is  very  dear 
— a  man  cannot  make  much  by  it.  The  best  of  the  Penn- 
sylvanian  country  is  in  the  eastern  valleys.  The  western 
valleys  are  narrow  and  precipitous.  The  Pennsylvanian 
people  grow  wheat  and  keep  a  good  many  cows,  but  he  seems 
to  say  that  they  do  not  go  in  very  much  for  dairy-farming. 
The  most  paying  crop  of  late  has  been  tobacco :  they  have 
discovered  that  they  can  grow  it.  A  very  large  proportion 
of  the  well-to-do  farmers  in  this  part  of  the  country  are 
Germans,  called  '  Dutch '  by  the  Americans.  There  are  also 
many  Scotch-Irish;  but  the  regular  Irish  are  not  so  good. 
The  Germans  still  speak  very  much  among  themselves  a  local 


PITTSBURGH.  241 

German,  different  from  the  school  German.  They  all  under 
stand  German.  Most  of  them  are  Protestants.  Here  also  the 
farmers  generally  own  their  own  land ;  but  some  rent,  and  in 
that  case  they  prefer  the  share  system.  It  answers  very  well 
with  an  honest  man,  but  you  are  apt  to  be  cheated.  He  has 
had  experience  of  this  system  on  a  farm  of  his  own,  which  has 
been  long  rented.  The  tenant  gives  him  half  of  the  corn  and 
hay.  He  knows  a  farmer  who  gives  two-thirds ;  but  then  the 
proprietor  supplies  the  seed  and  the  working  stock.  In  this 
part  of  the  country  they  have  no  trouble  or  ill-feeling  about 
religious  questions,  though  Catholic  priests  want  to  prosely 
tise  children  when  they  can.  I  also  talked  to  a  German.  He 
came  out  at  the  age  of  eighteen,  and  is  substantially  an 
American.  He  served  in  the  Federal  army  during  the  war, 
and  saved  $500,  also  made  a  little  money  in  other  ways,  and 
now  bitterly  regrets  that  he  did  not  put  his  savings  into  the 
land.  If  he  had  he  would  have  been  safe  and  well  off  now- 
As  it  is  he  seems  to  have  lost  his  money.  He  has  a  good 
enough  place  as  traveller  for  a  machinist,  with  $3  a  day  and 
expenses;  but,  as  he  says,  there  is  no  knowing  how  long  that 
will  last,  whereas  land  lasts  for  ever.  He  says  the  Germans 
work  well,  and  have  the  great  advantage  that  the  women 
work  as  well  as  the  men,  while  American  women  will  not 
work.  In  the  West,  howeyer,  the  women  are  comparatively 
few,  and  they  have  enough  other  work  to  do.  German 
emigration  has  been  much  checked  recently,  but  many 
Swedes  and  Norwegians  come,  and  some  people  who  are 
called  Kussiaas.  I  fancy  these  are  Mnemonites. 

Pittsburgh  is  a  very  smoky-looking  place ;  but  it  is 
surrounded  by  pretty  hills,  on  some  of  which  are  vineyards^ 
and  altogether  the  scene  looks  a  good  deal  like  a  European 
Continental  town,  the  smoke  apart.  My  guide-book  directed 
me  to  the  Union  Depot  Hotel,  but  I  found  it  had  been  burnt 
down  in  last  year's  riots,  and  I  went  to  the  Seventh  Avenue 
Hotel.  The  next  day  was  Sunday,  and  it  struck  me  that 
Pittsburgh  was  a  singularly  dull  and  uninteresting  place  on 
that  day  ;  nothing  seemed  to  be  going  on.  The  people  seem 
respectable  enough  ;  but  very  many  men  of  various  sorts  were 

R 


242  MY  JOURNAL. 

hanging  about  the  streets  in  a  moody  kind  of  way.  I  can 
easily  imagine  it  to  be  the  sort  of  place  for  an  outbreak  like 
that  which  occurred  last  year.  However,  at  present  the  place 
is  as  full  of  women  and  children  as  other  places,  and  one  sees 
wonderfully  few  signs  of  last  year's  destruction.  The  more  I 
walk  about  the  place  the  more  smoky  and  grimy  and  dull- 
looking  it  seems  to  be.  I  observe  many  negroes  about,  many 
of  the  women  in  smart  Sunday  dresses.  The  relations  be 
tween  them  and  the  whites  appear  quite  good. 

The  next  day  a  gentleman  connected  with  the  Pennsyl 
vania  Central  Railway  was  kind  enough  to  drive  me  about 
the  town  and  show  me  some  of  the  sights.  I  now  learned  that 
there  was  a  special  reason  for  the  extreme  dullness  and  want 
of  motion  yesterday.  It  seems  that  a  great  Sunday-closing 
movement  has  just  broken  out,  an  old  Act  of  1794  having 
been  put  in  force  against  the  publicans,  or  saloon-keepers, 
as  they  are  called  in  America ;  and  they  in  turn  have  put  in 
force  the  law  against  everyone  else.  Almost  all  the  street 
cars  were  stopped  and  every  sort  of  traffic.  The  saloon 
keepers  have  established  a '  Detective  Association '  to  deal  with 
Sunday-breakers,  and  are  now  the  great  promoters  of  the 
closing  movement,  which  is  the  great  question  of  the  day. 
There  used  to  be  very  many  saloons  and  much  drinking  in 
Pittsburgh  ;  but  '  Murphy '  has  been  very  active  lately,  and  is 
said  to  have  had  a  great  effect.  He  is  here  now.  I  am  afraid 
it  seems  inconsistent  with  what  I  have  said  in  detraction  of  the 
Pittsburgh  people,  but  I  am  told  that  this  is  a  very  Presby 
terian  and  Scotch-Irish  place.  Before  the  war  many  negroes 
took  refuge  here,  but  it  is  said  there  are  hardly  so  many  of 
them  now  as  there  were  then. 

This  is  a  great  railway  centre.  A  very  inconvenient  pe 
culiarity  of  American  freedom  is  the  great  variety  of  railway 
gauges,  which  gives  much  trouble  in  regard  to  the  through 
lines ;  but  they  have  got  over  this  difficulty  by  a  system  of 
hoisting  the  carriages  off  one  set  of  wheels  and  putting  them 
on  another.  This  is  very  rapidly  done ;  and  in  this  way,  not 
withstanding  change  of  gauge,  carriages  are  run  through  for 
long  distances.  There  is  a  very  large  traffic  between  this 


INTERIOR  OF  PENNSYLVANIA.  243 

place  and  Lake  Erie.  Ironstone  is  brought  in  large  quantities 
from  the  Lake  regions.  We  visited  one  of  the  largest  iron 
works.  Mr.  J ,  the  head  partner,  kindly  showed  us  over 

He  seemed  a  very  business-like  and  English-looking  sort  of 
man,  though  he  had  never  been  in  England.  From  2,500  to 
3,000  men,  of  all  nationalities,  are  employed  in  the  works. 

]V£r.  J Says  the  Grermans  are  the  only  men  who  are  saving  ; 

all  the  rest  scatter.  He  thinks  the  riots  last  year  were  very 
much  due  to  mismanagement,  and  that  it  was  a  mistake 
to  bring  in  the  military.  '  These  people  think  that  they  can 
reason.'  The  negroes  do  not  become  skilled  workmen — they 
only  work  as  labourers.  Workmen's  wages  are  very  much 
higher  here  than  in  England — more  so  in  some  kinds  of  labour 
than  in  others.  Ordinary  labourers  do  not  get  so  much  more, 
but  puddling  costs  almost  three  times  as  much  ;  that,  how 
ever,  is  partly  due  to  combinations.  East  of  the  Alleghanies 
the  rates  are  not  so  high.  Upon  the  whole  the  wages  he 
pays  to  skilled  workmen  are,  he  says,  nearly  twice  as  high  as 
those  in  England.  Capital  is  much  dearer  in  America.  He 
himself  long  paid  10  per  cent,  upon  very  large  sums ;  now 
money  is  cheaper.  In  Pennsylvania  the  best  iron-veins  are 
thin,  and  a  good  deal  worked  out.  Most  of  the  good  ore  comes 
from  Michigan — from  the  country  upon  Lake  Superior.  The 
advantage  of  Pittsburgh  is  the  very  cheap  coal.  They  have 
their  own  mines  almost  immediately  adjoining  the  works. 
Coal  costs  only  about  a  dollar  a  ton.  They  do  an  immense 
amount  of  rolling  bars,  and  also  manufacture  nails  upon  an 
enormous  s«ale.  They  have  some  new  and  complicated 
machines  that  only  Americans  can  work.  On  the  whole  he 
believes  that  American  workmen  do  more  than  English  work 
men.  He  was  very  much  impressed  by  Mr.  Lothian  Bell, 
who  had  paid  him  a  visit. 

From  Pittsburgh  I  took  the  train  to  Philadelphia.  We 
very  soon  got  into  pretty  suburbs,  clear  of  the  smoke,  and 
passed  through  a  smiling,  undulating  country,  without  any 
steep  inclines,  wood  and  cultivation  alternating.  Further  on, 
as  we  got  into  the  Alleghany  hills,  we  passed  through  some 
deep  wooded  gorges  and  up  some  steep  inclines ;  but  we  still 

ii  2 


244  MY   JOURNAL. 

came  upon  towns  and  villages  and  cultivation,  and  saw  several 
branch  railways  and  some  great  iron  works.  Even  after  the 
last  of  the  steep  ascents  we  never  lost  the  cultivated  and 
inhabited  country.  There  was  nothing  that  could  be  called 
mountains.  At  the  highest  point,  at  Cresson  Springs,  the 
ground  is  nearly  flat.  There  is  here  a  pretty  park,  and  the 
place  is  a  sort  of  sanatorium  in  the  hot  weather.  It  is  not 
very  cool,  but  people  say  that  at  night  they  can  always  sleep 
under  a  blanket. 

The  steep  part  of  the  road  was  going  down  on  the  other 
side.  There  are  eleven  miles  of  a  very  steep  incline — very 
wooded  and  very  picturesque  gorges,  abounding  in  pines  and 
cypresses — but  there  is  nothing  nearly  so  steep  as  on  the 
Indian  Ghauts.  At  the  foot  of  the  incline  at  Altona  there 
are  great  railway  works  ;  and  an  hour  further  we  came  to 
Huntingdon,  a  nice  rural  town,  where  I  stayed  for  the  night. 
I  found  that  the  bell  was  going  for  a  Democratic  political 
meeting,  and  I  went  there.  The  proceedings  were  opened  by 
a  brass  band.  It  seems  that  a  musical  performance  of  that 
kind  is  an  important  part  of  American  political  demonstra 
tions.  The  people  were  very  quiet  and  orderly.  I  heard  them 
saying,  '  The  Democrats  are  going  to  have  a  good  meeting.' 
There  was  not  so  much  appearance  of  party  feeling  as  there 
generally  is  with  us.  The  people  seemed  very  much  like 
those  of  one  of  our  country  towns.  I  noticed  one  or  two 
negro  boys  in  the  meeting.  They  seemed  quite  at  home, 
and  no  one  objected  to  their  presence.  The  meeting  was  kept 
waiting  a  considerable  time,  and  seemed  wonderfully  patient. 
At  last  the  Honourable  —  Stinger,  the  member  for  the  dis 
trict,  entered,  and  was  moderately  cheered.  A  respectable 
elderly  gentleman  was  called  to  the  chair,  and  there  was 
then  a  very  formal  nomination  of  vice-presidents  and  secre 
taries,  but  I  could  not  make  out  that  these  functionaries  had 
anything  to  do.  The  president  made  a  nice  little  speech. 
Then  the  Honourable  —  Stinger  came  forward  and  made  the 
speech  of  the  evening.  I  thought  it  really  very  good  and  effec 
tive — well-reasoned,  clear,  and  even  independent,  it  seemed 
to  me.  I  think  he  was  a  lawyer  by  profession.  His  great 


A  DEMOCRATIC   MEETING.  245 

contention  was  that  in  the  days  of  Democratic  rule  the 
•country  was  prosperous,  and  they  governed  themselves  in  a 
contented  way.  '  You  hardly  knew,'  he  said,  '  that  there  was 
a  United  States  Government,  except  when  you  went  to  the 
post-office  for  your  letters.  Under  the  Republican  Govern 
ment  there  is  want,  tramps,  execution  for  taxes,  and  other 
evils  ; '  and  he  accused  the  Republicans  of  extravagance, 
jobbing,  scheming  for  office,  and  support  of  rings  and  mono 
polies.  As  to  the  Southern  difficulty,  he  said  '  the  Constitu 
tional  question  and  the  rights  of  the  negroes  are  settled — no 
one  would  go  back  upon  that ;  but,  thank  God,  the  Carpet 
baggers  have  been  expelled  from  the  South ;  disturbance  and 
murder  are  stopped — the  rule  is  given  to  those  who  care  for 
the  rights  of  both  races.'  Military  rule  in  the  South  had  been 
stopped  by  Congress  refusing  appropriations  for  the  army 
until  the  troops  were  withdrawn.  As  regards  the  money 
question  he  was  very  vehement,  and  denounced  both  the 
Greenbackers  and  the  Silver-men.  He  wanted  to  give  the 
working  man  a  real  and  not  a  sham  dollar.  Afterwards, 
however,  he  somewhat  inconsistently  said  that  he  would  post 
pone  return  to  specie  payments  till  times  were  better.  He 
had  no  objection  to  the  silver  dollar,  if  enough  silver  were  put 
into  it  to  make  it  worth  a  dollar.  There  was  no  talk  of  the 
question  of  protection — that  goes  of  itself,  I  suppose.  He 
then  went  into  State  Government  affairs,  but  I  did  not  dis 
cover  that  there  were  any  burning  questions  except  personal 
ones,  and  upon  these  he  was  very  bitter.  He  accused  old 
Simon  Cameron  of  personal  rule  and  all  sorts  of  jobbing  to 
put  his  son,  Don  Cameron,  and  others  of  his  party,  into  office, 
with  the  view  to  raise  money  for  election  expenses.  Another 
man  followed,  whom  I  did  not  think  much  of — he  was  more 
of  a  ranter.  On  the  whole  I  should  say  the  speakers  were 
more  demonstrative  than  with  us,  and  the  people  less  so.  There 
was  no  opposition,  and  no  '  heckling,'  nor  any  vote  at  the  end 
— merely  moderate  applause — and  then  everyone  went  away. 
The  next  morning  I  looked  about  the  place.  People  were 
talking  very  quietly.  '  I  know  nothing  of  politics,'  I  heard 
some  say.  None  seemed  strong  or  bitter  upon  the  subject. 


246  MY  JOUKNAL. 

I  met  a  stoat  American  of  these  parts — a  rough  sort  of  man  ; 
but  he  owns  much  land  in  various  parts  of  Minnesota,  and  he 
wants  to  sell.  Apparently  land  speculation  has  been  some 
what  overdone.  The  Pennsylvania  Central  Canal  runs  along 
side  the  railway  here.  I  saw  no  signs  of  traffic  upon  it,  but  I 
am  told  that  it  carries  a  good  deal  of  coal.  There  are  some 
negroes  about  the  town,  but  apparently  none  in  the  country. 
I  saw  no  such  thing  as  a  negro  labourer  on  the  farms.  A 
very  important  people  here  are  the  '  Dunkards,'  a  German 
religious  sect.  They  are  about  the  best  and  most  prosperous 
farmers  in  this  country,  owning  almost  the  whole  of  one  rich 
valley.  They  are  building  a  fine  High  School  here,  which 
they  are  to  dedicate  to  the  public.  It  will  be  taken  over  as 
a  common  school.  There  is  a  great  deal  of  difference  of 
opinion  about  the  school  system.  One  man  denied  that  there 
are  free  schools,  but  I  found  that  he  meant  that  they  have  to 
pay  taxes  for  them  ;  and  he  put  it  that  if  a  man  owns  a  farm 
he  may  have  to  pay  $20,  when  a  man  of  equal  means,  but 
who  only  rents  a  house,  pays  only  one  or  two  dollars.  In  this 
town  there  are  as  many  as  eight  churches.  The  principal 
one  is  a  Presbyterian  church,  the  minister  of  which  has 
$1,700  (say  350L)  and  a  house.  Next  comes  the  Methodist 
church,  the  minister  of  which  receives  $1,200.  The  Epis 
copalians  are  few,  and  unable  to  support  a  parson.  In  vil 
lages,  I  am  told,  you  will  probably  find  only  two  churches, 
one  Presbyterian  and  the  other  Methodist. 

I  took  a  long  walk  out  into  the  country,  and  saw  a  good 
many  farms.  The  land  is  not  very  good  about  here.  There 
is  much  woodland  not  reclaimed,  but  it  is  being  taken  up 
bit  by  bit.  Notwithstanding  much  emigration  from  this 
country  to  the  West  they  do  not  seem  to  suffer  from  want 
of  population.  Most  of  the  farmers  hire  labour  more  or  less, 
and  plenty  of  farm-servants  are  to  be  got.  Pennsylvania 
seems  to  be  a  great  country  for  raising  humans.  The  prin 
cipal  crops  are  Indian  corn,  wheat,  and  a  good  many  potatoes. 
In  all  the  gardens  there  are  vines,  but  they  do  not  always  bear. 
All  the  country  hereabouts  is  at  this  moment  suffering 
very  much  from  drought.  I  found  that  some  farms  belong  to 


PHILADELPHIA.  247 

men  in  the  town,  who  work  them  with  hired  labour.  Some 
small  patches  are  held  by  men  who  do  other  work  as  well. 
I  talked  to  such  a  man  who  had  eighteen  acres  of  his  own. 
The  hired  servants  seem  decent  sort  of  people.  On  the  whole 
I  should  not  say  that  the  people  here  are  of  a  higher  class 
than  the  average  of  our  rural  populations.  Many  of  the 
children  have  bare  feet,  but  that  is  probably  due  to  the 
climate.  The  ordinary  cottages  seem  very  good. 

Groing  on  by  railway  to  Philadelphia  we  passed  through 
a  long  narrow  valley,  without  much  population,  and  then 
came  to  Harrisburgh,  the  political  capital  of  the  State,  and 
a  great  railway  centre.  The  Susquehanna  is  a  very  broad, 
shallow  river.  From  Harrisburgh  we  passed  through  Lan 
caster  County.  There  the  cultivation  is  very  good  indeed  ; 
the  fields  well  enclosed  and  carefully  worked.  I  still  notice 
the  absence  of  root-crops.  I  find  that  this  county  has  the 
reputation  of  being  very  highly  cultivated ;  in  fact,  Lancaster 
and  Cumberland  Counties  of  Pennsylvania  are  said  to  be  the 
best  cultivated  in  America.  The  land  looked  very  much 
like  good  Scotch  or  English  land  without  green  crops.  The 
farms  are  small  or  of  moderate  size,  the  great  majority 
owned  by  the  farmers.  Renting,  they  say,  seldom  answers. 

It  was  dark  when  we  reached  Philadelphia,  and  there 
were  no  cabs  at  the  station,  but  admirably  arranged  tram 
way-cars,  by  which  I  reached  my  hotel  without  difficulty,  the 
luggage  being,  as  is  always  the  case  in  America,  brought 
separately  by  a  man,  who  gives  you  a  ticket  for  it.  I  put 
up  at  the  Continental  Hotel — very  central,  but  expensive. 

In  the*  morning  I  looked  about  Philadelphia.  Like  all 
other  American  cities  it  is  very  rectangular,  but  some  of  the 
streets  are  more  European-looking  and  better  filled  than  any 
I  had  yet  seen  in  America.  Chestnut  and  Walnut  and  such 
like  streets  run  between  the  Delaware  and  the  Schuylkill 
rivers,  and  at  right  angles  to  them  run  the  numbered  streets. 
The  Delaware  is  not  here  a  very  large  river  ;  there  is  a  tide, 
but  the  water  is  fresh,  it  being  a  long  way  from  the  sea. 
There  is  said  to  be  not  less  water  in  the  river  than  over  the 
New  York  Bar  ;  but  the  disadvantage  is  that  the  shallow 


248  MY  JOURNAL. 

places  are  more  numerous,  and  it  takes  longer  to  pass  all  of 
them.  Evidently  the  port  is  at  some  disadvantage  in  this 
respect.  Some  of  the  larger  steamers  do  not  care  to  come 
up.  In  regard  to  the  grain  trade  Philadelphia  is  much  pressed 
by  Baltimore ;  there  is  great  rivalry  between  the  two  places. 
I  went  to  see  Independence  House  and  several  other  sights. 
Mr.  B ,  a  countryman  of  mine,  to  whom  I  had  an  intro 
duction,  was  good  enough  to  drive  me  about  in  the  afternoon. 
He  took  me  through  the  famous  Fairmount  Park.  A  very 
fine  large  park  it  is.  The  site  of  the  Centennial  Exhibition  was 
in  this  park,  and  certainly  a  very  commanding  and  good  site. 
Beyond  the  park  both  sides  of  a  pretty  stream  have  been 
taken  up  for  a  continuation  of  the  drive,  making  it  alto 
gether  eleven  miles  in  length.  The  country  here  is  not 
hilly,  but  undulating  and  pretty. 

I  made  the  acquaintance  of  Mr.  P ,  a  most  pleasant 

old  gentleman,  and  an  excellent  specimen  of  the  best  class  of 
Americans  of  the  older  generation  ;  also  his  son,  a  prosperous 
lawyer,  who  has  been  much  in  Scotland.  They  took  me  to 

see  Mr.  G.  W.  C ,  a  very  successful  man,  and  a  great 

institution  in  Philadelphia,  where  he  has  one  of  the  most 
successful  papers  in  America.  I  found  him  most  pleasant, 
and  ready  to  assist  me.  The  present  American  Minister  in 
London  is  a  Philadelphia  man,  and  is  evidently  very  much 
respected  and  looked  up  to  here.  The  Philadelphia  people 
seem  very  sociable,  and  very  intimate  with  one  another,  and 
altogether  very  agreeable  and  kind  to  strangers. 

In  the  evening  I  went  to  a  political  meeting  of  the  oppo 
site  persuasion  from  that  at  which  I  had  assisted  at  Hun 
tingdon.  The  Governor  of  this  State  presided,  a  quiet, 
inaudible  sort  of  man.  Then  came  the  Governor  that  is  to 
be,  who  was  rather  dry  and  financial ;  and  after  him  another 
orator,  who  gave  the  Eepublican  view  of  matters  very  well. 
As  with  the  other  side,  party  questions  seemed  to  be  very 
much  personal  ones.  He  pitched  into  the  Democrats  for 
having  caused  the  war,  which  was  the  root  of  all  the  evils  of 
which  they  had  lately  complained.  Now  they  were  recovering, 
and  the  great  thing  was  to  let  well  alone.  If  you  could  only 


PHILADELPHIA.  249 

let  Congress  sleep  for  ten  years  all  would  be  right.  It  would 
be  a  scandal  and  a  shame  if,  after  all  the  sufferings  of  the 
country,  the  defeated  Democrats  were  to  come  in  again. 
That  would  mean  the  victory  of  the  South,  compensation  for 
Southern  losses,  and  so  on.  On  the  currency  question  the 
Eepublicans  were  as  strong  for  hard  money  as  the  other  side 
had  been.  The  good  dollar  is  the  poor  man's  dollar.  The 
working  man  is  a  creditor  for  the  value  of  his  labour,  and 
wants  to  be  paid  in  good  money ;  the  bondholders  are  the 
widows  and  the  orphans  who  have  invested  their  little  all  in 
United  States  Bonds  ;  and  German  and  Dutch  people,  who 
trusted  the  United  States  while  the  English  fitted  up  corsairs 
to  destroy  our  trade.  (Great  applause.)  The  Democrats 
were  coquetting  with  the  Greenbackers.  That  would  never 
do.  Protection  might  be  good  or  bad  for  other  people,  but 
it  was  certainly  good  for  Pennsylvania.  He  accused  the 
Democrats  of  being  in  favour  of  a  tariff  for  revenue,  and  said 
that  would  be  ruin  to  them.  This  meeting,  like  the  other, 
was  quite  quiet  and  orderly.  There  seemed  to  be  less  of  row 
and  less  enthusiasm  than  in  one  of  our  political  meetings. 

The  city  seems  a  good  and  flourishing  one.  It  excels 
very  much  in  a  great  abundance  of  workmen's  houses.  They 
are  generally  held  by  the  workmen  themselves  on  a  sort  of 
quit-rent — what  we  should  call  '  feus  '  in  Scotland. 

The  next  day  Mr.  B took  me  to  see  several  of  the 

sights  of  Philadelphia.  One  very  new  institution  here  is 
the  Safety  House  ;  that  is,  fire-proof  houses,  with  fire-proof 
receptacles,  in  which  valuables  are  locked  away.  Anyone 
who  wishes  thus  to  secure  his  valuables,  papers,  &c.  takes  a 
little  compartment,  in  which  he  puts  them.  I  think  the 
Philadelphia  people  were  rather  disappointed  at  my  saying 
that  it  seemed  a  very  good  idea  indeed,  but  that  it  had  been 
very  long  anticipated  in  one  country — viz.,  China — where 
almost  every  village  possesses  a  safety  house  somewhat  on 
this  principle.  Europeans  generally  call  them  c  pawn-shops,' 
but  they  are  really  brick,  robber-proof,  and  to  some  extent 
fire-proof  buildings,  where  the  Chinese  deposit  their  valuables, 
which  is  the  more  necessary,  as  in  "that  country  very  few 


250  MY  JOURNAL. 

houses  are  proof  against  fire  and  against  thieves.  As  a 
means,  however,  of  providing  for  the  safety  of  valuables, 
securities,  and  other  papers  the  improved  .Pennsylvania 
safety  houses  are  very  useful  indeed. 

I  interviewed  two  or  three   of  the  leading  railway  chiefs 

here.    Colonel  S ,  the  President  of  the  great  Pennsylvania 

system  of  railways,  seems  a  shrewd  elderly  man.  I  had  a 
good  deal  of  talk  with  him.  He  admits  that  the  great  dif 
ficulty  in  regard  to  very  successful  railways  in  America  is, 
that  they  are  so  liable  to  the  competition  of  opposition  lines, 
that  they  cannot  expect  to  pay  very  enormous  dividends  ; 
but,  on  the  other  hand,  he  says  they  are  not  afraid  of  most  of 
these  oppositions.  These  lines  cost,  according  to  him,  very 
much  more  than  they  were  estimated  for.  They  do  not  pay 
now,  and  very  likely  never  will.  Others  say,  however,  that 
the  more  recent  lines  are  made  cheaper  than  the  old  ones. 

I  also  talked  to  Mr.  Gr ,  the  very  sanguine  President  of 

the  Philadelphia  and  Reading  Railway.  All  admit  him  to 
be  a  clever  man  ;  but  his  railway  is  in  a  bad  way  nevertheless, 
and  he  did  not  seem  to  find  many  to  share  his  sanguine 
estimates.  He  does  not  admit  that  the  Pennsylvania  iron  is 
worked  out  or  inferior,  as  I  had  been  told,  though  he  does 
admit  that  the  iron  ore  from  Lake  Superior  is  better  for 
some  purposes.  With  regard  to  the  relative  merits  of 
American  and  English  iron,  he  admits  that  the  English 
deposits  in  the  Cleveland  country  are  the  greatest  in  the 
world ;  but  then  he  says  that  English  iron  is  full  of  phos 
phorus,  and  won't  make  into  steel.  It  cannot  be  so  used 
unless  some  new  chemical  means  are  found  for  purging  it  of 
phosphorus.  The  American  ore  is  free  from  phosphorus. 
Thus  they  have  the  advantage  in  making  steel,  which  will 
tell  the  more  if,  in  addition  to  steel  rails,  it  becomes  the 
fashion  to  build  steel  ships,  as  is  now  expected.  As  it  is  he 
says  the  English  now  make  steel  cheaper  than  the  Americans, 
but  that  is  only  because  the  quantity  required  is  compara 
tively  small.  If  the  consumption  of  steel  in  the  world  very 
largely  increases,  the  English  have  not  the  ore  to  meet  the 
demand.  This  is  a  great  place  for  the  manufacture  of  loco- 


PHILADELPHIA.  251 

motives  and  all  sorts  of  railway  machinery.  There  seems  to 
be  no  doubt  that  the  Americans  export  locomotives  to  foreign 
countries,  which  must  be  due  to  skill  in  the  manufacture, 

not  to  the  material,  which  is  dearer  than  with  us.    Mr.  Gr 

is  very  hot  on  a  plan  for  inducing  the  ocean  steamers  to  use 
the  anthracite  coal  which  his  railway  supplies.  He  says 
that  if  the  furnaces  were  fitted  for  it  there  would  be  no 
difficulty,  and  they  would  then  find  it  an  immense  advantage, 
the  coal  being  very  superior  and  so  much  cleaner.  The 
difficulty,  it  seems,  is  to  get  anthracite  coal  to  use  on  these 
steamers  on  the  return  voyage  from  England ;  but  he  has 
specimens  to  show  that  there  is  very  good  anthracite  coal  in 
Wales  which  they  might  get.  It  seems  that  the  principal 
consumption  of  this  anthracite  is  now  in  New  York,  Phila 
delphia,  and  some  of  the  other  Eastern  cities.  There  are 
immense  deposits  of  it,  but  the  area  is  very  limited.  It 
occupies  an  exceedingly  small  space  on  the  coal-map  of  the 
United  States. 

I  have  got  the  statistical  atlas  of  the  United  States, 
giving  an  immense  amount  of  information.  The  Americans 
go  in  very  largely  for  statistics.  At  the  same  time  I  have 
not  been  able  to  make  out  how  they  obtain  accurate  figures. 
They  have  no  system  of  compulsory  agricultural  returns 
any  more  than  we  have.  So  far  as  I  can  understand  their 
agricultural  statistics  are  not  founded  on  reports  from 
farmers,  but  merely  on  the  estimates  of  qualified  observers 
in  connection  with  the  Statistical  Department  in  the 
various  par-ts  of  the  country.  Then  as  to  the  geological 
and  coal  maps.  There  are  no  general  surveys  of  the 
United  States  ;  that  is  not  considered  to  be  a  function  of 
the  general  Government,  but  of  each  State;  consequently 
the  older  and  more  settled  States  are  not  surveyed  according 
to  any  uniform  system.  The  best  surveys  are  those  of  the 
e  Territories,'  in  which  the  land  belonging  to  the  United  States 
has  been  surveyed  as  United  States  property.  From  what 
I  could  gather  I  should  say  that  there  are  some  inaccuracies 
in  the  statistical  maps.  For  instance,  I  could  not  make  out 
that  the  Illinois  coal-fields  are  really  so  enormous  as  they 

\ 


252  MY  JOURNAL. 

are  there  depicted — certainly  coal  is  not  so  cheap  in  Illinois 
as  it  is  in  Pennsylvania. 

I  understand  that  here  joint-stock  companies  are  not  so 
common  as  in  New  England,  and  the  reason  which  has  been 
given  to  me  is,  that  in  Pennsylvania  corporate  bodies  are 
taxed  on  all  their  property,  while  private  persons  are  taxed  on 
real  property  only,  contrary  to  the  practice  of  most  American 
States  which  by  their  Constitution  are  bound  to  levy  all  taxes 
upon  every  sort  of  property,  real  and  personal  equally. 

In  the  afternoon  I  went  with  Mr.  P to  his  house, 

which  is  within  a  few  miles  of  Philadelphia,  in  a  pretty, 
undulating  country — something  like  our  Kichmond,  without 
the  water.  The  Philadelphia  people  do  not  seem  to  have  con 
siderable  country  places,  like  the  New  Yorkers  ;  only  villas 

and  moderate  grounds.  Mr.  P 's  house  and  family  I 

found  extremely  pleasant  and  agreeable.  As  servants  they 
have  only  quiet-looking  maids,  no  men  ;  all  seems  very  nice 
and  simple.  The  boys,  according  to  the  American  fashion, 

live  at  home  and  go  to  school.  I  met  a  Mr.  M ,  with 

whom  I  had  some  talk  about  agriculture.  He  quite  agrees 
with  what  I  have  before  heard,  that  it  does  not  pay  to  let 
land.  He  says  that  in  the  German  counties  the  women 
will  work  in  the  fields — they  like  it,  and  will  not  be  pre 
vented  from  doing  so ;  but  no  other  women  do  this  kind  of 
work.  Parts  of  New  England,  he  says,  are  now  much  de 
serted  and  almost  returning  to  jungle;  the  people  have  gone 
West  to  better  land ;  and  the  poor  New  England  land,  which 
sufficed  for  the  Pilgrim  Fathers,  does  not  pay  now.  Even  in 
Connecticut,  where  the  land  is  better,  he  says  its  value  is 
much  depreciated.  He  compares  the  Yankees  (meaning 
New  Englanders)  to  Jews,  who  will  not  work  with  their 
hands,  but  expect  to  grow  rich  by  their  heads. 

It  seems  that  Mr.  McCulloch  (late  Financial  Secretary) 
has  been  holding  forth  on  the  deficiencies  of  American  agri 
culture,  comparing  it  to  that  of  the  Old  World  as  very  infe 
rior,  and  saying  that  agriculture  is  the  only  industry  to  which 
science  has  not  been  properly  applied  in  the  United  States. 

Some  of  the  people  here  speak  with  great  contempt  of 


PHILADELPHIA.  253 

the  *  shoddy '  fine  ladies  of  the  oil  regions  and  the  Western 
States,  but  they  admit  that  the  St.  Louis  women  are  nice — 
there  is  a  dash  of  French  blood  there.  The  Philadelphia 
people  are  different  in  style  and  ways  both  from  Yankees 
and  New  Yorkers.  They  think  the  latter  loud  and  purse- 
proud.  Cincinnati,  one  of  the  pleasantest  cities  in  the 
Union,  is,  I  am  told,  very  German.  The  Germans  there  go 
in  very  much  for  the  pleasures  of  life  according  to  their 
ideas,  musical  and  other.  c  What  is  money  without  pleasure 
and  comfort  ?  '  says  the  German.  There  is  now  a  good  deal 
of  society  in  Washington,  I  am  told,  but  it  is  somewhat 
formal,  the  foreign  Ministers  introducing  formalities ;  and 
there  are  many  questions  of  precedence  and  suchlike. 

People  here  say  that  the  New  England  servants  are  quite 
different  from  theirs.  There  is  more  equality  in  New  Eng 
land;  there  they  have  helps  rather  than  servants.  Many 
students,  male  and  even  female,  go  out  to  make  a  little 
money  by  service  in  the  hotels  during  the  summer,  which 
accounts  for  the  stories  told  of  the  waiter  interposing  to  solve 
scientific  or  social  questions  discussed  at  the  table.  In  the 
West  there  is  much  more  difficulty  about  servants,  and  the 
ladies  there  are  said  to  get  prematurely  old  on  this  account. 
In  the  South  people  have  had  great  reverses  of  fortune,  and 
aristocrats  were  obliged  to  serve  as  waiters,  while  blacks  sat 
in  the  Legislature  and  their  wives  rode  in  carriages.  I  gather, 
however,  that  this  only  happened  for  a  time  in  one  or  two 
States. 

Mr.  M-— . —  dwelt  very  much  upon  the  risk  of  fever  in 
the  Southern  States,  and  warned  me  very  emphatically 
against  it.  My  subsequent  experience,  however,  did  not 
confirm  this.  I  did  not  make  out  that  there  was  much  risk 
of  fever  in  most  places  in  the  South  ;  that  is,  where  '  Yellow 
Jack '  has  not  made  his  appearance,  as  is  unfortunately  so 
much  the  case  this  year  in  the  States  of  the  Lower  Mississippi. 
In  all  the  lower  parts  of  the  Southern  States  there  are  tracts 
which  are  exceedingly  feverish  in  summer ;  but  few  white 
people  live  there  at  that  season  ;  and  now  that  the  cool 
weather  has  come  in  they  are  quite  healthy. 


254  MY  JOURNAL. 

Next  day,  on  returning  to  Philadelphia,  I  went  with  Mr. 

P to  see  the  Courts.     They  retain  the  old  English  forms 

to  a  surprising  degree  ;  even  old  Norman  terms  which  we 
have  dropped.  They  have  still '  Courts  of  Oyer  and  Terminer,' 
and  shout  out  the  old  Norman  '  Oh,  yes  !  oh,  yes  ! '  Grrand 
juries  and  all  the  machinery  of  English  justice  are  fully 
maintained,  but  the  Judges  wear  no  robes.  Unanimity  of 
the  jury  is  still  insisted  on.  I  was  surprised  to  see  the 
number  of  Courts  at  work.  The  United  States  Courts,  besides 
dealing  with  breaches  of  the  United  States  laws,  decide 
cases  between  citizens  of  different  States.  The  defendant  is 
sued  where  he  is  found,  and  in  that  case  the  law  of  the  forum 
— that  is,  of  the  State  where  he  is — prevails.  The  United 
States  Courts  draw  their  juries  from  the  locality,  but  from  a 
larger  area  than  an  ordinary  jury  area.  The  Supreme  Court  of 
the  State  is  only  an  appellate  court;  it  has  no  original  jurisdic 
tion.  In  Pennsylvania  there  is  a  Court  of  Common  Pleas  for 
each  county ;  and  I  think  I  have  said  that  American^Counties 
are  very  numerous.  Then  in  each  township  there  are  justices 
of  the  peace  for  the  summary  trial  of  civil  and  criminal 
cases.  These  justices  do  not  always  receive  salaries,  but  are 
always  entitled  to  fees.  In  this  County  of  Philadelphia  the 
Court  of  Common  Pleas  consists  of  a  Chief  Justice  and  eight 
Judges ;  and  in  rural  counties  there  are  at  least  three  Judges 
of  the  Common  Pleas.  There  are  at  least  a  hundred  such 
Judges  in  the  State.  I  understand,  however,  that  sometimes 
laymen  are  elected  to  sit  as  Judges  in  these  courts.  In 
Pennsylvania  the  pay  of  the  Judges  ranges  from  600/.  to 
1,500£.  per  annum.  These  Judges  of  the  Courts  of  Common 
Pleas  hold  their  office  for  ten  years,  but  they  are  often  re- 
elected.  I  was  surprised  to  find  the  number  of  jury  courts 
which  were  sitting — about  eight  were  going  on  all  at  once  in 
the  same  set  of  buildings.  In  criminal  cases  not  of  the  very 
worst  class  the  prisoner  may  be  called  as  a  witness  on  his 
own  side,  but  is  not  otherwise  liable  to  examination.  A  man 
who  has  pleaded  guilty  can  be  called.  They  have  two  degrees 
of  murder,  for  the  first  of  which  only  the  punishment  is 
death.  The  sentence  may  be  commuted  by  the  Governor, 


PHILADELPHIA.  255 

who  ordinarily  acts  on  the  advice  of  a  '  Board  of  Pardons,* 
composed  of  the  chief  officials.  The  rules  of  extradition  be 
tween  different  States  do  not  seem  to  be  very  well  defined. 
The  Governor  surrenders  a  criminal  on  the  application  of 
another  Governor,  but  he  must  have  prima  facie  proof  of 
guilt,  and  may  refuse,  on  the  ground  that  the  prisoner  will 
not  be  fairly  tried  by  jury,  or  that  the  demand  is  made  for 
political  objects.  Just  now  there  has  been  a  polemical  cor 
respondence  between  the  Governors  of  Massachusetts  and 
South  Carolina  on  the  subject  of  the  surrender  of  an  ex- 
Governor  charged  with  embezzlement  and  other  offences  in 
his  political  capacity. 

I  went  to  see  the  proprietary  Library  here,  which  seems 
a  large  and  successful  institution.  I  understand  that  they 
have  no  free  libraries  in  this  State,  and  do  not  approve  of 
them.  I  also  hear  a  good  deal  of  expression  of  opinion  that 
there  has  been  too  much  education.  There  seems  somewhat 
a  tendency  to  decry  the  Common  School  system.  I  am,  in 
fact,  surprised  to  find  how  much  of  that  sort  of  feeling  there 
seems  to  be  here ;  but  I  believe  the  Common  School  system 
was  not  indigenous  in  Pennsylvania.  New  England  was  its 
native  land. 

On  the  last  day  of  my  stay  here  I  met  Mr.  M ,  who  is 

a  great  enthusiast  for  the  coloured  races,  and  who  has  written 
for  me  a  number  of  letters  of  introduction  to  people  and 
institutions  in  the  South.  Like  many  of  the  friends  of  the 
coloured  people  in  these  days,  he  has  taken  up  the  cause  of 
the  Bed  Indian,  whom  he  and  many  others  declare  to  be 
exceedingly  ill-used  in  the  Territories  where  they  still  remain. 
He  thinks,  on  the  whole,  the  negro  is  more  improvable  than 
the  Red  Indian,  because  he  is  not  too  proud,  and  is  willing 
and  anxious  to  learn ;  while  the  red  man  is  very  proud,  and 
won't  learn  if  he  can  help  it,  Also  he  says  that  the  red  men 
insist  upon  the  tribal  tenure  of  land,  and  will  not  have  indi 
vidual  property.  A  very  important  fact  is,  that  white  men 
go  amongst  the  red  tribes,  marry  red  women,  and  are  adopted 
into  the  tribes,  and  in  this  way  the  race  is  being  crossed  and 
may  be  absorbed;  whereas  the  whites  will  not  intermarry 


256  MY  JOURNAL. 

with  the  negroes  nor  even  with  the  mulattos.  He,  or  some 
one  else  whom  I  met,  laments  this,  for  the  curious  reason  that 
in  slave  days  these  mulattos  were  bred  from  the  highest  and 
best  blood  of  the  whites,  whereas  some  of  the  white  people 
come  from  very  low  blood  indeed. 

I  had  a  talk  with  old  Mr.  P about  politics.  He  says 

he  used  to  vote  Democrat ;  but  now,  though  he  is  not  much  of  a 
politician,  he  votes  Republican,  for  he  thinks  that  on  the  whole 
it  is  the  least  dishonest  side,  and  perhaps  it  is  better  to  keep 
in  the  people  who  are  in,  and  whose  maws  have  been  a  good 
deal  satisfied,  rather  than  bring  in  a  new  set  of  cormorants. 
He  says  the  original  difference  between  the  two  parties  was- 
the  question  of  central  power  against  State  power,  and  some 
very  distinguished  men  were  in  this  sense  great  Democrats ; 
but  now,  he  says,  the  Southern  question  must  be  settled,  and 
he  prefers  that  the  Republicans  should  settle  it. 

There  are  a  great  many  manufacturing  establishments  at 
Philadelphia,  and  a  great  variety  of  manufactures ;  but  I  had 
not  time  to  do  much  in  this  way.  I  was  obliged  to  confine 
myself  more  especially  to  the  things  belonging  to  my  own 
trade,  and  to  keep  the  rest  till  I  returned  from  the  South. 

There  are  some  very  sociable  clubs  of  literary  and  intel 
lectual  people  here,  who  meet  periodically  at  one  another's 
houses,  and  I  am  promised  the  pleasure  of  assisting  at  some 
of  these  gatherings,  if  I  return  later  in  the  season.  Fashion 
able  New  York  was  quite  out  of  town  when- 1  was  there,  and 
Philadelphia  still  is  so  for  the  most  part.  The  winter  is  the 
time  to  see  something  of  the  society  of  American  cities. 

BALTIMORE. 

In  the  afternoon  I  started  for  Baltimore.  We  passed 
through  a  pleasant  country,  with  many  houses  on  the  banks 
of  the  river.  It  was  dark  before  we  reached  Baltimore. 
The  general  aspect  of  the  place  seemed  to  be,  that  in  the 
lower  parts  land  and  water  were  very  much  intermixed.  At 
Baltimore  I  stopped  at  the  Mount  Vernon  Hotel.  It  is  kept 
on  the  European  and  not  on  the  American  plan,  and  seemed 


BALTIMORE.  257 

nice,  but  on  experience  I  was  a  good  deal  disappointed  with 
it.  They  say  that  this  European  fashion  does  not  suit 
people  here,  and  that  the  hotel,  which  was  once  good,  is  not 
now  well  maintained. 

Comparing  the  harbour  here  with  that  of  Philadelphia 
and  other  places,  I  am  told  that  the  United  States  Grovern- 
ment  undertake  the  charge  of  rivers,  harbours,  and  works  of 
internal  navigation.  They  have  made  some  bad  essays  in 
that  line  in  Pennsylvania,  and  the  system  altogether  leads 
to  a  good  deal  of  jobbing.  I  am  inclined  to  prefer  our  own 
system,  under  which  each  town  and  municipality  undertakes 
its  own  improvements. 

I  have  been  reading  an  account  of  the  insolvency  laws  of 
the  different  States,  now  that  the  general  bankruptcy  law  of 
the  United  States  has  expired.  In  most  States  a  debtor  can 
not  be  released  without  the  consent  of  all  his  creditors  ;  but, 
on  the  other  hand,  he  has  very  great  protection  in  the  exemp 
tion  from  execution  of  his  homestead  and  the  tools  of  his 
trade.  In  almost  every  State  a  man's  homestead — that  is,  land 
of  a  moderate  value  and  acreage — is  exempted  from  execution. 

Late  this  evening  Mr.  K ,  a  distinguished  member  of 

the  Society  of  Friends  here,  was  kind  enough  to  come  over 
and  take  me  with  him  to  his  house,  where  I  met  some  pleasant 
people.  Mr.  K —  -  is  a  well-known  philanthropist  and  friend 
of  the  negro.  Talking  of  the  blacks  with  the  people  I  met, 
they  seemed  to  take  a  hopeful  view  of  the  condition  of  the 
negro,  and  are  not  severe  upon  President  Hayes'  conciliatory 
administration.  They  recalled  the  time,  less  than  twenty 
years  ago,  when  slaves  were  openly  marched  down  to  be  sold 
in  the  South ;  when  it  was  highly  penal  to  teach  slaves  to 
read  and  write  ;  when  a  very  excellent  freed  man  was  im 
prisoned  for  ten  years  for  possessing  a  copy  of  '  Uncle  Tom's 
Cabin.'  Now  the  blacks  are  secure  in  their  freedom ;  they 
have  votes  ;  and  one  party  or  another  will  sooner  or  later  want 
their  votes.  Much,  too,  is  done  for  their  education  :  here 
the  blacks  are  kept  to  separate  schools,  but  these  schools 
are  good.  The  religious  position  of  the  blacks  is  also  very 
good ;  they  are  excellent  Christians.  They  have  taken  to 

S 


258  MY  JOURNAL. 

work  well.  Here  in  Baltimore  they  have  some  branches  of 
industry  very  much  to  themselves,  notably  caulking  ships  and 
brick-making.  They  have,  I  am  told,  a  ship-caulking  com 
pany  composed  entirely  of  coloured  men,  and  managed  by 
coloured  men.  I  was  sorry  that  in  my  stay  here  I  did  not 
manage  to  see  something  of  this  company,  for  this  is  the  only 
case  of  which  I  have  heard  where  black  men  have  successfully 
managed  anything  of  the  kind.  They  do  not  own  much  land, 
I  am  told,  but  they  work  well  on  the  land  in  the  country 
about  here,  as  well  as  in  domestic  service.  They  form  about 
a  fourth  of  the  population  here.  I  had  a  curious  account  of 
their  Freemason  and  other  societies.  Freemason  lodges  are 
believed  to  have  existed  among  them  even  in  the  days  of 
slavery,  unknown  to  their  masters.  The  system  is  said  to  have 
been  brought  from  the  British  colonies  ;  and  the  Freemasonry 
among  them  was,  I  am  told,  made  very  evident  during  the 
war. 

Next  morning  I  breakfasted  with  Mr.  Gr ,  President 

of  the  Hopkins  University,  a  man  full  of  information,  and  to 
whom  I  owe  much  kindness  and  assistance  during  my  stay  in 
Baltimore.  This  Hopkins  University  is  a  great  recent  endow 
ment,  and  conducted  on  the  most  modern  principles.  They 
have  got  over  several  Englishmen  as  teachers,  including  the 

distinguished  mathematician  Professor  S .     I  made  the 

acquaintance   of  Judge   A ,  one  of  the   United   States 

Judges,  who  has  been  much  employed  in  the  Southern  States  ; 

and  also  of  Mr.  K ,  formerly  a  distinguished  Confederate 

officer,  and  now  manager  of  a  steamboat  and  railway  com 
pany,  from  both  of  whom  I  had  much  assistance.  Again  I 
am  told  that  the  negroes  are  in  a  very  good  position  in  this 
State,  and  also  in  Virginia  and  North  Carolina.  The  best 
security  that  they  have  is  when  there  are  two  parties  among 
the  whites,  each  of  whom  wants  the  black  vote.  In  North 
Carolina  and  Tennessee  a  great  part  of  the  country  was  Eepub- 
lican,  and  during  the  civil  war  went  into  rebellion  against  the 
Confederate  Government.  The  poor  whites  owning  no  slaves 
never  cared  for  the  war.  But  now  things  are  much  more 
divided  by  black  and  white  lines.  The  white  man  must  now 


BALTIMORE.  259 

assert  himself  in  some  way  as  better  than  a  black.  If  he 
does  not  need  the  black  vote  he  can  only  do  so  by  beating 
the  black,  and  in  some  States  he  does  that.  My  subsequent 
experience,  however,  leads  me  to  think  that  this  was  rather 
a  poetical  exaggeration. 

From  this  point  Southwards — in  the  lower  country,  at  any 
rate,  and  in  days  before  the  war — the  system  of  small  indepen 
dent  farms  was  very  much  superseded  by  the  plantation 
system.  Virginia  was  a  country  of  plantations  ;  that  is  to 
say,  of  estates  cultivated  by  slaves.  In  some  parts  of  the 
country,  where  the  crops  are  not  valuable,  some  of  these  plan 
tations  are  now  a  good  deal  deserted.  In  some  of  these  places 
the  negroes  can  live  somewhat  lazily  on  fish  and  crabs,  but  in 
most  parts  they  now  work  well  for  their  living.  They  can 
be  had  as  labourers  on  the  railways  for  fifty  cents  a  day,  and 
are  very  docile  and  good  workmen.  In  South  Carolina  there 
has  been  more  of  extreme  reverses  and  more  bitter  feeling 
between  classes  than  in  any  of  the  States  I  have  mentioned, 
and  the  difficulties  there  are  greater.  Greorgia  has  been  from 
the  first  moderately  managed,  and  is  now  in  a  good  condition. 
There  have  not  been  many  complaints  regarding  Alabama. 
Louisiana  is  said  not  to  have  treated  the  negroes  harshly 
before  the  war.  Mississippi  seems  to  have  been  and  to  be 
the  worst  State.  It  is  very  difficult  to  ascertain  what  is 
now  the  state  of  things  in  some  of  the  Southern  States, 
because  no  Kepublican  newspapers  whatever  are  published 
there,  No  one  dares  publish  such  a  paper,  and  if  he  dared 
he  would  find  no  one  to  read  it,  for  want  of  education.  In 
many  of  "the  counties  of  South  Carolina  almost  the  whole 
population  is  black.  There  is  still  not  very  much  education 
in  the  South.  A  good  deal  has  been  done  by  Freedmen's 
Schools  established  by  the  Northerners,  and  there  is  every 
where  a  State  system  of  education  more  or  less,  but  it  is 
generally  very  imperfect.  However,  the  blacks  are  very 
anxious  to  learn — more  so  than  the  lower  whites.  The  Green 
back  question,  I  am  told,  promises  to  be  of  great  advantage 
to  the  South,  because  it  is  one  in  regard  to  which  there  is 
much  competition  for  the  black  vote,  and  this  brings  about  a 

s  2 


260  MY   JOURNAL. 

wholesome  state  of  things.  In  most  parts  of  the  South  the 
negroes  have  no  difficulty  in  getting  land,  if  they  can  pay  for 
it ;  but  in  some  places  there  is  a  difficulty,  because  the  whites 
will  not  sell,  thinking  the  possession  of  land  a  sort  of  patent 
of  nobility,  to  which  blacks  should  not  be  admitted  ;  and 
everywhere  there  is  the  difficulty  that  the  negroes  do  not 
very  much  save  money  to  buy  it.  Many  rent  land  on  shares, 
but  they  seldom  own  it.  After  the  war  their  idea  was,  that 
every  man  was  to  have  from  Government  twenty-five  acres 
and  a  mule,  but  they  have  not  yet  got  that.  In  Maryland  a 
good  many  of  the  blacks  do  save,  and  they  now  have  consider 
able  sums  in  the  savings  bank. 

I  asked  Judge  A —  -  how  juries  are  selected.  He  says 
that  by  the  Constitution  every  man  is  eligible  to  serve  on  a 
jury,  but  every  man  is  not  drawn  in  regular  roster.  In  fact, 
fit  and  proper  persons  are  selected  by  the  proper  officer,  to  be 
put  on  the  panel  from  which  the  juries  are  drawn  ;  and  in 
some  of  the  Southern  States  the  blacks  are  almost  excluded 
from  the  juries.  In  Philadelphia  I  noticed  that  on  most  of 
the  juries  there  was  one  coloured  man.  It  looked  as  if  it 
was  so  arranged.  I  asked  about  the  criminality  of  the 

blacks.     Judge   A says  they   sometimes    steal   a   great 

deal  in  a  small  way,  but  they  very  seldom  commit  violent 
crimes.  With  regard  to  the  accusations  of  rape,  which  have 
caused  some  very  violent  lynching  lately,  he  says  that  in  his 
experience  he  has  known  many  such  accusations,  and  many 
people  lynched  for  alleged  crimes  of  the  kind,  but  very  few 
regularly  put  upon  their  trial.  He  himself  only  remembers 
to  have  tried  three  such  cases :  in  two  the  accused  were 
certainly  innocent,  the  third  was  a  crazy  sort  of  man.  In 
South  Carolina  they  have  many  prisoners,  but  fully  nine- 
tenths  of  them  are  negroes,  and  the  State  authorities  are 
making  a  great  road  with  convict  labour.  It  is  even  the 
practice  to  let  out  the  convicts  to  private  persons.  As 
regards  prison  management  there  seems  just  as  much  com 
plaint  in  the  United  States  as  with  us.  In  Philadelphia  it 
certainly  was  so.  They  have  county  prisons,  under  county 
management,  and  State  penitentiaries,  under  State  manage- 


BALTIMORE.  261 

ment.     Mr.  G took  me  to  see  the  Hopkins  University. 

At  present  they  have  not  spent  their  money  in  building,  but 
occupy  a  large  house  in  the  town.  They  teach  every  branch 
of  knowledge,  including  '  Sanskrit  and  philology,'  '  Romance 
languages,'  '  classical  languages,'  4  biology,  chemistry,'  &c. 
The  endowment  amounts  to  about  a  million  sterling,  left, 
I  believe,  by  an  Englishman  long  resident  in  the  States. 

I  met   here  a   Mr.   A ,  a  young  man  who  is  devoting 

himself  to  the  history  of  land  tenure  in  the  United  States, 
especially  in  New  England.  It  seems  that  the  United  States 
Government  never  claimed  the  land  east  of  the  Alleghanies. 
There  it  all  belonged  to  chartered  proprietors  in  the  South 
and  to  townships  in  the  North.  Of  the  chartered  estates 
many  were  forfeited  for  taking  the  English  side  in  the 
Revolution.  Connecticut  was,  as  it  were,  settled  by  squatters, 
who  formed  independent  townships,  as  little  separate  repub 
lics,  and  the  State  was  formed  by  the  union  of  these  town 
ships.  The  other  New  England  States  were  principally 
settled  by  associations,  who  divided  out  the  land  and  gave 
charters  to  townships.  Now  in  all  these  States  almost  all 
the  land,  whether  reclaimed  or  not,  is  private  property ;  only 
some  special  tracts  belong  to  the  individual  States,  none  to 
the  United  States.  Some  of  the  deeds  constituting  New 
England  townships  reserve  certain  lands  for  common  use,  but 
these  have  for  the  most  part  since  been  divided  up.  There 
are  still,  however,  some  places  where  there  is  a  right  of 
common  pasture  after  the  crops  are  off  the  ground,  but  as  a 
rule  there  ^are  no  commons.  In  New  England  the  counties 
were  certainly  a  subsequent  institution,  formed  by  aggrega 
tion  of  townships.  The  county  is  now  an  important  area  for 
financial  and  judicial  purposes,  though  not  for  purposes  of 
popular  government.  It  seems  more  like  an  English  union 
than  a  county. 

I  have  been  very  kindly  made  free  of  two  excellent  clubs 
here,  the  Athenaeum  and  the  Maryland,  in  both  of  which 
there  is  very  pleasant  society  and  many  material  comforts. 
The  Washington  Monument  is  the  centre  of  fashionable 
Baltimore.  The  women  and  girls  in  the  street  seem  to  me 


262  MY  JOURNAL. 

smart  and  well-dressed,  without  being  too  flashy.  The 
country  about  is  very  well  wooded ;  the  town  is  on  mode 
rately  rising  ground — not  on  an  amphitheatre  of  hills,  such 
as  I  had  been  led  to  expect  from  the  guide-book.  The 
Sunday-closing  movement,  by  enforcing  old  laws,  is  going  on 
here  also.  I  was  told  a  story  about  the  famous  preacher 
Mr.  Beech er.  He  was  travelling  in  a  car  upon  a  Sunday, 
and  said  to  the  driver,  '  Would  it  not  be  better  for  all  parties 
if  you  gave  up  this  Sunday  traffic  ? '  '  Well,1  the  man  said, 
'  there  is  nothing  I  should  like  better,  but  we  cannot  give  it 

up  so  long  as  that  d theatre  there  lasts,'  pointing  over 

his  shoulder  to  Mr.  Beecher's  church.  I  went  to  see  an 
Englishman  resident  in  Baltimore.  He  thinks  the  Hopkins 
University  most  excellent  and  progressive.  He  says  that  in 
America  there  is  now  a  strong  tendency  to  Germanise  educa 
tion,  and  young  men  go  to  Germany  very  much.  President 

G complains  that  the   English  Universities   have   not 

encouraged  Americans.  He  dwells  upon  the  religious  tests 
and  other  difficulties,  and  says  that  is  why  young  men  have 
taken  to  the  Continent  of  Europe  rather  than  to  England. 
My  English  friend  says  that  the  expenses  in  America  are 
really  not  so  much  as  in  London,  if  you  go  the  right  way 
about  it.  The  people  are  not  literary  in  their  habits,  but 
still  English  books  are  very  much  read  and  appreciated.  He 
says  that,  though  people  in  America  try  very  hard  to  make 
money,  upon  the  whole  the  possession  of  money  is  thought 
less  of  than  with  us ;  a  rich  man  is  less  looked  up  to,  because 
wealth  is  less  stable  and  certain  than  with  us.  Reverses 
are  more  frequent,  and  Americans  who  have  been  rich  more 
easily  return  to  humble  positions.  Many  of  the  people 
whom  one  meets  in  good  American  society  occupy  positions 
much  humbler  than  would  be  thought  compatible  with  asso 
ciation  with  well-to-do  people  in  England.  Americans  do 
not  think  it  necessary  to  make  provision  for  their  children ; 
they  consider  that  children  may  well  provide  for  themselves,  as 
their  fathers  did  before  them.  With  all  their  chances  of  wealth 
they  are  generally  very  ready  to  accept  extremely  moderate 
salaries,  provided  they  are  permanent — that  seems  clear. 


BALTIMORE.  263 

The  weather  is  now  most  charming.  It  has  been  so, 
indeed,  throughout  my  tour  so  far.  This  place  is  very 
bright,  with  nice  residential  quarters.  A  peculiarity  of 
Baltimore,  however,  is  that  there  is  no  system  of  under 
ground  drainage ;  all  the  liquid  runs  in  dirty  streams 
through  the  streets  in  open  gutters,  while  the  solid  sewage 
is  carried  away  in  carts.  The  system  is  not  very  agreeable 
to  the  senses,  but  I  am  not  sure  that  it  is  not  much  more 
wholesome  than  our  underground  system. 

I  passed  a  Sunday  here.  This  is  a  great  church-going 
place.  Very  many  nicely-dressed  people  about  the  streets. 
I  notice  very  many  well-got-up  negroes  and  well-dressed 
negresses.  I  still  cannot  make  out  who  all  these  well- 
dressed  blacks  are.  They  are  not  clerks  or  shopkeepers. 
I  understand  that  there  are  very  few  negro  clerks  or  dealers. 
They  are  not  generally  superior  mechanics.  All  I  can  learn  is 
that  they  have  certain  special  occupations,  and  that  a  great 
many  of  them  are  waiters,  keepers  of  eating-houses,  and 
so  on. 

I  had  a  visit  from  two  gentlemen  of  the  Democratic  per 
suasion,  Senator  W—  —  and  Mr.  M ,  a  man  who  has  served 

in  important  positions  abroad.  Their  opinion  is,  that  the 
military  occupation  of  the  South  enabled  the  Carpet-baggers 
to  play  dreadful  tricks  before  high  heaven — to  falsify  the 
elections,  and  so  return  the  candidates  of  the  minority.  Now 
things  are,  they  say,  on  a  fair  and  safe  footing ;  the  negroes 
are  free  and  prosperous,  and  rights  are  secured  to  all — all 
that  is  necessary  is  to  leave  the  Southern  States  alone.  They 
say  that  after  the  war  the  blacks  were  helpless ;  their  old 
masters  did  everything  for  them,  and  enabled  them  to  cul 
tivate  the  land  upon  the  system  of  shares.  The  owners  did 
so  at  a  loss,  but  they  were  forced  into  it  by  circumstances, 
and  before  very  long  with  much  difficulty  they  succeeded  in 
raising  3,000,000  bales  of  cotton,  an  amount  which  has  since 
been  very  largely  increased.  The  negroes  felt  that  they  could 
not  live  without  this  assistance.  A  friendly  feeling  sprang  up 
again — in  fact,  it  never  was  lost.  During  the  first  two  years 
after  the  war  the  system  was  settling  down  very  satisfac- 


264  MY  JOURNAL. 

torily,  and  all  would  have  gone  well  but  for  the  new  Con 
stitution  forced  upon  the  South  by  the  victors,  and  worked 
by  the  Carpet-baggers  supported  by  the  military.  Now 
these  abuses  have  been  terminated,  things  are  improving,  and 
the  negroes  are  becoming  tolerably  prosperous  and  well-off. 
They  are  not  kept  bound  to  their  masters  by  debt ;  in  fact, 
they  get  very  little  credit.  Generally  the  plant  of  the 
farms,  the  animals,  the  seed,  and  everything  else,  is  supplied 
by  the  master.  I  am  told  that  in  Virginia  and  Maryland 
the  estates  are  not  very  large ;  they  are  not  what  we  should 
call  great  estates,  but  really  large  farms  of  from  600  to  1,500 
arable  acres.  The  great  Valley  of  Virginia  and  some  of  the 
Western  Virginian  country  is  fine  land. 

The  militia  system  of  the  United  States  is  founded  on 
the  old  English  militia.  There  are  some  black  companies, 
but  not  very  many.  In  Maryland  and  all  the  States  of  the 
South  townships  scarcely  exist  at  all.  The  organisation  is 
by  counties. 

I  took  a  walk  with  Mr.  Gr to  the  high  land  overlooking 

the  harbour.  The  harbour  here  is  in  the  channel  of  a  small 
river.  The  Chesapeake  is  a  short  distance  below.  It  is  only 
a  moderately  good  harbour,  but  then  there  are  great  facilities 
for  getting  to  sea ;  there  is  not  the  long  and  difficult  river 
which  lies  between  Philadelphia  and  the  sea. 

Talking  of  the  public  colleges  I  asked  if  blacks  were 
admitted.  I  was  told  that  the  question  solves  itself,  for  if 
blacks  were  admitted  the  whites  would  not  come,  and 
therefore  it  is  that  separate  colleges  have  been  provided  for 
the  blacks.  I  have  not  found  anyone  who  at  all  takes  in 
the  idea  of  the  races  drawing  nearer  by  intermarriage.  All 
seem  to  regard  the  blacks  as  a  servile  and  inferior  race. 

Mr.  M ,  whom  I  mentioned  above,  asserted  that  the  laws  of 

Massachusetts  and  Connecticut  still  make  mixed  marriages 
illegal ;  and  others  whom  I  have  asked  have  not  been  able  to 
deny  the  statement ;  but  I  have  not  verified  it  yet.  Mr. 
G—  -  lived  three  years  in  San  Francisco.  He  says  that  the 
climate  there  is  very  superior  to  this.  It  is  not  nearly  so 
hot  in  summer  ;  there  is  a  delicious  breeze,  and  the  ther- 


WASHINGTON.  265 

mometer  seldom  rises  above  80°,  while  in  winter  snow  is 
very  rare.  There  is  a  good  deal  of  rain  in  winter,  but  the 
Californian  climate  is  very  dry  in  summer.  The  great 
Wheat  Valley  lies  between  the  coast  range  of  hills  and  the 
great  interior  range.  The  fruit  country  is  upon  the  slopes  of 
the  higher  range.  Inland  the  summer  is  very  hot — almost 
as  much  so  as  in  the  Eastern  cities.  California,  in  fact,  is 
an  immense  country.  It  is  almost  as  long  as  the  tract  from 
Maine  to  Georgia  on  the  eastern  side.  There  are  a  good  many 
rowdy  people  in  California,  but  society  there  is  not  nearly  so 
bad  as  it  is  sometimes  represented.  In  San  Francisco  there 
is  pleasant  society,  and  a  great  many  people  who  go  to 
church  and  are  quite  civilised  Christians. 

The  last  evening  I  spent  at  Baltimore  I  found  a  very 

lively  and  agreeable  party  at  Mr.  R 's  house  ;  the  people 

rather  American  in  their  style,  but  very  pleasant  for  all  that. 

I  have  picked  up  here  a  good  many  ideas  and  opinions  as 
regards  the  Southern  States.  It  remains  to  be  seen  how  far  I 
shall  verify  them  when  I  get  there. 

WASHINGTON. 

Next  morning  I  started  for  Washington — a  little  more 
than  an  hour's  run  from  Baltimore.  I  hope  to  come  back  to 
Washington  at  the  time  that  Congress  meets ;  meantime  I 
have  only  gone  there  for  two  or  three  days  on  my  way  South. 
At  the  Baltimore  station  (or  depot,  as  the  Americans  always 
call  it)  I  found  that  the  President  and  Mrs.  Hayes  were 
passengers  by  the  same  train.  I  was  fortunate  enough  to  be 
introduced  to  them,  and  travelled  with  them  to  Washington, 
thus  having  the  opportunity  of  a  good  deal  of  talk  with  the 
President.  He  travelled  without  any  show,  like  any  other 
passenger,  but  an  ordinary  passenger-carriage  was  reserved 
for  him  and  his  party,  and  a  little  attention  was  paid  to  them 
by  the  railway  officials.  There  was  no  crowd  and  no  demon 
stration.  Whatever  may  be  said  of  the  President's  political 
character,  I  think  that  all  who  come  in  contact  with  him  are 
agreed  that  he  is  what  we  should  recognise  in  England  as  a 


266  MY  JOURNAL. 

gentleman,  and  that  his  wife  is  very  much  a  lady.  Socially 
they  are  certainly  exceedingly  well  fitted  to  fill  the  position 
in  which  they  are  placed.  I  have  heard  the  President  spoken 
of  as  politically  weak,  but  I  am  inclined  to  think  that  this 
opinion  comes  more  from  the  members  of  his  own  party,  who 
disapprove  his  measures  of  compromise,  than  from  anyone 
else.  It  is  not  for  me  to  express  an  opinion  on  this  subject, 
and  I  should  not  like  to  retail  all  he  said ;  but  this  I  will  say, 
that  I  have  not  met  in  America  a  man  more  pleasant  to 
talk  to. 

The  Baltimore  papers  contained  accounts  of  his  Southern 
policy,  said  to  have  been  obtained  from  him  in  interviews, 
and  I  ventured  to  ask  whether  these  accounts  are  authentic. 
He  said  that  for  the  most  part  the  statements  to  which  I 
alluded  were  true  enough  in  one  way,  but  that  the  accounts, 
of  alleged  interviews  were  not  true.  The  newspaper  people 
interview  those  who  have  come  out  from  the  President,  pick 
up  something,  put  into  his  mouth  what  they  think  he 
may  probably  have  said,  and  so  make  up  their  stories. 
He  was  reported  to  have  said  that  until  quite  recently 
there  had  been,  under  the  present  regime,  very  little  violence 
and  outrage  in  the  South  ;  and  I  could  not  help  calling 
his  attention  to  some  very  serious  outrages  which  had 
been  reported  within  the  last  week  or  two.  He  says  that 
my  experience  in  that  respect  has  been  exceptionally  unfor 
tunate  :  this  is  election-time,  and  the  most  is  made  of  what 
occurs. 

The  President  takes  a  very  favourable  view  of  the 
position  and  prospects  of  the  negro.  He  thinks  the  present 
race  of  negroes  are  not  equal  to  white  men ;  but  then,  ac 
cording  to  his  views,  the  qualities  of  mankind  are  very  much 
a  matter  of  climate.  Whether  white  or  black,  he  thinks  men 
are  inferior  in  hot  climates.  The  American  blacks  have  not 
yet  had  time  to  develop  the  higher  human  qualities  nor  to 
acquire  much  land,  but  he  hopes  they  will.  As  showing 
how  improvable  they  are,  he  tells  a  story  of  a  number  of 
blacks  who,  in  the  last  century,  followed  the  soldiers  of  the 
Revolutionary  War,  when  the  latter  got  grants  in  Ohio,  which 


THE   PRESIDENT.  267 

is  the  President's  own  State.  Eventually  Ohio  was  declared 
to  be  free  territory,  and  these  negroes  settled  down  as  free 
men — they  and  their  descendents  have  become  farmers,  and 
good  ones — they  are  at  this  day  liked  and  respected  by  their 
neighbours,  and  are  in  every  way  good  and  prosperous 
citizens.  He  hopes  that  the  Southern  blacks  will  do  likewise 
in  the  course  of  two  or  three  generations.  As  regards  the 
misconduct  and  outrages  sometimes  attributed  to  blacks,  he 
says  that  their  character  cannot  be  so  bad  as  some  would 
now  paint  it ;  and  as  proof  of  that  he  points  to  the  fact  that 
during  the  war  the  Southern  whites  left  their  families  and 
their  property,  and  everything  that  was  dear  to  them,  in 
charge  of  and  at  the  mercy  of  the  blacks.  Yet  these  blacks 
never  rose  against  their  masters'  families,  and,  as  a  rule, 
never  did  any  harm  whatever,  in  spite  of  all  the  opportunities 
they  had  during  a  protracted  war.  I  have  since  heard  this 
statement  repeated  in  the  Southern  States — sometimes,  no 
doubt,  with  a  view  to  showing  how  good  the  masters  had 
been.  But  at  any  rate  there  seems  to  be  no  doubt  of  the 
fact  that  the  blacks,  generally  speaking,  never  did  rise  for 
plunder  and  outrage  till  they  were  raised  by  the  actual 
presence  of  the  Northern  armies.  This  reminds  me  of  what  I 

was  told  by  Mr.  M at  Baltimore,  when  I  appealed  to  his 

experience  to  explain  why  the  negroes  of  the  United  States 
had  settled  down  so  easily  to  labour,  while  we  had  so  much 
trouble  in  Jamaica  and  elsewhere.  He  said  that  the  United 
States  negroes  are  long  domesticated,  tamed,  civilised, 
trained  to  regular  work,  and  no  longer  savages  from  Africa. 
Some  of  the  West  Indian  negroes  are  much  more  savage  and 
uncivilised  and,  he  believes,  more  difficult  to  manage.  At 
some  work  at  the  Isthmus  of  Panama,  where  different  classes 
of  blacks  were  working  together,  the  Jamaica  blacks  were 
notoriously  troublesome.  Also  he  says  that  the  situation  is 
vastly  different  in  a  country  where,  after  all,  the  blacks  are 
in  the  minority.  There  they  learn  to  behave  well ;  but  their 
conduct  may  be  very  different  when  they  are  in  the  great 
maj  ority,  with  comparatively  few  white  men.  It  will  be  remem 
bered  that  Mr.  M is  a  Southerner  ;  and  my  subsequent 


268  MY  JOURNAL. 

experience  of  parts  of  the  South  where  the  negro  population 
is  very  greatly  in  the  majority  hardly  bore  out  this  view. 

A  gentleman  who  travelled  with  us  remarked  that  there 
is  a  curious  clashing  between  the  United  States  laws  and  the 
laws  of  the  particular  States,  especially  in  South  Carolina, 
where  there  has  been  a  riotous  interference  with  the  United 
States  laws.  United  States  officers  have  arrested  the  ring 
leaders,  upon  which  the  local  authorities  have  arrested  the  Re 
publican  leaders,  on  accusation  of  offences  against  the  laws  of 
the  State.  There  is,  he  says,  a  good  deal  of  friction,  not  only  on 
account  of  the  difficulty  of  executing  the  electoral  laws  in  the 
South,  but  also  on  account  of  the  internal  revenue  laws  ;  and 
the  difficulty  is  increased  for  this  reason,  that,  owing  to  pro 
tection  and  bad  trade,  the  customs  revenue  has  been  very 
much  reduced,  and  the  United  States  Treasury  is  more  and 
more  driven  to  depend  upon  the  internal  revenues. 

Judge  A gives  almost  as  bad  an  account  of  the 

Carpet-baggers  as  the  democrats  do.  After  the  war,  he  says, 
all  the  Union  soldiers  who  had  property,  or  homes,  or  sweet 
hearts  went  home  ;  the  bad  ones,  who  had  none  of  these  ties, 
remained  and  undertook  the  government  of  the  country.  It 
really  was  necessary  to  take  the  Southern  States  out  of  such 
hands. 

I  asked  the  President  as  to  the  extent  to  which  the  white 
people  of  the  Northern  States  had  suffered  during  the  late 
bad  times  from  want  of  work,  remarking  that  I  had  not  seen 
so  many  signs  of  distress  as  I  had  expected.  He  said  that 
things  are  better  now  that  people  thrown  out  of  work  have  been 
absorbed,  partly  by  going  to  agriculture,  and  partly  because 
there  really  has  been  a  turn  for  the  better  in  business ;  but 
during  the  worst  times  there  was  a  great  deal  of  distress  even 
among  some  of  the  better  class  of  mechanics,  who  actually 
could  not  get  employment.  I  gather,  however,  from  many 
quarters  that  most  of  the  people  who  were  very  conspicuous 
for  want  of  employment,  and  who  appeared  about  the  country 
as  tramps  of  a  very  troublesome  and  dangerous  character, 
were  not  so  much  honest  workmen  as  a  sort  of  people  who, 
during  the  times  of  war  and  high  prices,  were  able  to  get 


THE   PRESIDENT.  269 

employment  of  a  light  and  easy  character.  In  these  days 
people  can  only  live  by  really  hard  work,  and  that  is  just 
what  the  tramp  class  wholly  object  to ;  consequently  very 
many  of  them  have  been  thrown  upon  the  country. 

I  had  a  good  deal  of  talk  with  the  President  on  the 
Silver  question.  He  says  that  the  American  production  is 
now  greater  than  ever,  not  only  on  account  of  the  discovery 
of  new  lodes,  but  because  people  have  learnt  to  extract  the 
ore  so  much  better  than  they  did.  It  is  found  that  immense 
quantities  of  inferior  ore  which  had  been  heaped  up  as  refuse 
can  now  be  worked  so  as  to  extract  silver  at  a  profit.  Labour 
is  also  very  much  cheaper  than  it  was  ;  and  the  New  South- 
Pacific  railway  lines,  going  right  into  the  heart  of  the 
metalliferous  regions,  will  probably  open  up  a  good  deal  of 
new  production.  Altogether  he  thinks  this  year's  production 
will  be  larger  than  it  ever  has  been,  and  that  the  production 
will  continue  to  be  large.  Mr.  Hayes  favours  the  plan  of 
putting  more  silver  into  the  dollar — this  is  the  way  to  give 
honest  money,  without  sacrificing  their  production  of  silver. 
Much  gold  is  also  produced  in  America,  yet  it  is  a  fact  that 
at  this  moment  gold  is  coming  from  Europe. 

I  asked  the  President  whether  he  shared  Mr.  McCulloch's 
views  as  to  the  want  of  good  farming  in  America.  He  said 
there  was,  no  doubt,  something  in  them,  but  at  the  same 
time  he  added  (and  I  think  very  truly)  that  it  may,  under 
certain  circumstances,  be  better  and  more  profitable  to  half- 
farm  two  hundred  acres  than  to  farm  very  well  thirty  acres. 
All  depends  upon  the  abundance  or  otherwise  of  land  and 
the  circumstances  of  the  case.  As  it  is,  he  says,  in  parts  of 
Pennsylvania  the  farmers  manure  quite  plentifully,  and  their 
agriculture  is  as  good  as  could  be  desired.  He  says  that  they 
have  very  fine  breeds  of  cattle  in  Virginia,  Kentucky,  and 
Ohio,  and  that  beef  promises  to  be  a  very  important  product 
and  export.  He  mentioned  a  curious,  and  to  me  unexpected 
fact,  that  the  most  valuable  produce  of  the  United  States  is 
hay.  After  hay  comes  Indian  corn,  then  cotton,  then  wheat 
and  tobacco.  As  regards  the  complaints  I  had  heard  re 
specting  education  rates  and  the  system  of  free  education,  he 


270  MY  JOURNAL. 

says  I  must  necessarily  come  across  grumblers.  The  well-to- 
do  people,  who  can  educate  their  children  privately,  do  not 
like  the  heavy  taxes  they  have  to  pay  for  education  ;  but  the 
poor  people  would  tell  a  different  tale. 

We  spoke  of  the  yellow  fever  now  raging  in  the  South, 
and  of  which  such  terrible  accounts  are  in  all  the  papers.  I 
remarked  that,  though  the  mortality  was  very  sad,  still,  used 
as  I  had  been  to  reckon  great  calamities  by  millions,  the 
total  loss  by  yellow  fever  in  the  United  States — now  stated  at 
about  10,000 — did  not  seem  so  great  in  so  large  a  population. 
He  admitted  this  to  be  true  ;  but  then,  he  says,  the  yellow 
fever  is  principally  a  disease  of  towns,  and  it  has  struck  with 
tremendous  severity  some  particular  places,  such  as  Memphis 
and  a  few  other  places  which  he  named.  There  has  not  been 
a  great  mortality  in  the  country  districts. 

I  remarked  to  Mr.  Hayes  that  I  had  noticed  the  quietness 
of  American  meetings,  the  absence  of  interruptions,  and  the 
contrast  in  that  respect  to  a  good  many  meetings  which  I  had 
lately  seen  in  England.  Neither  the  President  nor  Mrs.  Hayes 
have  ever  been  in  Europe  ;  but  Mr.  Hayes  had  been  in  Canada, 
and  he  said  that  there  he  had  remarked  that  the  style  of 
political  meetings  resembled  what  I  told  him  of  our  English 
meetings.  The  Canadians  seem  to  have  copied  us  in  that 
respect.  He  noticed  that  in  Canada  a  great  deal  of  noise 
and  interruption  took  place,  and  that  some  of  the  speakers 
were  unable  to  get  a  hearing. 

The  country  between  Baltimore  and  Washington  seemed 
poor  and  uninteresting ;  in  fact,  they  say  it  is  one  of  the 
poorest  parts  of  the  United  States.  The  entrance  to  Washing 
ton  is  through  a  poor  part  of  the  town.  The  Capitol  is  very 
conspicuous  ;  from  a  distance  it  looks  like  St.  Peter's  at  Eome. 
When  we  get  well  into  the  town  it  improves  very  much 
indeed  ;  very  fine,  wide  avenues  have  been  laid  out,  radiating 
from  central  points ;  and  there  are  some  fine  streets.  The 
place  was  laid  out  by  Washington  himself  in  hjs  capacity  of 
engineer  and  surveyor.  It  seems  that  he  had  great  ideas  of 
the  future,  and  a  sort  of  mania  for  broad  streets  and  mag 
nificent  designs.  The  accounts  I  heard  of  him  remind  me  of 


WASHINGTON.  271 

our  engineer-soldier,  Lord  Napier  of  Magdala.  Washington 
meant  the  principal  part  of  the  city  to  be  on  the  side  where 
it  is  not  now,  but  land  speculators  took  up  the  land  and  ran 
up  the  prices  so  high  that  people  built  on  what  he  meant  to 
be  the  back  part  of  the  town  ;  that  is  now  the  City  of  Wash 
ington,  with  the  Capitol,  as  it  were,  looking  away  from  it. 
Some  modern  Americans  grumble  about  the  width  of  the 
Washington  streets,  and  say  that  the  vastness  of  the  place 
dwarfs  the  buildings.  I  must  say  that  I  think  Washington 
was  quite  right.  In  this  climate,  where  trees  grow  easily, 
broad  avenues  are  very  effective  and  pleasing  ;  and  although 
the  City  of  Washington  was  for  upwards  of  half  a  century  a 
complete  failure,  and  until  a  few  years  ago  was  not  at  all  suc 
cessful,  it  has  made  immense  strides  of  late  years,  and  now, 
to  my  taste,  is  by  far  the  best  city  in  America.  It  is  not 
only  well  laid  out,  handsome,  and  clean,  but  it  has  that 
which  is  altogether  wanting  in  all  other  places  in  America 
that  I  have  seen,  viz.,  good  pavement.  All  the  principal 
avenues  and  streets  are  laid  down  with  excellent  asphalte 
pavement ;  so  that  instead  of  being  the  worst  it  is  the  best- 
paved  town  in  the  world  that  I  know ;  that  is,  so  far  as  the 
principal  streets  go.  There  are  a  number  of  very  fine  public 
buildings,  many  of  them  of  superb  granite  and  marble. 

I  went  to  the  Riggs  House  Hotel,  one  of  the  principal. 
It  seems  good,  and  is  very  central. 

Judge  A kindly  took  me  to  see  some  of  the  official 

people.     One    of  the  first   whose  acquaintance  I  made  was 

General  E- ,  the  Commissioner  of  Education,  a  gentleman 

to  whose  kind  assistance  I  owed  very  much  in  my  subsequent 
tour.  Before  we  got  to  talk  of  education  we  had  some  con 
versation  with  a  black  preacher  from  the  South,  who  came  in 
on  business.  Like  the  few  educated  blacks  I  have  met  so 
far,  he  takes  the  line  of  saying  that  the  negroes  have  scarcely 
had  fair  play.  He  says  there  is  a  combination  not  to  let 
them  buy  land,  also  to  keep  wages  unduly  low.  According 
to  him,  under  the  system  of  cultivation  on  shares  it  most 
frequently  happens  that  after  a  season  or  two  the  cultivators 
quarrel  with  the  proprietors,  and  go  off  somewhere  else ;  they 


272  MY  JOUKNAL. 

are  very  migratory.  This  man,  though  he  calls  himself  a 
preacher,  is  really  a  book-canvasser,  and  I  doubt  his  being  a 
very  good  authority. 

Coming  to  the  question  of  education,  I  was  given  to 
understand  that  a  good  enough  education  law  exists  in  every 
State,  or  almost  in  every  State,  but  it  is  not  properly  carried 
out.  The  excuse  is  that  '  the  Eadicals  have  spent  all  the 
money,'  and  there  is  none  now  available.  The  fact  of  the 
absence  of  money  is  in  many  instances  but  too  true.  Texas 
seems  to  have  some  peculiar  views  in  regard  to  education. 
Wherever  there  is  a  large  black  population  it  seems  to  be 
preferred  by  both  parties  that  both  schools  and  churches 
should  be  separate,  and  not  mixed ;  only  the  street  and  rail 
way  cars  and  political  meetings  are  common  to  both  races. 
At  first  a  good  many  Northern  men  were  opposed  to  eman 
cipation,  because  they  thought  that  the  emancipated  blacks 
would  overrun  the  North.  As  a  matter  of  fact  it  has  turned 
out  just  the  contrary,  many  of  the  Northern  blacks  having 
now  gone  South  :  they  prefer  the  climate. 

General  E 's  opinion  about  the  intellectual  capacity 

of  the  negroes  is,  that  they  are  bright  as  children ;  but 
when  you  get  to  the  higher  education  they  want  the  ratio- 
cinative  and  mathematical  faculty,  and  are  not  the  equals  of 
white  men  intellectually.  They  would  thus  seem  to  be  the  op 
posite  to  the  Hindoos,  who  have  a  great  turn  for  metaphysics 

and  everything  ratiocinative.     Judge  A ,  however,  does 

not  agree  with  this  view.  He  says  that  when  he  was  a  boy 
he  had  a  black  class-fellow  who  was  the  best  mathematician 
in  the  class.  The  comparison,  however,  becomes  very  dim- 
cult,  since  very  many  coloured  boys  are  really  mulattos. 

I  am  told  that  in  the  United  States  army  there  are  still 
a  considerable  number  of  regular  black  troops — about  two 
thousand  of  them. 

I  talked  with  Judge  A about  protection.     He  is  very 

strong  against  the  present  system,  and  says  that  it  leads  to 
interminable  abuse.  He  tells  a  story  of  some  interest  which 
went  in  for  protection  of  copper,  and  by  pressing  in  the 
Legislature  got  the  protection  which  they  wanted ;  but  no 


WASHINGTON.  273 

sooner  was  that  given  than  a  host  of  other  cognate  interests 
started  up,  so  that  in  the  end  this  one  protection  led  to  new 
protection  in  no  less  than  seventeen  different  cases.  The 
falling  off  of  the  customs  revenue  is  caused  not  only  by  the 
dull  trade,  but  also  by  protecting  to  so  great  an  extent  as 
to  kill  much  of  the  trade.  It  is  the  fashion  in  America  to 
protect  even  raw  materials,  such  as  the  wool  which  is  abso 
lutely  necessary  for  the  American  woollen  manufacture,  and 
which  the  country  does  not  produce  in  sufficient  quantity, 
and  the  iron  which  is  so  necessary  for  cheap  ships.  One 
protection  leads  to  another,  and  so  everyone  is  protected. 
People  in  America  have  hitherto  gone  in  for  clearness — high 
wages  and  dear  living — not  for  cheapness  ;  and  that  is  why 
newsboys  and  other  distributors  charge  exorbitant  prices. 
Evidently  the  Americans  need  some  relaxation  of  their  sys 
tem,  both  for  the  sake  of  revenue  and  for  the  moral  effect 
upon  the  country  of  a  little  free  trade. 

Next  day  I  went  to  see  the  Capitol.  It  is  a  very  fine 
building,  but  the  decorations  are  in  somewhat  old-fashioned 
style ;  the  columns  are  very  florid,  and  some  of  the  quasi- 
classical  paintings  inside  might,  I  venture  to  think,  with 
advantage  be  put  into  the  fire.  I  also  went  through  the 
markets,  and  saw  some  other  sights. 

Our  Minister  at  Washington  very  kindly  gave  me  some 
introductions.  I  called  on  Mr.  Evarts,  the  Secretary  of  State 
—a  spare,  Yankee-looking  man,  apparently  very  shrewd  and 
wide-awake.  He  has  been  in  England  and  seen  the  world 
and  a  good  many  of  the  men  of  the  Old  World.  I  gather 
from  his  talk  that  the  Americans  would  not  be  sorry  to  have 
Canada  if  it  came  into  their  arms.  Afterwards  I  met  the 
Attorney-General,  who  is,  in  fact,  the  Minister  of  Justice — a 
very  pleasant-looking  man  and  dignified  lawyer,  whose  style 
and  appearance  would  pass  exceedingly  well  in  the  higher 
places  of  Westminster  Hall.  He  was  good  enough  to  take 
me  a  drive  in  the  afternoon.  He  tells  me  that  American 
lawyers  are  almost  all  local.  There  is  no  considerable  Bar 
at  Washington ;  and  when  important  cases  come  up  to  the 
United  States  Supreme  Court  from  a  distance,  the  lawyers 

T 


274  MY   JOURNAL. 

generally  come  up  with  them.  He  admits  that  the  execution 
of  the  United  States  Revenue  laws  causes  considerable  friction ; 
but  I  afterwards  found  that  the  Eevenue  officers  will  hardly 
admit  this,  and  point  to  the  cheapness  and  ease  with  which 
their  revenue  is  collected.  I  have  been  much  inquiring  for 
some  compendious  comparative  account  of  the  Constitutions 
and  laws  of  the  different  States,  but  I  find  that  nothing  of 
the  kind  exists.  The  lawyers  seem  to  be  a  superior  class  of 
men,  but  very  few  of  them  know  anything  of  the  laws  of  any 
State  except  their  own.  There  is  very  little  regular  codifi 
cation  properly  so  called,  only  the  Revised  Codes,  or  rather 
compilations,  which  are  published  from  time  to  time  in  most 
States.  There  does  not  seem  to  be  very  much  publishing 
enterprise.  I  found  nothing  corresponding  to  our  shilling 
almanacs — s  Whitaker '  and  the  rest — with  the  mass  of  infor 
mation  which  they  contain.  Last  year  one  almanac,  called 
'  Spofford's  American  Almanac,'  was  published,  at  a  much 
higher  price,  and  certainly  contains  a  good  deal  of  informa 
tion  arranged  in  a  somewhat  haphazard  way.  If  the  publi 
cation  were  continued  it  might  be  worked  into  the  semblance 
of  an  English  almanac,  but  it  seems  doubtful  whether  it  is 
to  be  repeated. 

In  the  course  of  our  drive  this  afternoon  we  went  through 
a  very  beautiful  park  attached  to  the  Military  Hospital.  In 
this  park  the  President  has  a  good  cottage ;  it  is  his  only 
official  country  residence.  It  seems  that  every  United  States 
soldier  who  has  served  for  twenty  years  has  the  right  to  live 
in  the  Hospital  here,  on  payment  of  a  very  small  sum. 

The  following  day  also  I  spent  in  Washington.     General 

E introduced  me  to  the  Secretary  of  the  Interior,  Mr. 

Schurtz.  He  is  a  German,  and  very  German-looking,  but 
has  taken  a  very  strong  and  high  position  in  the  States. 
The  Minister  of  the  Interior  has  under  him  the  public  lands 
and  the  Indians,  as  well  as  education,  agriculture,  and  other 
departments.  Of  the  Indians  Mr.  Schurtz  has  no  very  great 
opinion.  He  thinks  they  are  very  impracticable,  and  looks 
to  their  eventual  disappearance  or  absorption.  In  many 
places  tame  Indians  are  settled  quietly  enough,  but  they  do 


WASHINGTON.  275 

not  improve  much.  The  wild  Indians  have  not  a  fair  chance, 
for  white  people  will  invade  their  lands,  and  often  treat  them 
very  unfairly.  These  are  the  Border  white  adventurers  known 
as '  Squall  Whites.'  I  have  heard  of  many  cases  in  which  the 
Indians  have  been  the  aggressed  upon. 

I   also   made  the  acquaintance  of  General  W ,  the 

Commissioner  of  Public  Lands,  and  got  papers  from  him  show 
ing  the  American  system.  A  man  who  takes  up  a  homestead 
or  purchases  at  the  low  upset  price  must  swear  that  he  takes 
it  for  himself,  and  not  to  sell ;  but  no  doubt  these  statements 
are  sometimes  false.  In  some  of  the  further  tracts  large 
quantities  of  land  may  be  taken  up;  and  in  the  country 
marked  ( desert '  a  good  deal  has  been  done  by  large  grantees, 
who  have  constructed  works  of  irrigation.  Members  of  Con 
gress  sometimes  manage  to  get  Bills  passed  to  sell  certain 
tracts  without  reserve.  In  Oregon  and  some  of  the  pastoral 
States,  land  not  purchased  is  let  out  in  large  tracts  on 
temporary  leases.  I  am  told  that  the  fashion  in  those 
countries  is  to  buy  or  take  up  as  homesteads  comparatively 
small  tracts  which  contain  the  springs,  without  which  the 
country  cannot  be  settled,  and  then  the  holder  feels  pretty 
secure  that  no  one  will  buy  the  waterless  land  which  he 
holds  at  a  cheap  rate  for  grazing  his  flocks.  I  believe  that 
a  good  many  Englishmen  have  in  this  way  settled  in  Oregon 
and  taken  to  sheep-farming  in  the  Australian  style. 

I  observe  that  in  all  the  public  offices  here,  almost  with 
out  exception,  everyone  has  some  military  rank ;  not  only 
the  heads,  of  departments,  but  the  very  clerks  are  generals, 
colonels,  and  majors ;  some  are  doctors.  I  fancy  this  is  not 
only  because,  owing  to  the  civil  war,  everyone  had  military 
rank,  but  also  because  in  many  cases  office  has  been  given  as 
a  reward  for  military  service. 

I  visited  the  Patent  Office,  a  very  magnificent  building ; 
but  it  has  suffered  from  fire,  to  which  everything  seems 
subject  in  this  country.  The  Americans  are  very  proud  of 
their  patent  system,  which  they  think  more  effective  than 
ours.  The  collection  seems  to  be  beautifully  kept.  I  also 
visited  the  Smithsonian  Institute,  founded  by  an  Englishman 

T   2 


276  MY  JOURNAL, 

— a  beautiful  place,  in  beautiful  grounds.  I  observe  that  in 
this  country  public  institutions  are  generally  very  well  kept. 
The  natural  history  and  other  collections  seemed  to  me  to 
be  an  agreeable  contrast  to  some  of  the  rickety  and  moth- 
eaten  animals  of  the  British  Museum.  Also,  whereas  many  of 
our  libraries  are  very  full  of  trash,  obtained  under  the  system 
which  gives  certain  libraries  a  right  to  all  books,  the  American 
libraries  are  made  up  exclusively  of  carefully  selected  books, 
and  are  generally  very  good  indeed. 

I  visited  the  office  of  the  Geological  Survey,  which  is  not 
only  an  office  for  surveys,  but  has  a  department  for  ethnolo 
gical  and  other  specimens ;  in  fact,  there  is  a  great  collection 
of  the  curiosities  of  the  United  States,  including  very  many 
archseological  remains.  There  are  some  very  fine  specimens 
of  Indian  pottery,  and  models  of  Indian  houses  and  villages. 
The  collection  is  in  capital  order.  It  is  well  worth  another 
visit.  I  met  Dr.  F •,  President  of  the  Medical  and  Sani 
tary  Society,  and  a  great  man  upon  anthropological  subjects. 
He  believes  the  negroes  to  bean  inferior  race.  As  regards 
the  mulattos,  though  they  are  often  fine  and  handsome,  he 
believes  them  to  be  a  sterile  race,  and  not  likely  to  last. 

I  went  to  the  Treasury,  and  was  introduced  to  Secretary 
Sherman.  He  was  very  civil  and  kind,  and  I  had  some  talk 

with  him  ;  after  which  he  handed  me  over  to  Mr.  R ,  head 

of  the  Internal  Revenue  Department,  who  told  me  a  great 
deal  about  Revenue  affairs. 

Mr.  Sherman  avows  that  he  is  not  in  favour  of  a  silver 
coinage.  He  keeps  the  coinage  pretty  nearly  down  to  the 
minimum  of  two  million  dollars  per  month  which  the  law 
equires.  They  can  use,  he  says,  fifty  millions  as  small  coin; 
and  when  they  go  beyond  that  they  must  either  limit  the 
issue  or  put  more  silver  into  the  dollar,  he  thinks. 

The  Revenue  officers  seem  confident  in  their  internal  re 
venue  system.  No  doubt  there  is  some  friction  and  a  good 
deal  of  smuggling ;  but  after  all  the  revenue  is  collected  at 
a  cost  of  3  J  per  cent. — less,  they  say,  than  it  costs  to  collect 
the  same  revenue  in  England.  Tobacco  is  more  frequently 
smuggled  than  spirits ;  but  it  costs  smugglers  more  when  they 


THE   REVENUE   SYSTEM.  277 

are  detected.  The  duty  on  tobacco  has  been  raised  to  24 
cents  (say  Is.)  per  pound.  That  does  not  seem  heavy  from 
our  point  of  view,  yet  there  is  a  good  deal  of  agitation  to 
reduce  it.  Leaf-tobacco  is  not  taxed  unless  it  is  sold ;  every 
man  is  free  to  consume  his  own  production.  In  Ohio  boys 
often  grow  a  patch  for  profit,  and  no  doubt  sell  it  to  their 
neighbours.  The  German  Government  have  had  a  commis 
sion  of  inquiry  here,  but  they  are  rather  disappointed.  They 
think  the  American  system  will  hardly  do  for  them,  as  they 
want  to  tax  the  leaf.  They  do  not  think  they  will  get  a 
sufficient  revenue  if  they  only  tax  the  manufactured  tobacco. 
If  we  are  ever  driven  to  fresh  taxation  of  the  people  in  India 
these  inquiries  of  the  Grerman  commission  would  be  very 
useful  to  us,  for  our  situation  there  is  very  much  the  same. 
The  difficulty  of  taxing  tobacco  in  India  is  that  it  is  so 
very  commonly  grown,  and  is  scarcely  manufactured  beyond 
drying  and  pressing  the  leaf. 

In  the  United  States  spirits  are  taxed  90  cents. ;  that  is, 
a  little  more  than  3s.  6d.  per  gallon,  as  against  10s.  in  this 
country.  Beer  is  charged  one  dollar  per  barrel  of  32  gallons; 
native  wine  is  not  taxed  at  all,  except  some  small  tax  on 
licenses  for  sale.  There  are  taxes  upon  matches,  patent 
medicines,  and  a  few  other  articles ;  but  these  yield  only 
a  very  moderate  income.  In  fact,  the  internal  revenue  is 
almost  entirely  derived  from  spirits  and  tobacco.  It  has 
gone  on  increasing  till  this  last  year,  when  there  has  been  a 
considerable  decline,  which  is  attributed  to  bad  times.  The 
Revenue  officers  do  not  greatly  attribute  loss  of  spirit  revenue 
to  'Murphy,'  but  they  say  that  the  people  drink  less  than 
they  formerly  did,  and  if  they  drank  as  formerly  the  reve 
nue  would  now  be  doubled  or  quadrupled.  Temperance  has 
checked  it.  Mr.  Sherman  thinks  that  from  a  financial  point 
of  view  tea  and  coffee  might  be  taxed  ;  but  there  is  a  strong 
public  feeling  in  favour  of  a  free  breakfast-table  ;  so  they 
cannot  demand  this  ;  but  they  tax  sugar,  and  that  protects 
the  native  sugar-growers. 

Of  the  public  officers  some  are  rather  poorly  paid ;  but  the 
army  is,  I  believe,  paid  higher  than  ours,  and  officers  have 


278  MY   JOURNAL. 

the  advantage  that  the  admirable  education,  of  which  I  saw 
something  at  West  Point,  is  given  to  them  by  the  State 
gratis.  Some,  however,  think  that  that  education  is  too 
severe  and  monastic — it  runs  too  much  in  one  groove. 

This  evening,  returning  from  the  unfinished  Washington 
Monument,  I  saw  by  far  the  most  magnificent  sunset  that  I 
have  ever  seen  in  my  life  anywhere,  or  ever  expect  to  see. 
There  was  a  lurid  light  in  the  clouds  which  I  can  only  call 
tremendous,  and  the  reflection  on  the  windows  of  the  city 
and  the  Capitol  on  the  other  side  made  me  believe  that  they 
were  on  fire.  I  am  sure  the  painter  who  painted  such  a 
scene  would  be  set  down  as  a  madman. 

Next  day  I  called  upon  Dr.  B ,  the  Surgeon-General. 

Yellow  fever  is,  of  course,  the  great  subject  of  inquiry  and 
discussion  at  present,  but  nothing  certain  is  arrived  at  re 
garding  its  origin  and  propagation.  I  have  noticed  that 
there  are  places  where  strict  quarantine  has  been  established^ 
on  account  of  the  present  prevalence  of  the  disease  ;  but  I 
gather  that  the  quarantine  rules  are  very  local  and  unsettled. 
I  am  told  that  in  the  hotter  Southern  States,  owing  to  the 
climate,  the  cattle  suffer  a  good  deal  from  diseases,  Texan 
fever  and  the  like,  quite  different  from  our  Northern  cattle 
diseases,  and  to  which  cattle  in  the  North  are  not  liable. 
These  diseases  affect  certain  breeds  of  cattle  differently  from 
others.  In  the  South  the  short-horns  are  much  affected, 
while  the  Jerseys  are  comparatively  little  touched ;  and  the 
Indian  Brahminee  breed,  of  which  there  are  a  good  many  in 
the  South,  are  quite  free  from  these  diseases.  Some  of  the 
States  have  established  quarantine  rules  for  Texan  cattle. 

I  called  on  General  Meyer,  chief  signal  officer,  a  very 
important  functionary  among  the  new  centralising  institutions 
of  the  American  Government.  The  office  is,  strictly  speak 
ing,  a  military  one,  and  the  General  has  a  corps  of  highly- 
trained  men  stationed  all  over  the  country,  through  whom 
he  is  enabled  to  establish  a  very  trustworthy  Intelligence 
Department ;  but  in  reality  the  Signal  Office  is  the  great 
Meteorological  and  Weather  Prediction  Department — the 
greatest  of  the  kind  in  the  world,  I  imagine.  In  this  office 


THE   WEATHER  DEPARTMENT.  279 

the  infant  science  of  meteorology  is  being  worked  out.  The 
most  important  result  is  that  prediction  of  storms  which  we 
have  begun  to  appreciate.  America  seems  to  have  a  speciality 
for  sending  us  storms,  and  the  warnings  we  receive,  nominally 
from  the  New  York  Herald  and  other  papers,  really  come 
from  the  Signal  Office  at  Washington.  The  officers  of  the 
department  say  that  their  predictions  prove  right  in  80  per 
cent,  of  the  whole,  and  that  the  balance  is  negative  ;  that  is 
to  say,  they  never  fail  to  announce  a  storm  or  give  warning 
of  a  storm  which  is  not  developed  somewhere  ;  but,  to  be  on 
the  safe  side,  they  sometimes  warn  places  of  storms  which 
happen  to  miss  the  particular  place.  However,  there  has 
just  been  here  a  very  great  and  rapid  storm,  which  came 
down  the  coast  from  the  South,  and  which  I  have  not  had 
occasion  to  mention,  because  it  passed  over  Washington  in 
the  night.  It  does  appear  that  the  warnings  which  were 
given  of  this  storm  were  rather  too  late ;  and  notwithstanding 
what  we  owe  to  the  department  in  England,  and  the  civility 
with  which  I  was  treated,  I  could  not  help  delicately  hinting 
at  the  saying,  '  Physician,  heal  thyself.'  It  seems  that  most 
of  the  storms  are  born  about  the  commencement  of  the  Grulf 
Stream,  off  the  coast  of  Florida  ;  and  sometimes  it  may 
happen  that,  like  a  shell  which  explodes  almost  at  the  mouth 
of  the  gun,  these  storms  may  burst  in  upon  the  States  before 
much  warning  can  be  given,  as  was,  in  fact,  the  case  in  this 
instance.  The  department  here  claims  to  be  establishing  cer 
tain  laws  as  to  the  rotatory  character  and  direction  of  storms. 
They  haver  a  wonderful  set  of  self-registering  instruments, 
and  produce  daily  charts  of  the  weather  all  over  the  country, 
besides  periodically  making  up  weather-charts  of  the  whole 
Northern  hemisphere  from  observations  taken  at  the  same 
time,  and  transmitted  by  telegraph. 

In  the  late  storm  the  fall  of  rain  here  in  a  very  short 
time  exceeded  three  inches.  The  rainfall  for  the  year  is 
heavier  than  ours ;  but  though  well  distributed  it  seems  to  fall 
in  heavier  plumps  than  with  us,  so  that  there  are  not  nearly 
so  many  hours  of  rain.  During  the  late  storm  some  of  the 
crank  American  steamers  were  wrecked  in  the  rivers  and 


280  MY  JOURNAL. 

estuaries;  in  fact,  large  numbers  of  craft  were  wrecked  in 
the  river  below  this.  The  officers  here  know  all  about  our 
meteorological  observations  in  India  ;  and,  in  fact,  I  find  that 
in  all  the  departmental  offices  they  have  a  very  thorough 
knowledge  of  what  we  have  been  doing  in  India,  and  know 
well  our  officers  and  their  publications.  At  Baltimore  Mr. 

G ,  to  my  surprise,  turned  up  in  his  college  library  a 

collection  of  languages  which  I  made  in  Bengal. 

I  called  upon  General  Sherman  to-day,  but  missed  him. 
I  had,  however,  a  talk  with  two  of  his  staff — very  pleasant 
gentlemen  of  the  military  persuasion.     They  have  just  been 
with  the  General  on  a  tour  over  the  far-away  South- Western 
Territories,  in  which  they  were  accompanied  by  a  gallant 
member   of   our   House   of  Commons    and   his  bride,   who 
must   have    done   an    amount    and  severity    of    travelling 
astonishing   for  a  lady.     They  described  New  Mexico  and 
Arizona  as  wretched  Territories — Arizona,  perhaps,  a  little 
the  better  of  the  two.     The  only  inhabitants  of  New  Mexico 
besides  wild  Indians  are  the  miserable  descendants  of  the  old 
Spanish  colonists  who  were  found  there — and  very  miserable 
they  seemed  to  be.     No  Americans  go  there  ;  and  some  of  the 
English  who  have  bought  Spanish  grants  and  tried  to  establish 
sheep-farms  do  not  seem  to  have  been  very  successful.     In 
the  far-away  Western  Territories  the  Indians  cause  an  im 
mense  deal  of  trouble  to  the  United  States  army,  with  the 
result,  in  fact,  that  that  small  army  is  really  the  most  hard- 
worked  in  the  world. 

Mexico  itself,  these  officers  say,  is  a  good  country,  but 
the  people  are  hopeless.  Most  of  them  are  priestridden,  and 
those  who  have  'jumped  off'  the  priests  are  brigands.  They 
contrast  Mexico  with  Canada,  which  they  highly  appreciate, 
giving  a  very  favourable  account  of  it,  dwelling  upon  its 
loyalty  to  the  British  connection.  They  hear  very  good 
accounts  of  Manitoba.  It  has  a  splendid  soil ;  but  there  is  no 
wood  there,  and  the  winter  is  too  cold  for  cattle.  They  think 
that  during  the  civil  war,  when  it  was  expected  that  the 
States  would  go  to  pieces,  the  English  were  ready  to  '  gobble 
up  '  their  Northern  Territories ;  and  the  French  Emperor 


LAW  AND   LAWYERS.  281 

undertook  his  Mexican  enterprise  simply  that  he  might  be 
ready  to  take  possession  of  the  Southern  States.  When  the 
war  was  over,  and  they  were  ready  for  him  with  their  har 
dened  troops,  he  had  not  a  chance,  and  they  ignominiously 
expelled  him  without  fighting.  They  do  not  seem  to  have 
any  sympathy  with  the  Afghans,  and  have  no  objection  to  our 
beating  them.  Camels,  they  say,  have  been  tried  in  the  dry 
parts  of  America,  but  have  been  quite  a  failure.  There  is 
always  rain  and  mud  at  some  season  of  the  year,  and  the 
climate  disagrees  with  camels. 

Later  I  met  General  Sherman  himself,  who  was  very  kind 
and  civil,  and  gave  me  some  introductions  to  his  officers  in 
the  parts  of  the  country  to  which  I  am  going.  He  does  not 
affect  the  style  mttitaire,  but  is  more  of  a  good,  shrewd 
Yankee,  like  his  brother,  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury.  He 
says  they  have  had  enough  of  war.  The  only  war  he  would 
like  to  undertake  would  be  one  against  the  Mexicans,  to  make 
them  take  back  New  Mexico  and  Arizona.  He  talked  of  the 
Chinese,  in  whom  he  seems  to  take  great  interest.  He  has  a 
very  high  opinion  of  the  Chinese  Minister  who  has  come  to 
the  States. 

I  called  on  the  Attorney-General.  In  his  office — and,  in 
fact,  in  most  of  the  public  offices  of  the  United  States  Govern 
ment — there  are  some  female  clerks.  They  are  described  as 
being  daughters  of  deceased  members  of  Congress,  or  persons 
having  similar  claims  upon  the  country,  and  are  said  to  work 
very  well.  There  are  also  some  coloured  clerks.  The  business 
connected  with  what  is  called  the  Court  of  Claims  (that  is, 
claims  against  the  United  States)  seemed  to  be  an  important 
department  in  the  Attorney- General's  office.  There  is  no 
Legislative  Office  for  the  drafting  of  bills — no  Sir  Henry 
Thring.  There  is  a  Pardon  Office,  where  all  questions  of  par 
don  are  considered.  The  Attorney-General  says  that  the  legis 
lation  of  some  of  the  States  is  rough  enough,  but  most  of  the 
older  Legislatures  are  well  provided  with  good  lawyers,  and 
new  States  very  much  copy  the  legislation  of  old  ones — choos 
ing  what  they  like  best.  I  noticed  a  great  mass  of  law-books, 
bound  in  the  regular  English  law-calf,  in  the  orthodox  style. 


282  MY  JOURNAL. 

I  visited  the  Supreme  Court,  sitting  in  the  Capitol.  All 
the  Judges  seemed  to  sit  together,  forming  a  very  large  Bench. 
Most  of  them  are  old  men,  and  all  elderly.  They  sit  in  a  very 
large  fine  room,  with  a  very  small  audience.  A  Californian 
case  was  going  on — a  question  of  title  under  a  Spanish  grant. 
A  young  lawyer,  in  a  white  tie,  but  no  wig  or  gown,  was 
arguing  the  case.  He  seemed  to  be  a  local  Californian  who 
had  come  up  about  it.  In  the  evening,  dining  at  the  British 
Minister's  house,  I  was  fortunate  enough  to  meet  several  of 
the  most  distinguished  public  men.  They  all  seemed  to  be 
very  strong  in  favour  of  honest  money.  I  talked  to  the  Chief 
Justice  about  the  usury  laws  which  still  prevail  in  America* 
He  seemed  to  say  that  though  they  do  still  exist  they  have 
little  practical  effect ;  they  are  seldom  pleaded  in  bar  of 
action.  If  usurious  interest  is  once  paid  it  cannot  be  re 
covered  ;  and  outside  the  law  there  is  a  kind  of  merchants' 
union  to  enforce  contracts.  Even  in  New  York  there  are 
still  usury  laws,  limiting  interest  to  7  per  cent. ;  but  the 
merchants  manage  to  defeat  it.  The  situation  of  the  great 
city  of  New  York  is  somewhat  peculiar,  for  the  rural  po 
pulation  of  the  State  a  good  deal  exceeds  the  town  popula 
tion,  and  is  decidedly  rural  and  primitive ;  so  that  in  regard 
to  usury  laws,  restriction  on  the  sale  of  spirits,  and  some 
other  matters  the  country  farmers  control  all  the  wealth  and 
power  of  New  York  City.  It  is  they  who  maintain  the  usury 
laws.  The  spirit-licensing  laws  are  now  the  subject  of  much 
contention  in  New  York. 

The  following  day  was  my  last  in  Washington,  and  after 
again  looking  in  at  some  of  the  offices  I  left  it  in  the  afternoon. 
There  is  a  very  important  Agricultural  Office,  where  they 
collect  all  sorts  of  agricultural  specimens  and  acclimatise  and 
distribute  new  plants  ;  but  the  head  of  the  department  was 
absent,  and  I  have  postponed  going  particularly  over  it  till 
my  return. 

Upon  the  whole  my  impression  of  Washington  is  that,  in 
spite  of  the  large  amount  of  home  rule  which  prevails  in  the 
United  States,  the  central  departments  of  the  Government  are 
upon  a  much  more  complete  footing,  with  larger  and  more 


VIRGINIA.  283 

various  establishments,  than  anything  of  the  kind  that  we 
have.  All  these  centralised  departments  are  the  creation  of 
the  last  few  years. 

There  seems  to  be  very  great  freedom  for  the  expres 
sion  of  political  opinion,  in  spite  of  the  victory  of  the  North 
in  the  war.  Looking  over  the  books  at  a  bookseller's  shop,  I 
came  upon  a  popular  school  history  of  America  in  the  form 
of  a  catechism,  which  gave  the  Southern  view  of  matters  in 
an  extreme,  I  may  say  a  violent,  form.  According  to  this 
children's  catechism,  at  the  end  of  the  war  General  Sherman 
agreed  to  receive  back  the  Southern  States  into  the  Union 
unconditionally  ;  but  this  pledge  on  the  faith  on  which  the 
Confederate  army  surrendered  was  basely  repudiated  and 
broken.  Soon  after,  the  assassination  of  Mr.  Lincoln  excited 
the  passions  of  the  Northerners,  and  by  perfidious  violence 
the  14th  and  15th  Amendments  of  the  Constitution  were 
put  in.  It  certainly  seems  very  liberal  to  allow  Southern 
children  to  be  taught  these  things. 

VIRGINIA. 

Virginia  is  close  to  Washington,  on  the  other  side  of  the 
Potomac  (pronounce  it  Potoomac,  or  you  will  be  exceed 
ingly  laughed  at) ;  but  I  had  arranged  first  to  visit  the  lower 
portion  of  Virginia  ;  so  I  went  back  to  Baltimore,  and  there 
took  the  steamer  of  what  is  called  the  Bay  Line.  In  the 
steamer  I  was  treated  with  great  civility,  at  the  instance  of 

Mr.  R .  -  I  passed  the  night  in  going  down  the  Bay  in 

as  great  comfort  as  if  I  had  been  in  a  luxurious  house.  The 
estuary  of  the  Chesapeake  is  here  called  the  '  Bay.'  These 
American  steamers  are  certainly  delightful  in  quiet  waters  ; 
but  the  consort  of  this  one  was  dreadfully  mauled  in  the 
late  storm,  and  very  nearly  went  to  the  bottom.  They  are 
built  too  high  for  bad  weather. 

In  the  morning  I  landed  at  Old  Point,  or  Fort  Munro> 
near  the  country  town  of  Hampton,  in  Virginia.  There  is  a 
large  hotel,  used  by  sea-bathers  in  the  summer.  I  had  an  in 
troduction  to  General  W ,  the  commander  of  the  fort, 


284  MY  JOURNAL. 

where  there  is  a  large  artillery  school.  General  1VL ,  of 

General  Sherman's  Staff,  most  kindly  took  charge  of  me 
during  my  visit  to  this  neighbourhood. 

I  notice  that  I  am  now  quite  in  the  land  of  blacks,  espe 
cially  here,  where  they  collected  in  numbers  during  the  war. 
In  this  district  they  are  quite  in  a  majority.  They  do  all  the 
work  about  the  wharves,  and  most  other  work.  I  principally 
came  here  to  see  the  '  Hampton  Agricultural  Institute  '  for 
blacks.  I  went  over  it  under  the  guidance  of  General  Arm 
strong,  who  has  charge  of  it,  and  has  made  it-  what  it  is.  It 
is  not  quite  an  Agricultural  Institute,  for  it  is  more  used  to 
turn  out  schoolmasters  than  anything  else.  The  justification 
for  teaching  them  agriculture  is  that,  as  the  schools  are  com 
monly  open  part  of  the  year  only,  there  is  every  opportunity 
for  the  practice  of  improved  agriculture  during  the  remainder 
of  the  year.  Several  trades  are  also  taught.  I  believe  this 
is  the  only  place  in  the  Southern  States  where  black  printers 
are  educated.  The  Institution  is  primarily  supported  by 
funds  subscribed  in  the  North,  but  it  is  now  largely  aided  by 
the  State  of  Virginia.  It  is  not  a  free  school,  not  being 
looked  upon  as  charitable.  The  students  are  expected  to 
pay  moderate  fees,  and  by  their  work  to  earn  something  to 
wards  their  own  living.  Besides  the  negro  students  there 
are  a  good  many  Indians,  sent  by  the  United  States  Govern 
ment.  They  are  Indians  from  the  Western  tribes  ;  and  it  is 
intended  that,  after  being  civilised  and  educated,  they  are  to 
.go  back,  and  to  improve  their  countrymen.  I  was  much  in 
terested  in  these  Indians.  They  are  not  red,  but  rather  yellow, 
and  not  at  all  unlike  some  of  the  Indo-Chinese  tribes  to  the 
east  of  Bengal. 

I  had  a  good  deal  of  talk  with  General  Armstrong  about 
the  negroes  and  about  Southern  politics.  He  is  the  son  of  a 
missionary  who  spent  many  years  in  the  Sandwich  Islands, 
but  was  a  distinguished  Federal  soldier  in  the  war.  He 
thinks  that  the  blacks  are  certainly  inferior  to  the  whites  in 
intellect,  but  they  are  improvable.  The  Indians  are  decidedly 
stronger  in  intellect,  but  much  more  difficult  to  manage. 
The  negroes  have  a  passion  for  land ;  it  is  their  great  wish  to 


VIRGINIA.  285 

acquire  it ;  but  they  are  wanting  in  saving  qualities,  pru 
dence  and  perseverance,  to  enable  them  to  do  so.  Those,, 
however,  who  were  the  best  hands  in  slave-times  are  now 
acquiring  land — not  very  much,  but  they  are  getting  on.  If 
they  are  able  to  buy  land  they  can  get  it.  In  some  parts  of 
the  country  there  is  a  social  prejudice  against  selling  to  them  : 
that  is,  in  localities  where  white  people  prevail,  they  do  not 
always  like  to  have  negroes  coming  among  them ;  but  at 
other  places,  where  the  population  is  principally  negro,  the 
whites  are  very  ready  to  sell  and  go  elsewhere.  He  thinks 
about  one-third  of  the  negroes  are  decidedly  good  ;  one-third 
may  be  made  good  by  good  management ;  and  one-  third  are  bad. 
Like  most  of  the  people  I  have  spoken  to,  he  has  not  much 
opinion  of  the  mulattos.  The  race  is  not  sterile,  but  it  de 
teriorates.  In  most  parts  of  the  South  the  negroes  rent  land 
on  shares ;  but  the  master  not  only  finds  stock,  but  makes 
advances  for  food  and  other  requirements,  and  at  the  end  of 
the  year  the  negroes  have  very  little  to  get.  They  are  very 
willing  for  education  ;  the  great  difficulty  is  about  teachers 
and  that  want  this  and  other  institutions  are  supplying. 
Most  of  the  Southern  States,  now  that  the  negroes  must 
have  votes,  are  really  adopting  the  policy  of  educating  and 
civilising  them.  Virginia  has  honestly  carried  out  the 
education  policy  so  far  as  her  funds  admit.  Altogether,  Re 
publican  that  he  is,  he  gives  a  favourable  view  of  the  situa 
tion.  Maryland,  Virginia,  and  North  Carolina  are  decidedly 
doing  well ;  and  in  South  Carolina,  though  some  Democrats 
opposed  Hampton,  the  present  Governor,  he  is  doing  good. 
The  worst  '  bulldozing '  has  been  in  Mississippi.  In  Virginia 
and  other  well-managed  States,  he  says,  people  are  quite  will 
ing  to  give  the  blacks  a  minority  representation  in  the  State 
Legislatures,  and  do  so.  This  district  is  represented  by  a 
black.  In  short,  he  fully  endorses  the  policy  of  the  present 
President,  which  most  Kepublicans  do  not.  The  negroes,  he 
says,  in  most  States,  really  are  allowed  to  vote,  and  do  ;  but 
whites  will  not  submit  to  be  ruled  over  by  blacks,  and  where 
that  is  feared  they  audaciously  false-count.  They  are  afraid 
to  excite  the  feelings  of  the  North  by  open  violence. 


286  MY  JOURNAL. 

With  the  view  of  giving  a  fair  trial  to  the  negroes  a 
good  deal  of  land  here  has  been  sold  in  small  patches,  which 
they  have  bought ;  and  a  good  many  private  proprietors,  fol 
lowing  this  example,  have  done  likewise,  so  that  there  is 
quite  a  large  black  proprietary,  owning  their  own  patches  of 
land  and  their  own  cottages.  The  patches,  however,  are  very 
small,  but  are  said  to  be  large  enough  to  grow  vegetables ; 
and  there  is  so  much  fishing  and  easy  living  here,  that  the 
negroes  are  not  obliged  to  work  very  hard.  An  immense 
quantity  of  vegetables  is  raised  in  this  part  of  Virginia,  to 
supply  the  winter  and  spring  markets  of  the  great  towns  of 
the  North.  The  winter  climate  here  is  very  mild ;  they  say 
that  cattle  can  almost  always  go  out  all  the  year.  In  the 
fields  about  I  saw  turnips  and  Scotch  kail ;  and  I  find  that 
root-crops  are  a  good  deal  more  grown  in  the  South  than  in 
the  North.  The  turnips,  however,  are  rather  poor.  Green 
sorghum  is  largely  used  as  fodder  for  cattle,  as  well  as  the 
leaves  of  the  maize. 

I  visited  the  Soldiers'  Home  here,  which  seemed  to  me  a 
folly — a  place  where  disabled  volunteer  soldiers  are  kept  in 
absolute  idleness,  with  nothing  whatever  to  do.  I  saw  an  old 
soldier  who  had  fought  against  us  in  the  war  of  1812,  and  by 
his  side  an  Englishman  who,  in  much  later  days,  had  fought  for 
the  United  States.  I  notice  that  in  all  United  States  books  and 
histories,  and,  I  may  say,  memories,  the  war  of  1812  occupies 
a,  prominent  place,  while  we  have  managed  to  forget  it. 

I  looked  in  at  the  Circuit  County  Court,  which  was  then 
sitting.  The  trial  is  by  jury.  The  Court  seemed  a  decent 
one,  and  the  lawyers  energetic.  During  the  recess  for  dinner, 
parties,  Judge,  lawyers,  and  all,  seemed  freely  to  mix  and  talk. 
The  Judge  was  a  regular  old  Virginian,  ruined  by  emancipa 
tion.  He  says,  '  Grod  made  niggers  different  from  white  men, 
•and  nobody  can  make  them  the  same.' 

I  hear  much  of  the  Freedman's  Savings  Bank,  which 
failed  with  a  loss  of  $4,000,000,  which  has  never  been 
replaced ;  and  the  loss  causes  much  distrust  among  negroes 
inclined  to  save. 

General  M took  me  back  to  Old  Point  in  an  outrigger 


VIRGINIA.  287 

kind  of  civilised  adaptation  of  the  outriggers  one 
sees  at  Ceylon.  I  think  they  might  with  great  advantage 
be  generally  adopted.  They  sail  wonderfully,  and  cannot 
be  upset. 

I  crossed  in  the  ferry-boat  to  Norfolk — a  pretty  sail.  At 
Norfolk  I  went  to  the  Atlantic  Hotel.  In  the  evening  I  had 
a  good  deal  of  talk  with  the  people  I  met  in  the  smoking- 
room.  They  declare  that  this  is  the  best  harbour  on  all  the 
Atlantic  coast,  and  a  good  many  other  people  think  so  too. 
It  is  thoroughly  sheltered,  close  to  the  sea,  with  no  bar,  and 
direct  railway  communication  with  the  Mississippi ;  so  that 
much  cotton  is  shipped  here,  not  only  from  the  Atlantic 
States  but  from  Memphis  and  the  Mississippi  country.  The 
cotton  is  carried  from  Memphis  for  two  dollars  a  bale,  while 
it  costs  one  dollar  to  New  Orleans  by  steamer,  is  more  roughly 
handled  there,  and  costs  more  for  the  transport  from  New 
Orleans  to  England.  Here,  too,  I  noticed  that  the  cotton- 
bales  were  very  roughly  handled ;  and  it  is  the  same  at  Alex 
andria,  Bombay,  and  all  cotton  marts.  It  seems  strange  that 
so  valuable  a  commodity  should  be  so  much  torn  and  scat 
tered  about.  It  seems  that  the  people  who  take  samples  must 
cut  the  bales  and  dig  into  them.  There  is  dreadful  wailing 
over  the  price  of  cotton :  it  is  now  nine  cents  a  pound,  or  less. 
Wheat  is  also  very  low  ;  sugar  is  better  than  it  was,  but  a 
Frenchman  from  the  South  seems  despondent  about  it.  Last 
year  the  early  frosts  made  great  havoc  in  the  sugar-cane ; 
this  year's  crop  remains  to  be  seen,  but  prices  are  not  very 
remunerative.  They  have  lately  commenced  shipping  from 
here  very  fine  Virginian  and  Kentucky  cattle  for  the  Eng 
lish  market.  A  man  who  sent  a  cargo  is  said  to  have  netted 
51.  a  head  upon  them  ;  many  more  are  to  be  sent.  I  saw 
two  or  three  fine  English  cotton  steamers,  and  pens  for  the 
accommodation  of  cattle  were  being  put  up  on  the  decks. 
There  is,  however,  a  good  deal  of  risk,  especially  in  thus 
sending  the  cattle  upon  deck.  The  insurance  for  cattle  is 
about  6  per  cent.  The  retail  price  of  beef  here  is  about 
'6d.  per  pound. 

In  the  morning  I  took  a  walk  about  the  town.     I  observe 


288  MY  JOURNAL 

that  here,  as  elsewhere,  the  suburban  streets  are  pretty  and 
well-kept.  Fig-trees  grow  well.  There  is  an  astonishing 
trade  in  oysters  here.  Oyster-packing  is  one  of  the  great 
industries,  and  all  the  roads  are  metalled  with  oyster-shells. 
The  most  successful  farmers  are  the  oyster-farmers. 

In  the  list  of  churches  I  see  here  that  the  Episcopal 
churches  stand  first,  then  the  Methodists ;  there  is  only  one 
Catholic  church.  I  am  told  that  though  small  in  numbers 
the  Episcopal  Church  in  many  respects  takes  a  good  position 
in  the  United  States.  They  are  said  to  have  done  more  for 
the.  Indians  than  any  other  Church,  and  Episcopalian  chap 
lains  seem  more  prominent  than  any  other  in  the  army. 
But  Americans  are  very  liberal  on  this  subject.  In  the  army 
the  Government  appoints  chaplains — ministers  of  every  sect 
are  eligible — the  best  man  is  selected,  without  reference  to 
the  particular  faith  he  professes ;  and,  strange  to  say,  there 
seem  to  be  no  quarrels  or  jealousy  upon  the  subject.  I  could 
only  hear  of  one  Catholic  who  had  been  appointed  to  the 
army ;  but,  among  Protestant  sects,  a  regiment  or  garrison 
has  sometimes  a  chaplain  of  one  persuasion,  and  sometimes 
of  another.  At  Hampton  Institute  the  services  seem  to  be 
taken  turn  and  turn  about.  I  suspect  that  a  great  deal  of 
approximation  of  sects  is  going  on  in  the  States. 

The  army,  I  believe,  is  very  well  supplied  with  good 
medical  men ;  but  I  am  told  that  throughout  the  Union 
medical  degrees  are  very  easily  got,  and  that  there  is  a  great 
want  of  security  in  regard  to  medical  qualifications. 

It  is  generally  said  by  those  whom  I  meet  that  in  most 
parts  of  Virginia  English  settlers  have  not  been  very  success 
ful.  They  have  sometimes  bought  inferior  land — they  are 
not  very  good  at  managing  black  labour,  and  do  not  under 
stand  tobacco  farming  and  curing.  The  truth  seems  to  be 
that  the  land  of  Virginia  was  a  good  deal  worked  out ;  much 
of  it  is  rather  poor,  and  much  of  it  had  been  improvidently 
farmed  in  slave  times.  The  proprietors  were  heavily  in 
debt,  and  would  have  '  burst  up,'  war  or  no  war.  Now  things, 
are  on  the  whole  rather  better ;  fertilisers  (that  is,  chemical 
manures)  are  much  used.  Many  of  the  poorer  whites  have 


VIRGINIA.  289 

got  land,  and  so  have  a  few  of  the  blacks.  Still  most  people 
in  these  parts  are  not  particularly  hard  workers,  and  they  are 
only  moderately  prosperous.  The  import  of  food-stuffs  from 
the  West  has  very  much  diminished  the  profits  of  farming 
here,  and  land  is  worth  less  than  it  was  before  the  war.  The 
only  prosperous  country  is  the  fine  pasture  land  in  the  west 
of  the  State,  where  cattle  are  largely  bred.  Much  tobacco 
now  comes  from  other  States,  but  the  tobacco  manufacture 
in  Virginia  is  still  very  large. 

From  Norfolk  I  took  rail  for  Petersburg,  through  a  very 
poor  country.  We  passed  through  the  '  Dismal  Swamp,'  a 
capital  specimen  of  the  belt  of  swampy  country  which  sur 
rounds  the  Southern  States,  consisting  of  large  tracts  of 
swamp,  mixed  with  poor  land  covered  with  pines  and  scrub- 
oaks.  There  was  occasional  cultivation,  but  most  of  it 
seemed  poor,  and  the  houses  were  chiefly  inhabited  by  blacks, 
A  good  deal  of  Indian  corn  is  grown,  and  I  saw  many  stacks 
of  Virginia  peas — a  great  cultivation  in  these  parts.  In  the 
train  I  met  a  very  pleasant  man,  Mr.  Y ,  formerly  a  Con 
federate  officer,  now  carrying  on  an  insurance  agency,  in 

which  he  has  for  his  partner  Mr.  J ,  a  Scotchman,  of  a 

family  whom  I  know.     I  met  Mr.  J at  Petersburg,  and 

he  was  kind  enough  to  show  me  about  the  place.  He  has 
tried  several  parts  of  the  world — went  at  one  time  to  South 
America,  then  came  to  Virginia  and  got  a  large  farm.  It 
answered  tolerably  well ;  but  he  found  the  life  dreadfully  soli 
tary,  and  now  has  gone  into  business  in  the  town.  He  still, 
however,  retains  his  estate,  a  considerable  portion  of  which 
he  cultivates  on  his  own  account.  He  keeps  two  or  three 
Scotchmen  as  permanent  servants,  and  they  get  gangs  of 
negroes  to  work  by  the  day  when  they  are  wanted.  The 
negroes  like  working  in  that  occasional  kind  of  way.  Part 
of  his  land  he  lets  out  in  small  farms  to  negroes  on  easy 
terms  as  regards  rent,  but  he  makes  it  a  condition  that  he  is 
to  get  labour  from  them  when  he  wants  it.  They  generally 
owe  the  rent,  and  let  him  take  it  out  in  labour.  He,  how 
ever,  does  not  think  it  a  paying  thing  to  buy  land  for  the 
purpose  of  renting  it  out.  Petersburg  is  a  pretty  town,  and 

U 


290  MY  JOURNAL. 

the  country  about  is  famous  as  the  scene  of  great  operations 
during  the  civil  war.  There  are  immense  cemeteries  in  the 
neighbourhood,  full  of  soldiers  of  both  sides.  There  is  a 
famous  place — a  sort  of  hole  or  small  crater — where  a  large 
number  of  black  Federal  soldiers  were  surrounded  and,  I  am 
afraid  I  must  almost  say,  massacred.  Petersburg  now  seems 
to  be  thriving.  There  is  only  one  old  ruin,  and  that  is  the 
English  church  of  the  early  days  of  the  colony.  It  is  said  to 
have  been  built  of  bricks  brought  from  England,  and  the 
walls  still  stand.  There  are  large  tobacco  manufactories 
here,  and  some  cotton-mills.  I  am  told  that  the  blacks  work 
well  for  a  time,  but  are  apt  to  leave  capriciously — in  that 
respect  they  cannot  be  relied  on.  It  is  also  more  popular 
to  employ  whites  who  are  in  want  of  work.  I  notice  that 
generally  most  of  the  United  States  employes  are  blacks, 
while  the  State  and  municipal  employes  are  mostly  whites. 
For  instance,  the  people  who  sweep  the  streets  of  Petersburg 
are  all  whites.  They  seem  to  get  very  low  wages.  Political 
contests  apart,  I  gather  that  there  is  little  bad  feeling  between 
the  white  and  black  castes ;  they  seem  quite  civil  to  one 
another.  The  different  occupations  are  a  good  deal  divided 
between  the  two.  Most  of  the  agricultural  labour  is  done  by 
blacks ;  so  that  things  seem  to  be  somewhat  the  converse  of 
that  which  I  found  in  States  further  North,  where  the  blacks 
are  found  in  towns,  and  not  in  the  country.  I  am  told  that 
the  Virginian  gentlemen  of  former  days  sometimes  struggle 
on  with  their  properties  and  make  the  best  they  can  of 
them ;  sometimes  go  to  other  States,  where  many  of  them 
have  prospered  in  various  enterprises  ;  and  sometimes  take  to 
hotel-keeping  and  suchlike  occupations  in  their  own  country. 
The  hotel  at  Petersburg  is  kept  by  a  General  and  ex-planter, 
who  stands  behind  the  bar,  and  seems  to  be  a  very  pleasant, 
elderly  landlord.  They  say  the  relations  between  blacks  and 
whites  are  better  in  Virginia  than  in  some  other  States, 
because  in  slave  times  the  blacks  were  better  treated,  this 
being  a  breeding  State.  The  people  who  raised  negroes  were 
kind  to  and  careful  of  them  ;  and  the  only  unpleasant  part  of 
the  relation  was  the  selling  off  when  the  stock  became  fit  for 


VIRGINIA.  291 

the  market.  However,  this  was  done  through  slave-dealers, 
whose  avocation  was  held  to  be  degrading,  and  with  whom 
the  gentlemen  who  sold  the  slaves  would  not  hold  social 
intercourse. 

Mr.  Y —  —  does  not  confirm  the  statement  that  a  certain 
number  of  seats  in  the  State  Assemblies  are  allowed  to  the 
blacks  by  way  of  conciliation  and  minority  representation. 
He  says  that  whatever  seats  they  have  they  only  get  by  hard 
voting,  and  he  admits  that  when  the  Democrats  are  hard  put 
to  it  they  sometimes  manipulate  a  good  deal  in  the  count 
ing  of  votes.  The  negroes  are  in  a  very  decided  majority  in 
the  Petersburg  Congressional  District ;  and,  besides  returning 
some  members  to  the  State  Assembly,  they  have  hitherto 
succeeded  in  returning  a  Republican  member  to  Congress,  a 
Norwegian,  who  seems  generally  admitted  to  be  a  very  able 
man,  and  who  has  much  influence  with  the  negroes.  The 
blacks  have  great  faith  in  Greneral  Grant,  as  the  man  who 
gave  them  their  freedom,  and  they  go  to  the  poll  as  his  sup 
porters.  There  are  several  companies  of  black  militia  volun 
teers  in  this  State,  with  their  own  black  officers  ;  there  is  one 
such  company  at  Petersburg,  said  to  be  much  better  drilled 
than  the  white  companies. 

Travelling  to  Richmond  I  met  an  old  gentleman,  a  Demo 
crat,  coming  back  from  canvassing,  and  had  a  good  deal  of 
talk  with  him.  He  was  very  hot  on  politics,  and  denounces 
the  Norwegian  as  ;  white  without,  but  very  black  within.'  He 
was  full  of  currency  questions,  and  a  hot  free-trader  of  a  kind. 
His  argument  seems  to  be  that  if  the  tariff  was  more  adjusted 
for  revenue,  then,  with  the  aid  of  the  larger  customs  revenue  so 
obtained,  they  might  get  rid  of  the  internal  revenue,  which  he 
describes  as  most  oppressive  and  expensive.  He  says  that  the 
present  tariff  kills  trade ;  that  for  every  dollar  paid  to  the 
State  as  customs  duty  on  woollen  goods  the  people  pay  $600 
to  their  own  manufacturers  ;  and  for  every  dollar  paid  as  duty 
upon  cotton  they  pay  $2,000 — all  this  for  the  benefit  of  two 
or  three  Northern  States,  especially  Pennsylvania  ;  and  even 
there,  he  says,  the  manufacturers  are  but  a  small  minority 
now,  and  nearly  played  out.  He  dwells  upon  the  much  larger 

u  2 


292  MY   JOURNAL. 

number  of  the  agricultural  population,  and  says  they  should 
be  favoured,  and  not  the  manufacturers.  He  talks  good  Eng 
lish,  and  would  pass  as  a  very  good  committee-man  with  us. 

I  understand  that  Virginia  is  in  difficulties  about  the 
State  debt,  and  there  are  various  plans  for  adjusting  it  by 
cutting  it  down.  Some  say  that  the  people  of  the  State 
could  pay  if  they  liked ;  but  the  farmers  do  not  like  heavy 
taxation,  especially  in  the  present  depreciated  condition  of 
their  properties.  In  rural  parts  of  the  country  the  State 
and  local  taxes  come  to  about  1^  per  cent,  on  the  capital 
value,  and  then  there  is  a  poll-tax  of  $\±  and  some  other 
taxes.  On  each  glass  of  whisky  being  sold  a  bell  is  struck, 
marking  a  register,  and  a  tax  is  paid  to  the  State,  besides 
that  to  the  United  States.  Some  recent  amendments  have 
been  made  in  the  Constitution,  introducing  provisions  de 
signed  to  hit  the  blacks.  These  provisions  disfranchise  all 
who  have  not  paid  up  the  poll-tax,  and  collectors  are  said  to 
be  sometimes  very  lax  till  the  election  is  over ;  moreover, 
they  disfranchise  for  life  every  man  convicted  of  larceny  or 
other  such  offence,  unless  he  is  pardoned  by  the  Governor. 
The  blacks  are  tried  for  these  offences  by  local  justices  of  the 
peace,  who  are  generally  white  Democrats.  I  think  this  rule 
is  dangerous.  Flogging  is  very  freely  used  in  Virginia  as  a 
punishment  for  larceny,  the  system  being  different  from  that 
of  the  States  further  South,  where  they  prefer  to  imprison 
criminals  and  to  hire  them  out  at  a  profit. 

At  Richmond  I  went  to  see  the  Exchange  Hotel,  which 
seemed  very  good. 

Next  day  I  went  to  see  Dr.  D ,  State  Superintendent  of 

Education.  I  had  a  good  deal  of  talk  with  him,  and  went  with 
him  to  see  some  schools,  both  black  and  white.  Virginia  is 
divided  into  ninety-nine  counties.  After  the  war  an  attempt 
was  made  to  introduce  townships,  according  to  Northern 
ideas;  but  that  has  been  given  up,  and  now  counties  are 
divided  into  magisterial  districts,  which  have  not  the  same 
organisation  as  townships.  The  great  difficulty  in  regard  to 
education  is  caused  by  the  embarrassed  financial  position  of 
the  State.  Unfortunately,  the  Treasury  is  so  low  that  it  is 


VIRGINIA.  293 

very  difficult  to  get  from  it  the  educational  funds  deposited 
there ;  and  then  by  law  taxes  are  payable  in  debt  coupons, 
and  they  get  more  of  these  coupons  than  cash.  In  this  State 
one-fifth  of  the  State  assessment  is  set  apart  for  education, 
as  well  as  a  poll-tax  of  a  dollar  a  head,  which  it  is  optional 
with  counties  to  increase  to  $1 J.  Elections  are  very  fre 
quent  here.  In  Virginia  the  different  elections  do  not  take 
place  at  the  same  time.  One  year  there  is  an  election  for 
Congress,  and  another  year  for  the  State  Legislature ;  while 
the  elections  for  county  and  local  officers  take  place  at  a 
different  period  of  the  year. 

Some  think  that  farmers  now  almost  overdo  expenditure 
upon  fertilisers.  These  chemical  fertilisers  are  sometimes 
rather  dangerous,  and  perhaps  good  farmyard  manure  is  the 
best  after  all.  A  curious  feature  of  the  law  is  that,  in  Virginia 
and  some  other  States,  the  manure-merchant  has  a  privilege 
or  hypothec  over  the  crops. 

Dr.  R —  -  thinks  the  negroes  are  generally  inferior  in  in 
tellect  to  the  whites,  and  not  capable  of  sustained  or  skilful 
work ;  but  still  they  are  very  good  within  certain  limits — they 
are  very  well-disposed,  and  much  can  be  made  of  them. 

Of  public  free  schools  there  are  three  classes — Primary, 
Grammar,  and  Higher — but  these  seem  to  run  very  much 
into  one  another  when  they  are  in  the  same  building,  as  was 
the  case  at  Richmond.  Almost  all  the  masters  seem  to  be 
mistresses.  They  follow  the  old  Scotch  system  of  schooling 
in  the  winter  and  farming  in  the  summer.  By  the  law  of 
this  State  schools  must  be  open  not  less  than  five  months, 
but  in  Richmond  they  keep  them  open  for  nine.  There  is 
no  compulsory  law,  but  children  come  freely  to  the  schools. 
The  children  of  the  upper  classes  are  very  well  represented  in 
all  the  schools,  but  there  are  also  large  private  schools  in 
Richmond.  I  saw  one  very  large  one.  The  private  schools 
are  principally  of  the  lower  grades,  where  the  scholars  of  the 
public  schools  are  of  a  very  mixed  class  ;  in  the  higher  schools 
there  are  not  so  many  of  the  poor,  and  the  upper  classes  go 
more  freely.  Boys  and  girls  are  always  taught  together  in 
the  same  class,  but  they  do  not  sit  together,  and  they  are 


294  MY  JOURNAL. 

kept  quite  separate  in  playtime.  The  girls  in  the  higher 
schools  seem  of  a  superior  class,  and  there  the  girls  very  con 
siderably  preponderate  over  the  boys.  Many  of  the  boys  of 
that  age  go  into  offices.  As  a  rule  in  the  higher  schools  the 
pupils  take  one  foreign  language — the  girls  generally  French, 
the  boys  Latin  or  German.  I  did  not  learn  that  much 
science  was  taught.  In  the  black  schools  I  noticed  some  very 
fair  mulattos — one  girl  in  particular,  who  would  have  been 
very  fair  for  a  European,  was  placed  among  the  blacks,  many 
of  whom  are  very  black  and  hideous.  I  hardly  knew  before 
what  an  ugly  race  some  of  the  blacks  are. 

I  went  to  see  a  great  tobacco  factory.  It  is  entirely  con 
fined  to  the  manufacture  of  chewing-tobacco.  By  far  the 
greatest  part  of  the  labour  is  done  by  blacks.  Tobacco 
seems  to  be  specially  their  vocation.  Most  of  the  foremen 
are  whites,  and  some  of  the  work  is  done  by  white  and 
black  men  mixed.  I  did  not  see  any  mixture  of  white  and 
black  women  ;  that  does  not  seem  to  be  allowed.  Cigars,  it 
seems,  are  not  made  by  blacks  ;  it  is  one  of  the  skilled  things 
they  do  not  do.  The  black  labourers  in  the  factory  get 
about  a  dollar  a  day  for  moderately  skilled  work,  and  some 
times  more ;  they  do  not  work  very  regularly — they  average 
about  four  days  a  week.  All  seem  to  agree  that  negroes 
are  fond  of  amusement ;  they  like  to  make  the  most  of  life. 
They  go  on  excursions,  fishing  expeditions,  and  so  on,  and 
thus  vary  their  hard  work.  In  the  tobacco  factory  the  women 
were  set  to  sing  for  my  benefit,  and  they  certainly  do  that 
very  well.  The  tobacco-leaves  are  dried  and  packed  in  hogs 
heads  by  the  farmers,  and  in  that  shape  they  come  to  the 
manufactories.  The  value  very  much  depends  on  the  way  in 
which  the  drying  process  is  done  by  the  farmers. 

I  was  invited  to  go  out  into  the  country  with  General 

W ,  and  went  with  him  to  his  place,  about  twenty  miles 

distant.  There  was  much  tree-jungle  on  the  way,  and  it  did  not 
seem  to  be  a  very  fertile  country.  The  houses  were  of  wood, 
and  did  not  look  very  good.  He  is  a  great  farmer,  and  has 
some  1,600  acres  under  cultivation,  but  his  is  a  very  exceptional 
case.  He  is  a  somewhat  rare  instance  of  a  Virginian  proprietor 


VIRGINIA.  295 

successfully  accepting  the  change  of  circumstances,  and  he  has 
done  so  in  a  very  good  spirit.  I  rather  gather,  however,  that 

his  farming  does  not  pay  particularly  well.     General  W 

employs  entirely  negro  labour,  with  white  foremen,  one  of  whom 
I  saw  on  horseback  watching  the  ploughs.  The  fact  seems 
to  be  that  people  accustomed  to  black  labour  do  not  get  on 
very  well  with  whites,  and  vice  versa\  and  so  it  is  that  where 
they  were  accustomed  to  slave  labour  they  now  employ  blacks, 
and  do  not  think  of  introducing  whites.  The  Southern  rail 
ways  and  other  great  works  have  been  almost  entirely  con 
structed  by  black  labour.  General  W is  very  fond  of  his 

black  people  ;  most  of  them  were  born  and  bred  on  the  pro 
perty.  He  had  many  more  before  the  war — perhaps  400 — 
worth,  he  says,  about  $150,000,  and  now  there  are  in  all  about 
150.  Eighteen  are  permanently  employed  upon  this  block 
of  1,000  acres.  Then  there  are  the  women  and  children,  and 
some  men  who  have  a  little  land,  and  work  occasionally  for  him. 
He  seems  to  say  that  hereabouts  the  difficulty  rather  is  for  all 
to  get  work  than  for  employers  to  get  labour  enough.  He  is 
clear  that,  so  far  as  income  is  concerned,  if  he  had  got  the 
value  of  his  slaves  by  way  of  compensation  he  would  be  better 
off  than  under  the  slave  system.  The  only  drawback  is  that 
formerly  you  had  the  comfort  of  servants  whom  you  could 
bring  up  to  your  ways  and  be  sure  of  keeping,  but  now  they  do 
as  they  like.  Others,  however,  say  that,  in  this  view,  account 
is  not  taken  of  the  increase  of  the  negroes,  which  was  the 
great  source  of  profit  in  former  days,  and  much  recouped  the 
owner  for  the  capital  sunk  in  slave  property. 

General  W 's  land  seemed  to  be  fine  and  easily  workable, 

but  it  needs  manure.  The  principal  staples  are  Indian  corn, 
wheat,  and  artificial  grass.  I  gather  that  much  of  the  best 
land  in  river-bottoms  and  such  situations  is  still  held  by 
the  old  proprietors  and  farmed  by  negro  labour ;  but  these 
farms  are  generally  not  very  profitable,  and  throughout 
the  State  there  is  much  pecuniary  difficulty.  In  the  cattle- 
grazing  tracts  there  are  some  really  large  estates.  I  heard  of 
one  very  large  indeed.  I  asked  what  the  proprietor  made  of 
his  land.  The  answer  was,  '  He  lets  out  part  of  it,  and  turns 


296  MY  JOURNAL. 

cattle  on  the  rest.'  In  the  Southern  States  mules  are  almost 
always  used  for  ploughing ;  in  some  parts  of  the  country  oxen 
are  a  good  deal  used  for  draught.  On  all  sides  I  hear  that 

General  W is  a  very  excellent  specimen  of  the  fine  old 

Virginian  proprietor ;  but  then  he  is  a  man  of  means,  and 
can  do  what  most  others  cannot.  He  is  a  most  polished  and 
courteous  gentleman.  His  place,  however,  shows  no  signs 
of  ever  having  been  a  fine  place  in  our  sense.  It  is  more 
like  a  comfortable  planter's  or  gentleman-farmer's  house,  and 
there  is  no  affectation  of  grandeur.  The  family  seem  very 

English  in  their  ideas  and  sympathies.  General  W stands 

up  for  the  character  and  capacity  of  the  negroes,  but  he  ad 
mits  that  they  are  not  up  to  managing  delicate  machines. 
He  says  they  are  very  trustworthy,  and  his  doors  never  were 
locked  during  the  war ;  but  they  sometimes  lay  their  hands  on 

petty  articles  of  food  and  such  things.     Although  Gen.  W 

was  a  Confederate  general  he  seems  to  be  in  truth  now  nearly 
a  Republican.  His  family  appear  scarcely  to  share  his  very 
hopeful  view  of  the  situation.  Mrs.  W—  —  is  well  known  to 
have  been  the  kindest  of  mistresses.  She  admits  the  horrors 
of  slavery,  but  now  thinks  things  are  even  worse,  and  that  the 
blacks  will  presently  be  starved.  Miss  W—  —  thinks  Washing 
ton  made  a  great  mistake  in  separating  from  England.  Very 
many  Virginians  seem  still  to  affect  English  sympathies. 
General  W—  -  says  that  before  the  war  farming  was  a  profes 
sion  as  good  as  law  or  medicine.  I  gather  that  the  proprietor- 
farmers  ranked  with  professional  men,  not  above  them.  The 
next  day  we  came  back  to  Richmond.  I  had  some  most  agree 
able  talk  with  the  ladies  of  the  party,  and  shall  always  have  a 
very  pleasant  remembrance  of  this  visit.  They  say  that  young 
ladies  here  are  much  more  independent  than  the  New  York 
young  ladies  now  are,  the  latter  having  begun  to  affect  the 
European  fashion. 

I  called  on  Major  P ,  an  ex-Confederate  officer,  and 

now  a  lawyer.  He  was  very  civil,  and  gave  me  much  assistance. 
He  took  me  to  call  on  the  Governor  of  the  State,  Colonel 
Holliday,  a  bright  and  highly  educated  man,  who  is,  I 
believe,  a  very  successful  Governor.  He  lost  an  arm  in  the 


VIRGINIA.  297 

war  on  the  Confederate  side.  Like  most  people  here,  he  de 
fends  the  institution  of  slavery,  though  he  cannot  defend  the 
slave-trade  between  the  breeding  States  and  the  consuming 
States.  Accepting  slavery  as  past  and  gone,  he  is  all  for  re 
taining  and  making  the  most  of  the  negroes,  on  whom  he 
relies  as  the  conservative  element  in  the  country,  as  contrasted 
with  the  communistic  and  troublesome  among  the  white 
workmen.  He  says  the  blacks  are  so  far  quite  free  from 
trades-unionism  and  Communism,  and  they  are  very  useful 
and  good  labourers.  They  are,  however,  neither  mentally 
equal  to  the  whites,  nor  will  they  do  so  much  hard  work  in  a 
sustained  way — not  so  much  as  the  Irishmen;  they  will  take 
holidays  and  amuse  themselves  occasionally.  The  mulattos 
he  thinks  are  superior  to  the  ordinary  negroes ;  they  are  free 
from  the  odour  which  is  a  great  drawback  to  the  negroes  in 
domestic  service. 

Colonel  Holliday  explained  that  much  of  the  State  debt 
had  been  incurred  for  internal  improvements,  which  do  not 
pay — railways,  canals,  and  the  like.  The  making  of  such 
works  by  the  State  tends  to  excessive  '  log-rolling' in  the 
State  Legislature,  and  that  is  the  origin  of  the  clause  re 
cently  inserted  in  the  Constitution  of  this  and  other  States 
which  prohibits  the  making  of  any  internal  improvements  by 
the  State.  In  Virginia  they  had  no  land  to  give  to  the  rail 
ways,  and  they  gave  large  money  grants  by  way  of  subsidy. 
He  did  not  seem  much  inclined  to  free  trade,  but  rather 
hoped  that  Virginia  might  increase  her  manufactures.  He 
thinks  the  state  of  the  labour  market  is  pretty  satisfactory 
here — people  can  get  work,  and  employers  can  get  labour. 
All  they  want  is  to  be  let  alone.  He  is  very  friendly  to 
England,  but  dwells  much  on  the  '  Cassandra '  warnings  of 
which  we  have  lately  heard,  and  especially  on  the  great 
danger  to  England  of  engaging  in  any  European  war.  In 
that  case,  he  says,  our  commerce  would  be  swept  from  the 
ocean,  as  was  that  of  the  United  States,  and  we  shall  find 
the  disadvantage  of  living  in  an  island. 

I  went  to  see  Messrs.   B ,  bankers  and  merchants. 

They  tell  me  a  curious  fact :  that  before  the  war  of  a  total  of 


298  MY   JOURNAL. 

Virginian  exports  of  some  $34,000,000  close  on  half—  viz.,  be 
tween  sixteen  and  seventeen  millions — was  the  value  of  slaves 
exported.  In  some  parts  of  the  South  slaves  were  a  good  deal 
worked  out,  but  generally  the  demand  for  slaves  in  the  South 
was  caused  by  increase  of  cultivation.  Sugar  has  now  de 
clined,  but  cotton  has  extended,  and  will  extend.  The 
present  price  of  nine  cents  is  not  so  very  bad  after  all ;  it  is 
quite  up  to  the  average  of  the  prices  before  the  war.  In  those 
days  it  has  been  known  as  low  as  four  or  five  cents.  They 
do  not  think  money  is  being  lost  in  the  cultivation  of  cotton, 
though  it  is  not  very  profitable.  A  good  deal  of  money  is 
advanced  to  planters  by  people  called  factors,  who  seem  to 
fulfil  the  functions  of  the  Indian  Mahajan.  Even  if  cotton 
be  not  lucrative  the  people  in  the  Southern  States  must  grow 
it ;  they  have  no  alternative.  They  have  no  other  great 
staple  there.  There  has  been  considerable  increase  in  the 
cultivation  of  cotton  by  small  white  farmers  in  the  hilly 
districts,  and  a  very  great  increase  in  Texas,  a  State  which 
seems  to  be  going  ahead  very  fast. 

I  went  to  see  some  of  the  great  flour-mills  here.  Most  of 
the  labour  is  black,  but  the  really  skilled  work  must  be  done 
by  whites.  I  saw  a  good  deal  of  work  in  which  black  and 
white  men  are  employed  indiscriminately,  and  are  paid  the 
same.  There  are  said  to  be  no  signs  of  jealousy  between  the 
two  races.  The  James  Eiver  is  very  rocky  and  rapid  in  its 
course  up  to  this  point.  Above  Eichmond  it  has  been  canal 
ised,  and  it  is  here  applied  to  provide  the  great  water-power 
by  which  the  mills  are  worked.  On  the  opposite  side  is  a 
place  called  Manchester,  where  there  are  several  cotton-mills. 
The  river  is  very  red  and  muddy ;  this  is  no  doubt  due  to 
the  red  soil  which  they  have  about  here.  This  red  soil  ex 
tends  a  long  way  through  the  Southern  States. 

Here  too  there  was  a  great  agricultural  fair  going  on.  I 
went  out  to  see  it,  but  was  somewhat  disappointed.  The 
grounds  seemed  too  large  for  the  show.  There  were  two  most 
enormous  cattle,  but  the  others  did  not  strike  me  very  much. 
The  most  frequent  animals  were  small  Jersey  cows,  pretty 
little  beasts.  Trotting  horses  were  conspicuous.  There  seemed 


VIRGINIA.  299 

DO  great  show  of  fruits  and  vegetables.  I  may  remark,  now 
that  I  have  seen  a  good  many  of  these  shows,  that  as  an  agri 
cultural  show  that  which  I  saw  at  Hamilton,  in  Canada,  was 
the  best  of  them  all.  I  suspect  that  Virginia  is  not  at  all  up 
to  the  Northern  States  in  agricultural  enterprise.  Coming 
back  from  the  fair  I  watched  the  ploughing  going  on  in  some 
large  fields.  The  soil  seemed  light.  It  was  being  largely 
limed,  and  green  crops  were  being  ploughed  in.  This  is  very 
much  the  practice  in  these  parts.  I  waited  for  two  ploughs 
to  come  round,  to  see  who  the  labourers  were,  and  found  that 
one  was  held  by  a  black  man,  and  one  by  a  white  man. 

Returning  to  the  town,  I  went  to  inquire  about  books 
giving  information  about  the  State  laws,  and  got  an  authori 
tative  compilation,  the  '  Revised  Code  of  Virginia,'  in  one 
thick  volume,  circulated  by  authority  of  the  Legislature. 

In  the  evening  Colonel ,  son  of  the  distinguished  hydro- 

grapher,  was  good  enough  to  call  upon  me  and  introduce  me 
to  the  Westmoreland  Club,  an  excellent  institution.  After 
wards  I  went  to  the  theatre.  The  principal  object  of  the 
play  seemed  to  be  to  satirise  an  American  member  of  Con 
gress,  a  '  lady  who  had  been  abroad,'  and  an  English  tourist. 
They  were  very  severe  on  the  Congress-man,  and  attributed 
to  him  all  sorts  of  corruption,  which  caused  great  laughter 
and  applause.  A  '  civil  rights  man '  was  introduced.  It 
seems  that  a  civil  rights  man  is  one  who  is  in  favour  of  com 
plete  equality  of  blacks  and  whites.  He  tells  that  in  New 
York  he  patronises  a  '  civil  rights '  barber's  shop,  where  they 
shave  both  blacks  and  whites,  an  idea  which  seemed  to  amuse 
the  audience.  The  English  tourist  was  a  stupid  and  unin 
teresting  person.  The  'lady  who  had  been  abroad'  was  a 
caricature  of  the  people  we  see  in  Continental  Hotels,  and 
she  was  held  up  to  much  ridicule.  She  was  also  the  vehicle 
for  exhibiting  genuine  Worth's  dresses,  which  the  Virginian 
ladies  seemed  to  think  a  very  interesting  sight. 

Next  morning  I  breakfasted  with  Governor  Holliday,  and 
met  a  party  at  his  house.  He  has  an  official  residence  ;  and 
I  noticed  that  convicts  in  chains  were  cleaning  up  the  grounds 
in  a  way  that  very  much  reminded  me  of  the  practice  in 


300  MY  JOURNAL. 

India  in  former  days.     The  chain-gang  is  a  recognised  insti 
tution,  and  you  may  see  them  working  in  the  streets  any  day. 

The  people  whom  I  met  this  morning  say  that  General  W . 

and  his  farm  are  far  too  favourable  a  specimen,  and  that 
most  of  the  people  in  Virginia  are  not  at  all  well  off.  Even 
in  the  best  parts  of  the  State  much  good  land  is  for  sale  for 
less  than  the  buildings  alone  originally  cost.  They  think, 
however,  that  their  geographical  situation  in  the  centre  of 
the  Union  ought  to  enable  them  to  retrieve  their  position, 
and  they  would  do  so  if  they  were  not  ruined  by  the  exces 
sive  cheapness  of  produce  imported  from  the  West.  They  all 
defend  the  institution  of  slavery  without  reserve,  and  declare 
that  it  often  happened  that  the  masters  had  to  work  very 
hard  indeed,  while  the  black  labourers  had  a  life  the  hap 
piest,  easiest,  and  most  free  from  care  that  it  is  possible  to 
imagine.  There  is  now  an  income-tax  in  Virginia  on  all 
incomes,  not  derived  from  property,  exceeding  six  hundred 
dollars  per  annum,  the  first  six  hundred  dollars  being  in  all 
cases  exempt.  All  property  is  liable  to  the  property-tax,  and 
this  income-tax  is  merely  to  catch  people  who  do  not  pay 
property-tax,  and  who  in  most  of  the  States  are  exempt  from 
direct  taxation.  Some  people  of  the  town  say  that  personal 
property  is  very  fully  taxed ;  indeed,  even  more  so  than  the 
land,  the  land  being  now  valued  at  a  very  low  rate.  It 
seems  that  there  is  a  good  deal  of  evasion  of  the  income-tax. 
The  assessors  are  elected,  and  dare  not  assess  rigorously.  I 
talked  to  a  member  of  the  Virginian  Legislature,  which  con 
tains  a  good  many  men  of  some  substance.  He  has  both 
won  and  lost  his  seat  on  the  question  of  the  dog-tax,  which  is 
said  to  be  necessary  for  the  protection  of  the  stock-breeders, 
but  is  very  unpopular.  It  is  imposed  in  some  counties,  and 
not  in  others.  Many  people  seem  to  hope  that  local  and  side 
questions  of  this  kind  will  take  people  off  from  party  divi 
sions  and  black  and  white  factions.  I  observe  that  there 
are  two  or  three  independent  candidates  for  Congress  in  this 
State.  I  am  told  stories  of  negroes  who  say  they  will  vote 
for  a  man  because  he  is  a  '  gentleman.'  I  learn  one  thing 
which  shocks  me — that  blacks  are  here  systematically  ex- 


VIRGINIA.  301 

eluded  from  the  juries.  This  seems  to  be  avowed,  the  excuse 
being,  '  They  have  got  votes,  and  we  cannot  give  them  every 
thing.'  In  the  United  States  Courts  blacks  are  put  on  the 
juries,  but  not  in  the  Virginian  Courts.  They  say  that  there 
are  many  free  traders  here,  but  free  trade  is  not  an  active 
question  at  present.  The  Southern  States  are  much  more 
occupied  with  reconstruction  questions.  They  managed  ta 
carry  the  last  changes  of  the  Virginian  Constitution,  which 
gave  the  whites  some  advantages,  under  cover  of  disputes 
with  the  Federal  Government  on  greater  questions. 

I  visited  the  Richmond  Institute,  a  philanthropic  estab 
lishment  for  the  education  of  black  teachers  and  preachers. 

It  seemed  to  be  doing  very  well.  Mr.  C ,  the  principal, 

has  a  high  opinion  of  the  negroes,  but  he  admits  that  they 
are  not  mathematical.  He  is  a  Northerner  sent  by  Northern 
people  to  carry  on  this  work.  He  admits  that  the  men  of 
Richmond  behave  very  well  to  him,  but  says  that  the  ladies 
are  much  more  bigoted. 

I  visited  Mr.  V 's  establishment  for  extracting  the 

juice  of  meat  in  a  pure  form,  without  heating  or  cooking.  I 
believe  that  this  essence  has  an  extraordinary  virtue  for 
invalids. 

I  lunched  with  Mr.  B ,  and  met  a  large  party  there. 

They  were  generally  pleasant  people.  The  Virginian  ladies 
are  very  agreeable,  but  they  denounce  in  very  strong  language 
General  Grant  and  the  Abolitionists  and  all  their  works. 
Mr.  B is  President  of  the  National  Bank  here.  He  com 
plains  that,  the  banks  are  over-taxed.  They  could  lend  money 
at  5  or  6  per  cent.,  if  they  were  not  taxed,  better  than 
they  now  can  at  10  per  cent.  These  National  Banks  are  a 
great  question  in  the  United  States.  At  present  a  large 
party  denounce  them,  saying  that  they  have  far  too  favour 
able  terms.  They  are  allowed  to  issue  bank-notes  on  deposit 
of  United  States  securities  ;  so  that  their  solvency,  so  far  as 
regards  these  notes,  is  always  secured. 

After  dining  with  Major  P I  went  with  him  to  a 

great  gathering  and  banquet  of  the  '  Confederate  Soldiers  of 
Northern  Virginia,'  where  we  heard  a  great  oration,  giving 


302  MY  JOURNAL. 

a  military  history  of  a  part  of  the  war  from  the  Confederate 
point  of  view. 

This  day  concludes  my  stay  in  Virginia,  and  ends  a 
pleasant  visit  to  Richmond.  It  strikes  me  that  now  I  have 
got  into  a  negro  country  the  servants  are  more  numerous  than 
in  the  North.  Their  style  and  manners  are  something  like 
those  of  native  servants  in  India.  I  believe  in  former  days 
the  Southerners  were  more  English  in  their  habits  than  some 
of  the  Northerners.  Ladies  used  to  ride  on  horseback  ;  now 
they  cannot  afford  many  horses,  and  private  property  pre 
vailed  here  so  early  that  there  are  not  the  open  sectional 
roads  that  I  saw  in  Illinois.  Ladies  who  attempt  to  ride  or 
drive  complain  of  the  endless  number  of  gates  and  want  of 
open  country. 


NORTH  CAROLINA. 

From  Richmond  I  travelled  to  Raleigh,  the  political 
capital  of  North  Carolina.  It  is  about  8^  hours'  run  by 
rail.  The  country  is  more  or  less  undulating.  A  great 
deal  of  it  seemed  rather  poor,  with  a  great  deal  of  wood- 
principally  pine,  and  some  indifferent  oaks  and  other  trees. 
I  am  told  that  the  original  pine  of  the  Southern  country 
is  a  very  good  wood ;  but  when  these  trees  have  been  once  cut 
the  second  growth,  which  comes  up  spontaneously,  is  gene 
rally  a  tree  of  an  inferior  species.  Most  of  the  soil  seemed 
to  be  reddish  and  rather  light,  but  a  good  deal  of  it  is  culti 
vated  ;  and  as  we  got  South  cotton  became  common.  The 
cotton  crop  is  now  ripe  upon  the  ground,  and  picking  is 
going  on.  My  general  impression  of  the  cotton  I  saw 
was  that  it  gives  one  the  idea  of  a  great  extent  of  culti 
vation,  rather  than  of  very  high  cultivation.  I  am  told 
that  the  cotton-plant  grows  very  well  in  this  reddish, 
lightish  soil ;  in  fact,  it  prefers  a  light  soil,  if  it 
have  only  a  little  manure.  This  country  is  rather  far 
North  for  its  cultivation.  The  largest  amount  of  cotton  is 
by  no  means  produced  from  the  largest  plants.  Some  very 


NORTH   CAROLINA.  303 

small,  short  plants  are  very  heavy  with  cotton.  There  is  a 
great  variety  in  the  yield ;  some  fields  seeming  very  heavy, 
others  very  poor. 

I  noticed  many  very  miserable  huts  scattered  about  in 
an  isolated  way  among  the  fields  and  the  woods.  They  seem 
to  be  mostly  of  one  pattern,  and  were  inhabited  both  by 
white  people  and  by  blacks.  I  remarked  to  my  fellow- 
passengers  on  the  wretchedness  of  these  houses,  and  they 
admitted  that  the  cottages  are  certainly  very  poor  ;  but  they 
say  in  the  South  people  are  less  in  need  of  good  houses,  as  the 
climate  is  more  favourable.  I  understand  that  these  isolated 
houses  have  been  built  since  the  war.  Before  the  war  the  people 
— at  any  rate,  the  blacks — used  to  live  together  in  planta 
tion  settlements.  Since  the  war  both  whites  and  blacks  have 
got  land  who  had  it  not  before.  The  two  first  acquaintances 
I  made  both  came  into  these  Southern  parts  with  the  Federal 
army,  and  stayed  at  the  end  of  the  war.  One  of  them  is  an 
Englishman  ;  they  both  seem  to  be  on  good  terms  with  the 
people  with  whom  they  are  engaged  in  cotton-buying  and 
such  business. 

In  the  cotton-fields  I  several  times  noticed  white  people 
at  work,  but  the  majority  of  the  cotton  cultivators  seemed  to 
be  black.  White  and  black  children  seemed  friendly  enough 
together,  but  intermarriage  is  prohibited.  It  seems,  how 
ever,  that  there  has  been  a  good  deal  of  intermixture  of 
races,  and  many  of  the  coloured  people  are  not  pure  blacks. 
I  have  heard  it  said  with  much  truth,  that  since  it  is  so 
there  is  much  ground  for  legalising  intermarriage.  The 
cotton  is  all  ginned  by  machinery,  and  what  is  called  half- 
pressed.  All  over  the  country  there  are  ginning  mills  and 
pressing  machines,  where  the  cotton  is  made  up  and  sent  to 
the  great  ports,  where  it  is  re-pressed  for  export.  Much  of 
the  cotton  seed  is  used  for  manure  ;  in  fact,  the  seed  makes 
the  best  manure  for  this  crop.  I  am  told  the  settlers  who 
have  come  to  North  Carolina  of  late  years  have,  in  most 
instances,  not  succeeded  very  well ;  they  were  very  often 
cheated  by  land  companies,  and  did  not  understand  the  busi- 


304  MY  JOURNAL. 

ness  ;  but  there  are  some  Northern  farmers  who  have  done 
very  well. 

There  was  a  second  class  on  the  train  chiefly  occupied  by 
negroes,  but  not  exclusively  so.  I  noticed  an  advertisement 
of  a  travelling  agent,  who  wants  '  150  farmers  to  go  to 
Texas,'  and  offers  to  engage  them  '  either  on  wages  or  on 
shares.'  Both  my  travelling  acquaintances,  though  in  some 
sense  carpet-baggers  themselves,  speak  strongly  of  the  evils 
of  the  carpet-bag  government  of  the  Southern  States. 

Kaleigh  seems  to  be  a  pretty  country  place,  with  plenty 
of  flowers  and  good  vegetation.  I  went  to  the  Yarborough 
House  Hotel,  which  I  found  comfortable.  Reading  the  local 
papers  in  the  evening,  I  saw  that  most  of  the  seats  in  Con 
gress  for  this  State  are  contested.  I  did  not  see  evidence  of 
any  great  bitterness.  In  the  papers  I  noticed  an  account  of 
a  local  county  meeting  for  Wayne  County — not  a  popular 
meeting,  but  only  of  the  County  Commissioners,  who  are  five 
in  number.  The  subjects  seemed  very  like  those  dealt  with 
by  our  Local  Boards.  I  remarked  the  following : — The  poor- 
house  and  paupers  ;  the  county  gaol  ;  roads  and  bridges,  and 
apportionment  of  labour — in  these  States  the  inhabitants  are 
bound  to  work  on  the  roads  on  the  system  which  used  to  be 
called  '  Statute  labour '  in  Scotland — ;  spirit  licences  ; 
valuation  of  property  ;  registration  of  voters  ;  arrangement 
of  school  districts ;  appointment  of  a  local  constable  on  a 
casual  vacancy.  It  is  mentioned  that  there  are  nine  paupers 
in  the  poor-house — four  white  and  five  coloured — and  then 
there  is  a  notice  of  small  allowances  granted  to  out-paupers. 

Later  in  the  evening  I  went  to  a  Democratic  meeting, 
but  it  was  very  cold,  and  the  meeting  was  thinly  attended. 
The  people  were  very  silent  and  undemonstrative  while  the 
orator  exposed  financial  questions.  He  went  in  for  an  ex 
tended  currency,  without  precisely  saying  that  he  meant 
greenbacks.  He  was  against  protection.  He  said  that  the 
property  of  Massachusetts  is  ten  times  greater  than  that  of 
North  Carolina,  but  the  United  States'  taxation  is  not  in  the 
same  proportion.  '  Money,'  he  said,  '  was  unjustly  appre 
ciated,  and  everything  else  depreciated.' 


NORTH   CAROLINA.  305 

Next  day  I  called  on  the  Governor  of  the  State,  Mr. 
Vance,  who  received  me  very  civilly,  and  with  him  I  found  an 
old  Mr.  C ,  of  Scotch  descent,  and  formerly  a  rich  pro 
prietor,  who  had  at  least  a  thousand  slaves,  but  who  now 
talks  as  if  he  was  terribly  reduced.  He  said  that  what  has 
protected  people  in  this  State  is  the  homestead  law.  I  after 
wards,  however,  heard  that  he  is  understood  to  be  quite  rich, 
and  that  he  does  not  like  the  homestead  law,  because  it  pro 
tects  debtors  too  much.  That  homestead  law  is  certainly  very 

much  in  force  here  ;   and  Mr.  C described  it  as  saving  to 

a  man  just  as  much  land  as  his  neighbours  choose  to  lay  out 
for  him  under  the  valuation  clauses,  so  that,  he  says,  creditors 
have  suffered  more  than  debtors.  I  also  made  the  acquaint 
ance  of  Mr.  D ,  one  of  the  principal  residents,  also  of  his 

son,  and  some  other  gentlemen.     Messrs.  D claim  to  hold 

their  land  under  a  royal  grant,  and  are  Episcopalians,  but  I 
understand  that  there  are  comparatively  few  Episcopalians 
in  North  Carolina,  which  was  not  so  aristocratic  in  its  origin 
as  Virginia  on  the  one  side,  and  South  Carolina  on  the  other. 
Different  parts  of  the  State  are  still  held  by  the  descendants 
of  the  original  settlers  ;  very  few  foreigners  have  come  in  of 
late  years.  The  part  near  the  sea  was  principally  occupied 
by  Englishmen,  with  blacks  under  them.  Then  a  great  part 
of  the  low-lying  country  inland  towards  the  borders  of  South 
Carolina  is  occupied  by  a  large  Scotch -Highland  settlement, 
who,  I  am  told,  still  speak  Graelic.  They  are  a  hard-working 
population,  who  never  had  many  slaves,  but  worked  them 
selves,  getting  out  timber  and  growing  corn  and  cotton. 
Materially  speaking,  they  have  not  prospered  exceedingly  ; 
but  they  have  educated  themselves,  and  do  well  on  the  whole. 
They  are  said  to  have  come  after  the  rebellion  of  '45,  and 
among  them  Flora  Macdonald.  They  are  Presbyterians.  In 
another  part  of  the  State  there  is  a  strong  colony  of  Scotch- 
Irish.  Further  West  there  are  many  Germans,  and  much  of 
the  mountainous  country  in  the  extreme  West  is  occupied  by 
Moravians  and  other  such  settlers,  who  used  to  live  a  very 
rough  and  isolated  life.  These  people  it  was  who,  aided  by 
a  great  many  deserters  and  others,  rebelled  against  the  Con- 

x 


306  MY  JOURNAL. 

federate  Government  during  the  war,  as  did  many  of  the 
people  in  Andrew  Johnson's  country  in  East  Tennessee.  In 
those  days  they  used  to  be  called  '  Bush  Whackers.'  They  were 
influenced  partly  by  the  old  Whig  spirit,  partly  by  a  dislike 
of  the  war,  and  partly  by  a  dislike  of  the  compulsory  service 
which  it  was  sought  to  impose  upon  them.  The  black  popula 
tion  is  most  numerous  in  the  low-lying  lands  in  the  eastern 
part  of  the  State.  In  the  rest,  whites  are  more  numerous. 

Before  the  war  the  most  valuable  property  consisted  of 
slaves.     The  direct  profit  from  their  work  did  not  suffice  to 
pay  the  interest  on  the  capital  sunk  upon  them,  and  the  real 
profit  was  in  the  increase  of  the  slaves  and  selling  them 
away.     Old  Mr.  C —   -  says,  with  evident  pride  in  his  good 
management,  that  by  feeding  his  slaves  well  and  marrying 
them  judiciously,  he  used  to  double  their  number  in  twenty 
years.     After  the  war  the  people  had   neither   money  nor 
stock,  and  were  very  badly  off  indeed.     Some  of  the  low 
lands,  protected  by  dykes  which  needed  care   and  labour, 
have  now  been  flooded  and  disused,  and  in  that  part  of  the 
country  the  negroes  live  by  fishing,  etc.,  and  only  grow  a 
very  moderate  amount  of  cotton  and    corn.     It   has  been 
found,  however,  of  late  years  that  the  higher  red  land,  which 
was  not  before  supposed  to  be  good  for  cotton,  does  grow 
it  exceedingly  well,  and  very  much  land  has  been  brought 
under  cotton  which  was  not  so  cultivated  before,  partly  by 
breaking  up  new  land  and  partly  by  substituting  cotton  for 
corn,  grass,  and  pigs.     Bacon  is  now  brought  from  the  West 
very  cheap.     This  change  has  especially  taken  place  in  the 
district  about  Raleigh,  in  which  very  little  cotton  was  grown 
before,  whereas  Raleigh  is  now  a  very  large  cotton  mart. 
I  am  told  that  few  large  farmers  succeed,  though  some  do 
more  or  less,  chiefly  those  who  have  a  knack  of  managing 
the  negroes.     Generally  speaking,  the  most  successful  are 
the  smaller  farmers,  who  work  themselves  with  their  families. 
At  first  these   people  were  obliged  to  get   advances  from 
factors  and  commission  agents.     Now  they  are  getting  more 
independent,  and  would  do  very  well  if  they  could  only  get 
a  tolerable  price  for  their  cotton.     Cotton  is  in  these  parts 


NORTH  CAROLINA.  307 

the  only  crop  that  brings  money,  except  tobacco,  which  is 
cultivated  to  a  considerable  extent  in  one  part  of  this  State. 
A  good  deal  of  the  land  has  changed  hands  since  the  war, 
and  every  man  who  has  prudence  can  get  land.  Still 
although  some  small  people,  both  white  and  black,  get  land 
of  their  own,  much  more  is  rented  on  various  terms.  Many 
proprietors  cultivate  some  land  themselves,  and  rent  out  the 

rest.     Some  proprietors  (old  Mr.  C ,  for  instance)  rent  out 

the  land  in  large  blocks  to  white  farmers,  who  pay  them  one- 
third  of  the  corn  and  one-fourth  of  the  cotton,  and  these 
white  farmers  again  (who  seem  to  be  a  sort  of  middle  men) 
make  arrangements  with  the  blacks ;  perhaps  they  find  the 
mules,  etc.,  and  get  two-thirds  of  the  crop.  Many  blacks 
again  take  farms  direct  from  the  proprietors ;  and  these,  Mr. 

C says,  are  the  best  farmers.    Very  often  rent  is  paid  in 

the  shape  of  a  fixed  quantity  of  cotton  ;  there  is  very  seldom 
a  money  rent.  I  have  seen  a  good  many  cotton -fields  near 
the  town,  and  talked  over  the  system  of  cultivation.  One 
mule  is  sufficient,  the  plough  being  a  light  one.  The  crop 
requires  much  ploughing,  and  hoeing  and  labour,  but  little 
machinery.  The  seed  is  drilled  in,  then  ploughed  between 
the  drills,  and  the  plants  are  thinned  out  by  hoeing  like  our 
turnips ;  in  fact,  the  cultivation  a  good  deal  reminded  me 
of  turnip  cultivation.  Manure  seems  to  be  very  generally 
used.  A  bale1  an  acre  is  a  very  good  crop,  but  half  or  three 
quarters  of  a  bale  is  more  common.  In  the  lower  land 
further  east  they  get  more  cotton  to  the  acre,  but  it  is 
inferior  in  quality  to  the  upland  cotton,  and  the  farmers 
on  the  lowlands  do  not  seem  to  be  so  independent.  It  is 
most  frequently  necessary  for  the  proprietor  to  supply 
everything,  and  that  system  generally  breaks  down  in  the 
end.  Here  a  small  farmer  can  cultivate  about  twenty-five 
acres  of  cotton  if  he  has  a  family  to  help  him.  By  far  the 
greater  portion  of  the  land  round  Ealeigh  seems  to  be  under 
cotton  ;  one  sees  large  stretches  of  it.  Besides  the  few 
blacks  who  possess  farms  of  their  own,  very  many  own  houses 
and  small  patches  of  land  not  large  enough  to  make  them 

1  About  450  Ibs. 
x  2 


308  MY  JOURNAL. 

independent  farmers,  and  these  men  work  as  lured  labourers 
besides  cultivating  their  patches.  I  hear  no  complaint  that 
the  blacks  about  here  are  idle.  There  is  no  decrease  in  their 
numbers,  but  owing  to  their  careless  habits  they  are  not  now 
increasing  so  fast  as  they  used  to,  nor  so  fast  as  the  whites. 
The  disadvantage  in  regard  to  labour  in  these  parts  is  that 
the  female  labour,  which  was  largely  available  in  slave  times, 
is  now  lost,  as  the  black  women  will  not  work ;  they  like  to 
copy  the  whites  in  this  respect,  and  the  preachers  have  taken 
the  side  of  the  women.  They  cook  and  wash  and  do  house 
hold  work,  but,  excepting  the  cotton-picking  at  the  picking 
season,  will  seldom  do  field  work.  Those  of  the  lower  class 
of  whites  who  have  no  energy  to  rise  above  the  position  of 
hired  labourers  are  no  better  off  than  the  blacks,  and  are  not 
paid  higher,  but  by  far  the  greater  part  of  the  hired  labour 
is  black.  In  the  town,  labourers  get  nearly  a  dollar  a  day  ;  in 
the  country  they  are  hired  at  eight  or  ten  dollars  a  month 
with  a  house  and  rations,  or  fifty  cents  a  day  without  rations. 
I  hear  complaints  that  many  of  the  white  people  go  West 
instead  of  improving  the  lands  at  home  ;  many  of  the  High 
landers  have  gone  west.  Here  also  I  am  told  that  the  only 
complaint  against  the  negroes  is  that,  though  generally 
willing  to  work,  they  are  too  much  inclined  to  take  holidays 
and  amuse  themselves.  That  is  said  to  be  an  objection  to 
employing  them  in  mills  and  places  where  regular  labour 
is  required.  They  are  apt  to  go  to  church  meetings  or  to 
market  the  produce  of  their  little  patches.  They  drink 
more  than  is  good  for  them,  but  I  do  not  gather  that  they 
are  very  drunken. 

Good  land  can  be  bought  in  these  parts  at  from  five  to 
twelve  dollars  an  acre,  but  there  is  much  poor  land  to  be  had 
for  one  or  two  dollars.  In  the  hilly  part  of  this  State  there 
is  no  limestone,  and  they  say  that  lime  is  necessary  to  make 
bone  and  produce  a  good  race  of  men  or  animals.  At  any 
rate,  they  do  not  fatten  cattle  very  much,  but  they  raise 
store  cattle  in  the  hilly  parts  and  send  them  to  Virginia. 
Indian  corn  grows  well.  I  am  told  that  it  is  not  considered 
to  be  suited  to  a  tropical  climate.  Even  in  the  most 


NORTH   CAROLINA.  309 

southerly  States  of  the  Union  it  is  not  so  good  as  in  the 
central  States.  The  rainfall  here  seems  to  be  very  good ;  it 
averages  upwards  of  forty  inches  per  annum,  and  is  pretty 
regular.  Perhaps  three-fourths  of  the  State  is  still  covered 
with  wood,  and  most  of  this  might  be  cultivated  if  it  were 
cleared,  and  manure  were  more  or  less  used.  A  good  deal 
of  wheat  is  grown,  but  not  much  barley  or  oats. 

Governor  Vance,  though  now  a  Democrat,  comes  from  the 

Western  hill  country,  and  both  he  and  Mr.  C and  others 

whom  I  met  seemed  to  be  very  well  inclined  towards  the 
negroes,  saying  that  they  often  make  the  best  farmers,  and 
generally  the  best  labourers.     The  Governor  says,  that  on 
the  whole  the  black  representatives  sent  to  the  Legislature 
are  fairly  selected ;  illiterate  they  are,  but  some  of  them  are 
quite  well-disposed  and  sensible.     He  instances  as  one  of  the 
best  a  black  carpenter  who  sits  in  the  Legislature,  and  when 
not  so  engaged  works  well  at  his  trade.     Most  of  the  skilled 
trades  are  in  the  hands  of  the  whites,  but  there  are  black 
carpenters,  blacksmiths,  and  bricklayers,  and  the  whites  have 
not  attempted  to  put  them  down.  In  the  last  State  Assembly 
there  were  fourteen  blacks,  and  there  are  still  eight  of  them 
in  the  State  Legislature.   None  of  the  State  judges  are  black, 
but   some    of   the   county   officers  are.      There   is  a  black 
prosecuting  attorney  at  Raleigh,  but  he  is  not  very  good.   In 
this  State  blacks  are  allowed  to  sit  on  juries,  and  do  to  some 
extent,  but  not  very  many  of  them.     There  is  still  a  very 
strong  social  prejudice  against  people  with  any  tinge  of  colour, 
especially  among  ladies,  who  would  not  for  their  lives  sit  in 
the  same  room  with  a  coloured  man.     I  am  told  that  the 
last  Governor  was  obliged  to  give  up  his  receptions  because 
of  the  difficulty  about  the  black  members  of  the  Legislature, 
for  if  they  came  no  whites  would  come.     The  whites  have 
agreed  to  accept  the  blacks  for  business  purposes,  but  not  for 
social  purposes.     This  State  was  originally  entirely  against 
secession  and  war.     It  was  formerly  a  very  Whig  State,  and 
although  afterwards  the  Democrats  prevailed,  when  the  quarrel 
between  the  North  and  South  came  North  Carolina  voted 
entirely  against  secession,  till  Lincoln's  military  measures  for 


310  MY  JOURNAL. 

the  coercion  of  the  South  excited  the  opposition  of  the  more 
moderate  Southerners ;  then  North  Carolina  took  the  Con 
federate  side,  and  supplied  a  very  large  number  of  soldiers  to 
the  Confederate  army.  After  the  war  there  was  a  good  deal 
of  bitterness — carpet-bag  rule  lasted  for  some  time,  and  there 
were  Klu-klux  organizations  against  it ;  but  now  things 
have  quieted  down. 

In  the  present  election  there  are  still  some  '  radical ' 
candidates,  and  some  independent  ones ;  the  result  of  the 
election  remains  to  be  seen.  In  this  State,  also,  the  blacks 
have  two  or  three  militia  companies,  but  they  are  deterred 
from  forming  more  by  the  expense.  In  the  present  Congress 
there  is  only  one  Eepublican  from  the  State,  a  white  man. 
He  was  formerly  Governor  of  the  State,  and  was  well  liked, 
but  I  understand  that  he  is  not  to  be  re-elected.  The  blacks 
have  put  up  candidates  of  their  own,  and  are  likely  to  elect 
a  black  man  if  they  do  not  lose  the  seat  by  division  among 
themselves,  for  two  blacks  are  opposing  one  another  ;  one  of 
them  said  to  have  been  originally  a  West  Indian.  In  the 
mountain  regions  the  white  people  seem  now  to  be  generally 
Democrats.  General  Vance,  the  Governor's  brother,  is  not 
opposed  there. 

As  in  Virginia,  there  has  been  a  recent  revision  of  the 
Constitution,  modifying  that  imposed  on  the  State  after  the 
war — much  more  so  apparently  than  in  Virginia.  The  State 
judges  are  still  elected  by  the  people,  but  the  justices  of  the 
peace  are  nominated  by  a  committee  of  the  Assembly,  and 
these  j  ustices  elect  the  county  commissioners,  so  that  there 
is  really  no  popular  local  self-government  except  in  towns. 
However,  it  is  said  that  things  are  fairly  managed,  and  that 
by  way  of  compromise  the  committee  of  the  Assembly  appoint 
some  of  both  parties.  Under  this  arrangement  some  blacks 
are  appointed  to  office.  The  blacks  are  said  not  to  have  '  the 
same  cohesion  for  purposes  of  public  plunder  as  the  whites.' 

Up  to  1830  the  parties  in  the  United  States  were  Hamil- 
tonian  and  Jeifersonian,  otherwise,  Federal  and  Republican. 
Then  they  changed  their  names  to  those  of  Whig  and  Demo 
crat.  But  at  the  time  of  the  war  the  Whigs  gave  up,  and  the 


NORTH  CAROLINA.  311 

present  Republicans  took  their  place,  so  that,  in  fact,  the  title 
of  Republican  has  changed  sides ;  the  Jeffersonian  Republicans 
of  former  days  now  being  represented  by  the  Democrats,  while 
the  successors  of  the  Hamiltonian  federals  are  called  Re 
publicans. 

In  North  Carolina  there  was  a  property  qualification  for 
the  franchise  up  to  1850,  and  before  1855  any  free  blacks 
possessed  of  property  were  admitted  to  the  franchise.  After 
those  dates  blacks  were  excluded,  and  all  whites  were  admit 
ted.  The  system  of  taxation  here  seems  very  much  like  that 
in  Virginia.  Besides  the  property  tax  there  is  an  income 
tax,  from  which  the  necessary  expense  of  living,  not  to 
exceed  $\  ,000  in  any  case,  is  exempted.  There  is  a  con 
siderable  State  debt,  but  no  attempt  is  made  to  pay  interest 
upon  it  at  present.  The  roads  are  very  bad;  apparently 
there  are  no  metalled  roads  in  all  the  State,  only  the  common 
earth  roads  made  by  the  labour  of  the  people  themselves,  and 
very  indifferently  made. 

The  town  of  Raleigh  is,  as  usual,  very  scattered,  with 
broad  streets  quite  unpaved,  and  a  good  deal  of  ornamental 
ground  about  the  houses.  The  population  of  the  place  is  about 
12,000.  The  Capitol  is  a  fine  building,  in  a  commanding 
situation.  I  noticed  a  very  large  lunatic  asylum,  and  there 
seemed  to  be  a  good  many  other  institutions.  There  are 
many  whiskey  shops,  and  a  good  many  churches.  The  cotton 
market  is  very  busy  ;  the  general  market  seems  well  supplied. 
The  most  common  fish  in  these  parts  are  what  are  called  sea- 
trout  ;  but  I  do  not  think  that  they  are  our  sea-trout,  and 
they  do  not  seem  very  good.  I  am  told  that  in  the  streams 
in  the  hill-country  there  is  very  abundant  trout-fishing. 

In  the  evening  I  went  out  to  take  tea  with  old  Mr.  D 

who  has  a  very  pretty  place,  with  a  very  nice  house,  beautiful 
grounds,  and  a  most  pleasant  family.  All  the  arrangements 
seemed  simple  and  unpretending,  but  very  nice  and  com 
fortable.  I  had  some  more  talk  with  the  Messrs.  D .  They 

say  local  bodies  do  not  borrow  very  much,  because  no  one 
will  trust  them  in  these  days.  A  railway  is  now  being  made 
by  the  State  through  the  mountain  country,  principally  by 


312  MY  JOURNAL. 

convict  labour.  I  saw  in  the  papers  that  a  man  has  been 
sentenced  to  death  for  burglary,  and,  on  enquiry,  I  find  that 
burglary  is  a  capital  offence  in  this  State,  though  the  capital 
sentence  may  not  be  very  often  carried  into  effect  in  such  a 
case.  On  the  other  hand,  corporal  punishment  is  not  used 
for  minor  offences,  as  it  is  in  Virginia.  It  seems  to  be  more 
profitable  to  imprison  offenders  and  work  them. 

The  next  day  I  visited  the  State  Agricultural  and  Geolo 
gical  Museum,  established  in  pursuance  of  a  law  which  seems 
now  to  be  the  fashion  in  most  of  the  States.  The  Agricul 
tural  Commissioner  seems  to  be  an  active  man  ;  he  has  a  very 
good  agricultural  collection,  and  appears  to  be  doing  his  best 
to  improve  the  staples  of  the  country.  He  has  also  some  very 
useful  maps.  This  State  runs  a  great  length  from  east  to 
west,  and  he  divides  it  into  three  belts.  First,  the  swampy 
country  to  the  east,  which  is  rich,  but  very  much  of  it  is 
under  water  or  under  jungle ;  when  reclaimed  it  is  very  good 
for  rice  and  corn  and  such  staples,  but,  owing  to  the  disre 
pair  of  the  dykes  already  mentioned,  much  of  it  is  in  a  bad 
way.  Then,  in  the  centre  of  the  State,  is  a  country  of  sandy 
and  red  soil,  much  of  it  covered  with  pine  trees,  but  also 
very  much  of  it  under  cotton.  This  is,  in  fact,  the  cotton 
belt.  Then  there  is  the  high  country  in  the  west  of  the  State, 
•with  a  granite  soil  and  an  oak  vegetation.  There  they  grow 
tobacco  and  wheat,  and  raise  cotton.  They  have  also  a  good 
many  minerals,  and  hope  to  have  a  good  many  more  if  the 
country  is  opened  out.  In  the  far  western  corner  of  this 
State  is  the  highest  mountain  in  all  the  Eastern  States, 
nearly  7,000  feet  high,  I  think.  The  hill-country  is  said 
to  be  very  charming.  In  the  Agricultural  Collections  in 
these  States  I  noticed,  what  I  also  noticed  in  the  Paris 
Exhibition,  the  absence  of  any  collection  of  Indian  products. 
I  think  our  Indian  Agricultural  Department  should  supply 
these.  I  notice  here  specimens  of  the  Indian  Jawaree,  the 
Nile  Dhoura,  and  well  known  in  Southern  Europe  under  I 
forget  what  name.  It  is  one  of  the  most  widely  cultivated 
food-grains  in  the  world,  but  the  cultivation  does  not  seem  ta 
have  taken  root  in  the  States.  The  specimens  here  are  called 


NORTH   CAROLINA.  313 

'  Pampas- corn.'  Sweet  potatoes  are  a  very  great  product  in 
the  Southern  States ;  they  grow  to  an  enormous  size,  more 
like  mangolds.  There  are  some  good  specimens  of  beet  and 
mangolds,  but  I  understand  that  they  are  not  much  grown. 
The  turnips  are  very  poor.  Eed  clover,  I  understand,  grows 
well.  For  fertilizers,  besides  using  the  cotton  seed,  they 
have  any  quantity  of  good  marl  and  phosphates  from  the 
Charleston  beds. 

I  visited  Mr.  S ,  the  State  Superintendent  of  Educa 
tion  ;  he  does  not  give  a  very  good  account  of  his  department. 
Education  in  former  days  was  at  a  very  low  ebb,  and  it  does 
not  seem  to  have  been  very  much  raised.  The  Constitution 
requires  that  the  schools  should  be  kept  open  for  at  least  four 
months  in  the  year,  but,  owing  to  want  of  funds  and  other 
causes,  it  appears  from  the  last  returns  that  the  average  time 
during  which  each  school  was  actually  open  was  not  more 
than  eight  weeks.  But  there  is  some  private  schooling,  and, 
perhaps,  half  of  the  grown  white  people  can  read  and  write. 
Very  many  of  them,  however,  are  quite  ignorant,  some  even 
who  hold  good  farms.  The  blacks  were,  at  first,  very  zealous 
about  education,  but  seem  to  be  discouraged,  and  not  to  be 
so  zealous  now.  The  Education  Department  has  the  greater 
part  of  the  State  poll-tax,  a  share  of  the  general  property 
tax,  and  the  swampy  lands  which  still  belong  to  the  State. 
There  seems  to  have  been  some  difficulty  as  to  the  arrange* 
ments  for  spending  the  money,  for  the  last  report  complains 
that  there  was  a  balance  unspent  in  several  of  the  counties. 
Besides  the  State  schools  the  blacks  have  the  benefit  of  a 
good  manyfreedmen's  schools,  still  maintained  by  subscriptions 
from  the  North.  The  public  money  for  schools  is  equally  dis 
tributed  between  the  white  and  black  schools,  per  capita, 
The  blacks  have  about  half  as  many  schools  as  the  whites. 
About  half  of  the  whole  number  of  children  are  upon  the 
school  rolls,  but  the  average  attendance  is  only  about  one- 
fourth.  In  this  State  the  majority  of  the  teachers  are  males 
The  Southern  whites  do  not  like  to  teach  black  children,, 
and  it  is  necessary  either  to  get  Northerners  or  to  employ 
coloured  teachers. 


314  MY  JOURNAL. 

Mr.  D kindly  arranged  for  me  a  little  trip  into  the 

country  to  see  the  farmers.  The  land  generally  seemed  to 
be  the  light  red  soil  which  I  before  mentioned,  undulating 
and  with  much  wood  about.  Cotton  is  by  far  the  principal 
cultivation.  I  thought  it  certainly  not  so  highly-cultivated 
a  crop  as  the  cotton  I  had  seen  in  Egypt,  and  the  land  here  is 
infinitely  less  valuable  than  land  in  Egypt ;  but  in  many  fields 
there  are  this  year  very  good  crops,  from  three-quarters  to 
one  bale  per  acre.  I  was  interested  in  a  nice  little  farm  of 
a  black  man,  who  produces  in  a  good  season  almost  twenty 
bales  of  cotton.  He  was  a  frank  and  communicative  person ; 
he  is  totally  illiterate,  but  seems  to  understand  his  business 
as  a  farmer.  He  pays  3^  bales  of  cotton  as  rent,  but 
does  not  know  how  many  acres  lie  has.  His  cotton  crops 
seemed  good,  though  much  of  the  land  has  been  sown  with 
cotton  seven  years  in  succession.  He  also  grows  some  corn 
and  some  hay  for  his  mule  ;  has  no  cows,  but  some  pigs.  The 
owner  only  found  materials  for  a  very  poor  house,  and  he  put  it 
up.  He  holds  from  year  to  year  without  a  lease,  and  says  that 
as  the  owner  will  not  improve  his  house  and  fences  he  thinks 
of  trying  to  get  land  of  his  own.  Much  of  the  land  now  under 
crop  he  has  himself  cleared  from  wood,  and  his  rent  has  been 
increased  in  consequence.  Evidently  much  of  the  land  in 
these  parts  has  recently  been  reclaimed  from  forest.  This  man 
has  one  son  working  with  him,  who  gets  a  share  of  the  pro 
ceeds.  His  wife  and  daughters  assist  more  or  less  at  harvest 
times.  He  has  only  one  mule.  He  has  several  other  sons, 
for  one  of  whom  he  has  bought  four  acres  of  land  on  which 
the  son  has  established  a  blacksmith's  shop.  Another  son 
works  as  a  farm-labourer  at  fifty  cents  a-day,  and  two  others 
rent  farms  in  another  part  of  the  country.  A  little  further 
on  we  went  over  the  farm  of  a  white  man.  This  is  also 
rented.  The  house  and  farm  buildings  seemed  quite  good. 
The  farmer  was  a  decent  man,  but  a  brother  who  works  with 
him  looks  dissipated  and  inferior.  He  has  a  wife  and  family. 
The  children  go  to  school.  He  has  a  good  deal  of  wood  on 
his  land,  and  sells  wood  in  the  town.  The  family  do  not  seem 
very  communicative.  I  have  generally  noticed  that  the 


NORTH   CAROLINA.  315 

wives  of  American  small  farmers  are  not  very  free-spoken, 
and  keep  in  the  background  more  than  such  women  would  in 
this  country.  Besides  this  brother,  the  farmer  has  two  hired 
servants,  one  black  and  the  other  white  ;  they  are  paid  the 
same,  and  he  says  that  the  black  is  the  best.  He  too  pays  a 
rent  in  cotton — a  fixed  quantity.  Further  on  we  came  upon 
a  farm  of  about  forty  acres,  owned  by  a  black.  He  had  a 
good  house,  but  the  land  seemed  rather  slovenly,  not  so  well 
cultivated  as  the  rented  farm.  We  then  visited  the  farm  of 
a  considerable  proprietor,  who  has  also  a  business  in  the  town. 
He  cultivates  himself  between  200  and  300  acres,  of  which  he 
has  115  acres  under  cotton.  His  old  father  looks  after  the 
farm  here.  He  follows  a  system  of  rotation  of  crops  more  or 
less,  but  not  very  strictly.  He  sometimes  grows  cotton  two 
or  three  years  in  succession  without  any  change.  He  has  a 
ginning  mill ;  a  white  man  has  charge  of  that.  The  rest  of 
his  labourers  are  black.  He  keeps  a  good  number  of  Alder- 
ney  cows,  and  raises  them  for  sale.  His  land  is  all  well 
fenced. 

We  met  many  men  with  carts  bringing  in  produce,  some 
white  and  some  black ;  they  seemed  very  much  on  an  equality. 
On  the  roads  of  the  town  I  saw  white  and  black  men  work 
ing  together.  I  noticed  that  the  favourite  amusement  with 
the  negro  boys  seems  to  be  to  drill  as  mock  soldiers,  with 
sticks  and  flags  and  wooden  muskets. 

I  visited  Mr.  T ,  head  of  the  Shaw  Institute,  a  college 

maintained  by  Northern  subscription  to  educate  black 
teachers.  _The  buildings  are  good,  and  it  seems  a  successful 

institution.      Mr.  T says  his  pupils  turn  out  well.     He 

is  a  Bostonian,  served  in  the  war,  and  is  now  rather  bitter  in 
his  political  talk.  He  takes  a  gloomy  view  of  the  prospects 
of  the  blacks,  and  is  much  in  favour  of  their  going  to  Liberia. 
He  says  there  is  no  justice  in  the  courts  either  for  Northern 
men  or  for  blacks,  especially  since  the  local  self-government 
of  places  populated  by  blacks  has  been  put  an  end  to  under 
the  revised  Constitution.  He  also  says  that  the  blacks  are 
much  cheated  in  regard  to  contracts  and  wages  due  to  them. 
In  these  Southern  States  it  is  considered  to  be  enough  for  a 


316  MY  JOURNAL. 

debtor  to  say  that  he  has  no  money.  I  fear  there  is  much 
truth  in  the  complaint  about  the  frequent  non-payment  of 

wages.     Mr.  T says  he  is  quite  isolated;    he  has  no 

sympathy  from  the  people  here.  He  has  a  bad  opinion  of 
the  present  State  Government,  but  a  worse  opinion  of  the 
carpet-bag  and  negro  politicians.  He  says  the  negro  mem 
bers  of  the  present  Assembly  are  rascals,  as  are  also  their 
candidates  for  Congress.  He  would  rather  vote  for  a 
Democrat  than  for  any  of  them.  He  has  some  building 
work  going  on ;  the  master-mason  is  a  black,  and  two  white 
men  are  among  the  workmen;  but  this  is  an  exceptional 
case,  and  could  not  ordinarily  occur.  He  thinks  the  blacks 
are  rather  slow  in  intellect  and  deficient  in  enterprise,  but 
they  are  otherwise  good.  Many  of  them  are  very  religious, 
but  many  others  have  very  little  idea  of  the  Christian  re 
ligion. 

Every  American  State  has  a  Secretary  of  State  under  the 
G-overnment.  I  made  the  acquaintance  of  the  Secretary 
of  State  here.  He  is  by  birth  a  Mississippian,  and  was 
editor  of  a  Democratic  paper  at  Wilmington,  the  port  of 
North  Carolina.  Journalists  are  not  confined  to  their  own 
vocation  so  much  as  with  us ;  they  often  rise  to  high  political 
offices. 

I  also  made  the  acquaintance  of  a  gentleman  of  fine 
presence  and  highly  civilized  manners,  who  seemed  to  be  a 
survivor  of  the  higher  class  of  proprietors.  He  seems  to  have 
preserved  his  fine  estates  in  South  Carolina  in  spite  of  the 
troubles,  and  he  maintains  a  great  stud  of  horses  and  other 
attributes  of  grandeur.  He  offered  to  drive  me  over  to  South 
Carolina  in  his  four-in-hand  drag,  and  to  show  me  the 
humours  of  a  Carolinian  election.  I  thought  I  had  at  last 
found  an  opportunity  of  seeing  one  of  the  Southern  aristocratic 
establishments,  and  accordingly  accepted  his  invitation  with 
joy ;  but  at  the  time  when  the  final  arrangements  were  to  be 
made,  he  did  not  appear  ;  and,  on  enquiry,  I  found  that  people 

talked  irreverently  of  him  as  '  Spanish  B ,'  and  hinted  that 

he  had  a  good  many  chateaux  in  Spain.      Next  morning,  he 
still  did  not  turn  upv  «o  I  thought  it  prudent  not  to  wait,  and 


NORTH   CAROLINA.  317 

followed  out  my  own  plans.     This  was  the  only  c  sell '  of  the 
kind  I  had  during  my  tour. 

I  have  been  looking  at  the  revised  Constitution  of  this 
State,  and  at  the  laws  passed  in  the  last  biennial  session  of 
the  Legislature — that  of  1876-77  ;  also  those  of  one  previous 
session — 1868-69.  By  this  constitution  jury  trial  may  be 
waived  in  civil  cases,  and  petty  misdemeanours  may  be  tried 
without  jury,  provided  in  such  case  there  is  the  right  of 
appeal.  Judges  and  judges'  clerks  are  elected  for  eight  and 
four  years  respectively.  No  decree  can  be  executed  against 
the  State.  The  revenue  is  to  be  raised  by  a  tax  on  all  pro 
perty,  an  income-tax,  licence  taxes,  and  a  poll-tax  on  all 
males  between  the  ages  of  21  and  50,  rot  exceeding  in 
amount  the  property-tax  on  $300,  and  also  not  exceeding 
two  dollars  per  poll  for  the  State  and  county  together.  Three- 
fourths  of  the  poll-tax  is  to  go  to  education,  and  one-fourth 
to  the  support  of  the  poor.  Towns  are  allowed  to  impose 
special  taxes  for  schools,  both  on  property  and  on  polls.  No 
more  money  may  be  borrowed  by  the  State  unless  a  special 
tax  is  at  the  same  time  raised  and  pledged  to  pay  off  the  loan. 
Local  bodies  may  borrow  only  after  a  plebiscite.  The  educa 
tion  of  blacks  and  whites  is  to  be  separate.  The  Assembly 
may  pass  a  compulsory  education  law,  but  has  not  done  so 
yet.  The  Assembly  is  to  arm  and  keep  up  the  militia. 
Black  companies  are  to  be  kept  separate  from  white  ones. 
Property  of  debtors  is  to  be  exempt  from  execution  for  debt 
to  the  extent  of  $500,  in  the  case  of  personal  property, 
and  homesteads  to  the  value  of  $1,000.  No  deed  for  the 
sale  of  a  homestead  is  valid  without  the  consent  of  the  wife. 
The  session  of  the  Legislature  is  limited  to  sixty  days.  Not 
withstanding  the  shortness  of  the  session,  the  mass  of  legisla 
tion  got  through  is  marvellous.  Perhaps  in  the  two  sessions 
I  have  examined  it  may  be  larger  than  usual  because  a 
Eevised  Constitution  had  been  passed  shortly  before  each  of 
these  sessions  ;  but  at  any  rate  the  Statute  Book  shows  great 
activity  and  frequent  dealing,  in  accordance  with  popular 
wants,  with  questions  we  should  hardly  touch  by  legislation. 
In  the  session  of  1876-77,  two  hundred  and  nine-three  public 


318  MY  JOURNAL. 

Acts  were  pa?sed,  besides  one  hundred  and  fourteen  private 
Acts.    In  the  session  of  1868-69  two  hundred  and  eighty-three 
public  Acts  were  passed,  and  of  these  latter  very  many  were 
large  and  important  Acts.     Among  the  Acts  of   1876-77    I 
notice  the  following : — An  Act  to  give  effect  to  the   new 
system   of  county   and   local    government    by    nomination 
through  a  committee  of  the  Assembly,  as  previously  noticed  ; 
several    Acts    regulating    judicial    functions,    jurisdiction, 
and  machinery ;  consolidated    revenue   and  school   Acts  ;  a 
valuation  Act ;  an  election  Act ;  an  Act  establishing  hypothec 
in  favour  of  landlords  ;  a  strict  Sunday-closing  Act,  without 
any  bonafide  traveller  or  other  such  exemptions,  except  for 
medical  prescriptions  (but  I  am  told  that  the  Act  is  a  good 
deal  evaded) ;  several  Acts  to  prohibit  altogether  the  sale  of 
liquor  in  certain  localities,  as,  for  instance,  within  two  miles 
of  certain  churches  and  institutions,  or  other  similar  areas ; 
and  one  Act  to  enable  the  people  of  a  particular  locality  to 
decide  by  vote  whether  liquor  shall  be  sold  or  not ;  an  Act  to 
regulate  the  employment  of  prisoners  and  the  letting  them 
out  for  hire ;   several  Acts  to  enable  particular  counties  to 
levy    special    taxes;     many    Acts   incorporating    towns    or 
amending  and  regulating  the  constitution  of  towns;    many 
Acts  to  settle  local  boundaries,  local  drainage  questions,  and 
the  like;    several  Acts   to  relieve  the  people  of  particular 
localities  of  any  hindrance  to  grazing  on  unenclosed  lands, 
restraining  excessive  weighing  charges,  and  the  like ;  a  good 
many  Acts  to  relieve  public  officers,  corporations,  or  indivi 
duals  from  pecuniary  or  other  liabilities ;  (most  frequently 
these  are  to  give  indemnity  to  sheriffs,  for  proceedings  not 
directly  legal)  ;    several  Acts  to  incorporate  railway  com 
panies  ;  principally  to  make  small  branch  railways — some  of 
them  narrow-gauge  lines — and  to  enable  counties  and  corpo 
rations  to  subscribe  to  such  railways.     There  is  a  curious 
game  law  to  prohibit  the  exportation  of  partridges  or  quails, 
dead  or  alive,  from  counties  near  railways,  on  the  ground 
that  they  are  useful  for  the  destruction  of  insects.     There  is 
very  much  game  in  this  part  of  the  country ;  large  bags  of 
partridges  are  got.     Some  of  the  lands  are  '  posted,'  that  is 


NORTH  CAROLINA.  319 

preserved ;  others  are  practically  free  to  sportsmen.  There 
is  another  Act,  supplementary  to  a  former  one,  for  the  pro 
tection  of  deer  in  certain  localities. 

I  have  talked  about  this  legislation  with  a  lawyer  who 
seems  to  be  of  the  Conservative  persuasion.  He  says  that 
there  is  a  great  deal  too  much  legislation — that  localities  and 
individuals  get  too  much  done  in  this  way,  and  that  there  is 
too  much  meddling.  Acts  of  this  kind  are  settled  out  of  the 
Legislature  by  bargaining  and  give  and  take,  and  the  more 
general  Acts  are  settled  by  party  caucus  before  being  brought 
into  the  Legislature.  After  they  are  brought  in  all  Bills  are 
referred  to  committees,  and  after  being  dealt  with  by  them 
are  generally  carried  in  the  Assembly  without  much  debate. 
The  cldture,  or  as  they  call  it,  '  the  previous  question,'  is 
much  used.  The  limitation  of  the  session  to  sixty  days  is  a 
recent  change — it  used  to  be  longer.  The  legislation  is,  he 
says,  very  loose.  The  Eevised  Code  was  very  loosely  passed., 
and  both  that  and  many  of  the  subsequent  Acts  give  much 
trouble  to  the  lawyers.  He  seems  rather  a  pessimist  upon 
the  subject.  I  have  not  been  able  quite  to  understand  the 
difference  between  the  public  and  private  Acts,  except  that 
the  latter  are  of  a  minor  character,  e.g.,  to  incorporate  small 
towns  and  villages  and  Masonic  Lodges  and  other  institutions. 
One  is  to  establish  a  '  Camping  Ground '  as  a  corporation ; 
apparently  these  camping  grounds  are  kept  for  religious 
meetings.  A  good  many  of  these  Acts  are  about  toll  and 
ferry  dues. 

I  spent  the  Sunday  here.  In  the  morning  I  went  to  a 
black  church,  but  was  not  very  fortunate,  as  there  had  been 
some  division  among  the  congregation,  and  the  place  was 
thinly  attended.  In  the  evening  I  found  a  better  congrega 
tion  at  another  church.  The  preacher  was  very  loud,  em 
phatic,  and  earnest,  but  there  was  not  very  much  cohesion  in 
what  he  said ;  the  singing  was  good.  I  went  out  with  Mr. 

B to  see  a  large  vineyard  that  he  has  started.     He  makes 

very  fair  wine,  but  only  the  native  American  vines  succeed — 
the  French  vines  have  quite  failed — blight  greatly  affects 
them  and  other  fruit  trees.  This  does  not  seem  to  be  much 


320  MY  JOURNAL. 

of  a  fruit  country.  Talking  about  cotton,  I  am  told  that  it  is 
a  very  hardy  plant,  and  does  not  suffer  from  occasional 
droughts.  They  say  that  not  only  has  the  cultivation  of 
cotton  in  these  parts  increased  in  area,  but  that  it  is  also 
much  better  cultivated  than  it  was  before  the  war.  They 
now  get  here  crops  which  before  the  war  were  only  got  in  the 
Mississippi  Valley.  In  the  case  of  rented  farms  it  is  a  matter 
of  bargain  who  is  to  supply  the  manure.  There  are  no  leases 
and  no  tenant-rights — but  unfortunately  the  manures  of 

commerce  do  not  last  much  more  than  one  year.  Mr.  B 

says  the  black  people  are  very  good  and  moderate  in  their 
way  of  living.  They  do  not  eat  too  much  meat — more  affect 
a  vegetable  diet,  and  are  healthy  in  consequence ;  but  they 
are  very  careless  in  cases  of  sickness,  and  wanting  in  kindness 
to  one  another  when  they  are  ill.  In  the  Municipality  of 
Ealeigh  there  are  eleven  whites  and  six  blacks.  The  black 

councillors  do  very  well,  says  Mr.  B .  He  himself  is  in 

the  Council,  and  having  had  occasion  to  differ  from  some  of 
his  colleagues  had  the  support  of  the  blacks. 

I  am  surprised  to  see  how  little  excitement  there  is  in 
regard  to  the  contested  election  which  is  to  take  place  the 
day  after  to-morrow.  There  are  no  placards,  and  few  signs  of 
a  struggle  going  on. 

Next  day  I  started  for  Salisbury,  a  place  in  this  State 
considerably  to  the  west.  The  country  is  still  undulating, 
with  a  mixture  of  wood  and  cultivation.  We  came  to  the  district 
where  tobacco  is  largely  grown,  and  stopped  some  time  at 
Durhams,  the  centre  of  the  tobacco  manufacture.  I  had  an 
opportunity  of  going  over  one  of  the  factories — in  fact,  one  of 
the  largest  manufactories  of  smoking  tobacco  in  the  United 
States.  They  also  manufacture  what  is  called  snuff,  but  it  is 
not  really  taken  as  snuff ;  it  is  chewed.  They  tell  me  that  a 
fine  quality  of  this  snuff  is  very  much  used  by  American 
ladies,  who  put  it  in  their  mouths  on  the  pretext  of  its  being 
good  for  the  teeth,  but  they  really  chew  it,  and  so  consume 
large  quantities.  I  never  could  get  anyone  to  admit  this 
practice,  but  so  said  the  manufacturers.  Here  also  almost 
all  the  work  is  done  by  blacks,  but  certain  departments — 


NORTH  CAROLINA.  321 

namely,  the  weighing  and  finishing  off  the  packages — are  ex 
clusively  in  the  hands  of  white  men.  Employers  never  can 
trust  the  blacks  with  anything  which  requires  careful  atten 
tion  and  accuracy. 

Travelling  along  I  noticed  both  black  and  white  men  in 
the  fields  and  cottages,  but  apparently  the  blacks  are  in  the 
majority.  They  seemed  to  be  the  main  labouring  population. 
The  country  seems  very  raviney,  and  if  the  land  is  not  cared 
for  it  is  apt  to  run  out  into  ravines,  as  frequently  happens 
in  the  hands  of  careless  tenants.  I  gather  that  it  frequently 
happens  that  when  land  has  been  over-cropped  it  is  abandoned 
to  wood  for  a  time — in  all  this  country  wherever  it  is  let 
alone  wood  springs  up. 

I  stopped  at  the  Haw  Biver  to  see  the  cotton  mills  there. 
They  carry  out  the  whole  process  of  manufacture,  from  clean 
ing  the  cotton  as  it  comes  loose  from  the  fields  to  the  manu 
facture  of  the  cloth  and  the  dyeing  of  it,  in  the  same  not 
very  large  establishment.  The  mills  are  worked  by  water 
power,  as  is  always  the  case  in  this  part  of  the  country.  All 
the  Atlantic  States  have  the  advantage  of  an  unlimited  water 
power,  the  country  sloping  from  the  Alleghanies  to  the  sea 
with  many  running  streams,  and  being  in  this  respect  a  great 
contrast  to  most  of  the  country  west  of  the  Alleghanies.  In 
the  mills  all  the  labour  is  white — there  are  no  blacks  em 
ployed  ;  they  are  said  not  to  be  sufficiently  careful.  At  any 

rate  it  is  not  the  habit  to  employ  them.     Colonel'H ,the 

manager  of  the  mill  which  I  visited,  first  said  that  the  labour 
was  excellent,  but  coming  to  details  he  found  a  good  many 
faults  with  his  people,  and  said  that  he  had  just  turned  off 
several  families  for  irregular  attendance  by  way  of  example. 
I  was  surprised  to  hear  that  the  working  hours  are  twelve 
hours  a  day.  That  system  is  fully  enforced.  The  people 
work  from  seven  in  the  morning  to  half-past  seven  in  the 
evening,  with  only  half-an-hour  for  dinner.  This  really 
seems  too  much,  and  I  gather  that  it  is  very  doubtful  whether 
more  is  done  in  twelve  hours  than  by  those  who  work  only 
ten  hours.  This  Southern  master  seemed  to  me  to  be  more 
severe  with  his  work  people  than  an  English  master  could  be. 

Y 


322  MY  JOURNAL. 

Perhaps  he  is  too  much  of  a  military  man.  The  women  earn 
about  fifty  cents  a  day,  the  men  from  seventy-five  cents  to  a 
dollar.  The  Southern  mills  seem  to  have  taken,  in  relation 
to  those  of  the  North,  much  the  same  position  which  the 
Indian  mills  do  to  those  of  Lancashire.  They  manufacture 
only  the  coarser  qualities  of  goods,  leaving  the  finer  qualities 
to  the  Northern  mills.  They  claim  that  they  have  a  better 
climate  in  the  South,  with  less  extremes  of  heat  and  cold, 
fewer  short  days,  and  less  need  of  fuel  and  lights  ;  and  they 
have  great  advantage,  they  say,  not  only  in  the  saving  in  the 
carriage  of  cotton,  but  also  in  that  they  are  saved  the  serious 
expense  of  packing  it.  Their  labour,  too,  is  cheaper  than 
that  in  the  North. 

Here  I  went  out  to  see  the  farm  of  Mr.  B ,aNew  Jersey 

man,  who  has  lately  established  a  farm  of  six  hundred  acres, 
principally  with  the  object  of  breeding  horses.  The  road,  as 

usual,  I  find  detestable,  but  Mr.  B •  says  the  New  Jersey 

roads  are  good — they  have  a  good  gravel  soil  there.  Pasture 
and  cattle-breeding  have  been  somewhat  neglected  in  these 
Southern  States,  and  he  hopes  to  show  them  the  way  to  im 
prove.  He  has  a  very  high  opinion  of  the  black  people — 
likes  them  as  labourers,  and  thinks  they  only  need  to  be 
treated  fairly  and  civilly  to  get  good  work  out  of  them ;  in 
fact,  they  work  as  well  as  white  men,  and  better :  and  the 
only  complaints  against  them  come  from  those  who  do  not 
treat  them  fairly  nor  pay  them  regularly.  He,  too,  says 
that  there  is  great  irregularity  in  the  payment  of  wages. 
His  only  doubt  is  about  the  rising  generation.  He  thinks 
the  old  ex-slaves  who  were  accustomed  to  work  do  very  well, 
but  the  children  are  not  sufficiently  under  the  control  of  their 
parents,  and  are  growing  up  with  an  indisposition  to  work. 
He  is  strong  on  the  excellence  of  the  climate  here  about 
800  feet  above  the  sea.  It  is  never  so  hot  in  summer,  he 
says,  as  in  the  Northern  Atlantic  States.  The  thermometer 
does  not  usually  rise  above  80  degrees,  and  the  winters  are 
mild  and  good.  There  seems  to  be  no  doubt  that  there  is 
a  great  change  in  the  winter  climate  as  one  passes  South 
through  Virginia  into  the  Carolinas  and  Georgia. 


NORTH  CAROLINA.  323 

I  bad  met  in  the  train  an  old  Scotchman,  Mr.  M , 

who  has  been  upwards  of  forty  years  settled  in  this  State. 
He  is  a  builder  by  trade,  and  has  done  much  work  of  that 
kind,  but  has  now  acquired  land  and  settled  down.  He  took 

me  to  dine  with  a  friend,  Mr.  H ,  who  keeps  a  store  at 

Haw  River,  and  who  is  married  to  a  New  England  wife.  This 
lady  gave  us  a  very  nicely-cooked  meal,  very  neatly  served. 
Throughout  the  States  it  does  seem  that  the  New  England 

people  are   in  many  respects    superior.      Mr.    M very 

kindly  insisted  on  taking  me  to  his  house  at  Salisbury,  where 
I  was  most  comfortably  accommodated.  In  the  morning  we 
walked  about  the  town,  which  seemed  a  nice  rural  place. 

Mr.  M 's  wife  is  also  a  New  Englander,  but  they  are  all 

now  thoroughly  Southern  in  feeling,  botli   as  to  the  war  and 

as  to  the  question  of  slavery.     According  to  Mr.  M the 

Northerners  were  the  first  slave-holders,  and  when  they  found 
that  slaves  were  not  a  profitable  property  in  the  North  they 
sold  them  South,  and  went  in  for  abolition.  In  the  war  the 
North  Carolinian  people  did  not  go  heartily  with  the  South 
till  their  feelings  got  embittered  by  the  great  destruction  of 
property  and  other  ill-usages  to  which  they  were  subjected 
by  the  Northern  armies.  A  sister  of  his  own  was  burnt  out 
by  the  Federal  soldiers  and  died  from  exposure.  He  and  his 
son-in-law,  who  is  also  a  contractor  for  public  works,  told  me 
a  good  deal  about  the  blacks,  whom  they  have  much  em 
ployed.  They  decidedly  like  them  as  labourers.  In  the 
North  the  white  men  get  higher  wages  and  do  more  work. 
There  they  will  not  allow  the  competition  of  the  negro; 
especially  the  foreigners — Irishmen  being  most  prominent — 
will  not ;  but  the  Southern  climate  is  too  hot  for  the  Irish — 
they  do  not  care  to  come  South  ;  while  the  Southern  whites 
not  being  anxious  to  work  as  hired  labourers,  do  not  object 
to  the  negroes  performing  that  function.  Thus  the  blacks 
are  not  bull-dosed  on  labour  questions,  and  altogether  get  on 
very  well.  Wages  in  the  South  are  certainly  a  good  deal 
lower  than  in  the  North,  and  the  negroes  can  live  on  much 
cheaper  and  poorer  food  than  the  Northern  whites.  Most  of 
the  Southern  whites  have  land  more  or  less,  and  many  of 

T  2 


324  MY  JOURNAL. 

them  employ,  or  hope  to  employ,  negroes.  They  are  always 
glad  to  hire  them  when  they  can  afford  to  do  so.  The 
better  and  more  moderate  of  the  Southern  whites  certainly 
wish  to  conciliate  and  utilise  the  negroes. 

Mr.  M ,  while  speaking  so  well  of  the  negroes  in 

other  respects,  dwelt  very  much  on  that  which  I  had  before 
heard,  their  want  of  family  affection  and  kindness  to  one 
another  in  sickness.  He  tells  the  story  of  a  son  whom  he 
nursed  through  small-pox,  and  who  was  then  set  to  nurse  hi& 
own  father  who  had  taken  the  disease,  but  deserted  the 
father  and  left  him  to  die.  There  seems  to  be  a  general  con 
currence  of  assertion,  that  in  slave  times  it  was  necessary 
for  the  white  masters  and  mistresses  to  see  that  the  black 
children  were  looked  after  and  that  the  sick  were  nursed. 
Now  these  things  are  much  neglected. 

Mr.  M has  a  good  deal  of  land.  Part  of  it  is  farmed 

by  one  of  his  sons,  who  is  also  a  medical  man.  Part  is  let 
to  a  black  man  on  shares,  and  part  to  a  white  man.  The 
great  difficulty,  he  says,  is  the  tendency  to  let  down  the 
land.  We  visited  a  suburb  almost  entirely  inhabited  by 
blacks.  Most  of  these  people  own  their  own  house  and  patches 
of  land — some  one,  some  two,  some  three,  some  six  acres,  and 
they  seem  to  get  on  very  well.  Many  of  them  appeared  to 
be  of  mixed  blood.  One  man  was  quite  fair  with  blonde  hair, 
but  quite  woolly.  Several  among  them  are  blacksmiths ;  they 
affect  that  trade  a  good  deal. 

Having  occasion  to  send  a  telegram  here,  I  noticed  the 
excessive  charge — one  dollar  for  eight  words  to  New  York. 
I  have  since  found  that  this  is  so  in  all  out-of-the-way  places. 
The  telegraphs  in  the  United  States  are  entirely  in  the  hands 
of  monopolist  private  companies,  and  they  charge  just  in 
proportion  to  the  absence  of  competition.  There  is  no  fixed 
rule  with  reference  to  distance,  or  anything  else. 

This  is  the  day  of  the  general  election.  I  went  to  see  the 
voting.  There  is  a  contest  between  two  white  candidates, 
but  one  of  them  is  an  Independent  and  seems  to  be  supported 
by  the  blacks.  There  is  little  sign  of  excitement.  The 
ballot-box  is  kept  at  an  open  window,  and  the  proceedings 


SOUTH  CAROLINA.  325 

are  conducted  in  a  loose  sort  of  way.  Half  a  dozen  people, 
officials  and  other,  are  in  the  room  behind  the  box.  There 
is  no  pretence  of  secrecy  in  regard  to  the  ballot  papers. 
Papers  with  the  names  of  the  candidates  are  lying  about. 
Each  voter  takes  one  and  gives  it  to  be  put  into  the  box. 
I  understand  they  generally  pride  themselves  on  voting 
openly.  The  blacks  seem  to  be  voting  freely  ;  there  is  no 
sign  of  intimidation.  After  breakfast  I  started  for  South 
Carolina. 


SOUTH  CAROLINA. 

I  entered  the  '  Petrel '  State  of  South  Carolina  on  the 
day  of  the  election,  and  the  first  station  in  that  State  that  we 
came  to  was  full  of  people  dressed  in  the  famous  red  shirt, 
which  we  also  saw  continually  at  all  the  stations  as  we  came 
along.  In  this  part  of  the  State  there  does  not  seem  to  be 
a  very  serious  contest ;  it  is  only  in  the  lower  regions,  where 
the  black  population  is  very  numerous,  that  there  is  any 
doubt  about  the  result  of  the  elections.  The  constitution  of 
South  Carolina  is  still  that  which  was  imposed  upon  it  after 
the  war.  It  has  not  been  revised,  and  is  still  of  the  popular 
character  dictated  by  Northern  ideas.  All  the  county  and 
local  officers  are  elected ;  there  is  no  such  system  of  nomina 
tion  as  prevails  in  North  Carolina.  Here  the  elections  for 
Congress,  for  the  State  Assembly,  and  for  the  local  offices,  all 
take  place  together, — are  all  entered  in  one  '  ticket.'  Mr. 
Wade  Hampton,  the  present  Governor,  is  a  moderate  Demo 
crat,  and  his  re-election  is  not  opposed  on  this  occasion. 
Where  there  is  a  serious  contest  it  is  in  regard  to  the  mem- 

o 

bers  of  Congress  and  State  Assembly,  and  the  local  officers. 
Ked  shirts  now  seem  to  be  only  a  party  badge.  I  saw  no 
appearance  of  actual  6  bull-dosing,'  but  there  were  many 
signs  of  election-day — many  people  about,  a  good  deal  of 
talking  and  shouting  and  galloping  about  on  horseback,  and 
some  few  symptoms  of  whisky.  There  were  a  good  many 
negroes  about,  and  they  did  not  look  terrorised.  There  is 


326  MY  JOURNAL. 

no  need  to  terrorise  them  just  here,  as  they  have  no  chance — 
the  whites  having  it  all  their  own  way.  A  few  blacks  go  with 
the  Democrats,  and  I  saw  one  or  two  of  them  wearing  the 
red  shirt.  On  my  arrival  in  Columbia,  the  capital  of  the 
State,  io  the  evening,  things  seemed  pretty  quiet :  the  elec 
tion  had  passed  without  any  serious  trouble. 

The  country  between  Salisbury  and  Columbia  is  still 
much  like  what  I  had  before  seen,  but  it  became  almost 
hilly.  The  tobacco  country  was  left  behind  a  long  way  back. 
All  this  through  which  I  passed  to-day  is  principally  cotton 
country.  Much  of  the  cotton  plant  is  very  short  and  small, 
but  apparently  very  productive ;  many  fields  are  at  this  time 
very  heavy  with  cotton.  It  is  quite  a  profitable  cultivation 
when  an  average  of  half  a  bale  an  acre  is  obtained.  If  some 
fields  yield  a  good  deal  more,  there  is  also  a  good  deal  of 
poor  cultivation  which  does  not  yield  more  than  a  quarter  of 
a  bale,  or  even  less  than  that.  Cotton  requires  much  weed 
ing,  and  if  that  is  neglected  the  result  is  bad.  On  all  hands 
I  am  told  tli at  the  cotton  cultivation  has  greatly  extended 
in  the  upper  country.  It  now  grows  right  up  to  the  '  Blue 
Mountains,'  as  they  are  called.  Some  is  cultivated  by  whites, 
but  more  on  land  owned  by  whites,  with  the  aid  of  black 
labour. 

I  met  in  the  train  a  Canadian  barrister  taking  his  family 
to  Aikin  in  Georgia.  Some  places  in  Georgia,  and  still  more 
in  Florida,  are  great  health  resorts  for  northern  people.  In 
the  winter  the  climate  there  is  said  to  be  very  good.  This 
gentleman  gives  a  very  favourable  account  of  the  state  of 
things  in  Canada.  According  to  him  they  have  a  selection 
of  the  best  of  English  and  American  institutions.  They 
have  free  elections,  and  a  fair  representation  of  all  classes, 
but  the  judges  and  most  of  the  higher  public  officers  are 
nominated  by  the  Dominion  Government.  Xow-a-days,  he 
says,  almost  no  one  in  Canada  is  favourable  to  annexation  to 
the  States.  The  Church  of  England  was  disestablished  in 
1848.  The  clergy  got  life-rents  of  their  incomes,  and  were 
allowed  to  commute.  The  Church  in  Canada  is  now  exceed 
ingly  well  off.  The  proximity  of  the  great  lakes,  which  never 


SOUTH   CAROLINA.  327 

freeze,  makes  the  climate  of  Upper  Canada  milder  than  that 
of  other  northern  regions,  but  rather  damp.  He  is  altogether 
against  the  idea  of  a  Customs  Union  with  the  United  States. 
He  says  the  manufacturing  interest  in  Canada  is  not  very 
strong,  but  the  people  of  the  States  are  determined  to  ruin  it 
by  underselling  them,  and  that  cannot  be  allowed. 

After  one  has  heard  so  much  about  the  deplorable 
state  of  things  in  South  Carolina,  I  am  struck  with  the  good 
and  prosperous  appearance  of  the  country  towns  along  the 
road.  Several  new  railways  are  in  process  of  construction — 
one  that  I  saw  was  narrow  gauge — in  fact,  in  America  narrow 
gauge  railways  seem  to  be  a  good  deal  in  favour  for  short 
branches  and  broken  ground.  In  spite  of  all  their  misfortunes 
and  of  the  constant  complaints  of  want  of  money,  people  seem 
to  be  recuperating  themselves  wonderfully. 

At  Columbia  I  went  to  the  Wheeler  House  Hotel,  the 
principal  in  the  place,  a  respectable  hotel,  but  not  quite  up 
to  the  mark  of  those  I  had  hitherto  seen.  I  am  relieved  to 
find  that  mosquitoes  have  not  yet  made  their  appearance. 

Next  morning  I  found  an  account  of  the  elections  in  the 
papers.  As  there  are  no  Republican  papers  here,  one  cannot 
hear  that  side.  The  local  papers  assert  that  this  has  been 
the  quietest  election  ever  known.  There  has  been  no  violence, 
only  some  attempts  at  fraud  on  the  part  of  the  blacks,  which 
have  been  promptly  and  properly  repressed.  I  observe,  how 
ever,  that  it  is  admitted  that  at  several  places  the  United 
States  supervisor,  who  is  entitled  to  be  present  at  each 
polling  place,  has  protested  against  the  rejection  of  black 
votes.  At  one  place  near  this  some  young  men  are  said  to 
have  done  good  service  by  putting  a  stop  to  the  frauds  of  the 
blacks.  It  is  suggested  that  some  black  employes  who  voted 
wrong  must  be  dismissed.  It  seems  to  be  assumed  that  all 
the  elections  in  this  State  have  certainly  gone  in  favour  of 
the  Democrats.  That  was  indeed  a  foregone  conclusion. 

After  breakfast  I  went  to  the  Capitol — there  is  always  a 
Capitol  in  each  State — and  paid  my  respects  to  Governor 
Wade  Hampton,  to  whom  I  had  an  introduction.  He  is 
generally  reputed  to  be  a  very  superior  man,  and  evidently  has 


328  MY  JOURNAL. 

great  influence.  Originally  a  Carolina  man,  he  had  also  large 
property  in  Mississippi,  like  a  good  many  others  of  the  rich 
people  in  this  part  of  the  country  ;  but  he  was  quite  ruined  by 
the  war.  Cotton,  being  the  great  resource  of  the  Southern 
States,  was  captured  or  burnt  by  the  Federal  armies,  and  he 
lost  5,000  bales.  He  now  lives,  I  understand,,  in  a  cottage  in 
a  humble  way.  All  his  conversation  gave  one  the  idea  of  a 
very  moderate  man.  His  private  secretary  and  nephew,  Mr. 
M ,  however  (a  gentleman  who  kindly  gave  me  much  infor 
mation),  is  a  pessimist.  He  will  have  it  that  both  in  South 
Carolina  and  in  the  Mississippi  Valley  cultivation  has  on  the 
whole  decreased.  The  coast  lands  of  this  State,  and  the  sugar 
lands  of  Louisiana  have,  he  says,  gone  to  rack  and  ruin,  and  he 
tells  of  the  enormous  depreciation  of  property  in  New  Orleans 
and  on  the  banks  of  the  Mississippi.  He  admits,  however, 
the  extension  of  the  cotton  cultivation  in  the  higher  parts  of 
the  State,  but  says  that  there  is  a  great  deal  too  much  of  it, 
and  it  does  not  pay.  Mr.  Wade  Hampton  talks  very  strongly 
of  the  misconduct  and  fraud  of  the  carpet-bag  Government 
which  was  displaced  last  year.  At  one  time,  he  says,  98  out 
of  124  members  of  the  Assembly  were  blacks,  and  there  was 
unlimited  fraud  and  stealing.  He  gave  me  the  report  of  the 
committee  appointed  to  investigate  these  frauds.  The  debt 
of  the  State,  he  says,  is  not  so  very  large — about  seven  mil 
lion  dollars  ;  he  would  rather  pay  than  repudiate.  Meantime, 
while  the  matter  is  under  the  consideration  of  the  Legislature, 
the  money  for  the  interest  is  lodged  in  the  Treasury.  Al 
though  the  county  officers  are  elected,  it  seems  that  the  jus 
tices  of  the  peace  are  nominated  by  the  Governor,  and  are  now 
mostly  Democrats,  but  some  of  the  other  side  are  nominated 
also.  Some  blacks  are  put  upon  juries,  but  not  many.  '  We 

give  them  more  than  they  gave  us,'  says  Mr.  M . 

The  Governor  speaks  of  the  black  population  in  terms 
similar  to  what  I  had  heard  before.  He  says  the  better  class 
of  whites  certainly  want  to  conserve  the  negro ;  the  lower 
whites  are  less  favourable,  and  will  not  admit  them  to  social 
equality  ;  but  the  bitterness  is  only  political  and  not  carried 
into  labour  questions. 


SOUTH   CAROLINA.  329 

I  had  a  good  deal  of  talk  with  several  gentlemen  in  the 
office,  or  who  happened  to  be  about  the  Capitol.  They  all 
admit  that  the  ballot  at  elections  is  an  utter  farce,  and  that 
there  is  no  pretence  at  secrecy.  A  common  dodge  is  to 
print  tickets  in  imitation  of  those  of  the  enemy,  and  to  foist 
them  upon  illiterate  voters  of  the  other  side.  More  fre 
quently  the  ballot  is  'stuffed'  by  putting  in  several  thin 
tickets  wrapt  together.  The  rule  is  that  if  more  vote  tickets 
are  found  in  the  box  than  the  number  of  voters  the  excess 
number  is  drawn  out  by  a  man  blindfolded  for  the  purpose. 
He  can  very  well  distinguish  the  tickets  of  his  own  party; 
they  are  generally  on  a  different  kind  of  paper.  They  gave 
me  one  of  the  Democratic  tickets  used  in  the  present  election 
for  this  county  of  Eichland.  It  is  a  piece  of  the  thinnest 
tissue  paper,  about  a  couple  of  inches  long  by  an  inch  broad, 
upon  which  are  printed  the  names  of  the  whole  of  the  can 
didates  for  the  various  offices  and  seats  in  the  Legislature. 
This  ticket  comprises  the  vote  for  the  Governor,  Lieutenant- 
Governor,  Secretary  of  State,  State  Superintendent  of  Edu 
cation,  Comptroller  -  General,  Adjutant  and  Inspector- 
General,  State  Treasurer,  Attorney  -  General,  member  of 
Congress  for  the  third  district,  one  State  Senator,  five 
representatives  of  the  county  in  the  State  Assembly,  Local 
School  Commissioner,  and  three  county  Commissioners. 
They  say  there  never  was  an  election  without  fraud,  and 
some,  no  doubt,  there  was  on  this  occasion.  A  young  man, 
evidently  one  of  those  referred  to  in  the  newspaper  para 
graph  which  I  have  mentioned,  says  he  went  to  a  polling 
place  about  six  miles  distant.  The  negroes  were  very  dis 
appointed  in  the  belief  that  they  were  losing  the  election, 
and  there  was  much  fear  of  their  becoming  violent  and 
smashing  the  ballot-boxes.  Fifteen  or  twenty  young  whites 
banded  together  for  the  protection  of  the  boxes,  lighted  a 
fire  and  sang  songs.  Presently  the  negroes,  finding  they 
could  do  nothing,  came  round  and  joined  in  the  songs,  and 
so  all  went  well.  They  speak  very  bitterly  of  the  indepen 
dent  candidates.  They  say  more  stress  is  laid  on  the  election 
for  Congress  than  on  those  for  the  State  Assembly,  because 


330  MY  JOURNAL. 

the  next  Presdential  election  may  depend  a  good  deal  upon 
the  majority  in  Congress.  The  negroes  are  amenable  to  the 
whites  in  all  things  except  elections.  In  election  matters 
they  have  taken  an  independent  line,  and  insist  upon  voting 
Republican.  The  preachers  influence  them  very  much,  and 
also  the  negro  women,  who  are  very  strong  Republicans. 
These  women  used  to  believe  that  if  a  Democratic  governor 
were  elected  they  would  not  be  allowed  to  wear  veils,  and 
that  is  a  privilege  of  freedom  which  they  prize  greatly. 
My  informants  account,  however,  for  their  victory  in  the 
elections  by  saying  that  they  managed  to  influence  many  of 
the  blacks.  They  agreed  among  themselves  that  each  man 
should  bring  at  least  one  negro  to  the  poll  and  as  many 
more  as  possible.  They  suggest  that  many  negroes,  though 
ostensibly  voting  Republican  in  order  to  deceive  their  wives 
and  preachers,  really  voted  Democratic,  their  own  inclination 
being  that  way.  They  say  the  red  shirt  was  merely  a  political 
emblem  got  up  in  mockery  of  some  phrase  about  '  bloody 
shirts '  used  by  an  Indiana  senator.  It  never  meant  any 
thing  more  serious.  The  Klu-klux  was  at  one  time  bad,  but 
not  so  very  bad ;  they  sometimes  tarred  and  feathered,  but 
seldom  murdered.  In  short,  South  Carolina  is  altogether 
not  so  black  as  it  has  been  painted,  according  to  their 
account. 

After  the  labours  of  the  election  campaign  the  Governor 
is  going  out  hunting  for  two  or  three  days,  and  I  have  not 
had  the  opportunity  of  seeing  very  much  of  him,  but  he 
has  been  very  friendly,  and  has  given  me  introductions  to 
the  county  of  Beaufort,  where  the  negroes  are  thickest,  and 
where  he  advises  me  to  go  if  I  want  to  see  a  negro  county. 
What  they  call  hunting  in  America  is  not  hunting  in  our 
sense,  but  shooting  ;  either  ordinary  shooting,  or  drives  for 
big  game.  This  hunting  expedition  turned  out  very  dis 
astrous  for  poor  Governor  Hampton.  Riding  to  a  place 
where  he  expected  the  deer  to  pass,  he  was  thrown  in  the 
forest,  and  his  leg  smashed  in  a  frightful  manner.  He  was 
entirely  alone,  and  remained  on  the  ground  for  hours  before 
he  was  discovered,  though  he  managed  to  keep  firing  his  gun 


SOUTH   CAROLINA.  331 

to  attract  attention.  He  was  long  in  a  very  precarious  state. 
I  much  hope  that  he  has  quite  recovered. 

Walking  out  in  the  neighbourhood  of  the  town,  I  got 
into  conversation  with  a  coloured  man,  apparently  connected 
with  the  city  waterworks,  and  I  talked  to  him  about  the 
election.  He  says  the  Democrats  were  to  win  in  this  dis 
trict  :  that  was  known,  but  it  was  done  by  the  fraudulent 
stuffing  of  the  ballot-boxes.  The  Eepublicans  really  have 
a  majority  of  2,500,  and  the  coloured  people  have  voted 
steadily  on  the  Eepublican  side,  but  they  are  cheated  because 
they  have  not  the  control  of  the  ballot-boxes.  He  too 
explained  the  mode  of  stuffing  the  boxes  and  the  other 
dodges  as  I  had  heard  them  before.  He  says  that  while  the 
Eepublicans  were  in  power  they  allowed  a  fair  representation 
of  the  other  side,  but  now  that  the  Democrats  have  got  into 
power  they  control  all  the  returning  officers,  and  take  every 
thing,  leaving  nothing  for  the  other  side.  He  seemed  a 
very  sensible,  intelligent  man,  and  his  story  appears  at  least 
as  good  as  that  told  on  the  other  side. 

This  place  suffered  terribly  when  it  was  taken  by  Sher 
man's  army,  and  it  is  a  hotly-disputed  question  whether  the 
firing  and  destruction  were  done  by  Sherman's  troops  or 
by  the  Confederates  themselves  to  prevent  the  cotton,  &c.? 
falling  into  Sherman's  hands.  My  black  friend  attributes 
the  injury  to  Columbia  to  the  Confederates,  but  does  not  put 
it  in  an  unreasonably  wicked  light.  The  town  seems  now 
to  have  very  much  recovered  from  the  destruction.  It  has 
been  much  rebuilt,  and  looks  very  well-  Many  of  the  best 
houses  were  built  by  the  carpet-bag  officials.  The  Capitol 
seems  a  fine  building ;  all  the  public  offices  are  in  it,  as  is 
usually  the  case.  There  are  wide  grassy  streets  lined  with 
good  trees,  many  of  them  magnolias  and  other  southern 
plants.  The  houses  have  pretty  grounds  about  them,  and  I 
notice  some  particularly  thriving  deodars.  The  situation  of 
the  town  is  pretty,  upon  a  considerable  river.  The  country 
about  is  very  well  wooded,  and  the  woods  are  now  beautifully 
coloured,  the  autumnal  tints  being  at  their  best.  I  notice 
several  varieties  of  fir  trees.  Cows  graze  freely  about  on  the 


332  MY  JOURNAL. 

grassy  avenues.  There  are  several  iron  works  here,  where 
they  make  small  engines  and  do  other  such  work.  It  is 
remarkable  how  the  iron  trade  seems  to  be  developing 
throughout  the  States.  I  understand  that  in  all  these  works 
except  one,  they  employ  exclusively  white  labour.  There 
are  no  mills  on  the  fine  river  here,  but  there  is  a  small  canal 
which  it  is  proposed  to  enlarge  as  a  State  work  in  the  hope 
of  establishing  mills.  Apparently,  there  is  not  in  this  State 
the  prohibition  against  undertaking  public  works  which  has 
recently  been  put  into  the  Constitution  of  a  good  many 
States. 

I  looked  into  the  Penitentiary:  the  system  seems  rather 
loose,  and  intramural  labour  does  not  pay.  There  were  from 
ten  to  twelve  black  men  to  one  white,  but  they  all  work 
together. 

Lotteries  are  prohibited  in  most  of  the  States,  including 
this;  but  I  saw  that  the  Louisana  State  Lottery,  drawn 
monthly,  is  everywhere  largely  advertised. 

Mr.  T ,  Superintendent  of  Education,  kindly  took 

me  out  for  a  drive.  The  place  seems  altogether  very  nice, 
and  the  climate  very  good.  The  carpet-baggers  have  now 
almost  entirely  disappeared,  and  the  best  of  the  houses  are 
for  sale  cheap.  A  good  many  have  been  bought  by  Northern 
people,  who  come  to  reside  here  for  the  sake  of  the  climate. 

Mr.  T gives  a  tolerable  account  of  the  education  in 

this  State,  but  besides  the  difficulty  of  obtaining  efficient 
superintendence  and  efficient  schoolmasters,  there  is  a  very 
great  difficulty  about  money.  The  schoolmasters  are  paid  by 
certificates  of  indebtedness,  and  thus  are  heavily  in  arrears. 
While  Southerners  can  hardly  be  got  to  teach  blacks,  good 
Northerners  will  not  come  on  these  terms,  especially  as  they 
.are  only  employed  for  a  few  months  in  the  year.  Such  as 
they  are,  the  schools  are  open  for  three,  four,  or  five  months. 

A  very  sad  thing  here  is  the  beautiful  university  build 
ings  and  college-close,  like  one  of  the  best  of  English  col 
leges,  but  now  quite  given  up.  It  seems  that  before  the  war 
this  University  was  exceedingly  good  and  had  a  high  repu 
tation,  but  the  funds  were  lost  or  stolen,  and  of  late  years  it 


SOUTH   CAROLINA.  333 

has  been  a  question  with  the  Legislature  whether  to  provide 
for  the  payment  of  debts,  or  to  spend  money  on  education. 
The  former  policy  prevailed,  and  education  has  been  neg 
lected.  There  is  still  kept  up  the  beautiful  college  library, 
and  the  fine  old  ex-president  of  the  college  gets  a  small 
living  as  librarian.  He  says  that  the  difficulty  about  setting 
up  the  college  again  arises  from  this — that  the  people  of  the- 
different  churches  have  set  up  sectarian  colleges  of  their  owny 
and  are  against  this  general  college. 

For  want  of  funds  the  Agricultural  and  Survey  Depart 
ments,  for  which  the  Constitution  provides,  have  not  yet  been 
started  in  this  State.  Mr.  T says  that  the  school  poll- 
tax  is  not  half  collected,  and  the  property  tax  is  very  irregu 
larly  collected — and  what  is  paid  is  generally  paid  in  debt- 
certificates  or  notes  of  a  bankrupt  State  Bank.  By  this  con 
stitution  non-payment  of  taxes  does  not  deprive  of  the  right 
of  voting.  The  negroes  are  zealous  to  learn  and  are  getting 
on  a  good  deal,  but,  like  others  he  says  they  are  decidedly 
inferior  to  white  men  beyond  a  certain  point.  The  carpet 
baggers  at  first  tried  mixed  schools,  but  even  they  did  not 
continue  that  long ;  it  was  found  necessary  to  separate  them.. 
Some  of  the  mulattos  and  free  blacks  were  better  off  before- 
the  war  than  they  are  now.  They  suffered  in  their  property 
like  everyone  else  during  the  war.  The  enfranchised  slaves- 
do  not  care  for  them,  and  none  of  them  now  are  leading  men. 
One  great  difficulty  about  school?  is  that  the  local  school 
managers  are  continually  changed  at  every  election — even 
without  change  of  party,  people  often  change  their  local 
officers. 

I  visited  Dr.  C ,the  Northern  President  of  the  Benedict 

Institute  for  blacks.  He  seems  a  very  fair  and  moderate 
man.  Talking  of  the  elections,  he  says  that  the  blacks  saw 
that  the  tide  was  going  against  them — they  had  no  leaders 
and  no  organisation,  and  had  no  funds  for  election  purposes — 
it  is  characteristic  of  them  under  such  circumstances  to  show 
no  energy.  They  have  caved  in  and  allowed  themselves  to- 
be  beaten  by  fair  means  or  foul. 

He,  too,  thinks  that  the  intellect  of  the  blacks  is  inferior 


334  MY  JOURNAL. 

to  that  of  whites,  but  among  the  blacks  there  are  some  who 
are  very  superior,  and  the  mulattos  are  better  than  the 
ordinary  blacks.  He  understands  that  in  slave  times  the 
slaveholders  used  to  distinguish  between  different  races  of 
blacks,  some  being  intellectually  as  well  as  physically 
superior  to  others ;  but  they  are  now  so  mixed  up  that 
the  races  can  hardly  be  distinguished.  I  walked  out  with 
him,  and  saw  a  large  negro  location.  In  most  cases  houses 
and  small  patches  of  land  were  owned  by  the  people  them 
selves,  and  they  seemed  tolerably  well-to-do.  Dr.  C , 

however,  says  that  they  do  not  save  much  ;  they  are  certainly 
wanting  in  thrift  and  prudence,  spend  money  as  they  get  it, 
and  live  from  hand  to  mouth.  We  came  upon  a  row  of 
very  nice  regular  houses,  and  on  inquiry  I  found  that  after 
emancipation  these  houses  were  given  to  the  negroes  by 

their  late  master.      This  master  was  a  General  P ,  whose 

acquaintance  I  afterwards  made.  He  is  about  the  most 
charming  old  gentleman  I  have  yet  seen  in  America — Eng 
lish  of  the  best  kind  in  speech  and  manner.  He  has  been 
intimate  with  many  of  our  most  distinguished  men.  He 
claims  that,  if  they  had  been  left  alone  emancipation  would 
have  been  brought  about  in  a  beneficial  way  in  course 
of  time.  As  it  is,  there  have  been  frightful  upheavals 
and  great  injustice  in  achieving  that  object ;  but  he  now 
hopes  for  the  best.  The  negroes  hereabouts  have,  he  says, 
sometimes  difficulty  in  finding  work.  They  cannot  get 
on  without  the  white  man's  guidance — with  that  they  do 
very  well. 

I  had  also  an  opportunity  of  conversing  with  a  coloured 
preacher,  a  clever  and  influential  man.  He  seems,  however, 
very  extreme  in  his  views.  He  says  that  during  the  election 
there  was  gross  intimidation,  and  much  unfair  influence,  but 
in  spite  of  it  all  the  blacks  voted  Eepublican  as  solid  as  ever. 
Nevertheless,  the  boxes  were  stuffed  and  the  majority  stolen. 
The  election  commissioners  are  all  on  one  side,  and  so  are 
the  newspapers,  and  they  openly  published  violent  threats. 
The  negroes  will  never  get  justice ;  there  is  nothing  for 
them  but  to  go  to  Liberia.  There  is  an  extreme  party  here 


SOUTH  CAROLINA.  335 

opposed  to  Mr.  Wade  Hampton,  of  which  General  Geary  is 
the  leader.  He  openly  says  that  the  blacks  were  made  by  God  to 
till  the  soil,  and  may  do  that,  but  they  cannot  be  allowed  to 
vote  and  hold  land,  else  they  would  be  masters,  and  the 
whites  slaves.  Wages  are,  he  says,  low  here.  In  some  country 
parts  labourers  do  not  get  more  than  six  dollars  a  month, 
besides  rations,  and  that  is  not  paid.  He  does  not  think 
much  of  Wade  Hampton.  He  is  only  a  politician,  and  is 
moderate  for  the  sake  of  place.  He  does  not  deny  that, 
politics  apart,  white  and  black  people  get  on  together  well 
enough ;  but  the  latter  will  never  have  their  proper  share  of 
power.  He  says  juries  are  not  fairly  constituted — nine-tenths 
of  them  are  always  whites.  Even  under  the  Carpet-baggers 
all  the  Judges  were  white.  Throughout  the  United  States 
all  elections  and  all  administrations  are  corrupt,  and  not 
likely  to  be  better — all  is  bad. 

I  have  been  inquiring  about  the  tenure  of  land.  Here, 
as  elsewhere,  large  farms  seldom  succeed.  Most  of  the 
whites  have  land,  more  or  less.  Some  are  good,  but  others 
are  a  poor  lot,  uneducated  and  unthrifty,  especially  a  class,  of 
whom  there  are  many  in  the  district  near  this,  called  '  Sand- 
hillers.'  They  are  said  to  be  the  descendants  of  assigned 
convicts  of  former  days.  They  have  poor  farms  and  poor 
soil ;  what  little  work  they  do  they  do  themselves  ;  they  have 
no  servants.  They  bring  wood  into  the  town  for  sale.  I 
saw  a  good  many  of  them,  and  certainly  they  are  a  poor- 
looking  set.  About  forty  per  cent,  of  the  white  voters  here 
cannot  write  their  names.  The  blacks  have  as  yet  got  com 
paratively  little  land  of  their  own,  and  chiefly  cultivate  as 
tenants  on  various  terms,  generally  on  the  share  system  ;  but, 
as  I  have  elsewhere  noticed,  they  have  very  frequently  houses 
and  small  patches.  There  is  now  great  abundance  of  land 
for  sale  in  this  State ;  but  wages  are  very  low,  and,  under  the 
Carpet-bag  Government,  taxation  was  very  high,  so  that  there 
was  not  much  chance  of  saving,  and  few  have  money  to  buy 
land.  The  black  preacher  says  a  good  many  blacks  have 
bought  land  and  paid  for  it,  but  have  been  cheated  out  of  it, 
the  titles  proving  to  be  bad. 


336  MY  JOURNAL. 

I  have  been  talking  about  the  Churches,  asking  whether 
the  black  and  white  Churches  go  together  under  the  same 
system  of  Church  government.  It  seems  that  most  of  the 
churches  here  are  Baptist,  and  chiefly  on  the  congregational 
system.  The  Methodists  have  a  Church  system,  but  they  are 
divided  into  North  and  South,  and  black  and  white  Churches, 
There  is  no  general  organisation  common  to  both.  The 
Presbyterian  black  Churches,  however,  send  delegates  to  the 
General  Presbyterian  Assembly. 

There  seems  now  no  doubt  that  the  Democrats  have 
carried  all  the  elections  throughout  this  State.  There  has 
been  no  sort  of  compromise  ;  they  have  taken  everything — 
Congress,  State,  Assembly,  and  all  the  county  offices,  except 
ing  only  in  Beaufort  County.  Those  districts  where  the 
blacks  are  ten  to  one  have  now  returned  Democrats. 

I  gather  that  the  United  States  election  supervisors  were 
a  poor  lot — often  coloured  men  ;  and  they  were  frequently 
hustled  and  insulted.  One  of  them  was  arrested  on  some 
frivolous  pretext.  According  to  one  Northerner  nothing  but 
United  States  troops  at  every  polling- place  will  prevent  a 
strong  and  embittered  minority  from  triumphing  over  a  weak 
majority.  In  this  part  of  the  country  the  Republican  or 
Radical  party  is  dead  for  the  present.  The  victory  of  the 
whites  is  now  so  complete  that  there  is  certainly  peace  such 
as  there  was  not  before. 

I  travelled  from  Columbia  to  Charleston  through  the 
night  in  a  very  comfortable  sleeping-car  belonging  to  the 
local  railway.  In  the  glimpses  of  the  night  I  could  only  see 
that  we  passed  through  a  great  deal  of  pine-forest.  At  day 
light  I  found  that  there  were  many  tall  pines  near  the  route ; 
but  approaching  Charleston  the  country  became  more  open, 
with  fine  soil  and  good  cultivation.  Strawberries,  cabbages, 
sweet  potatoes,  and  common  potatoes  seemed  to  be  largely 
grown.  The  potatoes  are  not  yet  killed  by  frost.  I  went  to 
the  Charleston  Hotel,  which  was  comfortable.  After  break 
fast  I  walked  about  the  town.  The  site  is  flat,  and  the 
country  not  striking,  but  the  vegetation  is  extremely  fine — 
very  much  of  a  semi-tropical  character.  There  are  many 


SOUTH  CAROLINA.  337 

orange-trees  in  full  bearing  and  other  fruit-trees  and  shrubs. 
Many  of  the  houses  are  extremely  good,  and  very  prettily 
arranged,  with  gardens  about  them.  The  climate  here  is  said 
to  be  very  good ;  the  hot  weather  is  tempered  by  the  trade- 
winds  and  sea-breezes.  In  summer  the  thermometer  rises  to 
about  90°,  and  there  is  little  hard  frost  in  the  winter.  The 
magnolias  and  evergreen  oaks  are  fine  trees,  and  very 
abundant. 

I  called  on  Colonel  T—  — ,  a  gentleman  engaged  in  the 
cotton  business,  who  gave  me  much  assistance.  He  introduced 
me  to  the  Carolina  Club,  and  to  several  gentlemen  there,  with 
whom  I  had  a  great  deal  of  talk.  They  say  they  had  hoped 
the  negroes  would  have  turned  out  good  small  cultivators  and 
paid  rent,  and  that  they,  as  owners,  would  have  had  an  easy 
time  ;  but  the  negro  fails  in  that  respect ;  he  is  improvident 

and  careless,  lets  down  the  land,  and  spoils  it.  But  Mr.  S , 

a  gentleman  who  manages  a  large  rice  estate,  and  lives  there, 
happened  to  come  in.  He  gives  quite  a  different  account ;  he 
says  that  the  higher  part  of  the  estate  is  let  out  to  negroes 
who  really  cultivate  exceedingly  well,  and  raise  cotton  much 
better  than  he  could  have  expected.  He  charges  $30  to 
each  family,  and  they  cultivate  as  much  cotton  and  corn 
as  they  can,  he  undertaking  to  take  out  half  the  rent  in 
labour,  and  in  practice  generally  taking  out  the  whole  in  this 
shape  by  employing  them  at  fifty  cents  a  day  on  the  rice-lands, 
and  setting  off  the  wages  against  the  rent.  When  I  put  to 
the  other  gentlemen  the  contradiction  which  this  account 
seemed  to  imply  to  their  views  they  said  that  these  were 
especially  good  negroes;  that  they  came  from  the  upper 
country,  where  they  had  been  mixed  with  whites  and  accus 
tomed  to  labour.  It  seems  that  during  the  war  there  were 
large  migrations.  Many  from  this  part  of  the  country  went 
up  with  the  Northern  armies,  and  many  up-country  negroes 
came  down  with  them.  One  gentleman  said  he  had  heard  of 
a  large  number  of  negroes  from  an  estate  in  this  neighbour 
hood  who  settled  up-country,  and,  he  is  told,  now  all  own 
land.  It  seems  generally  agreed  that  the  negroes  are  very 
good  labourers,  and  do  well  when  they  have  white  men  to 


338  MY  JOURNAL. 

look  over  them  and  set  them  an  example.  The  native  whites 
manage  them  better  and  get  more  work  out  of  them  than 
any  Northerners  or  foreigners.  When,  however,  the  negroes 
get  together  in  masses  and  out  of  the  control  and  direction 
of  white  men  they  are  apt  to  go  back.  These  gentlemen 
instanced  a  case  of  some  blacks  on  estates  within  their  own 
knowledge,  who  were  good  mechanics  before  the  war,  but  now 
are  worth  very  little.  There  are  few  blacks  among  the  higher 
mechanics,  but  some  of  them  earn  very  high  wages  here  as 
stevedores  for  lading  ships.  In  the  cold  weather  a  good 
many  white  people  have  come  up  to  work  here,  but  they  do 
not  seem  to  have  been  very  successful.  Some  Irish  come, 
but  I  do  not  gather  that  they  are  here  now.  Irish  women, 
however,  much  improved  and  civilised,  one  finds  everywhere. 
The  housemaid  at  the  hotel  here  is  an  Irishwoman,  and  seems 
very  decent  and  good.  She  came  originally  from  Dublin, 
married  an  American,  who  was  killed  in  the  war,  on  the  Con 
federate  side,  as  was  also  her  brother,  and  now  she  has  settled 
down  into  service. 

The  people  I  have  met  to-day  are  much  interested  in  rice, 
which  is  cultivated  in  this  part  of  the  country.  It  had  gone 
out  very  much.  Since  the  war  some  estates  have  been  quite 
abandoned.  For  instance,  I  hear  of  one  estate  which  was 
worth  500,000  dollars  before  the  war,  and  for  which  after  the 
war  275,000  dollars  was  offered  and  refused;  it  has  since 
wholly  broken  down  and  fallen  out  of  cultivation,  and  was 
bought  the  other  day  for  6,000  dollars  by  some  gentlemen 
who  are  trying  to  resuscitate  it.  On  the  other  hand,  a  good 
many  estates,  the  owners  of  which  were  able  to  hold  on  and 
keep  up  the  cultivation,  are  now  doing  pretty  well.  The 
truth,  however,  seems  to  be  that  rice  is  only  grown  in  the 
United  States  by  the  aid  of  an  exorbitant  protective  duty, 
and  it  is  used  in  America  only — none  is  exported.  The 
Indian  rice  beats  it  in  foreign  markets.  People  here  say 
they  are  no  longer  for  free  trade ;  there  is  nothing  like  pro 
tection.  The  jute-bagging  used  for  rice  and  cotton  is  highly 
protected.  Here  they  have  only  one  jute-mill,  lately  erected, 
but  they  hope  to  have  more.  They  are  trying  experiments 


SOUTH  CAROLINA.  339 

to  grow  jute,  and  jute-seed  for  the  purpose  has  lately  been 
distributed. 

The  Sea  Islands,  on  which  the  long  cotton  grows,  or  used 
to  grow,  lie  along  the  shore  in  this  neighbourhood  and  south 
wards  to  Savannah.  They  are  not  islands  out  in  the  ocean, 
but  flat  tracts  along  the  shore,  more  or  less  separated  from 
the  mainland  by  narrow  channels.  The  soil  is  very  good, 
but  the  only  culture  to  which  it  has  been  hitherto  very  spe 
cially  devoted  was  the  long- staple  cotton,  the  cultivation  of 
which  has  now  greatly  declined.  These  cotton  lands  form 
the  outermost  belt  next  the  sea ;  behind  them  are  the  rice 
lands,  which  usually  lie  along  the  rivers  and  fresh-water 
estuaries.  Behind  the  rice  lands  and  the  pine-belt  come 
the  upland  cotton  lands.  All  the  cotton  grown  in  this  part 
of  the  world,  except  the  Sea  Island,  is  classed  as  upland.  New 
Orleans  cotton  is  classed  separately,  and  seems  to  be  a  better 
and  stronger  staple.  There  is  still  more  cotton  shipped  from 
New  Orleans  than  from  Charleston  or  any  other  port.  The 
long  cotton,  or  Sea  Island,  is  a  different  variety  of  the  plant 
from  the  common  cotton.  It  requires  more  careful  cultiva 
tion,  and  produces  very  much  less  cotton — generally  only  a 
third  or  a  fourth  of  the  quantity  that  is  got  from  a  good  field 
of  short  cotton.  It  still  fetches  a  very  much  higher  price 
than  the  short  cotton,  but  not  so  high  in  proportion  as  it 
did  before,  and  in  consequence  comparatively  little  of  it  is 
raised. 

In  the  evening  I  went  a  little  way  out  into  the  country. 
There  seems  to  be  an  immense  cultivation  of  strawberries 
here  for  the  Northern  markets.  One  sees  great  fields  of 
strawberries.  There  is  a  good  drive,  metalled  with  oyster- 
shells  and  lined  with  fine  magnolias,  called  Magnolia  Avenue. 
The  beauty  and  fashion  of  Charleston  were  out  for  the  even 
ing,  principally  driving  fast-trotting  horses.  I  am  told  that 
there  were  and  still  are  some  French  mulattos  in  Charles 
ton  in  a  much  higher  position  than  the  ordinary  coloured 
people — like  those  in  a  considerable  position  in  New  Orleans 
— but  they  form  an  exclusive  class  by  themselves,  and  are 
not  so  well  off  as  they  were  before  the  war,  in  which  they  lost 

z  2 


340  MY  JOURNAL. 

heavily.  Altogether  the  '  genteel '  coloured  people  keep  very 
much  to  themselves. 

Next  morning  I  called  on  Mr.  A ,  a  gentleman  who 

was  most  kind  in  assisting  me.  He  is  interested  in  the 
Phosphate  Beds,  and  he  showed  me  a  large  collection  of  fine 
fossils  found  there,  in  excellent  preservation.  I  also  called  on 
the  City  Superintendent  of  Schools,  who  is  at  the  same  time 
the  Episcopalian  clergyman.  He  lived  in  a  poor  house,  and 
did  not  seem  a  prosperous  parson.  He  is  a  Carolina  man,  and 
does  not  think  much  of  the  blacks  ;  but  the  city  schools  are, 
he  says,  good.  I  saw  many  nice-looking  girls  and  young  women 
going  to  school,  with  their  books.  The  Charleston  people 
generally  impress  me  favourably.  The  place  is  not  what  it 
has  been,  but  on  the  whole  it  is  wonderfully  well  maintained, 
and  the  citizens  make  the  best  of  the  situation. 

To-day  I  made  the  acquaintance  of  Mr.  W—  — ,  a  lawyer, 
who  has  just  been  elected  to  the  State  Legislature,  and  is  a 
very  pleasant  and  well-informed  man  ;  and  also  of  one  or  two 
other  gentlemen.  Talking  over  South  Carolina  affairs,  I 
gather  that  the  principal  people  of  this  State  were  not  so  far 
gone  in  difficulties  before  the  war  as  those  in  Virginia.  Many 
of  them  had  great  plantations  in  Mississippi,  to  which  they 
transferred  large  bodies  of  their  surplus  slaves  ;  and  at  one 
time  they  made  a  great  deal  of  money,  in  consequence  of 
which  they  took  to  expensive  living,  keeping  racehorses  and 
other  fine  things.  When  cotton  fell  in  price  their  profits 
diminished,  but  they  looked  for  future  improvement,  arid  did 
not  mind  some  debt.  After  that  came  the  war  and  great 
destruction  of  property,  especially  of  cotton,  the  stores  of 
which  were  captured  or  plundered,  while  the  whole  of  the 
slave  property  was  lost  by  emancipation.  Land  became  a 
drug  in  the  market,  and  they  had  no  means  of  meeting  their 
debts ;  and  so  it  was  that  many  of  them  have  now  become 
very  poor.  There  seems  to  be  no  doubt  that  many  ladies  who 
were  once  well-to-do  now  fill  almost  menial  offices  or  take  in 
sewing ;  and  the  estates  and  places  which  were  finely  kept 
have  now  deteriorated,  especially  those  in  the  low  country, 
where,  since  long  cotton  has  gone  down  in  the  world,  they 


SOUTH  CAROLINA.  341 

liave  not  succeeded  in  finding  other  suitable  staples.  The 
Charleston  people  say  that  if  only  this  low  country  could  be 
restored  Charleston  must  still  flourish.  The  negro  labour 
is  very  good,  and  there  is  great  abundance  of  it ;  but  the 
negroes  like  regular  pay,  and  do  not  care  to  be  kept  in  arrears 
or  paid  by  cheques,  as  is  too  often  the  case.  A  cheque  is  an 
order  on  the  employer's  store.  If  the  negro  is  in  debt  it  is 
eet  off;  if  not,  he  is  kept  waiting  for  his  money,  or  is 
obliged  to  take  goods  on  the  truck  system. 

I  went  to  see  Mr.  D ,  a  pure  negro  and  notable  charac 
ter.  He  has  been  in  England  and  in  Africa,  and  has  seen  the 
world.  He  is  now  a  justice  of  the  peace  here — Trial  Justice, 
they  call  it.  He  was  appointed  by  Wade  Hampton.  He 
seems  a  very  characteristic,  pleasant,  amusing  sort  of  person, 
and  talks  well.  He  was  educated  in  the  North.  He  is  in 
favour  of  Wade  Hampton,  who,  he  says,  appoints  black  men 
when  they  really  are  educated  and  fit.  I  hear  he  quite  holds 
his  own  as  a  justice. 

I  also  made  the  acquaintance  of  E ,  a  model  Demo 
cratic  negro  and  friend  of  the  white  man.  His  story  seemed 
to  me  a  little  too  much  as  if  it  had  been  rehearsed.  He  tells 
very  fluently  how  he  was  a  slave,  and  bow  he  was  educated 
by  his  mistress ;  and  how  after  emancipation  his  master  and 
mistress,  being  reduced  to  poverty,  he  supported  them  both, 
and  eventually  buried  them  both — he  lays  great  stress  upon 
the  burying.  He  stuck  to  the  whites  in  bad  times  amid  the 
persecution  of  his  own  race,  and  now  is  a  prosperous  livery- 
stable  keeper,  and  a  friend  of  the  party  in  power,  while  his 
own  race  have  also  become  friendly  to  him. 

Mr.  W invited  me  to  go  over  with  him  to  his  house, 

on  the  other  side  of  the  river,  in  what  is  called  Christ-Church 
parish,  where  I  should  see  blacks  in  great  abundance ;  and 
we  started  together.  A  parish  is  a  mere  popular  term  for  a 
tract  of  country ;  it  is  not  now  a  real  division,  civil  or 
ecclesiastical.  Since  I  have  come  into  the  land  of  blacks  I 
notice  signs  of  the  abundance  of  labour.  Instead  of  having 
to  carry  one's  own  bag  and  take  care  of  one's  self,  as  one  has 
in  the  North,  one  is  constantly  beset  by  blacks  who  want  to 


342  MY   JOURNAL. 

carry  one's  things  and  do  all  sorts  of  services  for  one.  Cross 
ing  over,  I  talked  with  a  large  fruit  and  vegetable  farmer, 
who  raises  for  the  Northern  markets.  He  employs  nothing 
but  black  labour,  and  finds  it  very  good  indeed  ;  but,  again, 
he  has  something  to-say  against  the  blacks,  alleging  that 
they  are  loose  and  immoral  in  their  ways,  and  dishonest  in 
small  things.  Women  work  as  well  as  men.  In  this  Christ- 
Church  parish  the  negroes  are  almost  fifty  to  one.  The 
whole  of  this  part  of  the  country  outside  of  the  town  is 
almost  entirely  a  negro  country.  This  is  part  of  the  county 
which  Mr.  W — —  is  to  represent.  He  seems  to  be  on  ex 
tremely  friendly  terms  with  the  people,  but  frankly  admits 
that  he  cannot  get  them  to  vote  for  him.  In  the  evening  we 
went  out  and  saw  the  negro  population  making  their  pur 
chases  in  the  village.  The  people  do  not  seem  to  be  of  a 
high  type — rather  inferior,  I  thought,  to  those  I  had  seen  up- 
country,  but  very  good-natured  and  cheerful.  They  seem  to 
have  got  very  much  into  the  ways  of  white  people,  and  do 
their  shopping  much  as  white  people  do  in  other  parts  of  the 
world.  The  only  difference  seems  to  be  that  they  are  black, 
and  perhaps  a  little  dirtier  than  the  average  of  civilised 
mankind.  The  storekeepers  are  Grermans — they  seem 
almost  to  monopolise  that  sort  of  business ;  the  negroes 
scarcely  ever  rise  to  keep  stores.  Mr.  W—  -  talks  and 
shakes  hands  with  the  blacks,  and  they  reciprocate  and  laugh 
immoderately  when  he  tells  them  that  he  has  beaten  them 
this  election,  and  means  to  do  so  again.  Certainly  there  does 
not  seem  to  be  any  of  the  bitterness  which  one  might  have 
expected,  after  all  one  has  heard  of  South  Carolina,  especially 
considering  the  way  in  which  this  election  has  been  carried. 

Next  day  I  went  with  Mr.  W a  long  expedition  into 

the  country,  which  is  of  the  Sea  Island  character.  Much  of 
the  land  is  what  is  called  'old  field ;'  that  is,  land  which  was 
once  cultivated,  but  is  now  overgrown  with  wood.  I  am  told 
that  after  the  war  many  Northerners  came  up,  expecting  to 
make  large  fortunes  by  buying  good  land  cheap  in  this  part 
of  the  country,  and  they  began  by  attempting  high  farming, 
with  high-class  stock  and  so  on ;  but  they  almost  all  failed 


SOUTH   CAROLINA.  343 

and  went  back.  The  live-oaks  and  magnolias  are  really  very 
handsome  trees,  large,  round,  and  spreading.  There  is  still  a 
good  deal  of  cotton  cultivation — almost  all  long  cotton ;  short 
cotton  does  not  answer  here.  It  seems  that  short  cotton 
tends  to  grow  long  here,  while  long  cotton  grows  short  up- 
country.  The  negroes  cultivate  it  tolerably  well.  We  saw 
one  considerable  planter's  farm  superintended,  as  bailiff,  by 
an  Englishman  from  Birmingham.  Like  most  improving 
farmers  in  these  days,  he  is  trying  to  introduce  better  breeds 
of  cattle.  We  came  across  a  good  many  small  negro  farmers. 
They  generally  rent  land,  paying  as  much  as  four  dollars  an 
acre  for  it,  but  this  is  on  account  of  the  vicinity  of  Charles 
ton.  Further  away  in  the  country  they  can  get  it  for  two 
dollars  an  acre.  It  is  said  that  the  rent  is  very  troublesome 
to  collect,  and  that  this  same  land  is  sold  at  eight  to  ten 
dollars  an  acre.  We  heard  the  usual  tenant's  complaints  : 
that  though  the  rent  is  so  high  the  proprietors  do  not  keep 
up  the  house  and  fences,  &c.,  as  they  ought.  Many  of  the 
blacks,  however,  have  their  own  houses  and  little  patches  of 
land,  renting  as  much  more  as  is  necessary  to  make  up  a 
decent  farm ;  and  most  of  them  go  out  as  labourers  besides, 
more  or  less.  I  understand  that  in  most  parts  of  the  low 
country  the  proprietors  ate  willing  and  anxious  to  sell  plots 
of  land  to  the  negroes,  because  that  fixes  them  to  the  soil 
and  secures  a  supply  of  labour  when  it  is  needed.  I  feel 
sure  that  this  is  the  right  policy.  Here  the  negroes  are 
generally  well  off,  when  they  can  get  employment  and  are 
really  paid.  The  difficulty  seems,  rather,  to  be  to  get  em 
ployment,  than  for  employers  to  get  hands ;  but  I  am  told 
that  any  man  who  works  well  and  steadily,  and  is  honest,  is 
sure  of  employment.  There  is  much  complaint  about  their 
stealing  chickens  and  such  things  ;  otherwise  they  seem  to  be 
a  good  sort  of  people.  I  am  again  struck  by  the  easy,  laugh 
ing  familiarity  between  Mr.  W and  the  blacks,  and  the 

free  chaff  which  passes  about  the  election.  One  disagreeable 
result,  however,  of  the  less  independent  character  of  the 
negroes  in  these  parts,  and  of  the  electioneering  which  has 
been  going  on,  is,  that  very  many  of  them  seem  ready  to 


344  MY  JOURNAL. 

beg  for  assistance  in  one  shape  or  another.  On  the  other 
hand,  they  are  always  ready  to  give  any  little  assistance  and 
to  do  odd  jobs  whenever  they  are  asked  to  do  so,  and  are 
perfectly  content  when  a  little  tobacco  is  given  them  in 
return.  They  certainly  seem  a  remarkably  easily-managed, 
good-natured  set  of  people.  The  next  day  was  Sunday ;  we 
went  out  to  visit  a  rural  chapel  in  the  woods,  and  found  the 
congregation  in  full  and  tremendous  chorus  of  psalmody ; 
one  could  hear  them  half  a  mile  off.  The  whole  thing  was 
very  pleasant,  I  thought.  Afterwards  we  returned  to  Charles 
ton,  and  I  went  to  a  black  church  in  the  city — rather  a 
fine  one.  The  preacher  was  as  black  as  night — a  typical 
negro — and  perhaps  a  little  ridiculous  in  his  manners ;  but  I 
thought  him  a  stirring  and  effective  preacher.  Every  now 
and  then  during  the  sermon  some  of  the  congregation 
grunted  out  devout  ejaculations  in  token  of  assent  or  by  way 
of  emphasising  the  preacher's  good  points.  I  was  greatly 
disappointed,  however,  to  find  that  instead  of  the  fine,  bold 
singing  which  I  had  heard  in  the  country,  there  was  a  choir 
and  a  poor,  thin  imitation  of  civilised  singing. 

The  following  day  I  went  to  see  Dr.  B ,  the  United 

States  postmaster,  a  coloured  man,  and  said  to  be  the  best 
specimen  of  his  class  in  this  part  of  the  country ;  in  fact, 
according  to  my  informants,  the  only  man  appointed  by 
the  Kepublicans  who  is  not  hopelessly  corrupt.  He  seemed 
a  dapper,  pleasant,  well-educated  man,  and  reminded  me  of 
some  of  the  more  educated  East  Indians  in  Calcutta.  He  is 
quite  a  Northerner.  He  admits  that  the  blacks  have  not 
come  much  to  the  front  in  any  way,  and  that  in  commerce 
they  do  not  keep  stores  or  attain  any  considerable  position, 
but  he  explains  it  all  by  saying  that  the  social  prejudice 
against  coloured  people  is  so  great  that  they  have  not  a 
chance.  Like  many  of  his  class,  he  favours  the  idea  of 
Liberia,  and  the  great  Black  Republic  that  is  to  be  there. 

I  paid  a  visit  to  my  namesake  Mr.  C ,  the  indepen 
dent  Democrat,  who  stood  for  State  Senator  for  this  district, 
but  was  defeated.  He  is  a  lawyer,  and  all  agree  that  he  is  a 
very  superior  man.  I  found  him  very  moderate,  and  not  at 


SOUTH   CAROLINA.  345 

all  inclined  to  be  vituperative,  although  the  election  was  bit 
terly  contested.  He  says  that  he  represented  the  principle 
of  Conciliation  against  those  who  would  not  yield  anything. 
The  election  was  won  by  simple  cheating ;  that  is,  by  stuff 
ing  the  ballot-boxes.  At  one  polling-place  not  more  than  a 
thousand  voted,  but  there  were  three  thousand  five  hundred 
papers  in  the  box.  There  was  not  much  intimidation,  but 
only  cheating. 

Afterwards  I  went  over  to  James  Island,  to  see  a  good  long- 
ootton  plantation,  still  maintained  on  the  high  farming  sys 
tem  by  Mr.  H .  The  cotton-fields  seemed  really  very 

fine  ;  they  are  highly  manured,  and  give  a  large  yield  to  the 
acre.  The  cost  of  raising  it  in  this  expensive  way  is,  how 
ever,  so  great  that  it  seems  doubtful  whether  it  pays  very 
well.  Like  all  who  have  to  do  with  them,  he  speaks  very 
well  of  the  blacks  as  labourers.  He  is  trying  experiments  in 
raising  jute,  but  does  not  seem  to  know  how  to  grow  it.  At 
present  he  has  it  only  in  single  rows,  from  which  he  hopes  to 
get  seed  ;  but  it  is  doubtful  whether  that  will  ripen  suffi 
ciently.  I  spent  the  evening  at  Colonel  T 's ;  a  very  nice 

house  and  pleasant  party.     I  had  a  good  deal  of  talk  with 

several  people,  among  them  Capt.  D ,  an  Englishman, 

who  came  out  as  a  young  man,  fought  in  the  war  on  the  Con 
federate  side,  and  is  now  editor  of  the  principal  newspaper 
here.  They  say  that  in  this  lower  country  they  have  always 
been  for  conciliation,  and  have  supported  Wade  Hampton  in 
that  policy  against  Greary  and  the  violent  white  party  who 
are  in  the  upper  country.  They  point  to  the  unopposed 
acceptance  of  Wade  Hampton  in  the  present  election  as  a 
proof  of  his  success. 

As  a  general  result  of  all  that  I  have  been  able  to  learn 
about  the  elections  in  this  part  of  the  country,  I  may  say 
that  there  does  not  seem  to  be  the  least  doubt  that  they  were 
won  by  the  most  wholesale  cheating.  That  is  avowed  in  the 
most  open  way.  Most  people  seem  to  praise  the  negroes, 
and  to  be  on  very  good  terms  with  them ;  but  they  all  admit 
that,  while  the  blacks  will  do  almost  anything  else  for  them, 
when  it  comes  to  voting  they  cannot  be  influenced,  and  insist 


346  MY  JOURNAL. 

on  voting  with  their  party.  At  one  place  that  I  visited, 
where  a  considerable  number  of  Eepublican  votes  were 
recorded,  an  old  Democratic  gentleman  jocularly  remarked 
that  this  had  been  the  only  honest  poll  in  the  whole  district. 
They  say  the  Kepublicans  made  the  election  law  to  suit  their 
own  purpose  of  cheating,  and  had  arranged  the  electoral 
districts  so  as  to  swamp  the  whites  with  black  votes.  Now 
they  are  hoist  with  their  own  petard,  and  serve  them  right. 
The  blacks  seem  to  have  accepted  their  defeat  as  a  foregone 
conclusion,  and  therefore  it  is  that  they  are  quite  good- 
natured  over  it.  Perhaps,  too,  they  really  have  to  some  de 
gree  accepted  Wade  Hampton  and  his  policy,  and  are  not  so 
anxious  to  fight  as  they  otherwise  might  be.  Both  parties 
seem  to  assume  as  a  matter  of  course  that  whichever  con 
trols  the  machinery  of  the  elections  will  win  the  elections. 
I  am  told  that  Wade  Hampton  generally  appointed  two  De 
mocrats  and  one  Eadical  as  election  commissioners  ;  that 
the  radical  was  always  corrupt  and  could  be  bought,  and  that 
therefore  the  Democrats  always  had  it  their  own  way.  The 
Democrats  of  Charleston  have  done  something  to  conciliate 
those  blacks  who  accept  the  Democratic  ticket.  In  this  dis 
trict  seventeen  members  are  sent  up  to  the  State  Assembly, 
and  of  these  three  are  Democratic  blacks.  The  county  offi 
cers  are  whites,  but  there  are  some  blacks  in  the  Charleston 
municipality.  For  the  State  Assembly  the  Republicans  adop 
ted  a  fusion  ticket,  including  the  five  best  of  the  Democrats. 
Hitherto  three  Congressional  districts  in  the  black  part 
of  South  Carolina  have  been  represented  by  black  men,  and 
I  am  told  that  they  were  all  very  fair  specimens.  The  re 
presentative  of  the  Charleston  district  was  a  well-educated 
negro,  from  the  North.  The  Georgetown  district  was  repre 
sented  by  an  extremely  polished  black  gentleman,  who  was 
formerly  a  very  popular  barber  in  Charleston,  and  is  not  at 
all  a  bad  sort  of  person.  The  Beaufort  district  has  long  been 
represented  by  General  S ,  who,  while  a  slave,  was  em 
ployed  as  a  pilot,  and  in  the  war  distinguished  himself  by 
carrying  off  a  Confederate  vessel  and  delivering  her  to  the 
Federals.  He  has  now  great  influence  among  his  own  race, 


SOUTH  CAROLINA.  34 


and  is  not  unpopular  among  white  people.  He  behaved  well 
towards  his  former  master's  family  and  assisted  them.  In 
spite,  however,  of  this  favourable  account,  there  is  a  general 
accusation  that  under  the  Carpet-bag  Government  all  were 
corrupt,  both  black  and  white.  Honesty  was  a  thing  un 
known. 

I  observe  that  in  a  great  number  of  the  elections  for 
county  and  local  offices  in  these  Southern  States  the  oppor 
tunity  is  taken  to  provide  for  the  veterans  of  the  Confederate 
army  who  are  not  eligible  for  pensions.  I  saw  several  notices 
of  elections  of  one-legged  and  one-armed  ex-soldiers  to  county 
offices.  These  offices  are  profitable  —  if  not  paid  by  salaries 
they  have  considerable  fees. 

Looking  over  the  accounts  of  the  elections  in  other 
States,  of  which  the  papers  are  full,  I  observe  that  Governor 
Nicholls,  of  Louisiana,  is  said  to  be  conciliatory  and  to  have 
followed  the  same  policy  as  Wade  Hampton  ;  but  there  the 
negroes  fought  more  successfully  than  here  ;  and  in  some 
cases  the  Democrats  carried  the  seats  in  Congress  only  by 
adopting  a  fusion  ticket  and  giving  the  blacks  a  good  many 
county  offices.  There  seems  to  be  more  '  bulldozing  '  in 
Mississippi  than  anywhere  else.  That  is  called  '  the  Mississippi 
plan.'  South  Carolina  seems  to  be  the  only  State  which 
carried  everything  solidly  Democratic.  In  all  the  others 
there  has  been  more  or  less  success  of  Republican  or  inde 
pendent  candidates. 

I  have  heard  a  good  deal  here  about  the  late  exodus  to 
Liberia,  which  was  such  a  wretched  failure.  The  upper  class 
of  blacks  do  not  go  themselves,  but  preach  to  their  country 
men  the  advantage  of  going.  There  seems  no  doubt  that  the 
unhappy  people  who  went  found  themselves  much  worse  off 
than  if  they  had  stayed  at  home.  There  seems  to  be  a  much 
more  promising  field  for  emigration  from  Mississippi  and  the 
States  in  that  part  of  the  country  to  the  back  parts  of  Kansas 
and  the  Territories  where  land  is  to  be  got  free.  The  negroes 
seem  to  have  been  less  domiciled  in  Mississippi  than  they 
were  here,  and  since  emancipation  they  have  been  more 
migratory.  They  are  now  entitled  to  homesteads  on  the 


348  MY  JOURNAL. 

same  terms  as  white  men;  and  if  they  can  manage  the 
means  of  cultivating  virgin  lands  in  the  Far  West  they  will 
•do  very  well. 

I  have  been  looking  over  some  of  the  legislation  of  South 
-Carolina.  It  does  not  seem  very  different  from  that  which  I 
have  noticed  in  other  States.  There  is,  as  usual,  a  good  deal 
of  legislation  on  small  subjects,  such  as  an  Act  to  legitimise 
.a  child,  and  another  to  make  an  adopted  child  an  heir.  There 
is  a  regular  poor  law,  providing  for  a  poor-house  and  out 
door  relief.  Nothing  is  said  of  able-bodied  paupers.  The 
relief  seems  to  be  confined  to  really  necessitous  cases.  The 
joad  law  gives  the  option  of  contributing  either  labour  or 
money  for  the  making  of  roads.  There  is  a  provision  for  in 
specting  and  classifying  flour  and  some  other  things,  the 
same  as  I  noticed  at  Chicago,  and  a  limit  to  the  rates  for 
grinding  flour.  There  is  a  7  per  cent,  usury  law ;  but  I 
understand  that  in  practice  it  is  almost  entirely  evaded. 
Few  people  can  get  money  here  at  7  per  cent,  the  credit  is 
so  bad.  There  is  a  law  of  limited  partnership  for  sleeping 
partners,  but  companies  seem  to  be  only  incorporated  by 
special  Acts,  of  which  there  are  many.  There  is  not  now 
in  South  Carolina  any  law  prohibiting  the  intermarriage  of 
white  and  black  people. 

I  have  had  a  very  pleasant  visit  to  Charleston,  and  have 

received  much  kindness  here.  Mr.  A ,  whom  I  have 

already  mentioned,  and  who  has  throughout  given  me  much 
assistance,  has  kindly  arranged  for  me  a  visit  to  the  country. 
I  am  to  go  to  a  son-in-law  of  his,  who  has  an  estate  in  the 
rice  country. 

Travelling  in  this  part  of  the  country  is  sometimes  very 
difficult,  if  one  has  to  stop  at  places  on  the  way,  for  there  are 
seldom  more  than  two  trains,  sometimes  only  one,  in  the 
course  of  the  twenty-four  hours,  and  they  seem  generally  to 
manage  to  arrive  and  depart  in  the  very  middle  of  the  night. 
However,  by  getting  up  very  early  I  made  a  start  from 
Charleston.  The  country  through  which  we  ran  seemed 
mostly  forest,  with  occasional  cultivation.  At  Grreenpond  I 
was  met  by  Mr.  W ,  who  drove  me  through  the  forest  to 


SOUTH  CAROLINA.  349 

his  rice  plantation,  some  miles  off.  After  breakfast  wg  had  a 
long  and  pleasant  ride  over  his  land.  He  has  a  very  large 
extent  of  fine  rice-fields.  His  farm  is  nearly  a  thousand 
acres,  and  he  has  several  neighbours  who  have  also  large 
plantations ;  so  altogether  there  is  in  this  part  of  the  country 
a  rice  district  of  which  the  cultivation  is  well  maintained. 

Mr.  W has  a  very  elaborate  system  of  tidal  canals  for 

the  irrigation  of  the  rice.  The  salt  water  is  banked  out,  and 
the  fresh  water  is  regulated  by  sluices,  the  land  being  irrigated 
when  the  tides  rise  to  the  necessary  level.  The  rice  seems 
large  and  fine,  and  the  yield  is  said  to  be  large — sometimes 
as  much  as  eighty  bushels  of  unhusked  rice  to  the  acre ;  but 
the  expense  of  the  irrigation  and  other  arrangements  is 
considerable.  Still  they  would  do  well  if  it  were  not  for 
the  competition  of  Indian  rice  which  has  been  invading  the 
American  market.  The  planters  keep  the  rice-lands  in  their 
own  hands,  and,  beyond  a  little  fodder  for  their  mules,  &c., 
grow  little  else.  The  higher  grounds  they  give  over  to  the 
negroes,  who  cultivate  corn  and  vegetables  for  themselves, 
and  a  little  cotton.  In  lieu  of  rent  for  the  land  they  give 
two  days'  labour  in  the  week,  and  generally  work  two  days 
more,  at  fifty  cents  a  day.  In  most  cases  they  are  put  upon 
task-work.  In  this  part  of  the  country  the  women  seem  to 
work  as  freely  as  the  men,  both  in  the  fields  and  in  the 
thrashing-mills.  The  negroes  keep  a  large  number  of  cattle 

and  pigs ;  but  Mr.  W says  that  is  a  serious  difficulty, 

as  the  animals  increase  too  much,  and  the  proprietor  is  ex 
pected  to  find  grazing  for  them.  The  fence  law  is  a  great 
subject  of  dispute  in  this  part  of  the  country.  The  question 
is,  whether  the  owner  of  the  land  is  bound  to  fence  cattle 
out,  or  the  owner  of  the  cattle  to  keep  them  in.  Each 
county  decides  for  itself,  but  it  seems  to  be  a  burning 

question.     Mr.  W speaks  extremely  well  of  his  negroes, 

and  they  appear  to  be  on  very  good  terms  with  him.  They 
have  quite  a  respectful  manner,  and  in  this  out-of-the-way 
place  the  little  negro  girls  curtsey  like  English  Sunday-school 
children.  There  has  only  been  one  strike  in  this  neighbour 
hood,  but  that  was  a  bad  one.  The  negroes  struck  for  more 


350  MY  JOURNAL. 

pay  for  harvest-work,  and  very  violently  drove  away  others 

who  wished  to  work.  Mr.  W was  away,  and  his  manager 

could  get  no  assistance  from  the  Radical  Government ;  so  he 
was  obliged  to  yield  for  that  time,  but  he  has  since  come 
back  to  the  old  rates,  and  all  has  gone  smoothly ;  there  has 
been  no  more  trouble.  During  the  war  the  people  of  this 
part  of  the  country  suffered  very  much  from  the  destruction 
of  property  by  raiding  parties  from  the  Federal  fleet ;  and 
after  the  war,  when  the  Federal  people  established  the 
Radical  rule,  their  feelings  were  apt  to  be  hurt  by  their 
being  arrested  by  black  soldiers,  and  so  on.  However,  they 
do  not  seem  to  have  suffered  very  severely ;  and  now,  if  money 
were  only  more  plentiful,  and  there  was  a  better  demand  for 
their  produce,  they  would  do  very  well. 

Talking  of  these  arrests,  I  may  mention  that  arrest 
means  very  little  in  the  United  States.  Under  their  old- 
fashioned  English  laws  every  process,  criminal  or  civil,  is  com 
menced  by  arrest,  followed  by  bail.  De  Tocqueville  instances 
this  as  showing  how  an  English  law  favourable  to  the  rich, 
who  can  give  bail,  has  prevailed  even  under  Democratic 
institutions. 

Mr.  W has  laid  out  a  good  deal  of  land  in  lots,  which 

he  offers  to  the  negroes  for  sale.  Some  of  them  have  bought, 
but  most  have  not  the  means.  He,  like  others,  speaks  of 
their  immorality  and  want  of  fidelity  to  their  spouses. 
They  are  religious  in  their  way,  but  have  their  own  peculiar 
ideas  of  religion,  and  do  not  appreciate  some  of  our  theology. 

In  this  lower  country,  so  much  peopled  by  blacks,  who 
can  stand  the  climate,  the  whites  are  generally  obliged  to  go 
away  from  the  plantations,  in  the  hot  weather  to  healthier 
places.  In  slave  days  the  white  overseers  were  a  bad  set, 
and  little  educated.  They  had  no  accounts,  there  being  no 
money  to  pay,  and  they  were  mere  slave-drivers.  Now  Mr. 

W has  two  or  three  educated  young  men  under  him,  and 

they  take  it  turn  and  turn  about  to  stay  during  the  unhealthy 
season.  He  has  also  some  property  up-country,  and  he  says 
that  the  blacks  there  are  more  intelligent,  speak  better 
English,  and  often  make  good  farmers.  On  the  other  hand, 


SOUTH  CAROLINA.  351 

the  low  country  people  are  more  simple  and  more  easily 
managed ;  and  it  is  a  great  advantage  that  the  women  work 
here. 

There  is  plenty  of  game  about  here.  Mr.  W gave 

me  venison  of  his  own  shooting.  These  Southerners 
habitually  eat  sweet  potatoes,  and  hominy  made  of  Indian 
corn.  One  sees  very  little  of  potatoes  proper,  called  4  Irish 
potatoes.' 

I  enjoyed  this  visit  very  much  ;  and  the  impression  left 
upon  my  mind  is,  that  the  relations  between  a  planter  and 
the  negroes  upon  his  property  may  well  be  pleasant  and  satis 
factory.  A  little  more  money  and  profit  only  is  needed  to 
make  things  go  along  very  satisfactorily. 

The  following  day  Mr.  W—  -  drove  me  to  Kusaw,  en 
route  for  Beaufort.  All  this  is  quite  a  negro  country.  There 
never  were  many  whites  ;  and  after  leaving  the  rice  planta 
tions  we  find  that  most  of  the  planters  have  disappeared  since 
the  war  and  the  decadence  of  long  cotton.  We  saw  nothing 
but  scattered  negro  huts.  The  negroes  seem  now  never  to 
live  in  villages  ;  they  have  left  the  old  slave  lines  and  set  up 
isolated  houses  on  their  farms.  At  the  meeting  of  cross-roads 
you  may  find  small  stores,  generally  kept  by  Germans. 

At  Kusaw  we  went  over  the  Phosphate  Company's  works. 
They  seem  to  be  very  active  and  energetic.  The  material 
(composed  of  animal  fossils)  is  dredged  or  dived  for  in  the 
river,  and  is  then  cleaned  and  crushed  and  prepared  for 

export.  All  the  labour  is  black.  I  talked  to  Mr.  C , 

the  son  of  the  former  proprietor  of  all  the  land  about  here, 
and  now  a  manager  of  the  Phosphate  Company.  He  speaks 
very  highly  indeed  of  the  free  negro  labour,  and  I  myself 
saw  the  negroes  working  as  well  as  any  men  in  the  world  can 
work.  Evidently  these  people  are  not  wanting  in  physical 

capacity,  and  make  excellent  hired  labourers.  Mr.  C 

says  he  has  tried  Irishmen,  but  he  found  them  no  better 
workmen  than  negroes,  and  very  troublesome,  so  he  got  rid 
of  them.  The  blacks,  however,  only  do  the  manual  labour ; 
they  are  not  what  is  called  '  responsible,'  and  not  to  be 
trusted  with  machines  or  anything  of  that  kind.  There 


352  MY  JOURNAL. 

are,  however,  some  good  black  carpenters  and  blacksmiths, 
Most  of  these  black  labourers  have  land  of  their  own  over 
on  the  Islands.  After  doing  their  ploughing  and  sowing 
they  leave  the  women  and  children  to  hoe  and  weed  and 
come  over  here.  They  get  a  dollar  a  day,  and  some  of  the 
better  men  a  dollar  and  a  quarter,  but  they  seldom  save. 
After  they  have  made  a  little  money  they  like  to  go  and 
spend  it.  They  drink,  but  not  to  such  a  degree  as  to  in 
terfere  with  their  work.  They  go  home  and  get  drunk  on 
Saturday  night,  go  to  church  on  Sunday,  and  generally  are 
back  at  their  work  on  Monday.  He  has  had  only  one  small 
strike.  The  men  stayed  away  on  the  Saturday,  but  came 
back  on  the  Monday.  He  carried  on  his  work  all  through 
the  Radical  rule,  but  has  had  no  trouble  on  account  of 
political  difficulties.  He  could  always  get  on  with  the  black 
labourers.  All  that  the  negroes  require  is  to  get  their 
wages  regularly  paid  in  cash.  On  the  day  of  the  election 
they  would  not  stay  at  work.  They  all  went  off  to  vote  at 
Greenpond,  which  was  the  regular  polling-place ;  but  when 
they  got  there,  fifteen  miles  off,  they  were  told  that  there 
would  be  no  poll. 

I  was  kindly  sent  on  to  Beaufort  in  the  Phosphate  Com 
pany's  little  steamer,  which  took  me  through  the  river- 
channels.  The  appearance  of  this  flat  country,  in  which  land 
and  water  are  a  good  deal  intermixed,  reminded  me  very 
much  of  the  lower  parts  of  Bengal — the  tall  pine-trees  take 
the  place  of  the  Bengal  palms,  looking  in  the  distance 
not  unlike  them.  The  Sea  Islands  are  situated  very  like 
the  '  Soonderbun '  tracts.  Two  large  islands  lie  between 
Kusaw  and  Beaufort,  and  we  threaded  through  the  channels 
separating  them.  Before  the  war  these  islands  were  filled 
with  large  plantations  of  Sea  Island  cotton ;  and  here,  too, 
after  the  war,  Northerners  came  and  spent  much  money,  but 
were  disappointed ;  so  the  land  is  now  entirely  given  up  to 
the  negroes. 

The  steamer  landed  me  at  Beaufort.  It  is  a  remarkably 
nice-looking  place,  with  good  hotels  and  many  comforts.  I 
went  to  the  Sea  Island  Hotel,  and  was  comfortable  there. 


SOUTH  CAROLINA.  353 

The  town  seems  very  pleasant  and  cheerful,  with  no  signs 
whatever  of  the  tyranny  of  black  rule.  It  is  one  of  the 
oldest  settlements  in  America.  When  it  was  the  centre  of  a 
slave  population  it  was  used  as  a  summer  residence  by  the 
neighbouring  planters,  who  had  nice  houses  here.  These 
planters  are  described  as  having  been  very  good  gentleman- 
farmers  ;  they  were  well  educated,  and  were  especially  fond 
of  good  libraries.  In  the  early  part  of  the  war  Beaufort  was 
occupied  by  Federal  troops,  and  many  negroes  congregated 
under  their  protection.  Several  of  the  black  regiments  which 
were  raised  by  the  Federals  were  stationed  here.  Being  so 
occupied,  the  place  escaped  destruction  and  plunder,  and 
that  is  why  it  is  so  well  preserved.  It  now  seems  pretty  pros 
perous,  with  good  stores,  cotton-ginning  mills,  phosphate 
dealers,  and  so  on ;  but  the  old  race  of  planters  is  gone  or 
dispersed.  Many  of  the  houses  are  occupied  by  their  widows 
and  daughters,  in  a  sadly  impoverished  condition.  A  good 
deal  of  long  cotton  comes  in,  grown  in  a  small  way  by 
negroes,  but  nothing  like  what  there  was  before.  The  great 
majority  of  the  population  of  the  town,  and  almost  all  the 
population  of  the  surrounding  country,  are  black  ;  so  that  the 
Democrats  have  found  it  impossible  to  wrest  this  one  county 
from  the  Eadicals,  who  still  elect  the  county  officers  and  send 
members  to  the  State  Assembly ;  but  the  Democrats  have 
succeeded  in  conquering  the  Congressional  district.  The 
houses  are  surrounded  by  orange-trees  and  pleasant  vegeta 
tion,  but  they  are  not  so  well  painted  and  neat  as  they  used 
to  be.  Many  of  them  were  sold  for  arrears  of  taxes  ;  and  a 
good  many  of  the  smaller  ones  are  occupied  by  blacks,  who 
have  thus  much  better  quarters  than  they  usually  have. 
Some  land  in  the  neighbourhood  is  still  owned  by  whites, 
but  most  of  it  by  blacks,  who  purchased  it  after  the  tax  sales. 
Everything  seems  in  order ;  there  is  no  squatting  without 
title,  but  some  of  the  titles  are  incomplete,  the  instalments 
of  purchase-money  not  having  been  made  good.  The  blacks 
cannot  have  a  better  chance  than  they  have  here,  and  I  am 
very  anxious  to  know  how  they  are  getting  on. 

A  very  fair  and  moderate  medical  man,  Dr.  S ,  has 

A  A 


354  MY  JOURNAL. 

kindly  taken  me  a  drive  about  the  place  and  told  me  much, 
He  was  in  the  Confederate  army,  lost  everything  in  the  warr 
and  with  difficulty  borrowed  money  to  buy  back,  at  a  cheap 
price,  his  own  house,  which  had  been   sold  up ;  but  he  re 
covered  his  profession,  and  now  he  speaks  very  kindly  of  the 
blacks,  and  gives  a  very  favourable  account  of  the  state  of 
things  on  the  whole.     The  people  who  survived  the  war  seem 
to  have  got  on  well  enough.      There  has  been  no  serious 
trouble  or  disturbance  except   at  election  times;    and  the 
worst  outrage  of  which  I  heard  was  that  an  impudent  black 
woman  made  a  lady  take  the  wall  in  passing.     Dr.  S — 
drove  me  out  among  the  negro  farms  in  the  neighbourhood 
of  the  town.   They  are  generally  ten  and  twenty  acre  lots  ;  but 
the  soil  here  is  very  sandy  and  light,  and  scarcely  bears  any 
other  crops  than  cotton  and  sweet  potatoes.     It  needs  ma 
nure,  of  which  it  does  not  get  much.     Some  of  the  patches 
seemed  tolerably  well  farmed,  but  most  indifferently ;  and, 
as  most  of  the  people  near  the  town  depend  much  upon  the 
work  they  get  as  hired  labourers,  these  were  hardly  a  fair 
specimen.  A  little  further  off,  where  the  soil  is  better,  and  the 
negroes  must  depend  more  upon  agriculture,  I  am  told  that 
they  do  better.      We  talked  to  some  of  the  small   black 
farmers,  and  a  good  deal  to  a  well-spoken  black  woman,  the 
wife  of  one  of  the  best  of  them.     She  keeps  poultry,  and 
makes  a  profit  by  that.     They  have  no  children  of  their  own, 
but  keep  three,  whom  they  have  apparently  adopted.     On 

the  other  hand,  Dr.  S says  he  believes  that  the  blacks 

now  have  fewer  children  than  the  whites,  and  often  do  not 
want  to  have  children.  They  think  it  a  useless  trouble.  A 
day  or  two  ago  a  black  woman  said  as  much  to  me,  adding, 
'  I  know  when  I  grow  old  they  won't  take  care  of  me.'  Dr. 

S says,  as  others  say,  that  their  connubial  morality  is 

very  loose  indeed.  In  other  respects  he  speaks  well  of  them. 
Times  are  bad  for  all,  and  they  can  just  get  along ;  they  have 
no  money  to  spare  to  increase  and  improve  their  farms.  No 
doubt  most  of  them  are  improvident.  They  drink  a  good 
deal,  but  not  enough  to  incapacitate  them  for  work  or  to 
create  any  serious  scandal. 


SOUTH   CAROLINA.  355 

I  asked  how  the  people  of  Beaufort  were  situated  as  regards 
the  black  domination  in  the  Government  during  Carpet-bag 
rule ;  but  they  do  not  seem  to  have  suffered  much  from  that. 
The  Judges  have  generally  been  white,  and  some  of  them 
decent  men.  Some  white  men  were  allowed  to  be  on  the 
juries,  and  of  the  county  officers  and  justices  of  the  peace 
some  were  black  and  some  white.  The  Mayor  of  the  town, 
or  'Intendant,'  as  he  is  called,  is  a  white  man,  and  so  are  some 
of  the  Aldermen,  but  the  majority  of  the  latter  are  black. 
There  are  no  black  militia  here ;  the  blacks  have  not  got 
up  a  company,  but  there  is  a  white  company.  In  truth  the 
whites  never  have  been  much  oppressed,  except  that  they  felt 
that  they  were  living  under  a  corrupt  Government — the  taxes 
were  heavy  and  the  State  debt  increased.  The  blacks  now 
feel  that  Wade  Hampton  has  relieved  them  of  much  taxation ; 
only  more  money  is  wanted  to  improve  the  situation.  I  asked 
if,  with  the  advantages  they  have  had  in  this  part  of  the 
country,  many  of  the  blacks  have  raised  themselves  in  the 
world.  He  says  there  is  a  kind  of  black  aristocracy  here ; 
but  when  I  inquire  who  they  are  it  seems  to  consist  chiefly 
of  officials  and  two  or  three  coloured  lawyers  in  criminal  prac 
tice.  No  black  men  have  become  merchants,  or  considerable 
storekeepers.  There  is  only  one  very  small  store  in  the  town 
kept  by  a  black,  and  even  the  small  stores  in  the  country  are 
kept  by  German  Jews  and  suchlike  people.  Before  the  war 
the  blacks  had  one  or  two  decent  tailor's  shops  in  a  small  way, 
and  there  are  still  such  shops  ;  also  a  small  harness-maker ;  and 
there  are  some  good  carpenters  and  other  tradesmen,  some  of 
whom  will  undertake  small  contracts.  The  blacks  own  most 
of  the  hack  carriages.  All  their  preachers  are  black,  but  no 
medical  men.  One  Northern  coloured  man  came  and  tried 
to  practise  as  a  doctor,  but  he  was  very  extortionate,  and 
distrusted  by  his  own  race,  and  he  went  away. 

In  the  evening,  talking  to  some  of  the  people  in  the  hotel 
about  my  future  plans,  I  found  that  they  thought  Florida 
was  the  place  for  a  tourist  to  go  to.  That  is  a  great 
resort  for  people  in  search  of  a  good  climate  in  the  winter. 
Jacksonville  and  other  places  on  the  St.  John's  River  are 

A  A  2 


356  MY  JOURNAL. 

described  as  very  charming,  with  a  beautiful  climate  and  a 
great  cultivation  of  oranges.  The  scenery  is  said  to  be  quite 
tropical.  I  have  come  to  America  for  things  more  utilitarian 
than  tropical  scenery,  and  my  plans  will  not  admit  of  my 
going  to  Florida,  even  though  I  hear  that  in  some  parts  of 
the  State  there  are  some  very  good  black  settlements  upon 
the  land. 

Next  day  I  went  again  about  the  town  of  Beaufort.     I 

made  the  acquaintance  of  a  Mr.  B ,  a  coloured  lawyer, 

who  came  up  here  from  New  York.  He  seems  a  very  amus 
ing  person,  and  has  the  English  nomenclature  very  ready. 
He  says  there  are  here  about  six  white  and  six  coloured 
lawyers,  the  latter  principally  confined  to  criminal  practice. 
He  complains  of  the  quality  of  the  justice  administered. 
Things  have  been  in  one  extreme  or  the  other.  At  one  time 
most  of  the  jurors  were  blacks,  now  there  are  hardly  blacks 
enough  upon  the  juries.  He  showed  me  round  the  town,  and 
pointed  out  all  the  good  and  large  houses  belonging  to  whites, 
the  small  and  inferior  ones  to  blacks.  After  all,  he  says, 
'  intellect  will  tell.'  I  visited  the  coloured  school,  which 
seemed  to  be  doing  pretty  well.  The  master  of  one  class 
claims  to  be  a  reduced  planter  who  was  rich  in  his  time. 
However,  most  of  the  whites  in  these  parts  seem  to  have 
been  rich  planters  and  still  to  be  generals.  They  say  that  in 
old  times  the  imported  slaves  generally  claimed  to  have  been 
kings  in  Africa.  In  the  school  besides  the  planter  there  was  a 
very  nice  young  New  England  lady  and  two  female  coloured 
teachers,  all  doing  their  best ;  but  the  school  has  only  just 
reopened  after  a  vacation  of  some  seven  months.  The  New 
England  mistress  says  that  black  children  do  well,  but  they 
are  not  so  regular  in  attendance  as  Northern  children. 

I  called  on  Colonel  E ,  a  lawyer,  and  one  of  the  prin 
cipal  residents,  to  whom  the  Governor  had  given  me  an  intro 
duction.  He  says  the  blacks  in  this  neighbourhood  are  doing 
pretty  well,  but  they  sell  their  cotton  improvidently  below  its 
value  and  buy  grist  when  they  might  raise  and  grind  it  them 
selves.  The  best  specimen,  however,  of  successful  black  set 
tlement  is,  he  says,  in  St.  Helen's  Island,  on  the  other  side  of 


SOUTH   CAROLINA.  357 

the  river,  where  they  have  their  own  lots,  and  have  had  a 
good  deal  of  education  given  them  by  the  Northerners,  as  well 
as  some  good  example.  There,  he  thinks,  they  are  improv 
ing,  getting  tidier  houses,  and  altogether  rising  in  the  world. 
He  admits  that  the  black  members  of  Congress  from  this  State 
are  pretty  decent  men,  but  says  those  now  elected  by  this 
county  for  the  State  Assembly  are  very  bad.  He  admits  that 
the  blacks  have  generally  conducted  themselves  very  well 
under  the  circumstances  of  recent  years ;  and  now  that  the 
whites  have  got  the  control  of  the  Legislature  he  seems  pretty 
well  satisfied.  He  spoke  of  the  riot  on  the  rice  plantations  to 
which  I  have  before  alluded,  and  says  that  it  certainly  was  a 
serious  riot,  but  was  to  a  great  degree  attributable  to  unfair 
dealings  with  the  labourers,  and  paying  them  by  cheque  in 
stead  of  cash.  They  are  now  behaving  extremely  well.  He 
takes,  altogether,  a  favourable  view  of  the  situation.  He 
is  said  to  represent  Mr.  Wade  Hampton's  views  and  policy. 
Others,  however,  express  doubt  whether  there  is  much  real 
and  sincere  disposition  to  conciliate  in  the  Governor's 
party. 

I  also  made  the  acquaintance  of  General  S ,  the  negro 

Congressman  for  this  district,  who  has  just  been  ousted  in  the 
recent  election,  or  rather  will  be  ousted  in  consequence,  for 
the  American  arrangement  in  this  respect  is  very  peculiar. 
In  the  session  following  the  elections  the  old  members  will 
still  sit  till  March  ;  and  unless  there  is  an  extraordinary  session 
the  new  members  will  not  take  their  seats  till  a  year  hence. 

General  S is  the  hero  who  carried    off   the  gun -boat 

Planter  from  the  Confederates.  He  is  a  robust,  burly,  dark 
man,  now  in  the  prime  of  life,  and  very  popular  with  the 
blacks.  After  the  war  he  became  a  General  of  the  National 
Guards,  a  Congressman,  and  a  considerable  person.  He  at 
tributes  the  loss  of  the  present  election  entirely  to  fraud 
and  intimidation.  He  denies  that  any  considerable  number 
of  blacks  went  over  to  the  enemy.  In  these  lower  districts 
there  was  not  much  actual  violence  at  the  time  of  the  poll, 
but  there  had  been  intimidation  and  serious  obstruction  to 
his  canvass  and  his  meetings  before  the  election.  The 


358  MY  JOURNAL. 

Kepublicans,  he  says,  have  an  enormous  majority  in  this  and 
the  adjoining  districts,  if  they  only  got  fair  play.     Now,  the 
Democrats  have  elected  the  bitterest  of  their  party ;  there  has 
rarely  been  any  compromise.     They  are  sending  two  or  three 
black  Democrats  to  the  State  Legislature  from  the  Charles 
ton  district ;  but   that   is   quite   an   exception.     As  to  the 
remedy  for  the  frauds  which  have  deprived  him  of  his  seat  he 
says  he  might  lodge  a  petition  in  Congress;  but,  if  he  does,  he 
must  bear  all  the  expense  of  the  petition  and  the  witnesses  to 
support  his  case,  and  then  he  would  not  have  a  chance  as  long 
as  the  Democrats  have  the  majority  in  Congress.     He  does 
not  seem  to  be  supported  by  any  party  organisation  in  or  out 
of  the  State.     He  takes  a  favourable  view  of  the  condition  of 
the  coloured  people,  and  is  against  Liberia.     Though  they 
have  been  so  unfairly  treated  in  the  elections,  they  are  the 
best-natured  people  in  the  world,  and  bear  no  malice.     He 
complains  very  much  of  the  want  of  justice.    There  were  eight 
hundred  political  murders  committed  by  the  Ku-klux  and 
other  Democratic  organisations,  but  not  a  single  white  has 
been  hanged  nor  a  single  one  sent  to  the  Penitentiary  by  the 
States  Courts — only  a  few  imprisoned  by  the  United  States 
Courts.     He  attributes  the  difficulty  to  the  rule  requiring 
unanimity  of  the  jury,  which  still  prevails.     The  whites,  he 
says,  have  sworn  to  their  clubs  never  to  convict.     As  long  as 
there  is  one  of  them  on  the  jury  they  never  will.     The  United 
States  Chief  Justice  tried  one  case  which  was  as  clear  as  day 
light,  and  he  expressed  himself  as  dreadfully  disgusted  that 

the  jury  would  not  convict.     General  S admits  that  there 

was  very  much  abuse  during  the  eight  years  of  Eadical  rule 
in  this  State.  They  were  led  astray  by  bad  men.  He  de 
clares,  however,  that  the  black  members  now  sent  to  the 
State  Assembly  from  this  county  are  good  men ;  two  of  them 
are  well  educated,  and  the  third,  though  illiterate,  is  a  good 

Christian  farmer.     I  like  what  I  have  seen  of  General  S . 

Next  day  I  spent  in  an  expedition  to  Ladies'  and  St.  Helen's 
Sea  Islands,  to  see  the  negroes  settled  there  as  farmers, 
and  was  very  much  pleased  with  what  I  saw.  I  went  with 
General  S ,  the  Congressman,  who  kindly  chaperoned 


SOUTH  CAROLINA.  359 

me,  and  put  me  in  the  way  of  seeing  the  people.  These 
islands  are  so  far  islands  that  they  are  surrounded  by  water- 
channels.  They  have  good  soil  and  plenty  of  fresh  water. 
Most  of  the  land  was  sold  for  taxes  and  bought  by  the  blacks, 
and  a  good  deal  of  what  remained  as  private  property  of  the 
white  planters  is  being  gradually  disposed  of  to  these  same 
blacks,  as  the  owners  here  are  very  happy  to  sell  it  to  them 
— so  that  now  they  own  the  greater  part  of  the  islands,  and 
rent  what  remains,  with  little  exception.  They  have  thus  no 
planter  rivals.  The  whites  now  on  these  islands  are  Northern 
people,  who  fulfil  functions  which  the  blacks  cannot  yet  un 
dertake.  Some  white  merchants  grow  and  buy  their  cotton, 
and  others  keep  the  stores  necessary  to  supply  their  necessi 
ties.  The  better  class  of  schools  are  maintained  by  Northern 
and  English  ladies.  General  S —  -  seems  to  be  on  very 
popular  and  pleasant  terms  with  the  people.  They  all  salute 
him  heartily,  and  ask  him  all  kinds  of  questions,  and  he  has 
always  something  to  say  to  them.  On  one  of  the  islands  this 
was  a  kind  of  fete  day — the  Baptist  Preachers'  Convention 
was  being  held,  and  the  people  attended  in  large  numbers, 
the  women  especially,  in  their  best  clothes.  The  whole  scene 
was  very  pleasing  and  cheerful.  In  the  Convention  everything 
was  entirely  managed  by  the  black  people  themselves,  as  much 
as  if  no  whites  existed  on  this  continent.  The  preachers  ob 
served  much  parliamentary  form,  but  the  Court  was  appa 
rently  an  open  one — the  black  ladies  sat  round  and  assisted. 
These  country  people  seem  to  have  many  carts  and  nice 
ponies.  Their  houses  are  tolerable,  and  altogether  they 
seem  to  be  comfortable.  The  farms  seem  fairly  cultivated, 
especially  the  cotton  crop.  The  houses  have  all  been  built 
since  the  war,  and  some  of  them  show  signs  of  decided 
improvement. 

I  visited  Miss  T ,  the  head  of  the  Northern  schools 

which  I  have  mentioned.  She  is  a  lady  of  independent  pro 
perty,  who  has  devoted  herself  to  this  work.  I  had  a  good 
deal  of  talk  with  her.  She  gives  a  very  favourable  account 
of  the  negroes,  and  says  they  are  generally  out  of  debt.  The 
system  of  advances  which  at  one  time  prevailed  has  now 


360  MY  JOURNAL. 

ceased,  and  all  their  transactions  are  for  cash.     They  even 
pay  in  advance  for  any  land  that  they  rent.      She  lets  out 
some  land  herself,  and  finds  that  they  pay  punctually  in  this 
way.     Many  of  them  to  her  knowledge  are  saving  money 
and  buying  farms  for  their  sons.     They  are  especially  anxious 
to  set  up  their  sons  in  this  way.     She  and  others  with  whom  I 
have  talked  in  these  islands  decidedly  differ  from  the  accounts 
I  had  heard  elsewhere,  and  say  that  the  blacks  as  a  class  are 
kind  to  one  another  and  generally  ready  to  assist  relations 
and  friends  in  distress ;  but  it  is  admitted  that  they  are  still 
very  loose  in  their  connubial  relations,  that  being  a  relic  of 
slave  times,  when  marriage  was  not  regarded.     Miss  T — 
says  that  the  blacks  are  temperate.    Their  children  rather  look 
down  upon  those  among  them  who  have  any  white  blood,  and 
point  at  them  as  '  Secesh ; '   that  is,  secession  people.     The 
people  sell  their  cotton  and  eat  sweet  potatoes,  corn,  and 
bacon,  importing  some  of  these  things.      I  had  a  good  deal 
of  conversation  with  Mr.  N ,  the  principal  cotton  mer 
chant  in  the  Islands,  and  with  one  or  two  storekeepers.    Their 
accounts   very  much  tally  with  that  which  I  have  already 
stated.     Merchants  and  ginners  look  a  good  deal  after  the 
quality  of  the  seed,  and  distribute  it  among  the  small  farmers, 
in  order  that  the  plant  may  not  deteriorate.     The  cotton  cul 
ture  gives  the  people  employment  for  most  of  the  year,  and 
after  the  crop  is  gathered  the  women  have  much  employment 
in  the  ginning  factories.     The  long  cotton   requires  much 
more  handling  than  does  the  short.     The  people  are  very 
regular   and   good  as    regards    their  dealings  at  the  stores. 
Besides  the  superior  education  given  by  the  Northern  ladies, 
State  schools  are  kept  up,  but  for  want  of  funds  are  not  very 
efficient,  and  sometimes  are  scarcely  open   more   than  two 
months  in  the  year ;  but  the  people  do  a  good  deal  for  them 
selves  in  this  way,  and  are  getting  on  very  well. 

I  was  amused  to  see  the  way  in  which  the  women  fell  upon 
General  S —  -  on  the  question  of  the  title  to  their  lands,  in 
which  a  flaw  had  been  alleged,  which  has  much  alarmed  them. 
They  demanded  assurances  that  they  should  not  be  turned 
out.  As  to  politics  the  blacks  seem  very  ignorant,  but  very 


SOUTH   CAROLINA.  361 

hearty  upon  the  Eepublican  side.  People  here  deny  that 
there  is  much  drinking  among  them  ;  in  fact,  until  recently 
there  was  no  whisky-shop  at  all  upon  the  Islands.  The  black 
preachers  seem  to  be  a  sort  of  Christian  Brahmins  among 
them,  but  still  they  are  very  democratic  in  their  arrange 
ments.  The  people  like  to  have  a  large  voice  in  all  their 
religious  affairs.  These  preachers,  as  I  saw  them  gathered 
together  to-day,  are  rather  a  funny-looking  set,  with  their 
black  faces  and  white  ties,  but  they  seem  hearty  and  plea 
sant.  They  have  often  other  trades  besides  preaching. 

General  S pointed  out  one  of  them  who  is  a  first-rate 

wheelwright. 

Altogether  I  have  much  enjoyed  seeing  this  example  of 
a  negro  '  Eyotwar '  community,  who,  having  had  a  fair 
chance,  are  really  doing  very  well.  Originally  these  people 
were  among  the  lowest,  most  ignorant,  and  most  enslaved 
class  of  negroes  ;  and  they  have  gone  through  political  con 
vulsions  and  excitements  which  might  well  have  unsettled 
any  people  ;  yet  they  are  now  quite  settled  down. 

I  still  like  General  S on  further  acquaintance.  He 

is  not  very  highly  educated  or  brilliant,  but  is  a  thoroughly 
representative  man  among  these  people,  and  seems  to  have 
their  unlimited  confidence.  He  complains  that  the  present 
Government  has  taken  away  the  arms  from  the  National 
Guards,  of  which  there  were  two  regiments  in  these  Islands. 
They  were  disbanded,  and  only  the  volunteer  militia  com 
panies  remain.  Of  these  only  in  Charleston  is  there  a  black 

company.  Colonel  E ,  however,  does  not  admit  this 

statement.  He  says  the  National  Guards  were  fairly  treated, 
and  every  chance  was  given  to  them  to  become  efficient. 
They  were  only  disbanded  because  they  were  hopelessly  in 
efficient.  The  Government  gives  arms  to  the  volunteer 
companies,  but  they  must  pass  muster  as  efficient  and  pro 
perly  clothed.  General  S ,  on  the  other  hand,  says  that 

the  white  volunteer  rifle  companies  are  really  political  clubs, 
and  that  they  are  constantly  brought  together  by  their  own 
will  for  political  purposes.  In  one  place  where  he  had  a 
political  meeting  he  and  his  friends  were  fired  at ;  and  this 


362  MY  JOURNAL. 

statement  seems  to  be  confirmed  by  a  white  man  of  the  other 
party  whom  we  met  at  the  hotel  on  our  return.  He  talked 
with  much  gusto  of  the  way  in  which  the  buckshot  had 
crashed  through  a  heap  of  apples  upon  that  occasion.  The 
blacks  have  also  their  clubs,  but  they  are  not  of  a  military 
or  political  character :  they  are  more  of  the  nature  of  friendly 
societies  for  the  support  of  the  sick,  and  burial  clubs.  They 
all  attach  great  importance  to  burial.  These  clubs  are  very 
much  under  the  management  of  the  preachers.  General 

S showed  me  one  reverend  gentleman  who,  he  said, 

during  the  election  canvass  was  hauled  up  with  a  rope  about 
his  neck,  and  barely  escaped  with  his  life. 

I  paid  several  visits  before  leaving  the  place.  Mr.  Gr , 

a  Northern  man,  who  deals  in  land,  says  that  the  negroes  are 
certainly  buying  land ;  he  has  had  many  transactions  with 

them  himself.  Dr.  S and  Colonel  E excuse  the 

present  extreme  to  which  the  Democratic  party  have  carried 
their  triumph  in  the  elections  by  showing  how  willing  they 
were  to  compromise ;  but,  they  say,  the  Kadicals  would  not 
compromise. 

There  are  decided  mosquitoes  in  these  parts  ;  not  very 
serious  at  this  season,  but  so  much  so  as  to  make  mosquito- 
curtains  necessary.  After  a  successful  visit  to  Beaufort  I 
started  in  the  evening  for  Georgia,  and,  after  passing  through 
some  lagoons  and  heavy  wood,  travelled  far  inland  through 
the  night,  leaving  the  coast  districts  behind  me. 


GEORGIA. 

At  daylight  in  the  /norning  we  were  passing  through  a 
flattish  country,  with  much  cotton  cultivation,  and  soon  after 
wards  we  reached  Augusta,  in  Georgia.  Augusta  is  handsomely 
laid  out,  with  broad  boulevards  and  houses  surrounded  by 
beautiful  shrubs  and  trees.  It  must  be  charming  in  fine 
weather ;  but  to-day,  for  the  first  time  during  my  tour,  it  is 
raining  heavily,  and  I  had  an  opportunity  of  appreciating 
the  mud  of  an  unpaved  American  town.  I  am  told,  too,  that 


GEORGIA.  363 

before  the  rain  the  place  was  very  dusty.  This  is  a  great 
•cotton  mart — the  centre  of  a  large  cotton-growing  country. 
The  only  complaint  is,  that  the  farmers  grow  cotton  too 
•exclusively,  and  do  not  rotate  enough,  or  grow  food  enough 
for  themselves,  but  have  to  buy  largely  from  the  West. 
Augusta  is  on  the  River  Savannah,  which  gives  an  immense 
water-power,  the  fall  being  rapid,  the  stream  strong,  and  the 
supply  constant  and  unfailing.  Advantage  has  been  taken 
of  this  to  establish  great  cotton-mills,  which  are  doing  a 
large  and  prosperous  business.  The  stock  of  the  mills  is  at 
a  premium.  At  a  very  large  mill  which  I  visited  they  make 
only  coarse  unbleached  goods,  using  only  very  low  numbers 
of  yarn  ;  but  at  another  mill  close  by  they  make  finer  goods, 
the  yarns  used  being,  I  was  told,  about  No.  22.  It  is  said 
that,  while  in  other  parts  of  the  States  millowners  are  losing, 
these  Southern  mills  make  large  profits.  Three-fourths  of 
the  goods  go  to  New  York,  as  the  commercial  emporium. 
The  labour  employed  is  entirely  white,  and  is  upon  what 
they  call  the  '  family  system,'  which  is  much  the  same  as  the 
English  system,  as  opposed  to  the  New  England  practice, 
where  the  mill-girls  live  in  great  barracks.  Here  they  have 
workmen's  houses  near  the  mills,  much  like  what  one  sees  in 
England.  The  manager  says  that  the  people  work  quite  as 
well  as  Northern  mill- workers  of  whom  he  has  had  expe 
rience.  There  are  good  schools  in  the  town,  and  most  of  the 
people  are  now  fairly  educated  ;  but  there  is  no  compulsory 
school  law,  direct  or  indirect,  and  no  restriction  as  regards 
the  work  of  children.  The  women  earn  from  $3  to  $5  a 
week,  fifty  cents  a  day  being  the  wages  for  common  hands. 
They  are  very  regular  and  well-behaved.  Some  men  work 
well  too,  but  they  are  not  so  good  as  the  women.  They 
work  eleven  hours  a  day.  By  the  way,  I  may  mention  that 
I  have  met  some  people  who  speak  rather  in  a  depreciatory 
way  of  the  morals  of  the  charming  young  ladies  who  do  the 
mill-work  in  New  England  factories ;  but  I  have  not  visited 
these  latter,  and  cannot  say  whether  this  is  a  libel.  No 
blacks  are  employed  in  the  mills  here.  The  manager  says 
they  are  not  6  responsible.'  He  has  not  tried  them — perhaps 


364  MY  JOURNAL. 

they  might  do  well  enough  under  superintendence.  Before 
the  war  there  were,  I  understand,  several  small  mills  success 
fully  worked  by  slaves.  It  would  not  be  possible  to  work 
black  and  white  women  together.  The  white  women  would 
not  submit  to  it ;  they  are  far  more  intolerant  than  the  men, 
I  made  the  acquaintance  of  a  gentleman  in  the  iron 
mongery  trade,  Mr.  D ,  who  gave  me  much  assistance. 

He  says  he  has  a  good  many  English  goods.  No  one  can 
rival  the  English  in  cutlery  and  some  other  things,  but  the 
larger  machinery  is  made  best  in  America.  I  was  also  intro 
duced  to  Mr.  N ,  a  Charleston  man,  settled  here  as  a 

cotton-buyer.  He  seems  to  think  that  the  negroes  have 
hardly  so  good  a  chance  in  Georgia  as  in  South  Carolina. 
They  are  the  majority  of  the  population  about  here,  and 
most  of  the  cotton  is  raised  by  their  labour — principally  on 
shares  and  cotton-rents — but  it  is  not  a  very  satisfactory 
system.  The  farming  is  poorly  done,  and  the  negroes  are  apt 
to  change  about  a  good  deal.  There  are  a  good  many  Irish 
in  these  parts,  especially  in  the  upper  parts  of  the  country ; 
but  they  are  mostly  rather  a  low  type — people  who  come  up 
from  the  North  in  search  of  work.  They  are  employed  on 
the  streets  and  ditches  of  the  town,  and  to  a  considerable 
extent  on  the  railways ;  but  the  white  men  do  not  work 
better  than  the  blacks,  and  get  just  the  same  pay.  This  is 
confirmed  by  gentlemen  who  have  charge  of  railways  and 
have  had  experience  of  both  classes  of  workmen.  The 
climate  of  Augusta  is  hot  in  summer,  but  mild  in  winter. 

Mr.  N took  me  for  a  drive  to  Somerville,  an  elevated 

spot,  with  very  pretty  houses,  and  where  the  climate  is  very 
good.  Aikin,  which  I  have  already  mentioned,  is  a  similar 
place,  not  very  far  distant.  We  saw  some  cotton  grown  by 
white  planters  near  the  town,  and  had  some  talk  with  them. 
The  fields  we  saw  were  very  productive  :  the  yield  would  be 
about  a  bale  an  acre.  They  say  the  cotton  sometimes  suffers 
from  drought ;  but  they  have  this  advantage  in  this  climate, 
that  if  the  first  bloom  is  lost  they  get  a  large  second  bloom 
later  in  the  season,  and  that  is  the  case  this  year.  The  most 
productive  cotton-lands  are  in  Central  and  South-west  Georgia 


GEORGIA.  365 

— principally  the  flatter  lands,  where  the  rivers  run  out  from 
the  higher  country.  They  say,  however,  that  the  farther 
north  and  the  higher  up  cotton  can  be  made  to  grow,  with 
the  aid  of  stimulant  manures,  the  better  its  quality  is.  vMost 
of  the  whites  in  this  State  own  land.  The  poorer  whites  are 
generally  either  in  the  upper  country  or  in  the  poorer  parts 
of  the  low  country. 

People  here  will  not  admit  what  I  had  been  told  else 
where,  that,  compared  to  other  Southern  States,  Georgia  is 
prosperous.  Things,  they  say,  are  in  a  bad  way,  and  property 
has  much  depreciated.  They  admit,  however,  that  things 
are  better  than  they  were ;  but  there  is  still  great  complaint 
of  want  of  money,  in  consequence  of  which  the  rate  of 
interest  is  excessive.  They  say  that  responsible  men  with 
much  property  have  had  to  give  2  per  cent,  per  month  for 
loans,  and  have  still  to  pay  8  or  10  per  cent,  per  annum. 

From  Augusta  I  travelled  to  Atlanta,  the  present  political 
capital  of  Georgia.  The  first  part  of  the  line  went  for  a  long 
way  through  a  little-cultivated  country,  abounding  in  pines 
and  scrub-oaks,  the  cultivation  being  only  occasional  and 
rather  poor.  This  somewhat  surprised  me  after  what  I  had 
heard  of  the  quantity  of  cotton  grown  in  this  country,  but  it 
illustrates  what  I  had  before  been  several  times  told,  viz., 
that  the  railways  very  generally  run  along  the  ridges,  and 
that  thus  in  travelling  by  railway  one  sees  the  least  favour 
able  specimens  of  country.  Thirty  or  forty  miles  out  of 
Augusta,  however,  cotton  became  very  abundant,  growing  on 
undulating  ground.  All  the  way  on  to  Atlanta  the  country 
was  a  good  deal  undulated  and  varied,  with  a  good  deal  of 
wood.  This  seems  the  general  character  of  the  greater  part 
of  these  Southern  States ;  and  after  all  but  a  fraction  of  the 
whole  country  is  cultivated.  As  we  got  on  we  came  to  a  dis 
trict  considerably  elevated,  about  Barnet  and  Crawfordsville, 
and  I  noticed  that  in  this  fine  healthy-looking  country  there 
was  a  considerable  white  population.  A  large  proportion  of  the 
cottages  we  passed  here  seemed  to  be  inhabited  by  whites. 
These  cottages  generally  are  very  miserable-looking  dwell 
ings,  according  to  our  ideas,  but  they  seemed  to  be  full  of 


366  MY  JOURNAL. 

healthy  children.  There  are  a  good  many  blacks  also.  I 
understand  that  in  the  country  we  have  been  passing  through 
the  population  is  about  equally  divided  between  blacks  and 
whites.  To  the  south  of  this  line  are  the  great  cotton-pro 
ducing  districts,  where  the  black  population  prevails  ;  but  to 
the  north,  again,  where  the  country  rises  considerably,  there 
is  a  portion  of  Greorgia  which  is  quite  a  white  man's  country, 
and  now  contains  a  large  white  population.  There  are,  I 
understand,  nourishing  places  there,  such  as  Athens  and 
Grains ville  ;  and  quite  recently  that  country  has  been  im 
mensely  opened  out  by  a  new  line  of  railway  running  from 
Salisbury,  in  North  Carolina,  to  Atlanta,  through  the  higher 
tracts.  That  country  seems  to  have  been  exceedingly  isolated 
before  it  was  penetrated  by  railways.  They  say  that  the 
tobacco  produced  there  after  being  packed  in  hogsheads  was 
literally  rolled  down  to  Augusta  and  other  civilised  places, 
not  so  very  long  ago.  I  noticed  many  cattle  as  we  passed 
along,  but  they  did  not  seem  to  be  in  very  good  condition.  I 
am  told  that  they  are  rather  a  poor  breed,  and  do  not  give 
much  milk ;  and  I  can  testify  that  they  eat  tough  ;  but  great 
efforts  are  now  being  made  to  improve  them. 

I  made  the  acquaintance  in  the  train  of  Mr.  Stephens,  a 
Senator  of  this  State,  going  up  to  the  Legislature,  which  is 
now  in  session,  and  had  a  good  deal  of  talk  with  him.  He 
is  a  nephew  of  the  well-known  Alexander  Stephens,  the  Vice- 
President  and  brains  of  the  Confederacy,  who  is  himself  a 
Greorgian,  from  this  part  of  the  country.  His  accounts  of  the 
country  and  people  tally  pretty  well  with  what  I  have  before 
heard.  He  repeats  and  emphasises  the  complaint  about 
scarcity  of  money.  The  State,  he  says,  is  very  far  from 
prosperous,  and  in  consequence  the  fields,  very  many  of  which 
are  a  good  deal  exhausted  from  long  cotton  cultivation,  are 
not  sufficiently  manured  nor  cultivated  so  well  as  they  should 
be.  He  says  that  comparatively  few  blacks  own  land  ;  they 
do  not  save  money  to  buy  it.  On  the  contrary,  they  are 
generally  obliged  to  get  advances  to  carry  them  through  the 
season  in  the  cultivation  of  their  small  farms.  By  law  the 
proprietor  has  a  lien  on  the  crops  for  his  rent  and  advances; 


GEORGIA.  367 

and  when  the  accounts  are  settled  at  the  end  of  the  season 
the  black  farmers  are  often  behind  and  have  nothing  to  get ; 
and  then  next  year  they  either  go  on  in  the  same  way  or 
go  off  somewhere  else.  I  have  since,  however,  met  men  who 
declare  that  they  have  kept  their  old  slaves  on  their  land, 
except,  perhaps,  that  just  at  first  most  of  them  may  have 
gone  off  for  a  year  or  two  to  prove  their  independence, 
and  then  returned  and  settled  down.  The  common  rent  is 
two  bales  of  cotton — that  is,  about  900  Ibs. — for  as  much 
land  as  a  mule  can  work.  The  whites  in  this  part  of  the 
country  generally  have  land  of  their  own,  and  work  fairly 
well.  Near  Mr.  Stephens'  there  is  an  old  settlement  of  Ca 
tholic  Irish,  who  are  now  good  farmers.  The  cattle  do  not 
suffer  from  want  of  grass ;  there  is  plenty  of  it ;  and  Mr. 
Stephens  does  not  doubt  that  the  breed  will  be  improved.  He 
explained  to  me  about  the  grass  which  is  prevalent  here 
what  interested  me  much,  namely,  that  it  is  really  the  East 
Indian  grass  known  in  that  country  as  '  Dhoop  grass  ;'  that  is, 
sun-grass.  I  had  already  noticed  in  the  Southern  States  that 
the  grass  reminded  me  very  much  of  what  I  had  seen  in 
India,  and  it  seems  there  is  no  doubt  that  it  is  an  importation. 
It  was  introduced  from  India  into  the  Bermudas,  and  from 
Bermuda  into  the  States,  whence  it  is  called  Bermuda  grass. 
It  is  considered  to  be  first-rate  fodder,  and  is  only  too 
plentiful ;  that  is  to  say,  it  is  not  easily  kept  out  of  the  culti 
vated  fields.  It  does  not  injure  wheat,  as  it  is  kept  down 
by  the  cold  until  the  wheat  is  up ;  but  the  cotton  being  sown 
later,  it  is  very  troublesome  to  that  crop,  and  necessitates 
much  weeding.  At  first,  when  it  spread  over  the  country, 
as  it  did  very  rapidly,  it  created  quite  a  panic,  and  much 
depreciated  the  value  of  the  cotton-lands,  but  now  people 
have  discovered  that  it  is  so  good  a  grass  that  they  are  glad 
to  have  it. 

I  asked  Mr.  Stephens  about  Georgian  politics.  He  says 
that  after  the  war  for  a  time  they  were  allowed  to  manage  their 
own  affairs;  then  the  Constitution  of  1868  was  forced  upon 
them  by  the  Federal  Government,  and  for  a  short  period  the 
Republicans  were  in  power  in  the  State,  but  apparently  by  no 


368  MY  JOURNAL. 

means  an  irreconcilable  Republican  party.  The  Governor 
of  those  days  was  a  Northern  man,  who  had  been  settled  in 
Georgia  before  the  war,  was  '  a  good  rebel '  during  the  war, 
and  generally  liked.  In  1870  the  Democrats  again  got  the 
majority,  and  kept  it — so  much  so  that  they  have  now  almost 
everything  throughout  the  State.  There  are  now  only  two 
blacks  and  five  or  six  Republicans  in  the  Legislature,  but 
there  are  many  Independent  Democrats.  He  talks  as  if  the 
blacks  are  not  politically  irreconcilable,  as  in  South  Carolina, 
but  amenable  to  influence  and  money ;  they  can  be  managed 
well  enough,  if  only  a  little  money  is  available.  The  Indepen 
dents  have  not  established  a  separate  policy ;  they  have  only 
stood  in  opposition  to  the  Caucus  system  of  the  party.  He 

showed  me  a  speech  of  Dr.  F ,  one  of  the  Independents 

just  elected  to  Congress,  setting  forth  the  principles   upon 

which  he  stood  as  being  distinctly  Democratic.     Dr.  F , 

however,  seems  to  be  decidedly  '  greenbacky.'  He  is  very 
strong  in  favour  of  silver,  but  he  is  also  for  a  '  sufficient  but 
not  excessive  paper  issue,'  so  as  to  bring  up  values  and  save 
debtors.  I  suspect  the  Independents  in  these  parts  are  certainly 
in  the  main  Greenbackers.  Apparently  they  have  generally 
got  the  Republican  vote.  One  Independent  is,  however,  de 
scribed  as  a  '  Bourbon  Democrat.'  Bourbons  are  the  high 
handed  party,  who  would  like  to  act  as  the  Bourbons  did. 
Mr.  Alexander  Stephens  still  lives,  in  poor  health,  as  has 
always  been  the  case,  but  his  intellect  is  as  bright  as  ever, 
and  he  is  a  member  of  Congress  for  the  district  of  Georgia  in 
which  he  resides.  He  is,  in  fact,  practically  an  Independent, 
though  he  accepted  the  Caucus  nomination.  He  is  now 
entirely  for  a  moderate  and  conciliatory  policy.  He  is  also 
very  strong  for  silver,  and  would  have  both  an  unlimited 
coinage  of  that  metal  and  the  issue  of  silver  certificates. 

I  am  told  by  some  people  that  a  strong  repudiation  feel 
ing  is  growing  up  both  in  the  South  and  in  some  parts  of  the 
North.  By  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States,  States 
cannot  repudiate  their  debts,  but  they  can  refuse  to  make 
any  appropriation  to  pay  the  interest. 

Georgia  has  just  had  a  new  Constitution,  with  a  good 


GEORGIA.  369 

many  changes,  and  the  present  Assembly  has  recently  met 
for  the  first  time  under  this  new  Constitution.  Mr.  Stephens 
says,  however,  that  the  changes  are  not  of  an  important 
political  character.  I  asked  him  about  the  homestead  law 
protecting  the  debtor,  and  he  gave  me  an  account  which 
interested  me  much.  Under  the  old  law  of  this  State  the 
homestead  up  to  fifty  acres  of  land,  with  the  necessary  imple 
ments  and  provisions,  were  absolutely  protected  from  execu 
tion  for  debt,  and  the  right  could  not  be  waived ;  so  that  no 
mortgage  or  anything  else  took  away  this  privilege.  Under 
the  Constitution  of  1868  the  homestead  privilege  was  ex 
tended  to  the  value  of  #2,000  realty  or  $1,000  personalty. 
It  was  hoped  in  this  way  to  save  the  indebted  Georgians 
from  their  creditors,  but  the  Supreme  Court  of  the  United 
States  declared  that  this  provision  was  contrary  to  the 
United  States  Constitution  so  far  as  it  purported  to  have 
retroactive  effect ;  and  so  the  Georgians,  finding  that  it  had 
no  effect  to  save  them  from  past  debts,  and  took  away  their 
credit  for  the  future,  have  reduced  the  amount  under  the 
recent  changes.  The  right  can  now  be  waived,  and  so  small 
proprietors  are  enabled  to  mortgage  their  property  and  raise 
money  upon  it. 

Atlanta  is  in  an  elevated  region,  about  1,100  ft.  above 
the  sea.  It  is  now  a  great  railway  centre  and  a  prosperous 
place  ;  but,  as  I  am  to  remain  here  some  days,  I  am  dis 
appointed  to  find  that  it  is  not  at  all  a  pretty  or  nice  town ; 
very  inferior  in  amenities  to  all  the  other  Southern  towns  I 
have  seen.  It  is,  in  fact,  a  new  brick-built  town,  with  no 
trees  in  the  streets,  but  abundant  mud,  for  there  is  now  a 
good  deal  of  rain.  As  in  all  American  towns,  there  are  some 
nice  enough  villa  suburbs,  but  there  is  no  river  or  open 
ground  near.  The  principal  hotel,  the  Kimball,  is  crammed 
full,  and  I  had  difficulty  in  getting  in.  It  is  a  fine  large 
establishment,  with  a  great  hall  in  the  centre,  which  is 
immensely  crowded.  I  have  here  realised  for  the  first  time 
what  American  spitting  is.  It  really  requires  some  nerve  to 
walk  across  the  hall.  This  is  about  the  busiest  season  of  the 
year  for  the  cotton  traffic  and  mercantile  business  generally, 

B   B 


370  MY  JOURNAL. 

besides  that  the  Legislature  is  in  session.  I  understand  that 
the  climate  of  this  elevated  region  is  very  good.  At  present, 
on  account  of  clouds  and  rain,  it  is  rather  warm  and  muggy 
for  the  season  of  the  year. 

The  next  day  I  went  to  the  Houses  of  the  Legislature  in 
the  Capitol,  and  was  very  civilly  treated.     I  was  voted  the 
floor  of  both  Houses.     Access  to  the  floor  seems  to  be  pretty 
free  to  a  good  many  people,  to  say  nothing  of  the  ample 
galleries,  where  there  were  on  this  occasion  but  few  specta 
tors.     I  spent  most  of  my  time  to-day  in  the  Senate,  which 
is   comparatively    a    small  body;   but   I   looked   into   the 
Assembly  also.     The  debates  seemed  to  be  of  an  ordinary, 
commonplace  character.     In  the  early  part  of  the  session  a 
good  deal  of  the  business  is  formal,  very  many  of  the  bills 
being  brought   in,  read   a   first   and  second   time,  without 
much  debate,  and  referred  to  committees.     Evidently  all  the 
forms  of  these  American  Legislatures  were  originally  derived 
from   our  Parliament.     They  have,  however,  much  need  of 
brevity,  for  in  this  State  the  Legislature  sits  biennially,  and 
is  limited  to  a  session  of  forty  days  unless  it  is  continued  by 
a  two-thirds  vote.     They  consequently  from  time  to  time 
limit  the  speakers  by  a  vote  of  the  House;  generally  the 
limit  is  ten  minutes  in  the  Assembly  and  half  an  hour  in  the 
Senate  ;  but  often  by  a  simple  vote  it  is  reduced  to  five 
minutes  or  extended.     Then  they  have  and  frequently  use 
*  the   previous   question,'    or   cloture.      They   certainly   get 
through  a  great  deal  of  business — far  more,  J  am  told,  than 
does  Congress.     It  seems  to  be  tolerably  well  done,  though 
sometimes  rather  hastily.     About  half  the  Senate  and  one- 
third  of  the  Assembly  or  House  are  lawyers,  and  very  many 
of  them  are  ambitious  of  drawing  bills,  so  there  is  no  difficulty 
on  that  score.     At  present  there  are  no  regular  parties,  the 
Democrats  having  it  all  their  own  way.     Evidently,  however, 
the  Independents  are  very  largely  represented ;   in  the  late 
elections  they  have  got  nearly  half  of  the  seats  in  Congress 
for  Georgia.     They  are  not  united  in  any  pronounced  policy 
as  regards  the  blacks,  but  lay  themselves  out  for  black  votes, 
and  there  is  thus  a  division  with  regard  to  the  blacks  which 


GEORGIA.  371 

has  a  wholesome  effect.  I  liked  the  style  of  the  men  I  saw. 
Many  of  the  Senate  appeared  to  be  superior  men,  and  the 
representatives  in  the  Assembly  seem  to  be  a  decent-looking 
set — only  an  exceptional  man  here  and  there  had  his  legs  on 
the  table.  I  am  told  that  nearly  every  man  in  the  Senate  is 
a  speaker.  The  Americans  certainly  go  in  for  oratory  more 
than  we  do.  Their  style  is  peculiar.  They  have  a  way  of 
emphasising  the  last  word  of  every  sentence  and  the  last 
sentence  of  every  subject.  However,  on  every-day  subjects 
the  speakers  I  heard  bringing  on  motions  or  discussing  them 
seemed  to  be  reasonably  brief  and  not  excessively  loud.  The 
halls  are  large,  and  the  acoustics  not  very  good ;  so  that, 
besides  not  being  accustomed  to  our  quiet  English  ways,  it 
would  be  difficult  for  a  man  to  make  himself  heard,  amid  the 
buzz  of  a  good  many  people  moving  about  the  floor,  without 
speaking  pretty  loud.  Conspicuous  among  those  moving  about 
were  the  candidates  for  the  Judgeships  of  the  Superior  Courts, 
who  are  to  be  elected  in  a  day  or  two,  and  who  were  going 
from  member  to  member  soliciting  votes.  'Lobbying'  is 
strictly  forbidden  by  a  special  article  of  the  Constitution,  but 
that  provision  is  certainly  not  observed,  unless,  indeed,  it  be 
considered  that  canvassing  within  the  House  is  not  '  lobby 
ing.'  It  is  the  habit  of  American  Legislatures  to  have  a 
roll-call  upon  many  occasions.  Members  are  not  allowed  to 
absent  themselves  so  easily  as  with  us.  To-day  there  was  a 
roll-call  at  the  commencement  of  business  in  the  Senate,  but 
it  was  dispensed  with  in  the  Assembly  by  a  motion.  Prayers 
were  said  by  a  chaplain,  who  happened  to  be  an  Episcopalian, 
but  the  duty  is  taken,  turn  and  turn  about,  by  the  ministers 
of  various  denominations.  The  pay  of  the  legislators  is  not 
high,  and  has  lately  been  reduced.  It  is  only  a  daily  allow 
ance  while  the  session  lasts,  and  hardly  covers  expenses ; 
so  there  is  no  temptation  to  do  much  legislation  on  that 
ground. 

Afterwards  I  was  introduced  to  Mr.  Colquitt,  the  present 
Governor.  He  puts  it  that  everything  in  Georgia  is  done  by 
the  representatives  of  the  people,  not  by  the  people  them 
selves.  That,  I  take  it,  is  the  great  difference  between  the 

B  n  2 


372  MY  JOURNAL. 

Southern  system  and  that  of  the  North,  where  the  popular 
township  is  the  basis  and  original  unit  of  the  political  sys 
tem.  The  Grovernor  and  others  whom  I  met,  and  who  have 
had  experience  of  Congress  as  well  as  of  local  Legislatures, 
say  that  the  latter  work  better  and  give  more  satisfaction 
than  does  Congress  ;  but  a  Senator  who  heard  this  view  inter 
posed  with  the  caution,  '  You  must  look  inside,  here  and  else 
where,  in  regard  to  legislation :  there  is  too  much  of  "  Tickle 
me,  and  I'll  tickle  you."  '  It  seems  that  at  this  moment  there 
is  a  secret  committee  sitting  on  some  large  disbursements 
in  regard  to  which  imputations  have  been  made  against  the 
Governor. 

At  the  hotel  I  met  a  planter  of  extreme  Democratic 
views,  strongly  opposed  to  Independents  and  all  other  defec 
tors  from  the  party.  He  thinks  niggers  are  only  made  to 
be  slaves.  They  work  well  when  compelled,  but  will  do 
nothing  without  compulsion.  He  has  himself  a  farm  of 
500  acres,  and  no  man  has  worked  harder  than  he  has  ;  but 
he  cannot  make  a  living — with  the  price  of  cotton  so  much 
down  and  wages  not  down  the  cultivation  is  a  dead  loss, 
and  he  is  disgusted  with  the  world.  Between  us,  however, 
we  made  out  the  moral  to  be  that  a  farm  so  large  as  his  does 
not  pay,  especially  when  the  owner  does  not  like  niggers. 
He  is  now  dividing  it  up.  Part  he  has  given  to  his  sons, 
and  part  he  is  selling.  He  admits  that  men  with  small 
farms,  who  work  themselves  and  can  look  well  after  two  or 
three  nigger  servants,  may  live. 

In  the  evening  I  walked  out  into  the  country  and  saw 
some  of  the  country  people.  I  interviewed  a  small  black 
farmer  who  has  a  farm  of  twelve  acres,  in  the  midst  of  the 
woods.  He  was  a  slave.  After  emancipation  the  owners  of 
this  land,  who  were  relations  of  his  former  mistress,  allowed 
him  to  squat  and  clear  this  patch,  on  the  understanding  that 
he  was  to  pay  rent  when  he  could.  Presently  the  land  was 
sold,  and  the  new  owner  makes  him  pay  four  dollars  an  acre 
— a  heavy  rent ;  but  he  does  not  seem  to  complain,  as  the  land 
is  near  the  town.  He  has  eight  acres  in  cotton,  and  expected 
to  have  got  three  or  four  bales  or  more ;  but  there  has  been 


GEORGIA.  373 

much  drought  this  year,  and  he  has  little  more  than  two 
bales.  One  bale  I  saw  screwed  up  and  ready  for  market,  but 
he  is  keeping  it  back  for  a  better  price.  He  gets  along 
pretty  well ;  but  many  others  are  worse  off,  wages  being 
low  and  employment  precarious-  He  explains,  however,  that 
what  he  calls  low  wages  is  fifty  cents  a  day,  or  sometimes 
sixty  or  seventy  cents,  when  work  can  be  got.  He  is  a 
strong  Kepublican  in  his  politics,  but  says  that  many  of  his 
fellow-blacks  are  won  over  to  the  other  side.  Altogether, 
though  quite  uneducated,  he  seemed  to  be  a  good  and  in 
telligent  specimen. 

Next  day  I  made  the  acquaintance  of  Mr.   0 ,  the 

Superintendent  of  State  Schools,  a  thorough  old  Southerner, 
who  literally  '  never  set  foot  on  free  soil '  till  his  own  State 
was  made  free ;  and  to  this  day  he  has  never  been  in  the 
Northern  States.  He  is  now,  however,  very  zealous  in  favour 
of  progress  and  education.  I  went  to  hear  a  lecture  given 
by  him  in  the  evening.  He  says  he  began  by  being  strongly 
against  education,  but  now  finds  it  is  the  only  way  of  dealing 
with  the  people  under  present  circumstances,  and  he  only 
wants  money  to  carry  it  out.  The  State  has  behaved  very 
handsomely  in  maintaining  a  black  college,  where  200  young 
negroes  receive  what  he  thinks  only  rather  too  high  an  edu 
cation.  The  educated  blacks  look  to  be  politicians,  preachers, 
and  teachers.  The  effect  is  not  unlike  the  higher  education 
in  India,  the  only  difference  being  that  there  the  educated 
natives  look  to  being  lawyers,  while  here  they  look  to  be 

politicians.     Mr.   0 maintains  that,  imperfect  as  they 

are,  the  ordinary  country  schools  are  doing  much  good — 
three  months'  schooling  is  better  than  nothing :  the  seed  is 
being  sown.  In  most  of  the  large  towns  and  one  or  two 
counties,  they  have  a  superior  system,  and  keep  the  schools 

open  much  longer.    A  man  in  Mr.  0 's  position  is  not  at  all 

situated  like  one  of  our  inspectors  of  schools.  He  is  a  political 
office-holder  as  much  as  one  of  our  Ministers,  and  his  lecture 
was,  in  fact,  a  political  speech  of  a  departmental  character. 
He  appealed  especially  for  funds  for  his  department.  He 
and  others  want  to  introduce  a  special  drink-tax,  such  as 


374  MY  JOURNAL. 

that  called  in  Virginia  the  'Moffat  tax,'  which,  he  says, 
would  yield  a  large  sum ;  and  he  is  also  very  strong  for  a  dog- 
tax,  to  go  in  aid  of  education.  For  an  out-and-out  Southern 
man  he  seems  extremely  reasonable.  He  says,  with  hosts  of 
other  Southerners,  he  considers  the  war  is  ended,  and  they 
do  not  want  to  renew  it,  but  want  to  make  the  best  of  the 
existing  situation. 

Another  day  I  spent  principally  in  the  House  of  Repre 
sentatives.  The  galleries  were  very  well  filled,  many  ladies 
being  there,  and  on  one  side  many  blacks.  The  interest  is 
principally  on  account  of  the  election  of  the  United  States 
Senator,  which  is  to  take  place  this  day,  although  there  is  no 
opposition.  The  proceedings  were  of  an  ordinary  kind,  but 
a  fair  debate  of  some  length  arose,  in  which  the  speaking 
was  brief  and  to  the  point.  The  House  was  quite  patient, 
but  at  last  the  '  previous  question '  was  moved  and  the  pro 
ceedings  brought  to  a  close.  The  members  seemed  generally 
very  quiet ;  there  was  little  '  Hear,  hearing  ; '  and  when  at 
last  a  hit  was  made  it  was  recognised  by  stamping  and  ap 
plause  such  as  we  have  at  public  meetings.  The  members 
generally  were  respectable-looking  and  well-dressed  ;  only  a 
few  were  in  rural-farmer  sort  of  clothes.  I  noticed  nothing 
very  American  except  a  good  deal  of  spitting.  In  debate 
there  was  a  little  less  strictness  than  in  our  own  Houses  of 
Parliament — more  interruption  and  questions  put  by  one 
speaker  to  another — but  still  parliamentary  form  was  suffi 
ciently  maintained  to  remove  the  proceedings  from  any 
imputation  of  a  parish-vestry  character.  The  business 
seemed  to  be  well  got  through  in  a  simple  and  dignified  way. 
When  the  time  came  for  the  election  of  the  Senator  the  two 
Houses  came  together  in  joint  session.  There  was  then  a 
roll-call,  and  each  member  rose  in  his  place  and  gave  his 
vote.  There  is  no  ballot  in  this  election. 

I  was  introdued  to  an  ex -member  of  Congress,  Mr.  P . 

He  comes  from  the  extreme  north-east  of  this  State — the 
hilly  country,  where  the  gold-mines  are  worked.  It  seems 
that  all  the  north  of  Georgia  was  acquired  from  the  Indians 
when  they  were  moved  beyond  the  Mississippi  in  the  present 


GEORGIA.  375 

century.  Their  lands  were  purchased  by  the  State  of  Georgia 
and  divided  up  in  forty-acre  lots ;  and  thus  it  is  that  small 
white  farmers  owning  their  own  lands  are  very  numerous  in 
that  part  of  the  country.  Now  there  are  no  lands  belong 
ing  to  the  State  except  irreclaimable  swamps.  Some  of  the 
mines  are  now  to  a  considerable  extent  worked  by  convict 
labour.  It  seems  that  a  very  large  number  of  blacks  are  sent 
to  prison,  and  that  they  are  generally  hired  out.  In  slave 
times  little  was  thought  of  petty  pickings — such  as  taking  a 
turnip  from  a  field — but  now  such  things  are  very  severely 

punished.     I  asked  Mr.  P about  the  jury  system.     He 

admits  that  few  blacks  are  put  upon  juries,  except  in  the 
United  States  Courts,  but  he  declares  that  the  blacks  prefer 
white  jurors  and  generally  challenge  those  of  their  own  race, 
because  the  latter  are  bloodily  inclined,  and  are  always  for 
hanging  culprits.  They  do  not  like  poor  whites,  and  prefer 
those  who  have  owned  slaves — the  latter  generally  have  a 

sympathy  for  the  blacks.     Mr.  P says  that  the  forms  and 

style  of  the  Legislature  here  very  much  resemble  Congress, 
and  the  rules  are  much  the  same.     In  the  session  of  1868-9 
there  were  two  sides,  much  as  there  are  in  Congress.     The 
whites  at  first  expelled   the  blacks  from   the   Legislature, 
alleging  that  they  were  not  eligible  to  sit  there  ;  but  the 
blacks  were  restored  by  the  authority  of  Congress.     In  spite, 
however,  of  some  struggles  at  this  period,  this  State  did  not 
suffer  much  from  Republican  rule.     The  men  in  power  were 
capable  men,  and  the  best  men  of  the  State  lent  a  hand. 
Some  people  seem  to  think  that  the  Constitution  of  1868 
was  better  than  the  new  one  which  has  just  been  inaugurated. 
There  being  no  townships  in  this  State,  the  counties  are 
divided  into   militia  and  education  districts.     The  militia 
districts  are  an  old  institution,  and  they  are  used  as  a  con 
venient  arrangement  for  other  purposes  also.     As   in  other 
States,  many  special   local   bills   are   passed   by  the    State 
Legislature,  such  as  bills  to  authorise  a  particular  county 
to  raise  a  special  education  tax,  or  to  deal  with  the  '  fence 
question ; '  to  stop  the  sale  of  liquor  in  particular  places,  or  to 
give  the  inhabitants  the  option  of  doing  so.     I  have  been 


376  MY  JOURNAL. 

inquiring  regarding  the  liquor  laws  prevailing  here ;  they  are 
somewhat  complicated,  but  I  make  them  out  to  be  as  follows :  — 
First,  the  United  States  levy  an  excise  duty  on  all  spirits,  and 
also  a  quarterly  duty  for  licenses  to  sell ;  but  for  retail  sale 
a  man  must  also  get  a  license  from  the  State  of  Georgia. 
These  licenses  are  given  by  the  Probate  Judge  or  Judge- 
Ordinary,  who  as  a  rule  gives  them  to  every  person  of  good 
character  and  who  can  give  sufficient  security  for  his 
conduct.  For  this  local  license  another  license  fee  is  levied, 
which  goes  to  the  funds  of  the  county.  The  Legislature  may, 
and  often  does,  grant  to  corporate  towns  authority  to  levy 
these  license  fees  on  their  own  account,  and  they  generally 
charge  much  higher  rates  in  the  town  than  in  the  country. 
For  instance,  the  local  license  tax  for  liquor-shops  in  this 
part  of  the  country  is  $25  in  rural  places,  but  $300  in 
Atlanta.  In  places  where  the  sale  of  liquor  is  prohibited  by 
law  every  kind  of  sale  is  prohibited.  There  is  no  exception 
in  favour  of  wine  merchants  or  grocers  ;  but  private  persons 
are  not  prevented  from  importing  their  own  liquors  from 
distilleries  in  other  parts  cf  the  country. 

I  visited  Colonel  P ,  a  gentleman  to  whom  I  had  an 

introduction,  and  who  is  a  very  old  institution  here.  His 
family  had  much  property  in  Pennsylvania,  but  he  came  up 
here  a  long  time  ago,  and  acquired  land  which  had  been 
bought  from  the  Indians  ;  he  was,  in  fact,  one  of  the  first 
settlers  in  Atlanta.  He  says  that  large  tracts  of  land  situate 
in  central  Pennsylvania,  by  which  his  family  expected  to 
make  their  fortunes,  were  eventually  sold  for  a  dollar  an 
acre,  the  people  having  gone  West,  not  caring  to  cultivate  the 
poorer  lands  in  that  part  of  the  country.  During  the  war 

Colonel  P did  a  large  business  in  blockade-running,  for 

which  he  had  facilities  in  being  President  of  one  or  two 
Southern  railways,  and  he  seems  to  have  made  much  money 
in  that  way.  Besides  much  property  and  a  large  model  farm 
in  this  State  he  has  a  '  ranch '  in  New  Mexico,  looked  after  by 
one  of  his  sons.  Altogether  he  seems  to  have  been  a  great 
speculator  and  enterpriser.  He  is  evidently  now  a  thorough 
Southerner  in  feeling.  He  thinks  the  negro  first-rate  to 


GEORGIA.  377 

'  shovel  dirt,'  a  function  for  which  he  was  made,  but  no  good 
for  much  else.  He  must  be  '  kept  in  his  place,'  as  it  is  the 
fashion  to  say  in  Georgia.  In  accordance  with  the  common 
opinion  here,  he  says  that  the  cultivation  of  cotton  has  been 
overdone,  and  the  soil  exhausted  by  over-cropping.  Many 
people  are  now  emigrating  to  Texas  ;  and,  besides  the  white 
people  who  go  there,  a  good  many  unattached  blacks  have 
been  carried  off  to  the  South- Western  States  by  people  who 
have  embarked  in  enterprises  in  that  direction.  He,  like 
others,  says  that  the  attempt  to  carry  on  large  farms  in  this 
part  of  the  country  has  not  been  successful.  They  are  now 
being  divided  up,  but  the  division  is  arrived  at  more  by  the 
partition  of  estates  among  the  members  of  families  than  by 
selling  to  negroes.  This  is  a  healthy  country,  and  the  popu 
lation  increases.  The  Southern  gentlemen  now  work  much 
better  than  they  did.  According  to  some,  however,  the 
whites  work  only  because  they  must ;  and  the  negroes  work 

too,  although  they  had  rather  not.     Colonel  P says  the 

negroes  are  not  fitted  to  hold  farms.  The  renting  system 
leads  to  deterioration  of  the  land.  A  negro  lets  it  run  out, 
and  only  cultivates  the  best  part.  People  are  going  back 
from  this  renting  system,  and  prefer  moderate-sized  farms  of 
their  own,  upon  which  they  can  employ  two  or  more  negroes 
and  look  after  them  well.  He  talks  with  horror  of  the  im 
morality  of  the  negroes,  and  is  altogether  pessimist  upon  this 
subject.  He  and  others  are  strong  on  the  badness  of  the 
free  and  independent  young  negroes  who  have  grown  up  since 
the  war.  The  old  ones  have  some  virtues  ;  but  you  cannot 
strike  them  now,  and  similarly  they  cannot  and  do  not  strike 
and  discipline  their  children,  who  are  growing  up  unbroken 
and  uncontrolled.  It  does  seem  as  if  there  was  some  ground 
for  apprehension  on  this  score. 

Colonel  P took  me  to  see  some  great  iron- works.   All 

seemed  to  be  agreed  that  for  manual  labour,  in  this  climate 
at  any  rate,  the  blacks  are  better  than  the  whites,  and  in  the 
works  here  the  ordinary  labour  is  exclusively  done  by  black 
men.  They  would  not  have  white  men  if  they  could  get 
them.  If  the  negro  is  kept  in  his  place  and  is  made  to  work 


378  MY  JOURNAL. 

he  does  very  well,  but  he  is  not  fit  to  rise  higher  ;  he  has  no 
'judgment,'  and  does  not  make  a  skilled  mechanic.  The 
Georgian  who  is  head  of  the  office  at  these  works  takes 

entirely  the  same  view  as  Colonel  P ,  or  goes  even  farther. 

According  to  him  the  negro  is  unthrifty  to  the  last  degree, 
drinks  and  dances,  is  dishonest  and  immoral.  He  says  he 
knows  South  Carolina,  and  is  sure  that  the  negroes  who  have 
farms  on  the  Islands  there  cultivate  them  miserably.  They 
have  only  some  garden-patches ;  few  of  them  go  to  the 
phosphate  works  regularly.  They  labour  only  for  a  few  days 
at  a  time  when  they  are  driven  to  it  by  the  necessity  to  get  a 
little  money.  That  is  the  other  side  of  the  shield.  On  the 
other  hand,  an  Ohio  man,  who  superintends  the  iron  manu 
facture,  tells  quite  a  different  story.  He  says  that  there  are 
instances  here  of  negroes  developing  much  mechanical  skill 
and  conducting  themselves  very  well.  He  has  one  who  is  a 
very  superior  mechanic,  but  he  is  kept  working  under  an 
inferior  white.  He  doubts  if  the  negroes  will  be  allowed 
to  rise.  There  are  no  regular  trades  unions  against  them, 
but  there  is  a  general  view  that  the  negro  must  be  kept  in 
his  'place.  No  doubt  most  of  them  are  somewhat  wanting  in 
judgment.  According  to  the  Georgian  the  negroes  cannot 
see  straight.  As  carpenters  they  always  will  fit  their  work 
crooked.  The  Ohio  man,  however,  says  that  a  good  many 
are  not  only  quite  good  workmen,  but  also  thrifty  and  dis 
posed  to  save,  and  have  by  saving  come  to  own  their  own 
houses  and  a  little  land ;  but  he  says  that  they  are  frequently 
ousted  on  questions  of  title.  There  are  many  pettifogging 
lawyers  about  always  ready  to  get  up  a  case,  civil  or  criminal, 
against  a  negro.  The  blacks  are  sent  to  the  chain-gang  very 
readily ;  when  men  are  wanted  for  the  chain-gang  they  are 
always  got.  He  concurs,  however,  to  some  extent  with  what 
I  had  been  told  about  the  indiscipline  of  the  younger  negroes. 
He  has  some  who  have  been  to  prison,  and  the  chain-gang 
discipline  certainly  improves  them.  He  prefers  to  take  a 
young  man  who  has  served  for  a  time  in  the  chain-gang. 

In  the  evening  at  the  hotel  I  had  some  talk  with  Geor 
gians  of  the  upper  class,  with  the  general  result  that  their 


GEORGIA.  379 

opinions  are  unfavourable  to  the  negroes,  who  are,  they  say,  of 
an  extremely  migratory  disposition.  They  wander  about  too 
much.  If  a  man  is  discharged  he  does  not  care  ;  he  steals  till 
he  gets  another  job.  A  farmer  sitting  by,  however,  interposed 
to  say  that  in  the  last  three  or  four  years  they  have  much 
improved.  He  says  he  has  a  good  deal  given  up  the  cultiva 
tion  of  cotton,  going  in  for  other  things,  and  finds  that  with 
a  moderate  number  of  negro  hands  he  can  do  very  well. 
People  here  do  not  seem  to  have  adopted  the  South  Carolina 
plan  of  fixing  the  negroes  by  selling  them  small  patches  of 

land.      Judge  C ,  a  sensible  man  who  has  a  considerable 

estate,  seems  from  what  he  says  to  get  on  pretty  well  with  the 
negroes  upon  it.  He  likes  the  share  plan,  provided  that  he 
keeps  the  management  and  direction  entirely  in  his  own  hands, 
and  pays  the  cultivators  their  share  of  the  crops,  instead  of 
their  paying  him.  Some  of  them  do  very  well.  They  have 
a  house  and  small  enclosure  of  land  for  vegetables  and  provi 
sions  for  themselves,  and  then,  with  a  mule  supplied  by  him, 
a  man  will  cultivate  perhaps  forty  acres,  half  in  corn  and 
half  in  cotton.  He  gives  them  half  of  the  corn  and  one-third 
of  the  cotton  for  themselves,  or  the  value  of  it. 

I  have  been  looking  over  some  of  the  statistics  of  Georgia 
and  South  Carolina  with  reference  to  the  coloured  population, 
but  I  fancy  they  are  not  very  reliable,  and  they  are  not  made 
out  on  a  uniform  plan,  so  as  fully  to  admit  of  comparison.  In 
South  Carolina  they  have  had  a  census  of  their  own  subse 
quent  to  the  United  States  census,  and  claim  a  population 
exceeding  that  arrived  at  by  the  United  States  in  1870  by 
some  two  hundred  thousand.  According  to  their  census  there 
are  in  South  Carolina,  in  round  numbers,  350,000  whites  and 
575,000  blacks.  In  Georgia  there  has  been  no  recent  census. 
The  United  States  census  of  1870  gives  639,000  whites  and 
545,000  blacks.  People  here  say  that  after  emancipation 
there  was  a  very  great  mortality  among  the  blacks,  especially 
among  the  women  and  children,  yet  this  statement  is  hardly 
reconcilable  with  the  census  returns.  The  Georgia  census  of 
1860  gave  465,000  blacks,  which  number  was  increased  to 
545,000  in  1870.  The  increase  now  must  be  more  rapid, 


380  MY  JOURNAL. 

there  being  no  special  mortality,  except,  perhaps,  to  some 
degree,  from  want  of  sufficient  care  of  infants.  The  number 
of  tax-polls  according  to  the  last  return  is — whites,  126,985  ; 
blacks,  83,900 ;  but  I  understand  that  the  full  number  of  tax- 
polls  has  not  yet  been  got  at.  The  numbers  have  been  in 
creasing  a  great  deal.  The  blacks  pay  taxes  upon  501,000 
acres  out  of  upwards  of  thirty-seven  millions  of  acres,  but 
that  includes  all  land,  cultivated  and  waste.  Of  a  total  of 
6,804,437  acres  of 'improved  land  '  the  returns  give  176,915 
acres  as  cultivated  by  blacks  as  proprietors. 

Reading  the  local  papers  next  morning  I  observe  that 
they  do  not  report  the  debates  of  the  Legislature  ;  they  only 
give  the  proceedings,  with  the  briefest  notice  of  each  speech. 

To-day  I  again  visited  the  office  of  the  Comptroller- 
General  and  that  of  the  Superintendent  of  the  Geological  and 
Agricultural  Departments.  The  Comptroller-General  is  the 
head  of  the  Department  of  Revenue.  There  is  no  income- 
tax  in  Georgia,  only  the  usual  property-tax,  also  the  poll-tax 
for  education,  and  a  special  tax  on  lawyers,  doctors,  dentists, 
and  billiard-keepers,  in  the  nature  of  a  license  fee.  The 
counties  collect  a  pedlers'  tax,  which  seems  to  be  principally 
in  the  interest  of  the  storekeepers.  In  towns  there  are 
special  taxes  under  the  Acts  of  Incorporation.  In  Atlanta 
they  tax  storekeepers  on  the  amount  of  sales.  The  question 
of  the  drink-tax,  on  the  Virginian  model,  and  of  the  dog-tax, 
is  now  being  raised  in  the  Legislature. 

At  the  Agricultural  Department  the  general  lie  of  the 
country  was  explained  to  me.  A  great  deal  of  Georgia  is 
elevated,  and  from  the  higher  lands  the  country  slopes  down 
wards.  The  old-established  towns  are  generally  situated 
where  the  rivers  run  out  into  the  low  country  at  the  head  of 
the  navigation,  where  are  also  the  principal  cotton-lands. 
Lower  still  come  the  pine-barrens  and  swamps,  and  then  the 
Sea  Islands.  The  broad  pine-belt  extends  not  only  through 
the  States  which  I  have  visited,  but  round  through  Alabama 
and  Mississippi  and  well  into  Texas.  The  Superintendent 
states,  what  I  had  been  before  told,  that  in  the  lower  country 
all  the  best  lands  had  come  into  the  possession  of  the  rich 


GEORGIA.  381 

slave-owners,  while  the  poorer  whites  are  principally  found 
on  the  inferior  lands  ;  that  is,  the  pine-barrens,  which,  he  says, 
are  not  really  bad  land.  There  is  a  sandy  surface  something 
like  that  in  Prussia,  but  clay  underlies  the  surface,  and  that 
holds  fertilisers  well.  Georgia  was  certainly  much  more 
democratic  in  its  origin  than  Virginia  or  South  Carolina. 
When  a  great  part  of  the  State,  especially  all  the  upper  part, 
was  acquired  by  successive  purchases  from  the  Indians,  the 
land  of  Georgia  belonging  to  the  State  itself  not  to  the  United 
States,  each  new  acquisition  was  marked  out  in  parcels  and 
apportioned  by  lot  to  the  people  of  the  State.  Many  of 
these  lots  were  not  occupied,  and  were  purchased  for  a  song 
by  the  richer  people.  To  this  clay,  in  fact,  many  of  the  lots 
have  not  been  occupied,  and  the  purchasers  do  not  know 
where  they  are.  These  are  what  are  called  '  wild  lands ; '  and 
there  is  a  '  Wild  Land  '  Office,  the  business  of  which  is  to  find 
out  these  uncultivated  lands  and  to  tax  them — for  hitherto 
they  have  not  been  properly  taxed.  Before  the  war  there 
was  in  this  State  an  extreme  jealousy  of  interlopers.  So  far 
from  encouraging  new  immigrants,  the  Georgians  wished  to 
keep  them  out  and  to  keep  all  the  lands  for  themselves.  All 
this  is  now  changed — they  are  delighted  to  sell  their  lands 
when  they  can  find  purchasers,  and  new-comers  are  exceed 
ingly  welcome. 

We  are  now  having  rain,  which,  I  am  told,  is  not  unusual 
in  November,  and  is  generally  followed  by  a  week  of  clear 
frost.  That  is  the  hog-killing  season.  From  the  middle  of 
December  to  the  middle  of  February  there  is  generally  quite 
a  rainy  season — only  a  little  snow  coming  at  the  last.  In 
spring  they  generally  have  good  showers,  and  in  the  early 
summer  there  are  frequent  thunder-showers.  There  is  gene 
rally  heavy  rain  in  August  and  a  dry  autumn. 

The  present  Legislature  is  much  bent  on  economy.  They 
not  only  want  to  reduce  the  number  of  Circuit  Judges — a  ques 
tion  which  I  heard  debated — but  also  do  not  like  the  cost  of  the 
Agricultural  and  Geological  Departments.  The  farmers  espe 
cially  object  to  the  Agricultural  Department  as  useless. 

I  had  again  a  good  deal  of  talk  with  several  men.     They 


382  MY  JOURNAL. 

all  stoutly  maintain  that  Georgia  deserves  credit  as  having 
set  an  example  to  other  States  in  the  treatment  of  the  negro. 
After  the  war,  instead  of  refusing  to  take  any  part  in  affairs, 
as  the  white  leaders  of  some  States  did,  they  accepted  the 
situation,  sent  their  best  men  to  the  Convention  that  was  then 
held,  and  managed  to  get  things  arranged,  so  that  they  did 
not  fare  very  badly.  After  one  legislative  term,  in  which 
parties  were  pretty  equally  balanced,  they  got  the  complete 
control.  Since  then  their  policy  has  been  justice  to  and 
improvement  of  the  negro.  One  statement  took  me  quite  by 
surprise,  and  I  have  not  been  able  to  verify  it.  They  assert 
that  at  this  moment  there  are  more  drilled  negro  militia  than 
there  are  of  whites.  They  say  that  from  the  first  they 
thought  they  could  manage  the  blacks  best  by  drilling,  dis 
ciplining,  and  trusting  them ;  that  the  militia  is  far  better 
than  the  secret  clubs,  and  that  they  know  well  they  can  take 
the  arms  from  the  blacks  when  they  wish  to  do  so. 

I  notice  that  there  is  in  the  papers  to-day  the  report  of 
an  official  committee  upon  the  militia.  They  want  to  have 
it  regularly  organised,  with  pecuniary  assistance  from  the 
State,  a  Georgian  flag,  and  several  other  ambitious  things. 
That  looks  as  if  those  who  framed  the  report  wished  to  go 
very  far  in  the  way  of  State  independence.  I  have  been 
looking  over  the  report  of  the  Adjutant- General  of  South 
Carolina  regarding  the  withdrawal  of  arms  from  the  Black 
National  Guards.  He  says  that  arms  were  issued  indis 
criminately  to  the  people,  and  it  was  necessary  to  take  them 
away  from  those  who  were  not  qualified  to  use  them.  He  also 
complains  that  under  an  Act  of  1874  companies  called  Eifle 
Clubs  have  been  organised,  which  are  not  part  of  the  military 
establishment  of  the  State,  and  which  interfere  with  the  due 
organisation  of  the  National  Guards.  He  suggests  confining 
the  National  Guards  to  the  great  cities,  as  is,  he  says,  the 
case  in  other  States. 

The  gentlemen  to  whom  I  have  been  talking  dwell  much 
on  what  they  have  done  for  the  education  of  the  blacks. 
When  pressed  as  to  what  else  they  have  done  for  them  they 
rather  deal  in  generalities,  talking  of  their  good  and  con- 


GEORGIA.  383 

dilatory  treatment.  They  say  the  blacks  are  now  quite 
content  and  willingly  go  with  the  whites.  They  would  be 
all  right  but  for  the  interference  of  carpet-baggers,  and, 
above  all,  of  the  c  New  England  school  marmsS  These  they 
declare  to  be  the  pest  of  the  world,  putting  false  ideas  of 
equality  into  the  heads  of  the  blacks,  especially  the  black 
women,  whom  all  agree  in  describing  as  the  most  trouble 
some  of  the  race.  Some  time  ago,  they  say,  a  black  woman 
would  only  accept  the  place  of  cook  in  the  character  of  a 
lady-help.  Now  that  they  have  got  rid  of  the  Northerners,  a 
black  woman  will  conduct  herself  as  an  ordinary  cook.  They 
admit  that  they  have  done  nothing  special  to  settle  the 
negroes  on  land,  as  has  been  done  in  South  Carolina.  They 
had  not  thought  of  the  advantage  of  fixing  them  down ; 
but  they  declare  that  they  are  quite  ready  to  sell  land  to 
them  if  they  will  only  be  thrifty  and  save  money  for  the 
purpose,  as  some  in  fact  do.  But  they  say  that  the  blacks 
like  society,  their  wives  like  dress  and  dances  and  shows,  and 
being  free  to  do  as  they  liked  they  sought  to  obtain  these 
advantages  of  freedom  in  the  towns.  Now  many  have  gone 
back  to  the  country.  They  have  as  much  land  as  could  be 
expected  in  so  short  a  time.  I  could  not,  however,  obtain 
any  explanation  of  the  fact  shown  by  the  statistics,  that 
there  has  been  scarcely  any  increase  in  the  negro  ownership 
of  land  in  the  last  two  or  three  years.  It  must  be  a  long 
time,  they  say,  before  the  negroes  generally  hold  land. 
Gradually  they  may  acquire  it,  but  for  the  present  most  of 
them  must  be  tenants  or  labourers.  I  have  not  been  able  to 
carry  the  question  further  than  that.  I  had  been  told  that 
in  one  county  there  was  a  Granger's  League — a  combination 
not  to  sell  land  to  negroes — and  that  the  negroes  thereupon 
check-mated  the  land-owners  by  themselves  making  a  league 
to  leave  that  county.  My  friends  deny  any  knowledge  of  the 
Grangers'  League,  but  they  admit  to  have  heard  of  the  black 
league  in  Houston  County.  They  admit  that  very  many 
whites  have  disgraced  themselves  by  failing  to  pay  wages- 
earned  by  the  black  labourers.  That  has  been  a  general 
complaint  everywhere,  but  things,  they  say,  are  in  that 


384  MY   JOURNAL. 

respect  not  so  bad  in  Georgia  as  in  several  other  States. 
They  tell  stories  of  the  childish  character  of  the  negro — but 
he  works  well.  There  is  no  better  worker  when  he  is  at  it, 
only  he  is  always  liable  to  the  temptation  to  sit  up  at  night 
to  dance  and  frolic.  He  is  given  to  spout  ridiculously  in 
church,  and  to  steal  and  lie,  and  he  is  very  bad  in  love  mat 
ters.  He  is  very  stupid  in  his  crime,  and  is  always  found 
out,  and  so  it  is  that  he  always  gets  into  the  penitentiary 
when  the  police  would  never  detect  a  white  man. 

I  confess  I  am  more  and  more  suspicious  about  the 
criminal  justice  of  these  southern  states.  In  Georgia  there 
is  no  regular  penitentiary  at  all,  but  an  organised  system  of 
letting  out  the  prisoners  for  profit.  Some  people  here  have 
got  up  a  company  for  the  purpose  of  hiring  convicts.  They 
pay  $25,000  a  year  besides  all  expenses  of  food  and  keep,  so 
that  the  money  is  clear  profit  to  the  state.  The  lessees  work 
the  prisoners  both  on  estates  and  in  mines,  and  apparently 
maintain  severe  discipline  in  their  own  way,  and  make  a 
good  thing  of  it.  Colonel  P ,  who  is  not  very  mealy- 
mouthed,  admits  that  he  left  the  concern  because  he  could 
not  stand  the  inhumanity  of  it.  Another  partner  in  the 
concern  talked  with  great  glee  of  the  money  he  had  made 
out  of  the  convicts.  This  does  seem  simply  a  return  to 
another  form  of  slavery. 

Here,  too,  I  am  told  that  there  is  a  greater  separation 
of  the  white  and  black  castes  than  there  was  before  the  war. 
Now  there  is  complete  separation  in  churches  and  schools. 
It  was  a  black  member  who  moved  and  carried  in  the  legis 
lature  that  the  two  classes  of  schools  should  be  for  ever 
separate.  The  separation  is  the  doing  of  the  blacks.  They 
do  not  like  association  on  terms  of  inferiority. 

A  man  to  whom  I  talked  to-day  says  that  cotton,  can  only 
be  profitably  cultivated  by  blacks.  It  is  their  habit  and  edu 
cation  to  cultivate  cotton  and  it  gives  them  constant  employ 
ment  all  the  year  round  in  a  way  which  the  white  men  do 
not  like.  The  southern  white  man  feels  the  necessity  of 
labour  now  and  does  labour,  but  he  is  better  at  raising  corn 
and  such  things  than  cotton. 


GEORGIA.  385 

I  had  a  good  deal  of  talk  with  Governor  Browne,  a  very 
shrewd  and  remarkable  man.  He  is  a  self-made  man,  but 
was  Governor  of  Georgia  for  eight  years  down  to  the  close  of 
the  war.  He  seems  to  have  been  engaged  in  blockade-run 
ning,  and  to  have  made  a  good  deal  of  money  in  that  way; 
and  since  the  war,  like  all  the  great  men  in  this  country,  he 
is  president  of  railways  and  mining  companies.  He  is  evi 
dently  very  much  respected  and  still  quite  sustains  his  repu 
tation  of  being  a  very  long-headed  man.  He  has  been  a 
great  deal  over  the  States,  has  had  properties  and  specula 
tions  in  many  other  states  besides  his  own.  I  talked  to  him 
about  the  condition  of  some  of  the  Southern  States  which  I 
have  not  visited.  He  says  that  Alabama  soon  got  the 
government  into  its  own  hands,  though  not  quite  so  soon  as 
Georgia,  and  is  now  pretty  quiet  and  peaceful,  though  suffer 
ing  from  the  low  price  of  cotton ;  for  that  is  a  very  great 
cotton  state.  Both  Mississippi  and  Louisiana  have  had 
troubles  like  those  of  South  Carolina.  The  feeling  between 
blacks  and  whites  seems  to  be  worse  in  Mississippi  than  in 
any  other  state.  In  Mississippi  the  best  cotton  grows  on  the 
ridge  of  highish  land  near  the  river  ;  behind  that  there  are 
impracticable  swamps,  and  back  beyond  that  again  comes 
higher  land  on  which  cotton  is  raised  throughout  the  whole 
length  of  the  state.  In  Louisiana  sugar  is  doing  better  than 
it  was,  but  owing  to  the  liability  to  frost  it  is  cultivated  at  a 
great  disadvantage  as  compared  to  Cuba.  The  great  trouble 
of  the  Southern  States  is  the  debt,  most  of  which  was  con 
tracted  to  promote  railways.  Governor  Browne  says  that  the 
coloured  French  Creoles  of  Louisiana,  or  at  any  rate  the 
higher  class  among  them,  took  part  with  the  whites,  and 
having  lost  their  property  are  now  generally  Democratic. 
He  does  not  know  that  any  prominent  men  among  them 
have  attempted  to  become  the  political  leaders  of  the  blacks. 
They  still  prefer  the  white  man,  and  in  the  New  Orleans 
country  the  latter  to  some  extent  recognise  them  and  admit 
them  to  their  society  to  some  degree. 

In  the  evening  I  took  tea  with  Colonel  P and  his 

family.  Though  he  is,  I  believe,  a  rich  man,  he  lives  in  a 

C  C 


386  MY  JOURNAL. 

very  simple  style,  as  does  everyone  here.  All  the  governors 
of  these  states  seem  to  be  really  poor  men  who  now  live  in 
cottages,  but  they  are  also  men  of  some  family  and  consider 
ation  in  their  states.  Colonel  P is  full  of  stories  of  the 

way  in  which  money  was  made  in  the  war  by  blockade-run 
ning  and  suchlike  business,  especially  by  those  who  had 
command  of  the  railways.  The  sharpest  people  among  the 
Southerners  seem  to  have  gone  in  for  blockade-running,  which 
they  found  much  more  profitable  than  fighting.  As  to  the 

war,  Colonel  P says  that  at  first  the  Southerners  put  a 

splendid  set  of  men  into  the  field — they  had  long  been  pre 
paring  for  it — but  almost  all  those  were  killed  or  disabled, 
and  then,  what  with  inferior  men  and  pressed  men,  their 
armies  were  not  at  all  what  they  had  been.  As  the  war  went 
on,  the  Southern  armies  became  much  worse  while  the 
Northern  armies  became  much  better.  As  long  as  they  had 
only  to  fight  in  front,  they  did  very  well,  but  their  position 
was  much  altered  when  the  Federals  got  possession  of  the 
line  of  the  Mississippi.  Then  came  Sherman's  march  and 
much  destruction  of  cotton,  which  the  Federals  made  con 
traband  and  seized,  while  the  Confederates  burnt  it  to  prevent 
it  from  falling  into  the  hands  of  the  other  party.  There  was 
thus  much  suffering  in  the  Southern  states  and  a  great  want 
of  many  luxuries,  such  as  coffee  and  sugar.  Under  these 
circumstances  half  of  Lee's  men  deserted  and  came  to  look 
after  their  families,  and  so  at  last  the  South  turned  out  to  be 
an  empty  shell. 

Colonel  P says  that  in  these  parts  no  one  drinks  tea 

— coffee  is  universally  drunk,  generally  with  sugar  and  with 
out  milk. 

In  the  evening  I  went  to  hear  General  Gordon,  the  newly 
elected  senator,  who  gave  an  address.  He  was  very  eloquent 
and  successful,  but  I  thought  too  much  in  the  style  of  an 
energetic  preacher.  I  understand  now  where  the  negro 
preachers  get  their  style.  Greneral  Gordon's  discourse  was 
principally  a  very  strong  attack  upon  the  Independents. 
He  seemed  to  advocate  extreme  views — '  a  solid  South,'  and  so 
on.  They  had  got  State  after  State,  and  now  South  Carolina 


GEORGIA.  387 

too,  and  they  would  not  go  back.  Shame  to  those  who  broke 
their  own  ranks.  After  the  meeting  I  fraternised  with 
several  legislators  at  the  Kimball,  and  had  two  or  three  invi 
tations  to  '  take  a  drink.'  All  were  very  civil  and  cordial  and 
inclined  to  talk  of  England  as  their  model.  That  seems 
quite  the  fashion  here.  I  met  a  man  who  is  canvassing  for  a 
judgeship,  and  who  has,  he  said,  been  up  till  one  or  two  in 
the  morning  for  several  nights  in  succession  at  that  work. 

The  next  day  I  went  to  the  election  of  judges  by  the 
combined  Houses  in  joint  session.  It  is  done  in  the  same 
way  as  the  election  of  senator  and  is  a  dignified  enough  kind 
of  proceeding,  each  member  rising  as  his  name  is  called  and 
giving  his  vote.  The  salary  of  a  judge  is  $2,500  (say  5001.} 
a  year,  and  there  is  tremendous  canvassing  for  the  place. 
They  say  this  canvassing  is  absolutely  necessary ;  the  greatest 
lawyer  in  the  United  States  would  not  be  elected  if  he  did 
not  work  hard  for  it.  So  much  is  this  so,  under  the  present 
system,  that  many  people  say  that  they  prefer  the  former 
plan  when  the  Governor  nominated  with  the  consent  of  the 
Legislature,  or  even  when  the  judges  were  elected  by  the 
people  who  are  too  numerous  to  be  canvassed.  There  were 
very  hot  contests  for  the  judgeships  and  inferior  offices,  but 
when  the  election  was  over  I  heard  everyone  say  that  the 
man  he  worked  for  had  been  elected. 

I  visited  the  editor  of  the  small  weekly  Independent 
paper  published  here,  or  as  some  call  it  the  republican  paper. 
He  did  not  speak  at  all  bitterly.  When  Governor  Bullock 
was  elected  as  a  republican  there  was  a  good  deal  of  '  bull 
dozing  '  on  the  part  of  the  Democrats,  but  now  things  have 
settled  down.  The  principal  fault  of  Grovernor  Bullock  was 
that  he  was  elected  by  the  black  vote.  The  general  opinion 
seems  to  be  that  there  was  no  truth  in  the  charges  on  account 
of  which  he  was  driven  away.  There  is  still  a  little  bull 
dozing  and  a  good  deal  of  influence  bribery  and  whisky  used 
to  back  the  regular  Democratic  candidates.  The  blacks  are 
always  ready  to  vote  for  any  man  who  goes  against  the  regu 
lar  Democratic  ticket.  This  gentleman,  however,  joins  in 
the  general  statement  that  Georgia  treats  the  blacks  fairly 

c  c  2 


388  MY   JOURNAL. 

well.  If  willing  to  vote  Democratic  they  will  be  well  enough 
treated.  He  says  it  is  true  that  the  blacks  have  been  armed 
and  encouraged  to  take  their  part  as  militiamen.  Fair  jus 
tice  is  given  to  them  in  the  courts ;  there  is  a  disposition  to 
treat  them  as  not  very  responsible  children.  In  the  last 
sessions  one  white  man  was  convicted  of  murder  when  two 
blacks  were  acquitted.  The  blacks  are  treated  more  fairly 
in  the  settlement  of  their  accounts  at  the  end  of  the  year  in 
Georgia  than  in  other  states.  In  lower  Georgia  there  is  still 
some  unfairness,  and  in  some  other  states  the  blacks  are  cer 
tainly  very  unfairly  treated  in  this  matter.  They  are  so 
improvident  that  they  must  get  advances  to  support  them 
during  the  cultivating  season,  and  both  storekeepers  and 
landowners  '  stick  it  on '  to  them  terribly  when  the  account 
is  made  out  at  the  end  of  the  season. 

I  had  a  call  from  Mr.  \V ,  a  Scotch-Irishman  settled 

here.  He  was  bred  a  cotton-spinner,  and  emigrated  when 
cotton-spinning  came  to  an  end  in  Ireland.  He  had  mills  here 
before  the  war,  since  which  time  he  has  acquired  large  landed 
property.  Before  the  war  he  employed  in  his  mills  negroes 
and  negresses  along  with  some  free  whites.  That  was  not  an 
uncommon  practice,  and  they  did  very  well ;  but  since  eman 
cipation  the  blacks  have  not  been  employed  in  the  mills.  He 
also  took  me  to  see  a  friend,  another  Scotch-Irishman,  who 
came  out  with  nothing,  and  now  has  a  large  dry-goods  store, 
and  seems  a  prosperous  man.  Atlanta  is  a  new  place,  and 
there  are  a  great  many  self-made  men  in  it.  This  gentle 
man,  though  not  very  long  out,  fought  on  the  Confederate 
side  in  the  war.  He  showed  me  his  goods  ;  most  of  them  are 
of  American  make,  but  many  of  them  English.  The  mills  in 
these  parts,  he  says,  make  capital  woollen  goods  for  common 
use.  Georgian  wool  is  used,  but  it  is  not  well  cleaned,  and 
the  finer  woollen  goods  come  from  England.  They  make  a 
capital  kind  of  mixed  goods  which  are  very  largely  used,  and 
are  quite  cheap.  No  doubt  the  best  woollen  clothes  are  ex 
cessively  dear  in  this  country,  but  he  declares  the  Americans 
will  beat  us  in  cottons.  The  (  domestics '  made  in  the  North 
are  far  better  than  the  same  class  of  goods  from  England- 


GEORGIA.  389 

He  says  that  the  enormous  progress  of  American  manufac 
tures  in  the  last  ten  years  is  patent  and  astonishing.  The 
Americans  are  extremely  ready  to  invent  or  imitate,  and 
he  thinks  English  manufactures  are  doomed  to  decline. 
Southern  white  labour  is  as  cheap  and  good  as  any  labour  of 
the  kind  in  the  world.  The  white  mill-workers  are  a  good 
class  of  people,  and  very  often  own  their  own  houses,  or  if  not 
the  mill-owners  take  much  care  in  providing  houses  and  com 
forts  for  them. 

Mr.  W does  not  farm  himself  but  manages  his  land 

entirely  by  letting  it  out.  He  has  both  black  and  white 
tenants.  One  black  man,  a  respectable  Methodist  elder,  runs 
ten  ploughs  ;  yet  he  is  not  very  provident.  He  is  always 
liable  for  a  heavy  account  for  advances  during  the  year,  and 
does  not  seem  to  save.  Some  blacks,  however,  are  provident ; 
they  generally  pay  their  rent  quite  well,  there  is  no 
serious  difficulty  about  that.  The  ginning  mills  are  all 
rented  out  as  well  as  the  land.  In  this  way  he  gets  fair 
interest  for  his  money  with  some  trouble.  In  some  respects 
he  might  prefer  the  blacks  to  white  tenants,  but  they  are  very 
migratory.  That  is  the  universal  complaint.  They  do  not 

like  to  stay  long  anywhere.  However,  Mr.  W does  not 

find  that  they  let  the  land  down  badly.  They  are  bound  to 
repair  the  fences,  &c.,  and  they  do  it.  He  finds,  however, 
that  he  has  too  much  land,  and  he  thinks  of  selling.  He 
has  another  large  estate  in  the  Sea  Island  country,  which  he 
took  for  a  bad  debt,  but  now  he  gets  nothing  from  it.  Some 
negroes  squat  on  it,  and  cultivate  patches,  and  fish.  He  might 
get  some  rent  from  them,  but  it  would  not  be  enough  to 
repay  the  trouble  and  cost  of  collection.  I  think  Georgian 
landowners  might  well  try  to  locate  these  blacks  as  has  been 

done  in  the  Beaufort  country.  Mr.  W ,  however,  hopes  to 

make  his  low  country  estate  into  a  cattle  farm. 

To-day  I  noticed  a  very  large  number  of  small  farmers 
bringing  cotton  to  market  in  their  waggons.  Most  of  them 
were  v^hites,  driving  themselves,  and  evidently  quite  labouring 
men.  They  had  one  or  two  blacks  with  them,  but  not  very 
many.  There  were  also  a  few  black  farmers.  The  blacks 


390  MY  JOURNAL. 

whom  I  questioned  were  mostly  tenants  upon  the  share 
system.  They  appeared  to  me  rather  a  low  class,  and  their 
answers  to  my  questions  quite  tallied  with  the  accounts  I  had 
had  of  their  migratory  habits.  They  generally  had  not  re 
mained  very  long  in  one  place.  The  white  farmers  seemed 
good-looking  men,  but  poorly  clad.  They  looked  like  poor 
Irish  farmers.  They  came  in  covered  waggons,  in  which 
they  live  and  sleep,  and  some  of  them  had  their  wives  and 
children  with  them  in  the  waggons.  I  am  told  a  good  many 
people  from  these  parts  have  gone  to  Texas,  both  white  and 
black  ;  some  of  them  have  come  back  again. 

I  receive  a  good  many  visits  from  people  who  have  seen 
my  name  in  the  newspapers.  Altogether  there  is  a  general 
disposition  to  treat  me  civilly  and  to  lionise  me  in  a  small 
way  here.  As  they  say,  an  English  traveller  and  M.P. 
is  rare  up  here. 

This  evening  I  had  a  talk  with  a  nice  gentleman-like 
elderly  man,  member  for  Athens  and  a  strong  Independent. 
He  gave  me  the  views  of  that  party  in  opposition  to  those  of 
General  Gordon.  He  explains  the  evils  of  the  caucus  system. 
Generally  everything  is  settled  by  half-a-dozen  jobbers,  and 
without  any  reference  to  the  electors  at  large.  If  need  be  he 
says  let  us  have  a  primary  election,  but  there  are  many  objec 
tions  to  it.  It  has  no  law  or  check  of  any  kind,  and  should 
only  be  resorted  to  to  decide  between  Democrats  when  a 
Eadical  stands,  and  the  seat  is  in  danger.  That  not  being 
the  case  in  Georgia  the  caucus  system  is  totally  uncalled  for, 
and  is  a  mere  abuse  to  give  power  to  jobbers.  Therefore  it 
is  that  there  has  been  a  successful  uprising  of  the  people 
against  it.  Moreover,  the  system,  he  says,  is  a  gross  breach 
of  faith  with  the  black  voters,  who  are  excluded  from  the 
caucus.  He  says  the  Independents  get  a  fair  proportion  of 
the  black  votes,  but  not  by  any  means  all,  as  the  other  party 
pay  largely  for  votes  and  otherwise  coerce  and  influence  the 
voters.  He  dwells  on  the  heaviness  of  taxation  in  conse 
quence  of  the  debts  of  the  State  and  the  need  of  economy ; 
but  when  I  asked  him  for  particulars  regarding  the  heaviness 
of  taxation  he  seemed  to  refer  rather  to  municipal  than  to 


GEORGIA.  391 

general  taxation.  It  is  very  much  what  I  have  heard  in  other 
quarters.  Here  the  State  tax  is  40  cents  in  the  100  dols.  of 
capital  value  besides  10  cents  to  form  a  sinking  fund  to  get 
rid  of  the  debt.  The  county  taxation  is  not  heavy,  but 
there  is  heavy  taxation  in  the  towns,  often  amounting  to 
$2-50  per  cent,  on  capital  value.  I  cannot  quite  make 
out  how  the  value  of  personal  property  is  got  at — in  that 
respect  the  tax  is  certainly  much  evaded.  As  is  the  case 
with  us,  rich  men  often  live  in  fine  villa  houses  outside  the 
towns,  and  so  escape  the  town  taxation.  Under  the  present 
constitution  new  laws  and  appropriations,  and  elections  by 
the  Legislature  require  an  absolute  majority  of  the  whole 
House  to  be  present  and  vote  for  the  measure. 

They  say  that  the  position  of  United  States  Senator 
is  generally  preferred  to  that  of  Governor  of  a  State. 
General  Gordon  gives  a  reception  this  evening  in  the  form 
of  a  great  wine  party  to  the  members  of  the  Legislature. 
I  am  told  that  in  Washington  and  Philadelphia  and  some 
other  great  cities  it  is  common  enough  to  have  men's 
receptions  of  this  kind,  from  which  ladies  are  excluded. 
They  have  fine  suppers  and  wines,  and  everything  that  is 
brilliant. 

The  next  day  I  started  by  rail  for  Calhoun,  about  eighty 
miles  north  of  Atlanta.  I  am  surprised  by  the  goodness  of 
the  country,  and  the  large  extent  of  cultivation.  I  am  told 
that  cultivation  extends  a  long  way  on  either  side  of  the  line, 
especially  along  the  course  of  the  rivers.  There  is  also  much 
forest,  as  is  the  case  in  all  this  country.  There  is  very  little 
rise  after  leaving  Atlanta,  the  highest  point  is  not  more  than 
1,200  feet  above  the  sea.  This  railway  line  is  very  largely 
advertised  as  the  '  Great  Kenesaw  Eoute,'  which  takes  its 
name  from  the  Kenesaw  Mountain  ;  and  on  the  pictorial 
advertisements  the  Kenesaw  Mountain  is  very  magnificent 
indeed ;  but  when  I  came  to  see  the  reality  it  turned  out  to 
be  a  very  moderate  hill— perhaps  500  feet  above  the  surround 
ing  country.  We  crossed  several  rivers,  which  now  run  to 
wards  Mobile  and  the  Gulf  of  Mexico.  As  we  got  on,  the 
level  of  the  country  became  lower,  and  several  of  these  rivers 


392  MY  JOURNAL. 

are  navigable,  especially  for  a  considerable  distance  upwards. 
It  is  also  hoped  to  make  them  navigable  downwards,  so  that 
we  are  in  a  much  less  sloping  country  than  that  which  drains 
towards  the  Atlantic,  and  there  is  complaint  of  want  of 
water-power  for  saw-mills  and  other  machinery.  The  culti 
vation  is  various ;  there  is  a  good  deal  of  cotton,  but  also  a 
good  deal  of  corn  and  wheat.  They  say  anything  will  grow 
here,  but  no  one  thing  grows  so  well  as  it  does  somewhere 
else.  I  went  to  pay  a  visit  at  a  farm  of  Colonel  P—  — 's, 

near  Calhoun,  now  occupied  by  his  son,  Mr.  R.  P ;  and  I 

was  very  hospitably  entertained  by  young  Mr.  P and  his 

wife,  a  pleasant  young  lady  from  Philadelphia.     Mr.  P 

himself  was  at  school  in  England,  and  they  both  seem  very  nice 
and  refined  people.  As  usual,  they  live  in  a  very  simple  way, 
and  have  not  many  servants.  American  ladies,  who  live  in 
the  country,  manage  to  do  a  great  deal  themselves  without 
detracting  from  their  dress  and  demeanour.  There  is  a  stock 
farm  here,  of  which  old  Colonel  P —  -  is  very  proud.  There 
was  a  Jersey  bull,  said  to  be  splendid,  some  rather  thin  Jersey 
cows,  a  good  many  Merino  sheep,  and  a  large  flock  of  Angora 
goats.  They  grow  tolerable  turnips,  and  Mr.  P—  -  has  a 
successful  field  of  lucerne.  There  is  a  great  deal  of  game 
about  here.  I  saw  many  of  the  small  American  partridges, 
sometimes  called  quails.  They  sit  capitally  to  dogs,  rise 
in  regular  coveys  like  partridges,  but  fly  more  like  quails. 
There  are  also  some  rabbits  about,  which  looked  not  unlike 
English  rabbits,  running  with  cocked  tails,  showing  the 
white.  There  are  many  wild  turkeys  in  this  country ;  they 
are,  however,  very  shy  birds,  keep  in  the  woods,  and  are  seldom 
seen.  Tame  turkeys  are  very  abundant  in  these  Southern 
States,  and  poultry  in  general  is  abundant  and  good.  Much 
of  it  is  kept  by  small  farmers,  and  is  a  great  assistance  to 
them. 

I  drove  out  a  good  way  into  the  country,  over  varied  sort 
of  ground — some  fertile  bottoms,  and  a  good  deal  of  higher 
land.  The  lower  and  richer  land  is  principally  given  to 
cereals.  It  does  not  do  well  for  cotton.  The  cotton-plant 
grows  large  and  strong,  but  is  not  productive  there  ;  whereas 


GEORGIA.  393 

in  the  higher  red  lands  the  plant  is  small,  but  is  often 
covered  with  cotton  from  top  to  bottom.  The  lower  lands 
generally  belong  to  the  larger  proprietors.  Wherever  there 
are  large  proprietors  there  were  slaves,  and  there  are  now 
black  labourers.  Most  of  the  work  in  the  upper  country  is 
done  by  the  whites  themselves.  I  saw  some  good  specimens 
of  people  of  this  class.  Most  of  them  own  their  own  land, 
but  some  rent,  and  some  go  as  labourers,  getting  $8  or  $10 
a  month,  and  rations.  I  liked  the  look  of  these  people. 
They  are  decidedly  fair  with  no  tinge  of  swarthiness.  Many 
of  them  have  Scotch  names — Campbell,  Mclntyre,  Macinroy, 
and  so  on  ;  but  they  did  not  know  their  origin.  They  came 
up  from  the  Carolinas  and  Virginia,  and  did  not  emigrate 
direct  to  this  part  of  the  country.  Most  of  them  live  in 
miserable  houses,  but  some  of  the  houses  are  quite  good. 
Even  some  considerable  proprietors  live  in  poor  log-houses. 
It  is  said  that  some  of  these  people  hold  on  to  too  much 
land  when  they  had  better  sell ;  and  if  a  purchaser  comes 
they  ask  too  much.  Some  of  the  smaller  tenants  live  in 
places  unfit  for  an  Irishman,  with  no  windows,  and  showing 
much  daylight  between  the  logs.  I  never  saw  such  poor 
places,  except  Irish  turf  huts.  I  asked  one  man  about  it. 
'  Yes,'  he  said,  laughing ;  '  you  cannot  call  it  a  house,  but  as 
we  have  so  much  air  inside  we  do  not  catch  cold  when  we  go 
out/  This  man  was  a  poor  labourer,  and  he  had  half-a-dozen 
nice-looking  children  in  his  wretched  one-roomed  hut.  The 
children,  however,  looked  very  well.  These  people  seemed 
altogether  a  fair-spoken  and  quiet  laborious  population. 

From  the  higher  parts  of  the  ground  that  I  visited,  I  saw 
a  high  range  of  hills  standing  out  very  distinct  to  the  north 
east.  It  seems  as  if  the  main  Alleghanies  come  to  a  sudden 
end  near  this.  We  met  many  farmers  with  bullock- waggons 
coming  down  from  the  upper  country.  They  do  not  grow 
cotton  there,  and  scarcely  ever  had  any  negroes.  They  grow 
better  corn  and  wheat  than  in  the  lower  land,  and  much 
better  apples ;  and  would  get  on  well  enough  if  it  were  not 
for  the  United  States  whisky-blockade,  of  which  they  much 
complain,  as  interfering  with  their  industry  in  that  article. 


394  MY  JOURNAL. 

In  the  lower  grounds  I  came  upon  a  few  negro  farmers,  but 
they  were  only  renters ;  none  of  them  owned  land.  One  man 
had  got  some  uncleared  woodland  on  a  three  years'  lease,  the 
arrangement  being  that  he  should  pay  nothing  for  that  time, 
but  after  that  should  pay  a  rent.  There  is  much  good  timber 
in  all  this  country.  It  is  a  limestone  country  about  here,  but 
the  hills  above  are  sandstone.  Mr.  P—  -  thinks  that  the 
small  farmers  make  a  living  without  working  so  hard  for  it 
as  the  English  labourer.  Even  during  the  civil  war,  though 
cut  off  from  all  external  commerce,  they  got  on  pretty  well, 
raising  their  own  necessaries,  and  being  independent  of  all 
outside.  They  themselves  admit  that  the  smaller  farmers 
still  get  on  well  enough,  so  far  as  living  is  concerned.  They 
raise  enough  for  themselves,  and  their  women  weave  their 
clothes ;  they  have  few  wants  beyond  these. 

People  here  complain  that  the  pretended  free-schools  are 
a  farce.  They  are  very  poor  schools,  and  not  enough  of  them. 
In  any  case,  the  parents  are  obliged  to  pay  at  least  half  of 
the  cost.  I  asked  if  the  preachers  came  expensive,  and  was 
told  that  some  take  a  salary,  some  do  not.  One  Baptist 
minister  runs  a  fine  farm  and  preaches  for  nothing. 

After  completing  a  very  pleasant  visit  to  Mr.  P 's 

farm,  I  started  in  the  morning  to  go  on  to  Dalton,  in  the 
north-west  part  of  Georgia,  towards  Tennessee,  where  the 
watershed  changes  towards  the  Mississippi.  I  saw  much 
timber-trade  going  on  upon  the  rivers  and  the  railways. 
There  were  some  very  fine  walnut  logs,  much  white  oak,  and 
also  pine  and  other  wood.  It  is  feared  that  the  good  timber 
near  the  railway  will  soon  be  exhausted,  but  there  is  plenty 
of  it  a  little  farther  off.  There  are  no  signs  of  anything  like 
a  mountain  pass ;  the  road  runs  through  an  easy  country. 
There  is,  in  fact,  a  great  gap  between  the  hills. 

At  Dalton  I  had  a  beautiful  day,  and  utilised  it  by 
taking  a  long  walk  into  the  country,  where  I  saw  much  of 
the  southern  white  people,  visiting  a  good  many  of  their 
farms.  I  also  came  across  some  blacks.  The  whites  seemed 
to  be  a  pleasant-looking  people,  though  they  had  still  the 
appearance  of  being  poor.  Most  of  them  own  land,  but  some 


GEORGIA.  395 

rent,  and  some  go  out  as  labourers.  A  few  of  them  hire  one 
or  two  blacks  as  labourers.  They  say  the  blacks  are  not  so- 
good  workers  as  the  whites,  and  they  will  only  take  them  at 
cheaper  rates.  These  blacks  work  very  well  when  they  are 
sharply  looked  after,  but  they  will  waste  time  whenever  they 
get  the  chance.  I  looked  over  the  log-cabin  of  a  small  white 
farmer,  and  it  was  about  the  lowest  thing  of  the  kind  I  have 
seen.  On  account  of  the  want  of  water-power  and  the 
scarcity  of  saw-mills,  most  of  the  cabins  here  are  built  of 
very  rough  logs,  and  very  imperfectly  boarded  within.  This 
one  had  no  window,  but  very  many  casual  openings  in  the 
wall,  and  even  in  the  roof.  It  consisted  of  one  room,  with 
a  light  shed  attached  to  it  behind,  which  was  used  for  cook 
ing,  etc.  The  farmer  was  away,  but  I  found  his  wife,  a  very 
nice-looking  young  woman,  with  a  baby  and  a  boy  of  twelve, 
an  orphan  whom  they  seem  to  have  adopted.  He  could  read 
print,  he  said,  but  not  write.  The  woman  did  not  seem  to 
realise  that  the  house  was  particularly  bad.  Her  husband  is 
only  a  renter,  but  he  built  this  hut  himself  two  years  ago. 
She  had  a  loom,  and  was  weaving.  She  says  she  makes  her 
husband's  and  her  own  every-day  clothes,  but  they  have  to 
buy  Sunday  clothes  and  some  other  things.  There  was  also 
a  spinning-wheel,  as  is  generally  the  case  here.  She  says 
she  spins  some  thread  when  it  is  wanted,  but  they  buy  most 
of  the  thread.  I  was  inclined  to  pity  her  primitive  inno 
cence  and  ignorance,  and  tried  to  draw  her  out  by  asking 
her  questions  on  subjects  in  respect  to  which  I  was  not  very 
much  at  home.  At  last  she  burst  out  with  a  smile,  '  Whoy, 
it  seem  that  you  do'ant  know  nothink.'  I  felt  that  she  had 
the  best  of  it  on  her  own  subjects. 

Within  reach  of  the  railway  there  are  a  good  many 
blacks,  but  I  understand  that  the  few  there  were  in  the 
higher  parts  of  the  country  have  left  it.  I  talked  to  an  old 
black  man  who  occupied  one  of  a  cluster  of  very  poor  huts. 
He  said  that  his  former  mistress  had  given  some  of  her  ex- 
slaves  five  acres  each  of  woodland,  to  clear  and  hold  rent-free 
for  life.  It  certainly  seems  that,  in  these  older  States  at  any 
rate,  the  relations  between  the  former  masters  and  the  blacks 


396  MY  JOURNAL. 

are  often  not  unkindly,  and  the  masters  sometimes  do  things 
of  this  kind.  My  old  friend  says  he  got  on  well  enough 
when  he  could  work,  but  now  he  is  past  work,  and  seems 
rather  doubtful  of  the  advantages  of  freedom.  However,  he 
and  the  others  seem  to  form  a  sort  of  little  community  in 
the  woods.  The  able-bodied  men  cultivate,  the  women  raise 
chickens  and  take  in  washing ;  and  one  way  and  another 
they  manage  to  get  along.  On  the  road  I  met  a  very  intel 
ligent  and  plucky-looking  black  bringing  in  his  produce  to 
market  in  his  waggon — principally  peas.  His  family  were 
with  him.  He  has  two  mules,  and  seems  well-to-do.  He 
rents  land  on  a  four  years'  clearing  lease,  and  when  that  is  up 
he  hopes  to  buy  land  for  himself.  'Don't  you  think  that  is 
best  ? '  he  says.  These  blacks  seem  to  talk  and  put  questions 
in  a  more  simple  way  than  the  whites.  This  man  says  he 
found  the  main  fences,  but  himself  put  up  his  house  and  the 
cross  fences.  He  will  get  no  compensation  for  his  improve 
ments  when  he  goes  ;  he  must  leave  all  those  behind.  This 
is,  perhaps,  the  reason  why  the  huts  are  so  bad.  His  sons 
are  growing  up  and  marrying,  and  have  farms  of  their  own. 
He  himself  has  re-married  with  a  widow  with  four  children. 
As  he  pleasantly  remarks,  his  sons  are  going  off  into  the 
world,  and  he  must  have  some  one  to  work  for. 

In  the  afternoon  I  went  up  a  hill  to  see  the  country. 
There  is  evidently  a  complete  break  in  the  hills  here.  A 
flat  tract  stretches  over  into  the  valley  of  the  Tennessee 
River.  The  Alleghanies  proper  terminate  to  the  east,  but  a 
fresh  set  of  hills,  not  so  high,  commence  again  on  the  west, 
and  one  of  them  is  '  look-out  mountain '  over  Chattanooga, 
where  the  famous  battle  was  fought.  The  hilly  ridge,  I 
understand,  runs  westward,  through  Northern  Alabama. 

At  Dalton  I  saw  a  party  of  very  tidy,  well-set-up-looking 
blacks  playing  base-ball,  in  a  very  vigorous  way,  with  one  or 
two  whites  mixed  with  them.  The  bowler,  at  any  rate,  was, 
to  all  appearance,  a  white  man,  as  were  several  of  those 
sitting  and  looking  on.  Altogether  at  this  place  I  thought 
I  saw  more  of  fraternisation  between  blacks  and  whites  than 
in  most  places. 


THE   RETURN  JOURNEY.  397 

Chattanooga  is  not  far  off  in  Tennessee.  I  got  a  Chatta 
nooga  paper,  and  have  been  reading  it  with  reference  to 
Tennessee  politics.  It  seems  that  in  Chattanooga  the  Repub 
licans  have  a  majority,  but  the  town  politics  appear  more  to 
depend  upon  local  and  personal  questions.  At  Memphis  it 
seems  that  an  Independent  was  elected  district  attorney.  He 
has  appointed  a  coloured  man  as  his  deputy.  This  has 
created  a  great  sensation,  and  the  orthodox  Democrats  point 
to  it  as  showing  that  the  Independents  are  nothing  but 
traitors  in  disguise.  Altogether  I  gather  that  Tennessee  is  a 
country  in  which  there  is  a  considerable  mixture  of  parties, 
It  is  by  no  means  wholly  Democratic  and  anti-black.  East 
Tennessee,  in  fact,  is  a  white  man's  country. 

Dalton  is  quite  a  country  place,  but  there  are  neverthe 
less  one  or  two  very  tolerable  hotels,  at  one  of  which  I  was 
very  well  treated,  and  had  good  food.  The  '  vin  du  pays'  of  this 
country  seems  to  be  buttermilk  ;  everyone  drinks  it  at  meals. 

THE  RETURN  JOURNEY. 

I  had  hoped,  if  possible,  to  get  as  far  as  New  Orleans,  and 
thence  back  by  the  valley  of  the  Mississippi,  but  the  outburst 
of  yellow  fever  this  year  has  been  unprecedently  severe,  and 
on  account  of  the  lateness  of  the  frosts  it  continued  far 
beyond  expectation.  The  country  is  scarcely  yet  free  from  it, 
and  the  places  which  have  suffered  from  it  are  quite  dis 
organised.  Even  Chattanooga,  near  this,  has  suffered  very 
greatly,  and  things  have  not  yet  returned  to  their  usual  con 
dition.  I  had  therefore  given  up  the  idea  of  making  that 
tour,  and  resolved  to  use  the  rest  of  my  time  to  dip  into 
Tennessee  and  West  Virginia,  and  spend  a  few  days  in  Wash 
ington,  Philadelphia,  and  New  York.  Here,  however,  I  saw 
in  the  papers  that  Parliament  was  summoned  for  the  discus 
sion  of  subjects  interesting  to  me,  and  finding  that  the  train 
in  which  I  had  taken  my  passage  to  Knoxville,  in  Upper 
Tennessee,  was  going  on  to  Washington,  I  took  a  sleeping- 
berth,  and  continued  my  journey.  This  line  runs  on  the 
western  slope  of  the  Alleghanies.  From  the  glimpses  I  got  in 
the  night  I  saw  no  signs  of  a  mountainous  region.  At  dawn. 


398  MY  JOURNAL. 

we  had  entered  Virginia,  but  we  were  in  a  projecting  angle 
of  the  State  west  of  the  watershed,  and  geographically  a  part 
of  the  Kentucky  country  which  it  adjoins.     Here  I  at  once 
saw  we  were  in  a  great  grazing  country.     The  land  was  un 
dulating  and  to  some  degree  hilly,  fenced  off  into  large  grass 
parks.     The  grass   at  this  season  is  short,  but  seems  close 
natural  grass.      Some  of  the  higher  parts  looked  like  good 
sheep  walks,  and  there  were  a  good  many  sheep,  but  many  more 
cattle,  which  at  this  time  of  the  year  were  principally  in 
the  lower  pastures ;  I  saw  many  herds  of  large  fine  well-bred 
looking   cattle,  shorthorns   and   the   like ;  also  many  good 
horses.     There  was  a  good  deal  of  wood  in  parts,  but  most 
of  the  grass  land  was  clean  and  free  from  stumps  or   weeds. 
There  was  a  hard  frost  this  morning,  and  a  little  snow  on  the 
higher  parts  of  the  road,  but  the  weather  was  bright  and 
clear  and  became  warmer  in  the  middle  of  the  day.  Some  corn 
is  grown  in  this  country,  but  it  is  mostly  in  grass.     The  same 
style  of  country  continued  as  we  ran  on,  passing  over  several 
ridges  and  crossing  several  streams,  but  we  came  to  nothing 
very  precipitous  or  difficult  all  the  way  to  the  highest  point 
crossing    the  Alleghanies.      We    then    passed    through    a 
valley    skirted  by  high  hills  down  to  the  Virginia   'Pied 
mont  '  country,  as  it  is  called,  on  the  eastern   slope  of  the 
range.     There  seemed   to  be   a  decided  change  as  soon  as 
we  crossed  the  watershed — redder  soil,  much  more  cultiva 
tion  of  wheat  and  corn,  less  pasture — and   what   there    is 
seems  to   be  more  made  up  of  artificial  grass.      We   kept 
on  through   the   Piedmont   country  pretty  near   the    hills, 
and  much  accented,  and  so  continued  till  dark.     In  the  even 
ing  the  country  seemed  to  be  getting  flatter.     The  hills  are  a 
good  deal  cleared  in  parts,  but  there  is  still  a  great  deal  of 
wood  upon  them.      There  were  some  good  grazing  grounds, 
and  a  good  many  cattle  and  horses  on  this  eastern  slope,  but 
it  is  not  so  much  a  grazing  country  as  that  to  the  west.    This 
country  looks  at  the  worst  now,  the  grass  being  brown,  the 
trees  without  leaves,  and  the  fields  ploughed  up,  but  I  dare 
say  in  the  spring  it  merits  the  encomiums  which  the  Virgin 
ians  are  in  the  habit  of  bestowing  upon  it.     Throughout  the 


THE    RETURN  JOURNEY.  399 

route  to-day  the  houses  of  the  white  inhabitants  seemed 
better  than  those  I  had  previously  seen.  They  gave  one 
the  idea  of  pretty  well-to-do  farmers,  and  there  were  a  good 
many  houses  which  seemed  quite  up  to  the  pretensions  of 
small  squireens,  or  gentleman-farmers.  All  along  the  route  I 
noticed  more  blacks  than  I  had  expected  to  see  in  this  higher 
country.  Probably  the  vicinity  of  the  railway  accounts  for 
that ;  but  even  away  from  the  railway  stations  there  seemed 
to  be  a  good  many  black  families,  living  in  huts  as  miserable 
as  those  I  had  seen  farther  South.  Probably  the  blacks  are 
mere  labourers  and  dependents. 

The  eating  at  the  stations  where  we  stopped  for  meals 
seemed  always  very  tolerable,  and  I  noticed  that  in  this 
country  there  is  good  fresh  butter.  I  cannot  understand  why 
they  cannot  have  it  in  the  civilised  North.  Even  at  Wash 
ington  in  the  best  hotels  and  everywhere  else  they  have  nasty 
salt  butter ;  and  at  New  York  one  or  two  people  seem  only 
recently  to  have  made  quite  a  discovery  by  making  good 
fresh  butter,  which  they  can  sell  at  a  dollar  a  pound,  for 
it  is  a  rarity. 

I  slept  at  Washington,  and  spent  most  of  the  next  day 
there.  The  weather  was  lovely,  and  the  place  bright  and 
lively-looking.  People  are  evidently  beginning  to  assemble 
for  the  ensuing  meeting  of  Congress,  and  one  sees  many  smart, 
well-dressed  women  in  the  streets.  The  trees,  however,  have 
lost  their  leaves,  which  takes  off  from  the  beauty  which  I 
noticed  in  the  place  a  few  weeks  ago. 

I  went  to  the  Treasury,  where  they  kindly  gave  me  the 
official  papers  on  the  silver  question.  It  seems  clear  that  up 
to  1873  silver  was  a  complete  legal  tender,  and  that  anyone 
might  bring  silver  to  be  coined  and  get  silver  certificates  at 

once.     I  went  again  to  see  my  friend  General  E ,  of  the 

Educational  Department,  and  met  at  his  office  a  New  Hamp 
shire  member  of  Congress,  who  seemed  shocked  at  the  idea 
that  I  was  going  to  take  my  Southern  experiences  as  a  spe 
cimen  of  the  United  States.  He  insists  that  the  Northern 
States  are  very  different.  There,  he  says,  the  township 
system  is  in  full  force — that  is,  in  New  England — the  people 


400  MY  JOURNAL. 

at  large  frequently  meet  together  in  Township  Assembly  to 
vote  for  school  and  other  arrangements,  and  to  control  the  ex 
penditure.  Certainly  I  feel  I  have  still  to  do  New  England, 
if  I  live  and  have  another  opportunity  of  visiting  the  States. 

I  visited  the  Agricultural  Department,  and  saw  General 

D ,  the  head  of  it,  who  is  very  enthusiastic  over  his  work, 

though  somehow  there  seem  to  be  a  good  many  scoffers  about 
the  Department.  They  have  a  capital  collection  of  all  sorts 
of  produce,  and  are  now  making  great  efforts  to  introduce 

useful  plants  and  new  products.      General  D hopes  to 

acclimatise  the  bamboo.  He  is  trying  the  Japanese  variety, 
which  stands  frost.  There  seems  no  doubt  that  the  tea-plant 
thrives  in  the  Southern  States ;  but  people  have  not  really 
learnt  how  to  manufacture  tea.  The  Liberian  coffee  is  a 
variety  of  the  coffee-plant,  which,  it  seems,  unlike  the  Arabian 
plant,  will  stand  an  ordinar}7  tropical  climate,  and  bears  well, 
even  down  to  the  level  of  the  sea,  within  the  tropics.  It  struck 
me  that  in  India  we  ought  to  take  advantage  of  the  expe 
rience  of  the  United  States — for  instance,  to  obtain  improved 
varieties  of  Indian  corn  and  other  plants. 

There  was  again  a  very  good  sunset  to-day.  Washington 
seems  to  have  a  specialty  for  sunsets. 

In  the  evening  I  took  passage  in  the  sleeping-cars  for 
New  York.  The  Pullman  was  a  good  deal  crowded,  and  a 
crowded  Pullman  is  decidedly  not  comfortable.  I  met  a 
great  traveller  who  had  spent  twenty-eight  nights  in  the  cars 
during  the  last  six  weeks,  and  he  confirms  what  I  had  sus 
pected,  that  under  such  circumstances  as  we  had  this  night  it 
is  a  mistake  to  secure  a  lower  berth.  The  upper  berths,  for 
those  who  can  climb  up,  are  much  more  airy  and  comfortable. 
This  gentleman  is  a  resident  of  the  city  of  Mexico,  which,  he 
says,  is  a  place  of  250,000  inhabitants,  and  quite  civilised. 

We  reached  New  York  in  the  morning.  I  again  went  to 
the  Windsor.  There  are  now  a  great  many  winter  residents 
there,  but  the  place  is  quite  quiet.  The  weather  in  New 
York  is  not  yet  good  winter  weather.  They  have  had  it 
unusually  warm  for  the  season,  and  it  is  now  raw  and  rainy. 

I  called  on  Mr.  P ,  a  gentleman  to  whom  I  owe  much 


THE   RETURN  JOURNEY.  401 

kindness,  and  went  with  him  to  the  business  part  of  the 
city — '  down  town,'  as  they  call  it.  Here  I  had  some  talk 
with  several  good  financial  authorities  on  American  railways. 
Their  tone  about  them  is  generally  unfavourable — the  moral 
of  the  very  safe  men  is  that  no  shares  are  safe.  They  say 
that  the  capital  value  of  the  lines  is  generally  in  the  books  at 
a  much  higher  figure  than  that  at  which  they  could  now  be 
made,  and  that  the  only  safe  things  are  the  first  bonds  of  the 
very  best  lines.  These  lines,  they  say,  are  at  least  worth  the 
amount  of  the  first  bonds.  According  to  them  if  the  shares 
of  a  railway  are  above  par  then  you  may  with  tolerable  pru 
dence  buy  the  first  bonds,  and  that  is  all.  The  bonds  are 
liable  to  be  paid  off  after  a  certain  time,  but  some  of  them 
run  for  as  long  as  thirty  years,  and,  as  they  say,  that  is  much 
farther  than  anyone  looks  forward  in  this  country. 

In  the  evening  I  dined  with  Mr.  0 ,  and  met  Gene 
ral  B a  name  well  known  in  the  war.  He  is  a  New 

Englander,  from  Rhode  Island.  He  says  that  though,  no 
doubt,  as  I  had  before  been  told,  land  in  New  England  had 
fallen  much  in  value,  and  some  of  it  had  gone  out  of  culti 
vation,  there  has  been  quite  recently  considerable  signs  of 
improvement  in  New  England  farming  prospects,  and  a  rise 
again  in  the  value  of  the  land,  in  consequence  of  many  people 
who  have  been  driven  from  commerce  in  the  bad  times  having 
come  back  to  the  land.  He,  too,  says  that  many  Irish  have 
bought  land  in  New  England,  and  they  do  not  do  badly.  He 
gives  the  same  account  as  I  had  heard  before  of  the  good 
working  of  the  New  England  township  system.  He  says 
there  are  not  usually  any  commons,  only  village  greens ;  but 
he  knows  some  instances  of  considerable  common  pastures 
which  were  originally  reserved.  One  or  two  still  remain  ; 
others  have  been  divided  up  or  sold  by  a  vote  of  the  town 
ship.  It  seems  clear  that  in  America  commons  are  quite 
exceptional,  and  not  the  habit  of  the  country. 

The  people  whom  I  meet  here  dwell  much  on  the  effect 
of  the  Southern  election  practices,  and  the  attempt  to  make  a 
solid  South,  in  producing  a  solid  North  on  the  other  side  of 
the  question. 

D  D 


402  MY  JOURNAL. 

Mr.  0 ,  who  has  had  much  experience  of  the  States 

on  the  Mississippi,  gives  an  account  of  them  which  tallies 
pretty  well  with  what  I  had  already  learned.  He  says  the 
relations  between  the  whites  and  blacks  are  ordinarily  good 
enough,  and  they  would  get  on  sufficiently  well  together  if  it 
were  not  for  political  difficulties,  which"  in  Mississippi  and 
Louisiana  are  considerable.  The  blacks  make  capital  la 
bourers.  His  experience  is  that  on  Southern  railways  he 
gets  more  work  done  for  sixty  cents  than  for  a  dollar  in  the 
North.  He  has  had  much  railway  experience  in  several 
States  in  which  he  has  had  occasion  to  get  Bills  passed  and 
various  measures  sanctioned.  I  asked  him  about  the  honesty 
of  the  local  Legislatures.  He  says  some  new  States  have 
been  rather  bad,  but  that  for  some  years  in  the  States  through 
which  his  lines  passed  they  have  not  been  approached  for 
money.  The  effect  of  the  provision  in  the  Illinois  Consti 
tution  against  special  legislation  in  favour  of  corporations 
has  really  been  considerable.  The  law  is  carried  out  in  prac 
tice.  People  who  want  privileges  can  only  get  them  under 
the  general  laws  applicable  to  all.  I  have  not  yet  looked  up 
the  particulars  as  to  the  way  in  which  these  things  are 
managed  in  Illinois  and  other  States ;  but  in  Georgia,  where 
they  have  a  provision  of  the  same  kind,  I  understand  that  the 
general  laws  for  the  granting  of  charters  and  the  like  having 
been  passed,  people  who  want  them  apply  to  the  Courts  which 
adjudicate  the  question.  Mr.  0—  -  says  there  is  still  more 
planting  on  a  large  scale  in  Mississippi  and  the  adjoining 
countries  than  in  the  Atlantic  States,  and  he  instances  people 
who,  he  says,  are  there  doing  well,  cultivating  on  a  large  scale 
with  hired  negro  labour.  The  lands  near  the  river  in  Missis 
sippi  are  very  fertile  and  good,  and  there  is  a  large  popu 
lation  ;  but  in  the  central  part  of  the  State,  where  the 
railways  run,  the  land  is  inferior,  and  the  population  scat 
tered.  In  Louisiana  the  good  sugar-cane  lands  are  in  the 
extreme  south,  and  outside  of  the  swamp  and  forest  belt — 
apparently  in  a  tract  corresponding  in  situation  to  the  Sea 
Islands  of  the  Atlantic  coast.  Mr.  0 is  very  enthusi 
astic,  and  determined  to  make  the  railway  connecting  North 


THE  RETURN  JOURNEY.  403 

and  South,  in  the  Valley  of  the  Mississippi,  pa}7.  He  has 
great  faith  in  the  necessity  of  a  North  and  South  traffic. 
Food-stuffs  must  necessarily  come  from  North  to  South,  and 
sugar,  fruit,  and  other  things,  from  South  to  North.  Below 
Cairo  the  traffic  is  principally  by  river,  but  then  it  is  an 
enormous  traffic ;  they  would  be  content  if  they  got  one- 
tenth  of  it  on  the  railway. 

The  next  day  I  visited  some  of  the  sights  of  New  York 

with  Mr.  0 .     "We  went  to  the  '  Fulton'  market,  one  of 

the  principal  markets  in  New  York,  where  the  supply  of 
game,  poultry,  &c.,  for  '  Thanksgiving  Day,'  which  is  to  come 
off  to-morrow,  is  enormous,  and  the  variety  exceedingly 
great.  The  c  Thanksgiving  Day  '  was  a  New  England  insti 
tution,  to  commemorate  the  landing  of  the  Pilgrim  Fathers. 
It  gradually  extended  to  the  neighbouring  States,  and  to 
those  of  the  North- West ;  and  after  the  war  President  Lincoln 
made  it  a  national  holiday,  though  I  daresay  the  Southerners 
heartily  wish  that  the  Pilgrim  Fathers  had  gone  to  the  bot 
tom  of  the  sea  before  they  ever  landed  at  all.  However,  now 
6  Thanksgiving  Day '  seems  to  be  the  great  family  feast  of 
the  year.  In  the  market  there  was  a  very  great  quantity  of 
American  game.  Wild  turkeys  are  quite  common,  and  im 
mense,  large,  fine  birds  they  are.  The  quail  (whether  they 
are  quail  or  partridge)  are  in  immense  profusion.  I  also 
found  in  this  market  English  pheasants,  grouse,  and  hares, 
imported  from  Europe.  They  also  import  here  the  common 
white  European  grapes  which  we  see  on  our  fruit-stalls.  We 
lunched  at  a  famous  restaurant  in  the  market.  Ladies  fre 
quently  go  there  alone.  That  is  not  contrary  to  custom  here. 
A  dish  of  rabbit  was  specially  recommended,  and  I  tried  the 
American  rabbit.  There  is  generally  a  prejudice  against 
eating  it.  Most  people  of  the  higher  class  will  not  eat  rab 
bit,  though  they  eat  squirrels.  Rabbits,  however,  are  for 
sale  everywhere.  I  did  not  think  my  rabbit  particularly 
good.  It  is  not  very  like  one  of  our  own.  The  flesh  seemed 
to  be  darker  and  softer. 

In  the  evening  I  dined  with  Mr.  P ,  and  met  some 

pleasant  people.     We  had  a  good  deal  of  talk  about  New 

D  D  2 


404  MY  JOURNAL. 

York  politics.  Mr.  Cooper,  a  man  of  the  highest  position 
and  character,  whose  acquaintance  I  had  the  pleasure  of 
making,  is  Mayor-elect  of  New  York.  It  is  a  very  great 
step  in  advance  to  have  a  man  of  his  character  in  the  place* 
He  is  a  bright  and  clever  man,  of  large  independent  means, 
and  above  all  suspicion  of  jobbery  and  corruption.  The  tax 
ation  of  New  York  is  certainly  heavy.  At  present  the  tax 
for  city  and  county  purposes  is  two  dollars  and  seventy 
cents  upon  capital  value.  The  port  charges  are  also  heavy. 
Heavy  taxation  and  charges  do  a  great  deal  to  drive  trade  to 
other  ports.  Real  property  is  said  to  be  fully  assessed ;  in 
fact,  they  say  that  since  the  shrinkage  of  values  it  is  more 
than  fully  assessed.  The  heavy  taxation  is  the  cause  of  the 
high  rents.  Rents  are  higher  here  than  in  London,  but  then 
the  owner  pays  the  taxes,  not  the  occupier.  Personal  pro 
perty  is  taxed ;  nominally  at  any  rate  ;  but  I  have  not  yet 
been  able  to  get  anything  reliable  regarding  the  assessment 
of  personal  property ;  how  it  is  really  made  and  how  far  it  is 
evaded.  I  understand  a  man  is  not  required  to  make  a  re 
turn  of  his  personal  property  unless  he  chooses.  He  is 
assessed  at  the  amount  at  which  he  is  estimated  by  the 
assessor,  and  if  he  objects  he  has  to  prove  that  the  assessment 
is  wrong.  I  gather  that  in  truth  a  comparatively  small  amount 
of  personal  property  is  assessed  in  New  York.  I  understand 
that  practically  a  man  with  more  houses  or  offices  than  one 
may  elect  where  he  will  be  taxed  upon  property  which  is  not 
local.  For  instance,  a  man  with  a  large  property  in  foreign 
Funds  might  keep  his  securities  in  a  place  where  taxation 
is  light,  and  be  taxed  upon  them  there,  supposing  that  in 
reality  he  is  taxed  upon  them  at  all.  It  might,  in  fact,  be 
economical  to  keep  a  country  house  for  the  deposit  of  his  se 
curities.  Perhaps,  however,  there  is  not  much  personal  pro 
perty  of  this  kind.  United  States  bonds  are  exempt  from 
taxation,  and  railways  are  taxed  before  the  dividends  are 
paid. 

In  New  York  politics  it  is  the  Catholic  element  which 
causes  most  of  the  difficulties — that  is  felt  more  in  New  York 
City  than  anywhere  else.  The  bad  pavement  of  the  streets  and 


THE   RETURN  JOURNEY.  405 

many  other  evils  are  attributed  to  the  excessive  corruption 
which  has  distinguished  the  Administration  of  the  city.  Here 
also  there  seem  to  be  quite  as  many  complaints  against  the 
prisons  as  with  us.  They  say  that  many  rogues  spend  most 
-of  their  lives  in  prison.  The  New  York  papers  seem  to  be  now 
very  generally  writing  against  the  liquor  laws  of  1857,  which 
were,  in  fact,  imposed  upon  the  city  by  the  three  million 
country  people  of  the  State,  and  are  much  more  restrictive 
than  the  city  people  like.  There  is  a  Sunday-closing  law, 
and  an  attempt  to  confine  the  sale  of  liquor  to  bond  fide 
hotels  with  a  certain  number  of  beds,  and  so  on.  But  in 
this  respect  the  law  is  quite  evaded-  -two  or  three  beds  are 
set  up  in  public-houses  as  a  mere  make-believe 

I  have  not  had  time  to  see  anything  of  New  York  winter 
society  or  of  the  fashionable  people.  I  do  not  see  so  many 
signs  of  wealth  as  I  had  expected  to  see  in  this  famous  city, 
nor  do  I  observe  so  many  smart  and  elegantly  dressed  ladies 
in  the  streets  as  I  had  rather  expected  to  find,  after  all  one 
has  heard  of  the  dressy  elegance  of  the  American  ladies.  But 
then  the  weather  is  unfavourable,  and  perhaps  American 
ladies  are  not  so  much  given  to  walking  as  ours  are.  How 
ever,  as  New  England  remains  to  be  seen  another  day,  so 
also  I  hope  to  see  something  more  of  New  York  and  Phila 
delphia,  and  the  country  parts  of  these  States,  if  I  return  to 
America.  Meantime,  before  I  turned  back  I  had  completed 
the  object  for  which  I  was  so  anxious— to  see  something  of 
the  relations  between  whites  and  blacks  in  the  Southern 
States ;  and  having  done  that  and  completed  a  visit  which  I 
have  much  enjoyed,  I  am  now  content  to  conclude  it,  and  to 
trust  to  the  chance  of  seeing  more  another  day. 

In  the  morning  I  embarked  early  in  the  Republic,  a 
steamer  of  the  White  Star  line,  not  so  large  as  the  Ger 
manic,  but  still  a  fine  vessel.  While  the  steamer  was  hauling 
out  for  the  start  I  was  interviewed  by  a  reporter  of  the  '  New 
York  Herald  '  regarding  Afghanistan.  We  soon  got  off  and 
were  fairly  on  the  homeward  voyage.  There  are  few  passengers 
at  this  season  of  the  year,  and  scarcely  one  of  these  American. 
This  is  not  the  season  when  Americans  visit  Europe. 


406  MY  JOURNAL. 

I  have  been  talking  with  some  gentlemen  on  board  about 
the  beef  trade.  It  seems  that,  dead  or  living,  it  costs  about 
a  penny  a  pound  to  send  beef  to  England.  The  live  cattle 
are  as  yet  almost  all  brought  over  on  deck.  They  are  nailed 
up  in  tight  narrow  pens,  in  which  they  stand  and  cannot  lie 
down.  They  are  said  to  gain  flesh  on  board  if  the  weather  is 
good,  but  in  bad  weather  they  are  sometimes  almost  all  lost. 
They  are  knocked  about,  and  it  becomes  necessary  to  throw 
them  over.  Vessels  are  now  being  constructed  to  carry  cattle 
under  cover.  As  regards  dead  meat  they  can  carry  about 
sixty  tons  of  meat  in  a  300-ton  chamber,  specially  fitted  for 
the  purpose.  They  bring  over  whole  sides,  hung  up  in  the 
chamber — not  the  choice  pieces  only.  They  seal  up  this 
chamber  and  refrigerate  it.  On  the  return  voyage  the  cham 
ber  is  opened  and  the  space  used  for  any  other  cargo. 

On  the  voyage  home  the  vessels  go  south  of  the  New 
foundland  Banks,  running  due  east  for  the  first  thousand 
miles,  after  which  they  turn  north-east.  The  first  four  days 
we  had  good  weather,  and  we  should  have  had  it  all  the  way 
at  this  season.  It  is  commonly  said  that  at  this  season 
of  the  year  the  voyage  home  is  '  down  hill ; '  but  as  ill  luck 
would  have  it  we  had  to  encounter  a  strong  easterly  gale, 
which  much  retarded  us,  and  caused  the  loss  of  a  whole  day. 
The  voyage  to  Queens  town  occupied  upwards  of  nine  days. 


407 


STATE   CONSTITUTIONS. 

I  HATE  been  looking  over  some  of  the  past  and  present 
Constitutions  of  some  of  the  States,  as  set  forth  in  the 
6  Charters  and  Constitutions  of  the  United  States,'  by  Poor, 
in  two  large  volumes. 

MASSACHUSETTS. 

Under  the  original  Massachusetts  Constitution  of  1780 
there  was  to  be  complete  religious  toleration ;  but  all 
townships  were  bound  to  keep  up  Protestant  ministers  of 
religion.  There  was  equality  among  Protestant  sects ;  for 
though  every  man  was  bound  to  pay  a  church-tax,  he  might 
pay  to  the  minister  of  his  own  sect,  if  there  were  any  in  the 
township  ;  if  not,  then  to  the  common  minister.  People 
were  bound  to  attend  church,  and  in  some  of  the  New 
England  States  church  membership  was  necessary  to  the 
exercise  of  the  franchise.  The  original  franchise-law  in 
Massachusetts  required  a  property  qualification  of  3£.  per 
annum.  The  c  select  men  '  of  towns  and  all  representatives 
and  officials  were  bound  to  make  oath  of  belief  in  the  Chris 
tian  religion. 

By  an  amendment  passed  in  1822  the  suffrage  was  given 
to  all  adult  males  who  have  resided  and  paid  taxes,  and  the 
oath  of  office  was  altered  so  as  to  exclude  the  declaration  of 
religious  belief. 

In  1833  the  obligation  to  support  Protestant  ministers 
was  abolished,  and  henceforth  every  Christian  sect  was  at 
liberty  to  elect  their  own  ministers,  and  to  do  as  they  like. 

By  an  amendment  passed  in  1857  the  franchise  is  re 
stricted  to  those  who  can  read  in  the  English  language  and 
write  their  names,  and  that  is  the  still  existing  rule. 

The  Constitution  of  Massachusetts  has  not  been  materially 


408  STATE   CONSTITUTIONS. 

changed  since  the  war.  All  hereditary  privileges  are  for 
bidden.  Liberty  of  the  press,  the  free  right  of  all  citizens  to 
the  possession  of  arms,  and  the  free  right  of  assembly  are 
guaranteed.  The  Legislature  consists  of  a  Senate  of  40,  and 
a  House  of  Kepresentatives  of  240  members,  both  elected  by 
the  people.  The  Governor  has  a  veto,  unless  overruled 
by  a  two- thirds  vote  in  each  House.  Office-holders  are  not 
allowed  to  sit  in  the  Legislature.  The  Executive  power  is 
vested  in  an  elected  Governor  and  an  Executive  Council  of 
eight  persons  whose  advice  is  necessary  for  the  doing  of 
certain  things.  Judges  and  other  judicial  officers  are  ap 
pointed  by  the  Governor  and  Council.  The  Judges  are  to 
hold  during  good  behaviour,  unless  it  is  otherwise  prescribed 
by  law.  The  Justices  of  the  Peace  are  appointed  for  seven 
years,  and  are  eligible  for  reappointment.  The  University 
of  Harvard  is  established  and  endowed  by  the  Constitution, 
and  there  is  a  general  provision  enjoining  the  encouragement 
of  education.  No  moneys  raised  for  education  are  to  be 
given  to  any  particular  religious  sect. 


VIRGINIA. 

Every  edition  of  the  Constitution  of  Virginia,  including  the 
last  now  in  force,  commences  with  the  old  recital  of  grievances 
on  account  of  '  the  detestable  and  insupportable  tyranny  '  of 
George  III.,  who  had  sought  to  destroy  the  liberties  of  the 
people  in  many  ways,  and  among  others  c  by  prompting  our 
negroes  to  rise  in  arms  among  us — those  very  negroes  whom 
by  an  inhuman  use  of  his  negative  he  had  refused  us  per 
mission  to  exclude  by  law ;  by  endeavouring  to  bring  on  the 
inhabitants  of  our  frontiers  the  merciless  Indian  savages,' 
and  so  on. 

Then  comes  the  Bill  of  Rights,  consisting  of  seventeen 
articles  adopted  in  1776  and  five  more  added  since  the  civil 
war.  Most  of  the  State  Constitutions  seem  to  retain  the 
Bill  of  Rights,  in  a  more  or  less  modernised  form,  as  a  sort  of 
inner  kernel  of  the  Constitution.  Here  is  the  present  Vir- 


VIRGINIA.  409 

ginian  Bill  of  Rights,  which   retains  the  old  articles  and 
language.     The  modern  portions  are  printed  in  italics : — 

BILL    OF    EIGHTS. 

A  Declaration  of  Rights,  made  by  the  Representatives  of  the  good 
people  of  Virginia,  assembled  in  full  and  free  Convention,  which 
rights  do  pertain  to  them  and  their  posterity,  as  the  basis  and 
foundation  of  government. 

1.  That  all  men  are  by  nature   equally  free  and  independent, 
and  have  certain  inherent  rights,  of  which,  when  they  enter  into  a 
state  of  society,  they  cannot,  by  any  compact,  deprive  or  divest 
their  posterity ;  namely,  the  enjoyment  of  life  and  liberty,  with 
the  means  of  acquiring  and  possessing  property,  and  pursuing  and 
obtaining  happiness  and  safety. 

2.  That   this  State  shall  ever  remain  a  member  of  the  United 
States  of  America,  and  that  the  people  thereof  are  part  of  the 
American  nation,  and  that  all  attempts,  from  whatever  source  or 
upon  whatever  pretext,  to  dissolve  said   Union  or  to  sever  said 
nation,  are  unauthorised,  and  ought   to  be  resisted  with  the  whole 
power  of  the  State. 

3.  That  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States,  and  laws  of  Con 
gress  passed  in  pursuance  thereof,  constitute  the  supreme  law  of 
the  land,  to  which  paramount  allegiance  and  obedience  are  due 

from  every  citizen,  anything  in  the  Constitution,  ordinances,  or  laws 
of  any  State  to  the  contrary  notwithstanding. 

4.  That  all  power  is  vested  in,  and  consequently  derived  from, 
the  people ;  that  magistrates  are  their  trustees  and  servants,  and 
at  all  times  amenable  to  them. 

5.  That  government   is,  or  ought   to   be,  instituted   for   the 
common  benefit,  protection,  and  security  of  the  people,  nation,  or 
community ;  of  all  the  various  modes  and  forms  of  government, 
that  is  best  which  is  capable  of  producing  the  greatest  degree  of 
happiness  and  safety,  and  is  most  effectually  secured  against  the 
danger  of  maladministration  ;  and  that  when  any  government  shall 
be  found  inadequate  or  contrary  to  these  purposes,  a  majority  of 
the  community  hath  an  indubitable,  inalienable,  and  indefeasible 
right  to  reform,  alter,  or  abolish  it,  in  such  a  manner  as  shall  be 
judged  most  conducive  to  the  public  weal. 

6.  That  no  man,  or  set  of  men,  are  entitled  to  exclusive  or 
separate  emoluments  or  privileges  from  the  community  but  in 
consideration  of  public  services ;   which,  not   being  descendible, 


410  STATE   CONSTITUTIONS. 

neither  ought  the  offices  of  magistrate,  legislator,  or  judge  to  be 
hereditary. 

7.  That  the  legislative,  executive,  and  judicial  powers  should 
be  separate   and   distinct;   and   that  the  members   thereof  may 
be  restrained   from  oppression,  by  feeling  and  participating   the 
burthens  of  the  people,  they  should,  at  fixed  periods,  be  reduced 
to  a  private  station,  return  into  that  body  from  which  they  were 
originally  taken,  and  the  vacancies  be  supplied  by  frequent,  certain, 
and  regular  elections,  in  which   all  or  any  part  of  the  former 
members  to  be  again  eligible  or  ineligible,  as  the  laws  shall  direct. 

8.  That  all  elections  ought  to  be  free,  and  that  all  men,  having 
sufficient   evidence    of  permanent   common    interest   with,    and 
attachment  to,  the  community,  have  the  right  of  suffrage,  and 
cannot  be  taxed  or  deprived  of  their  property  for  public  uses, 
without  their  own  consent,  or  that  of  their   representatives  so 
elected,  nor  bound  by  any  law  to  which  they  have  not  in  like 
manner  assented  for  the  public  good. 

9.  That  all  power  of  suspending  laws,  or  the  execution  of  laws, 
by  any  authority,  without  consent  of  the  representatives  of  the 
people,  is  injurious  to  their  rights  and  not  to  be  exercised. 

10.  That,  in  all  capital  or  criminal  prosecutions,  a  man  hath  a 
right  to  demand  the  cause  and  nature  of  his  accusation,  to  be  con 
fronted  with  the  accusers  and  witnesses,  to  call  for  evidence  in  his 
favour,  and  to  a  speedy  trial  by  an  impartial  jury  of  his  vicinage, 
without  whose  unanimous  consent  he  cannot  be  found  guilty ;  nor 
can  he  be  compelled  to  give  evidence  against  himself ;  that  no  man 
be  deprived  of  his  liberty,  except  by  the  law  of  the  land  or  the 
judgment  of  his  peers. 

1 1 .  That  excessive  bail  ought  not  to  be  required,  nor  excessive 
fines  imposed,  nor  cruel  and  unusual  punishment  inflicted. 

12.  That  general  wan-ants,  whereby  an  officer  or  messenger 
may  be  commanded  to  search  suspected  places  without  evidence  of 
a  fact  committed,  or  to  seize  any  person  or  persons  not  named,  or 
whose  offence  is  not  particularly  described  and  supported  by  evi 
dence,  are  grievous  and  oppressive,  and  ought  not  to  be  granted. 

13.  That  in   controversies  respecting   property,  and   in  suits 
between   man   and   man,  the  trial  by  jury  is  preferable  to  any 
other,  and  ought  to  be  held  sacred. 

14.  That  the  freedom  of  the  press  is  one  of  the  great  bulwarks 
of  liberty,  and  can  never  be  restrained  but  by  despotic  govern 
ments,  and  any  citizen  may  speak,  write,  and  publish  his  senti 
ments  on  all  subjects,  being  responsible  for  the  abuse  of  that  liberty. 


VIRGINIA.  411 

15.  That  a  well-regulated  militia,  composed  of  the  body  of  the 
people  trained  to  arms,  is  the  proper,  natural,  and  safe  defence  of 
a  free  state ;  that  standing  armies,  in  time  of  peace,  should  be 
avoided  as  dangerous  to  liberty,  and  that  in  all  cases  the  military 
should  be  under   strict  subordination  to,  and   governed   by,  the 
civil  power. 

16.  That  the  people  have  a  right  to  uniform  government ;  andr 
therefore,  that  no  government  separate  from,  or  independent  of, 
the  Government  of  Virginia  ought  to  be  erected  or  established 
within  the  limits  thereof. 

17.  That  no  free  government,  or  the  blessings  of  liberty,  can 
be  preserved  to  any  people  but  by  a  firm  adherence  to  justice, 
moderation,  temperance,  and  virtue,  and  by  a  frequent  recurrence 
to  fundamental  principles. 

18.  That  religion,  or  the  duty  which  we  owe  to  our  Creator, 
and  the  manner  of  discharging  it,  can  ba  directed  only  by  reason 
and  conviction,  not  by  force  or  violence ;  and,  therefore,  all  men 
are  equally  entitled  to  the  free  exercise  of  religion  according  to 
the  dictates  of  conscience ;  and  that  it  is  the  mutual  duty  of  all 
to  practise  Christian  forbearance,  love,  and  charity  towards  each 
other. 

19.  That  neither  slavery  nor  involuntary  servitude,  except  as 
lawful  imprisonment  may  constitute  suc/i}  shall  exist  within  this 
State. 

20.  That  all  citizens  of  the  State  are  hereby  declared  to  possess 
equal  civil  and  political  rights  and  public  privileges. 

21.  The  rights  enumerated  in  this  Bill  of  Rights  shall  not  be 
construed  to  limit  other  rights  of  the  people  not  therein  expressed. 

The  declaration  of  the  political  rights  and  privileges  of  the 
inhabitants  of  this  State  is  hereby  declared  to  be  a  part  of  the  Con 
stitution  of  this  Commomvealth,  and  shall  not  be  violated  on  any 
pretence  whatever. 

Up  to  1850  the  franchise  was  confined  to  whites,  with  a 
property  qualification.  In  1850  the  property  qualification 
was  given  up,  and  all  adult  white  males  obtained  the  fran 
chise.  By  provisions  added  in  the  same  year  no  emanci 
pated  negroes  were  permitted  to  remain  in  the  State ;  or,  if 
they  did,  they  were  liable  to  be  again  reduced  to  slavery. 
The  Legislature  was  for  ever  forbidden  to  emancipate  any 
slave,  or  the  descendant  of  any  slave ;  and  it  was  empowered 


412  STATE   CONSTITUTIONS. 

to  restrict  by  law  the  power  of  individuals  to  emancipate 
slaves. 

By  the  post- War  Constitution,  put  in  force  in  1870,  all 
disqualifications  of  negroes  are  swept  away — the  franchise  is 
given  to  all  classes,  without  any  property  or  other  qualifica 
tion.  But  there  is  in  this  and  other  Southern  States  a  pro 
vision  disqualifying  all  persons  convicted  of  fighting  a  duel 
from  voting  or  holding  office ;  besides  the  disqualification  to 
vote  of  all  persons  convicted  of  felony  or  petit  larceny.  The 
Governor  and  Lieutenant- Governor  are  elected  by  the  people 
for  four  years ;  but  the  Secretary  of  the  Commonwealth, 
Treasurer,  and  Auditor  are  elected  by  joint  vote  of  the  two 
Houses.  The  Senators  and  Delegates  (members  of  the  Lower 
House)  are  elected  for  four  and  two  years  respectively.  The 
Legislature  meets  once  in  two  years,  and  remains  in  session 
not  more  than  ninety  days,  unless  it  is  extended,  by  a  three- 
fifths  vote,  for  not  more  than  thirty  days  longer.  That  is 
the  utmost  limit. 

The  Judges  are  elected  by  joint  vote  of  the  Houses  of  the 
Legislature  for  twelve,  eight,  and  six  years,  according  to  the 
class  of  Judge.  The  county  and  city  officers,  i.e.  Sheriff, 
Mayor,  Attorney  for  the  Commonwealth,  County  Clerk, 
County  Treasurer,  and  so  many  County  Commissioners  of  Re 
venue  as  may  be  provided  by  law,  are  elected  by  the  people 
for  four  or  six  years ;  and  all  city,  town,  and  village  officers 
not  specially  provided  for  are  to  be  similarly  elected.  Coun 
ties  are  divided  into  magisterial  districts,  each  of  which  is  to 
have  three  justices  of  the  peace,  a  constable,  and  an  overseer 
of  the  poor,  elected  for  two  years.  There  is  now  a  regular 
provision  for  education.  Each  magisterial  district  is  divided 
into  school  districts.  The  Legislature  is  required  to  provide 
a  uniform  system  of  free  public  schools,  to  be  complete  by 
the  year  1876,  and  is  authorised  to  make  such  laws  as  shall 
not  permit  parents  and  guardians  to  allow  their  children  to 
grow  up  in  ignorance  and  vagrancy.  There  is  to  be  a  literary 
fund,  made  up  of  the  proceeds  of  all  forfeited  or  waste  lands, 
a  capitation  tax,  and  an  annual  tax  on  all  property,  of  not 
less  than  one,  or  more  than  five,  mils,  in  the  dollar  (that  is, 
on  the  capital  value). 


ILLINOIS.  413 

The  militia  consists  of  all  able-bodied  men;  but  only 
volunteer  corps  are  classed  as  'active  militia,'  the  rest  as 
'  reserved  militia.' 

Taxation  is  to  be  equally  imposed  on  all  property,  and  a 
tax  may  be  imposed  on  incomes  in  excess  of  $600,  and  on 
licenses  for  the  sale  of  ardent  spirits,  theatrical  and  circus 
companies,  menageries  and  other  shows,  itinerant  pedlers, 
commission  merchants,  brokers,  and  on  all  other  business 
which  cannot  be  reached  by  the  ad  valorem  system.  All 
public  charitable,  religious,  and  educational  property  may 
be  exempted  from  the  property-tax. 

A  curious  instance  of  the  way  in  which  minor  matters 
are  sometimes  mixed  up  with  greater  ones  in  these  Consti 
tutions  is  a  provision  that  no  tax  shall  be  imposed  on  any 
citizen  for  the  privilege  of  taking  oysters,  but  the  sale  of 
oysters  may  be  taxed. 

No  debt  shall  be  incurred  by  the  State  except  to  meet 
casual  deficits,  to  redeem  previous  liabilities,  to  repress  in 
surrection,  or  to  defend  the  State  in  time  of  war  (rather 
wide  and  elastic  provisions) ;  and  every  debt  incurred  must 
be  accompanied  by  provision  for  a  sinking  fund. 

Payment  of  debts  incurred  by  the  usurping  authorities- 
during  the  war  is  strictly  forbidden.  The  credit  of  the  State- 
is  not  to  be  granted  to  any  person  or  corporation.  The 
State  is  not  to  subscribe  to  any  company,  nor  to  be  a  party 
to  any  work  of  internal  improvement,  nor  to  engage  in  carry 
ing  on  any  such  work. 

The  homestead  privilege  extends  to  the  value  of  $2,OOQ 
of  real  or  personal  property,  but  this  shall  not  interfere  with 
sale  of  the  property  in  virtue  of  a  mortgage.  The  Legis 
lature  is  to  pass  laws  regarding  the  setting  apart  and  holding 
homesteads  in  future. 

ILLINOIS. 

The  Constitution  of  Illinois  is  supposed  to  be  a  model  of 
modern  wisdom.  Some  distinguished  Englishmen  have,  I 
believe,  taken  part  in  moulding  it  to  its  present  shape,  and 
much  philosophy  and  learning  have  been  bestowed  on  it. 


414  STATE   CONSTITUTIONS. 

Under  the  original  Constitution  of  1818  every  adult 
white  male  had  the  suffrage,  but  blacks  were  excluded  both 
from  the  suffrage  and  from  the  militia. 

Under  the  amended  Constitution  of  1848  the  Legislature 
was  authorised  to  make  laws  to  prohibit  persons  of  colour 
from  immigrating  into  the  State. 

It  was  not  till  1870  that  all  colour  distinctions  were 
abolished. 

By  the  original  Constitution,  sect.  16  of  every  township 
(that  is,  one  mile  square)  was  set  apart  for  education,  and 
a  whole  township  was  granted  for  the  support  of  a  seminary 
of  higher  learning.  The  United  States  also  agreed  to  set 
apart  for  education  5  per  cent,  of  the  price  of  all  public 
lands  sold  within  the  limits  of  the  State. 

The  present  Constitution  is  that  of  1870.  It  is  rather 
long,  but  I  append  all  the  essential  parts  of  it,  omitting 
only  those  which  are  not  of  general  interest  and  importance. 
It  may,  I  think,  be  of  interest  to  my  readers  to  see  the  most 
improved  form  of  an  American  State  Constitution.  It  com 
mences  with  a  Bill  of  Rights,  laying  down  general  principles 
in  a  modernised  form ;  but  as  in  their  general  effect  these 
are  not  radically  different  from  the  Virginian  Bill  of  Rights, 
which  I  have  already  given,  I  omit  this  part  of  the  Illinois 
Constitution.  For  the  rest  I  leave  it  to  speak  for  itself: — 


CONSTITUTION  OF  1870. 

Adopted  in  Convention  May  13,  1870;  ratified  by  the  people 
July  2,  1870;  in  force  August  8,  1870. 

PREAMBLE. — We,  the  people  of  the  State  of  Illinois — grateful  to 
Almighty  God  for  the  civil,  political,  and  religions  liberty  which  He 
hath  so  long  permitted  us  to  enjoy,  and  looking  to  Him  for  a  bless 
ing  upon  our  endeavours  to  secure  and  transmit  the  same  unim 
paired  to  succeeding  generations — in  order  to  form  a  more  perfect 
government,  establish  justice,  insure  domestic  tranquillity,  provide 
for  the  common  defence,  promote  the  general  welfare,  and  secure 
the  blessings  of  liberty  to  ourselves  and  our  posterity,  do  ordain  and 
establish  this  Constitution  for  the  State  of  Illinois. 


ILLINOIS.  415 


ARTICLE  III. 

DISTRIBUTION    OF   POWERS. 

The  powers  of  the  government  of  this  state  are  divided  into 
three  distinct  departments — the  legislative,  executive,  and  judicial ; 
and  no  person,  or  collection  of  persons,  being  one  of  these  depart 
ments,  shall  exercise  any  power  properly  belonging  to  either  of  the 
others,  except  as  hereinafter  expressly  directed  or  permitted. 

ARTICLE  IV. 

LEGISLATIVE    DEPARTMENT. 

§  1.  The  legislative  power  shall  be  vested  in  a  general  assembly, 
which  shall  consist  of  a  senate  and  house  of  representatives,  both  to 
be  elected  by  the  people. 

ELECTION. 

§  2.  An  election  for  members  of  the  general  assembly  shall  be 
held  on  the  Tuesday  next  after  the  first  Monday  in  November,  in 
the  year  of  our  Lord  1870,  and  every  two  years  thereafter,  in 
each  county,  at  such  places  therein  as  may  be  provided  by  law. 
When  vacancies  occur  in  either  house,  the  governor,  or  person 
exercising  the  powers  of  governor,  shall  issue  writs  of  election  to 
fill  such  vacancies. 

ELIGIBILITY. 

§  3.  No  person  shall  be  a  senator  who  shall  not  have  attained 
the  age  of  twenty-five  years,  or  a  representative  who  shall  not  have 
attained  the  age  of  twenty-one  years.  No  person  shall  be  a  senator 
or  a  representative  who  shall  not  be  a  citizen  of  the  United  States, 
and  who  shall  not  have  been  for  five  years  a  resident  of  this  state, 
and  for  two  years  next  preceding  his  election  a  resident  within  the 
territory  forming  the  district  from  which  he  is  elected.  No  judge 
or  clerk  of  any  court,  secretary  of  state,  attorney  general,  state's 
attorney,  recorder,  sheriff,  or  collector  of  public  revenue,  member 
of  either  house  of  congress,  or  person  holding  any  lucrative  office 
under  the  United  States  or  this  state,  or  any  foreign  government, 
shall  have  a  seat  in  the  general  assembly  :  Provided,  that  appoint 
ments  in  the  militia,  and  the  offices  of  notary  public  and  justice  of 
the  peace,  shall  not  be  considered  lucrative.  Nor  shall  any  person, 


416  STATE   CONSTITUTIONS. 

holding  any  office  of  honour  or  profit  under  any  foreign  govern 
ment,  or  under  the  government  of  the  United  States  (except  post 
masters  whose  annual  compensation  does  not  exceed  the  sum  of 
$300),  hold  any  office  of  honour  or  profit  under  the  authority  of  this 
state. 

§  4.  No  person  who  has  been,  or  hereafter  shall  be,  convicted 
of  bribery,  perjury,  or  other  infamous  crime,  nor  any  person  who 
has  been  or  may  be  a  collector  or  holder  of  public  moneys,  who- 
shall  not  have  accounted  for  and  paid  over,  according  to  law,  all 
such  moneys  due  from  him,  shall  be  eligible  to  the  general 
assembly,  or  to  any  office  of  profit  or  trust  in  this  state. 

APPORTIONMENT — SENATORIAL. 

§  6.  The  general  assembly  shall  apportion  the  state  every  ten 
years,  beginning  with  the  year  1871,  by  dividing  the  population  of 
the  state,  as  ascertained  by  the  federal  census,  by  the  number  51, 
and  the  quotient  shall  be  the  ratio  of  representation  in  the  senate. 
The  state  shall  be  divided  into  51  senatorial  districts,  each  of  which 
shall  elect  one  senator,  whose  term  of  office  shall  be  four  years. 
The  senators  elected  in  the  year  of  our  Lord  1872,  in  districts 
bearing  odd  numbers,  shall  vacate  their  offices  at  the  end  of  two 
years,  and  those  elected  in  districts  bearing  even  numbers,  at  the 
end  of  four  years ;  and  vacancies  occurring  by  the  expiration  of 
term,  shall  be  filled  by  the  election  of  senators  for  the  full  term. 
Senatorial  districts  shall  be  formed  of  contiguous  and  compact 
territory,  bounded  by  county  lines,  and  contain,  as  nearly  as 
practicable,  an  equal  number  of  inhabitants ;  but  no  district  shall 
contain  less  than  four-fifths  of  the  senatorial  ratio.  Counties  con 
taining  not  less  than  the  ratio  and  three-fourths,  may  be  divided 
into  separate  districts,  and  shall  be  entitled  to  two  senators,  and  to 
one  additional  senator  for  each  number  of  inhabitants  equal  to  the 
ratio  contained  by  such  counties  in  excess  of  twice  the  number  of 
said  ratio. 

MINORITY   REPRESENTATION. 

§§7  and  8.  The  house  of  representatives  shall  consist  of  three 
times  the  number  of  the  members  of  the  senate,  and  the  term  of 
office  shall  be  two  years.  Three  representatives  shall  be  elected  in 
each  senatorial  district  at  the  general  election  iri  the  year  of  our 
Lord  1872,  and  every  two  years  thereafter.  In  all  elections  of 
representatives  aforesaid,  each  qualified  voter  may  cast  as  many 
votes  for  one  candidate  as  there  are  representatives  to  be  elected,  or 


ILLINOIS.  417 

may  distribute  the  same,  or  equal  parts  thereof,  among  the  candi 
dates,  as  he  shall  see  fit ;  and  the  candidates  highest  in  votes  shall 
be  declared  elected. 


TIME    OF    MEETING   AND    GENERAL    RULES. 

§  9.  The  sessions  of  the  general  assembly  shall  commence 
at  twelve  o'clock  noon,  on  the  Wednesday  next  after  the  first 
Monday  in  January,  in  the  year  next  ensuing  the  election  of 
members  thereof,  and  at  no  other  time,  unless  as  provided  by  this 
constitution.  A  majority  of  the  members  elected  to  each  house 
shall  constitute  a  quorum.  Each  house  shall  determine  the  rules 
of  its  proceedings,  and  be  the  judge  of  the  election  returns  and 
qualifications  of  its  members  ;  shall  choose  its  own  officers  ;  and  the 
senate  shall  choose  a  temporary  president  to  preside  when  the 
lieutenant-governor  shall  not  attend  as  president  or  shall  act  as 
governor.  The  secretary  of  state  shall  call  the  house  of  repre 
sentatives  to  order  at  the  opening  of  each  new  assembly,  and  preside 
over  it  until  a  temporary  presiding  officer  thereof  shall  have  been 
chosen  and  shall  have  taken  his  seat.  No  member  shall  be  expelled 
by  either  house  except  by  a  vote  of  two-thirds  of  all  the  members 
elected  to  that  house,  and  no  member  shall  be  twice  expelled  for 
the  same  offence.  Each  house  may  punish,  by  imprisonment,  any 
person  not  a  member,  who  shall  be  guilty  of  disrespect  to  the  house 
by  disorderly  or  contemptuous  behaviour  in  its  presence.  But  no 
such  imprisonment  shall  extend  beyond  twenty-four  hours  at  one 
time,  unless  the  person  shall  persist  in  such  disorderly  or  contemp 
tuous  behaviour. 

§  10.  The  doors  of  each  house,  and  of  committees  of  the  whole, 
shall  be  kept  open,  except  in  such  cases  as,  in  the  opinion  of  the 
house,  require  secrecy.  Neither  house  shall,  without  the  consent 
of  the  other,  adjourn  for  more  than  two  days,  or  to  any  other  place 
than  that  in  which  the  two  houses  shall  be  sitting.  Each  house 
shall  keep  a  journal  of  its  proceedings,  which  shall  be  published.  In 
the  senate  at  the  request  of  two  members,  and  in  the  house  at  the 
request  of  five  members,  the  yeas  and  nays  shall  be  taken  on  any 
question,  and  entered  upon  the  journal.  Any  two  members  of 
either  house  shall  have  liberty  to  dissent  from  and  protest,  in 
respectful  language,  against  any  act  or  resolution  which  they  think 
injurious  to  the  public  or  to  any  individual,  and  have  the  reasons 
of  their  dissent  entered  upon  the  journals. 


E  E 


418  STATE   CONSTITUTIONS. 

STYLE    OF   LAWS   AND   PASSAGE    OF   BILLS. 

§  11.  The  style  of  the  laws  of  this  state  shall  be:  "  Be  it 
enacted  by  the  People  of  the  State  of  Illinois,  represented  in 
the  General  Assembly." 

§  12.  Bills  may  originate  in  either  house,  but  may  be  altered, 
amended  or  rejected  by  the  other ;  and  on  the  final  passage  of  all 
bills,  the  vote  shall  be  by  yeas  and  nays,  upon  each  bill  separately, 
and  shall  be  entered  upon  the  journal;  and  no  bill  shall  become  a 
law  without  the  concurrence  of  a  majority  of  the  members  elected 
to  each  house. 

§  13.  Every  bill  shall  be  read  at  large  on  three  different  days, 
in  each  house ;  and  the  bill  and  all  amendments  thereto  shall  be 
printed  before  the  vote  is  taken  on  its  final  passage ;  and  every  bill, 
having  passed  both  houses,  shall  be  signed  by  the  speakers  thereof. 
No  act  hereafter  passed  shall  embrace  more  than  one  subject,  and 
that  shall  be  expressed  in  the  title.  But  if  any  subject  shall  be 
embraced  in  an  act  which  shall  not  be  expressed  in  the  title,  such 
act  shall  be  void  only  as  to  so  much  thereof  as  shall  not  be  so  ex 
pressed  ;  and  no  law  shall  be  revived  or  amended  by  reference  to 
its  title  only,  but  the  law  revived,  or  the  section  amended,  shall  be 
inserted  at  length  in  the  new  act.  And  no  act  of  the  general 
assembly  shall  take  effect  until  the  first  day  of  July  next  after  its 
passage,  unless,  in  case  of  emergency  (which  emergency  shall  be 
expressed  in  the  preamble  or  body  of  the  act),  the  general  assembly 
shall,  by  a  vote  of  two-thirds  of  all  the  members  elected  to  each 
house,  otherwise  direct. 

DISABILITIES. 

§  15.  No  person  elected  to  the  general  assembly  shall  receive 
any  civil  appointment  within  this  state  from  the  governor,  the 
governor  and  senate,  or  from  the  general  assembly,  during  the 
term  for  which  he  shall  have  been  elected  ;  and  all  such  appoint 
ments,  and  all  votes  given  for  any  such  members  for  any  such  office 
or  appointment,  shall  be  void  ;  nor  shall  any  member  of  the  general 
assembly  be  interested,  either  directly  or  indirectly,  in  any  contract 
with  the  state,  or  any  county  thereof,  authorised  by  any  law  passed 
during  the  term  for  which  he  shall  have  been  elected,  or  within 
one  year  after  the  expiration  thereof. 

rUBLIC   MONEYS   AND   APPKOPKIATIONS. 

§  16.  The  general  assembly  shall  make  no  appropriation  of 
money  out  of  the  treasury  in  any  private  law.  Bills  making  appro- 


ILLINOIS.  419 

priations  for  the  pay  of  members  and  officers  of  the  general  assembly, 
and  for  the  salaries  of  the  officers  of  the  government,  shall  contain 
no  provision  on  any  other  subject. 

§  17.  No  money  shall  be  drawn  from  the  treasury  except  in 
pursuance  of  an  appropriation  made  by  law,  and  on  the  presenta 
tion  of  a  warrant  issued  by  the  auditor  thereon ;  and  no  money 
shall  be  diverted  from  any  appropriation  made  for  any  purpose,  or 
taken  from  any  fund  whatever,  either  by  joint  or  separate  resolu 
tion.  The  auditor  shall,  within  sixty  days  after  the  adjournment 
of  each  session  of  the  general  assembly,  prepare  and  publish  a  full 
statement  of  all  money  expended  at  such  session,  specifying  the 
amount  of  each  item,  and  to  whom  and  for  what  paid. 

§  18.  Each  general  assembly  shall  provide  for  all  the  appropria 
tions  necessary  for  the  ordinary  and  contingent  expenses  of  the 
government  until  the  expiration  of  the  first  fiscal  quarter  after  the 
adjournment  of  the  next  regular  session,  the  aggregate  amount  of 
which  shall  not  be  increased  without  a  vote  of  two-thirds  of  the 
members  elected  to  each  house,  nor  exceed  the  amount  of  revenue 
authorised  by  law  to  be  raised  in  such  time ;  and  all  appropria 
tions,  general  or  special,  requiring  money  to  be  paid  out  of  the  state 
treasury,  from  funds  belonging  to  the  state,  shall  end  with  such 
fiscal  quarter  :  Provided,  the  state  may,  to  meet  casual  deficits  or 
failures  in  revenues,  contract  debts,  never  to  exceed  in  the  aggre 
gate  $250,000  ;  and  moneys  thus  borrowed  shall  be  applied  to  the 
purpose  for  which  they  were  obtained,  or  to  pay  the  debt  thus 
created,  and  to  no  other  purpose ;  and  no  other  debt,  except  for 
the  purpose  of  repelling  invasion,  suppressing  insurrection,  or 
defending  the  state  in  war  (for  payment  of  which  the  faith  of  the 
state  shall  be  pledged),  shall  be  contracted,  unless  the  law  authoris 
ing  the  same  shall,  at  a  general  election,  have  been  submitted  to 
the  people,  and  have  received  a  majority  of  the  votes  cast  for  mem 
bers  of  the  general  assembly  at  such  election.  The  general  assembly 
shall  provide  for  the  publication  of  said  law  for  three  months  at' 
least  before  the  vote  of  the  people  shall  be  taken  upon  the  same  ; 
and  provision  shall  be  made,  at  the  time,  for  the  payment  of  the 
interest  annually,  as  it  shall  accrue,  by  a  tax  levied  for  the  purpose 
or  from  other  sources  of  revenue ;  which  law,  providing  for  the 
payment  of  such  interest,  by  such  tax,  shall  be  irrepealable  until 
such  debt  be  paid :  And,  provided,  further,  that  the  law  levying 
the  tax  shall  be  submitted  to  the  people  with  the  law  authorising 
the  debt  to  be  contracted. 

§  19.  The  general  assembly  shall  never   grant  or  authorise 


420  STATE   CONSTITUTIONS. 

extra  compensation,  fee  or  allowance  to  any  public  officer,  agent, 
servant  or  contractor,  after  service  has  been  rendered  or  a  contract 
made,  nor  authorise  the  payment  of  any  claim,  or  part  thereof, 
hereafter  created  against  the  state  under  any  agreement  or  contract 
made  without  express  authority  of  law  ;  and  all  such  unauthorised 
agreements  or  contracts  shall  be  null  and  void  :  Provided,  the 
general  assembly  may  make  appropriations  for  expenditures  in 
curred  in  suppressing  insurrection  or  repelling  invasion. 

§  20.  The  state  shall  never  pay,  assume  or  become  responsible 
for  the  debts  or  liabilities  of,  or  in  any  manner  give,  loan,  or  ex 
tend  its  credit  to  or  in  aid  of  any  public  or  other  corporation, 
association,  or  individual. 

PAY    OF  MEMBERS. 

§  21.  The  members  of  the  general  assembly  shall  receive  for 
their  services  the  sum  of  $5  per  day,  during  the  first  session  held 
under  this  constitution,  and  10  cents  for  each  mile  necessarily 
travelled  in  going  to  and  returning  from  the  seat  of  government, 
to  be  computed  by  the  auditor  of  public  accounts ;  and  thereafter 
such  compensation  as  shall  be  prescribed  by  law,  and  no  other 
allowance  or  emolument,  directly  or  indirectly,  for  any  purpose 
whatever,  except  the  sum  of  $50  per  session  to  each  member, 
which  shall  be  in  full  for  postage,  stationery,  newspapers  and  all 
other  incidental  expenses  and  perquisites;  but  no  change  shall  be 
made  in  the  compensation  of  members  of  the  general  assembly 
during  the  term  for  which  they  may  have  been  elected.  The  pay 
and  mileage  allowed  to  each  member  of  the  general  assembly  shall 
be  certified  by  the  speaker  of  their  respective  houses,  and  entered 
on  the  journals  and  published  at  the  close  of  each  session. 

SPECIAL   LEGISLATION    PROHIBITED. 

§  22.  The  general  assembly  shall  not  pass  local  or  special  laws 
in  any  of  the  following  enumerated  cases,  that  is  to  say  :  for — 

Granting  divorces ; 

Changing  the  names  of  persons  or  places ; 

Laying  out,  opening,  altering  and  working  roads  or  highways ; 

Vacating  roads,  town  plats,  streets,  alleys  and  public  grounds ; 

Locating  or  changing  county  seats  ; 

Regulating  county  and  township  affairs ; 

Regulating  the  practice  in  courts  of  justice; 

Regulating  the  jurisdiction  and  duties  of  justices  of  the  peace, 
police  magistrates  and  constables ; 


ILLINOIS.  421 

Providing  for  changes  of  venue  in  civil  and  criminal  cases ; 

Incorporating  cities,  towns  or  villages,  or  changing  or  amend 
ing  the  charter  of  any  town,  city  or  village  ; 

Providing  for  the  election  of  members  of  the  board  of  super 
visors  in  townships,  incorporated  towns  or  cities ; 

Summoning  and  impanelling  grand  or  petit  j  uries ; 

Providing  for  the  management  of  common  schools  ; 

Regulating  the  rate  of  interest  on  money ; 

The  opening  and  conducting  of  any  election,  or  designating  the 
place  of  voting ; 

The  sale  or  mortgage  of  real  estate  belonging  to  minors  or 
others  under  disability ; 

The  protection  of  game  or  fish  ; 

Chartering  or  licensing  ferries  or  toll  bridges  ; 

Remitting  fines,  penalties  or  forfeitures  ; 

Creating,  increasing  or  decreasing  fees,  percentage  or  allowances 
of  public  officers,  during  the  term  for  which  said  officers  are  elected 
or  appointed ; 

Changing  the  law  of  descent ; 

Granting  to  any  corporation,  association  or  individual  the  right 
to  lay  down  railroad  tracks,  or  amending  existing  charters  for  such 
purpose ; 

Granting  to  any  corporation,  association  or  individual  any  spe 
cial  or  exclusive  privilege,  immunity  or  franchise  whatever. 

In  all  other  cases  where  a  general  law  can  be  made  applicable, 
no  special  law  shall  be  enacted. 

§  23.  The  general  assembly  shall  have  no  power  to  release  or 
extinguish,  in  whole  or  in  part,  the  indebtedness,  liability  or 
obligation  of  any  corporation  or  individual  to  this  state  or  to  any 
municipal  corporation  therein. 

IMPEACHMENT. 

§  24.  The  house  of  representatives  shall  have  the  sole  power 
of  impeachment ;  but  a  majority  of  all  the  members  elected  must 
concur  therein.  All  impeachments  shall  be  tried  by  the  senate ; 
and  when  sitting  for  that  purpose,  the  senators  shall  be  upon  oath, 
or  affirmation,  to  do  justice  according  to  law  and  evidence.  When 
the  governor  of  the  state  is  tried,  the  chief  justice  shall  preside. 
No  person  shall  be  convicted  without  the  concurrence  of  two-thirds 
of  the  senators  elected.  But  judgment,  in  such  cases,  shall  not 
extend  further  than  removal  from  office,  and  disqualification  to 
hold  any  office  of  honour,  profit  or  trust  under  the  government j)f 


422  STATE  -CONSTITUTIONS. 

this   state.      The  party,  whether   convicted   or   acquitted,   shall, 
nevertheless,  be  liable  to  prosecution,  trial,  judgment  and  punish 


ment  according  to  law. 


MISCELLANEOUS. 


§  26.  The  state  of  Illinois  shall  never  be  made  defendant  in 
any  court  of  law  or  equity. 

§  27.  The  general  assembly  shall  have  no  power  to  authorise 
lotteries  or  gift  enterprises  for  any  purpose,  and  shall  pass  laws 
to  prohibit  the  sale  of  lottery  or  gift  enterprise  tickets  in  this 
state. 

§  28.  No  law  shall  be  passed  which  shall  operate  to  extend 
the  term  of  any  public  officer  after  his  election  or  appointment. 

§  29.  It  shall  be  the  duty  of  the  general  assembly  to  pass  such 
laws  as  may  be  necessary  for  the  protection  of  operative  miners,  by 
providing  for  ventilation,  when  the  same  may  be  required,  and  the 
construction  of  escapement-shafts,  or  such  other  appliances  as  may 
secure  safety  in  all  coal  mines,  and  to  provide  for  the  enforcement 
of  said  laws  by  such  penalties  and  punishments  as  may  be  deemed 
proper. 

§  30.  The  general  assembly  may  provide  for  establishing  and 
opening  roads  and  cartways,  connected  with  a  public  road,  for  pri 
vate  and  public  use. 

§  31.  The  general  assembly  may  pass  laws  permitting  the 
owners  or  occupants  of  lands  to  construct  drains  and  ditches, 
for  agricultural  and  sanitary  purposes,  across  the  lands  of  others. 

§  32.  The  general  assembly  shall  pass  liberal  homestead  and 
exemption  laws. 

ARTICLE  V. 

EXECUTIVE   DEPARTMENT. 

§  1.  The  executive  department  shall  consist  of  a  governor, 
lieutenant-governor,  secretary  of  state,  auditor  of  public  accounts, 
treasurer,  superintendent  of  public  instruction,  and  attorney-general, 
who  shall,  each,  with  the  exception  of  the  treasurer,  hold  his  office 
for  the  term  of  four  years  from  the  second  Monday  of  January 
next  after  his  election,  and  until  his  successor  is  elected  and  quali 
fied.  They  shall,  except  the  lieutenant-governor,  reside  at  the 
seat  of  government  during  their  term  of  office,  and  keep  the  public 
records,  books  and  papers  there,  and  shall  perform  such  duties  as 
may  be  prescribed  by  law. 


ILLINOIS.  42 


n 


§  2.  The  treasurer  shall  hold  his  office  for  the  term  of  two 
years,  and  until  his  successor  is  elected  and  qualified,  and  shall  be 
ineligible  to  said  office  for  two  years  next  after  the  end  of  the  term 
for  which  he  was  elected.  He  may  be  required  by  the  governor 
to  give  reasonable  additional  security,  and  in  default  of  so  doing 
his  office  shall  be  deemed  vacant. 

ELECTION. 

§  3.  An  election  for  governor,  lieutenant-governor,  secretary  of 
state,  auditor  of  public  accounts,  and  attorney-general,  shall  be 
held  on  the  Tuesday  next  after  the  first  Monday  of  November,  in 
the  year  of  our  Lord  1872,  and  every  four  years  thereafter;  for 
superintendent  of  public  instruction,  on  the  Tuesday  next  after  the 
first  Monday  of  November,  in  the  year  1870,  and  every  four  years 
thereafter  ;  and  for  treasurer  on  the  day  last  above  mentioned,  and 
every  two  years  thereafter,  at  such  places  and  in  such  manner  as 
may  be  prescribed  by  law. 

ELIGIBILITY. 

§  5.  No  person  shall  be  eligible  to  the  office  of  governor,  or 
lieutenant-governor,  who  shall  not  have  attained  the  age  of  thirty 
years,  and  been,  for  five  years  next  preceding  his  election,  a  citizen 
of  the  United  States  and  of  this  state.  Neither  the  governor, 
lieutenant-gOA^ernor,  auditor  of  public  accounts,  secretary  of  state, 
superintendent  of  public  instruction  nor  attorney-general  shall  be 
eligible  to  any  other  office  during  the  period  for  which  he  shall 
have  been  elected. 

GOVERNOR. 

§  6.  The  supreme  executive  power  shall  be  vested  in  the 
governor,  who  shall  take  care  that  the  laws  be  faithfully  executed. 

§  7.  The  governor,  shall,  at  the  commencement  of  each  session, 
and  at  the  close  of  his  term  of  office,  give  to  the  general  assembly 
information,  by  message,  of  the  condition  of  the  state,  and  shall 
recommend  such  measures  as  he  shall  deem  expedient.  He  shall 
account  to  the  general  assembly,  and  accompany  his  message  with 
a  statement  of  all  moneys  received  and  paid  out  by  him  from  any 
funds  subject  to  his  order,  with  vouchers,  and  at  the  commence 
ment  of  each  regular  session,  present  estimates  of  the  amount  of 
money  required  to  be  raised  by  taxation  for  all  purposes. 

§  8.  The  governor  may,  on  extraordinary  occasions,  convene 
the  general  assembly,  by  proclamation,  stating  therein  the  purpose 


424  STAT3   CONSTITUTIONS. 

for  which  they  are  convened  ;  and  the  general  assembly  shall  enter 
upon  no  business  except  that  for  which  they  were  called  together. 

§  9.  In  case  of  a  disagreement  between  the  two  houses,  with 
respect  to  the  time  of  adjournment,  the  governor  may,  on  the  same 
being  certified  to  him,  by  the  house  first  moving  the  adjournment, 
adjourn  the  general  assembly  to  such  time  as  he  thinks  proper,  not 
beyond  the  first  day  of  the  next  regular  session. 

§  10.  The  governor  shall  nominate,  and  by  and  with  the 
advice  and  consent  of  the  senate  (a  majority  of  all  the  senators 
selected  concurring,  by  yeas  and  nays),  appoint  all  officers  whose 
offices  are  established  by  this  constitution,  or  which  may  be  created 
by  law,  and  whose  appointment  or  election  is  not  otherwise  pro 
vided  for ;  and  no  such  officer  shall  be  appointed  or  elected  by  the 
general  assembly. 

§  11.  In  case  of  a  vacancy,  during  the  recess  of  the  senate,  in 
any  office  which  is  not  elective,  the  governor  shall  make  a  tem 
porary  appointment  until  the  next  meeting  of  the  senate,  when  he 
shall  nominate  some  person  to  fill  such  office ;  and  any  person  so 
nominated,  who  is  confirmed  by  the  senate  (a  majority  of  all  the 
senators  elected  concurring  by  yeas  and  nays),  shall  hold  his  office 
during  the  remainder  of  the  term,  and  until  his  successor  shall  be 
appointed  and  qualified.  No  person,  after  being  rejected  by  the 
senate,  shall  be  again  nominated  for  the  same  office  at  the  same 
session,  unless  at  the  request  of  the  senate,  or  be  appointed  to  the 
same  office  during  the  recess  of  the  general  assembly. 

§  12.  The  governor  shall  have  power  to  remove  any  officer 
whom  he  may  appoint,  in  case  of  incompetency,  neglect  of  duty, 
or  malfeasance  in  office ;  and  he  may  declare  his.  office  vacant,  and 
fill  the  same  as  is  herein  provided  in  other  cas^s  of  vacancy. 

§  13.  The  governor  shall  have  power  to  grant  reprieves,  com 
mutations  and  pardons,  after  conviction,  for  all  offences,  subject  to 
such  regulations  as  may  ba  provided  by  law  relative  to  the  manner 
of  applying  therefor. 

§  14.  The  governor  shall  be  Commander-in-chief  of  the  military 
and  naval  forces  of  the  state  (except  when  they  shall  be  called 
into  the  service  of  the  United  States),  and  may  call  out  tiie  same 
to  execute  the  laws,  suppress  insurrection,  and  repel  invasion. 

§  15.  The  governor,  and  all  civil  officers  of  this  state,  shall  be 
liable  to  impeachment  for  any  misdemeanour  in  office. 

YETO. 

§  16.  Every  bill  passed  by  the  general  assembly  shall,  before 
it  becomes  a  law,  be  presented  to  the  governor.  If  he  approve,  he 


ILLINOIS.  425 

shall  sign  it,  and  thereupon  it  shall  become  a  law  ;  but  if  he  do 
not  approve,  he  shall  return  it,  with  his  objections,  to  the  house 
in  which  it  shall  have  originated,  which  house  shall  enter  the  ob 
jections  at  large  upon  its  journal,  and  proceed  to  reconsider  the 
bill.  If,  then,  two-thirds  of  the  members  elected  agree  to  pass  the 
same,  it  shall  be  sent,  together  with  the  objections,  to  the  other  house, 
by  which  it  shall  likewise  be  reconsidered,  and  if  approved  by  two- 
thirds  of  the  members  elected  to  that  house,  it  shall  become  a  law, 
notwithstanding  the  objections  of  the  governor.  But  in  all  such 
cases  the  vote  of  each  house  shall  be  determined  by  yeas  and  nays, 
to  be  entered  on  the  journal.  Any  bill  which  shall  not  be  returned 
by  the  governor  within  ten  da.ys  (Sundays  excepted)  after  it  shall 
have  been  presented  to  him,  shall  become  a  law  in  like  manner 
as  if  he  had  signed  it,  unless  the  general  assembly  shall,  by  their 
adjournment,  prevent  its  return,  in  which  case  it  shall  be  filed, 
with  his  objections,  in  the  office  of  the  secretary  of  state,  within 
ten  days  after  such  adjournment,  or  become  a  law. 

LIEUTENANT-GOYERNOR. 

§  18.  The  lieutenant-governor  shall  be  president  of  the  senate, 
and  shall  vote  only  when  the  senate  is  equally  divided.  The  senate 
shall  choose  a  president,  pro  tempore,  to  preside  in  case  of  the 
absence  or  impeachment  of  the  lieutenant-governor,  or  when  he 
shall  hold  the  office  of  governor. 

OTHER    STATE    OFFICERS. 

§  20.  An  account  shall  be  kept  by  the  officers  of  the  executive 
department,  and  of  all  the  public  institutions  of  the  state,  of  all 
moneys  received  or  disbursed  by  them,  severally,  from  all  sources, 
and  for  every  service  performed,  and  a  semi-annual  report  thereof 
be  made  to  the  governor,  under  oath  ;  and  any  officer  who  makes  a 
false  report  shall  be  guilty  of  perjury,  and  punished  accordingly. 

§  21.  The  officers  of  the  executive  department,  and  of  all  the 
public  institutions  of  the  state,  shall,  at  least  ten  days  preceding 
each  regular  session  of  the  general  assembly,  severally  report  to  the 
governor,  who  shall  transmit  such  reports  to  the  general  assembly, 
together  with  the  reports  of  the  judges  of  the  supreme  court  of  the 
defects  in  the  constitution  and  laws  •  and  the  governor  may  at  any 
time  require  information  in  writing,  under  oath,  from  the  officers  of 
the  executive  department,  and  all  officers  and  managers  of  state  in 
stitutions,  upon  any  subject  relating  to  the  condition,  management 
and  expenses  of  their  respective  offices. 


426  STATE   CONSTITUTIONS. 


FEES    AND    SALARIES. 

§  23.  The  officers  named  in  this  article  shall  receive  for  their 
services  a  salary  to  be  established  by  law,  which  shall  not  be  in 
creased  or  diminished  during  their  official  terms,  and  they  shall  not, 
after  the  expiration  of  the  terms  of  those  in  office  at  the  adoption 
of  this  constitution,  receive  to  their  own  use  any  fees,  costs,  per 
quisites  of  office,  or  other  compensation.  And  all  fees  that  may 
hereafter  be  payable  by  law  for  any  service  performed  by  any  officer 
provided  for  in  this  article  of  the  constitution,  shall  be  paid  in  ad 
vance  into  the  stat3  treasury. 

ARTICLE  VI. 

JUDICIAL    DEPARTMENT. 

§  1.  The  judicial  powers,  except  as  in  this  article  is  otherwise 
provided,  shall  be  vested  in  one  supreme  court,  circuit  courts, 
county  courts,  justices  of  the  peace,  police  magistrates,  and  in  such 
courts  as  may  be  created  by  law  in  and  for  cities  and  incorporated 
towns. 

SUPREME    COURT. 

§  2.  The  supreme  court  shall  consist  of  seven  judges,  and  shall 
have  original  jurisdiction  in  cases  relating  to  the  revenue,  in  man 
damus  and  habeas  corpus,  and  appellate  jurisdiction  in  all  other 
cases.  One  of  said  judges  shall  be  chief  justice ;  four  shall  con 
stitute  a  quorum,  and  the  concurrence  of  four  shall  be  necessary  to 
every  decision. 

§  3.  No  person  shall  be  eligible  to  the  office  of  judge  of  the 
supreme  court  unless  he  shall  be  at  least  thirty  years  of  age,  and  a 
citizen  of  the  United  States,  nor  unless  he  shall  have  resided  in  this 
state  five  years  next  preceding  his  election,  and  be  a  resident  of  the 
district  in  which  he  shall  be  elected. 

§  6.  At  the  time  of  voting  on  the  adoption  of  this  constitution, 
one  judge  of  the  supreme  court  shall  be  elected  by  the  electors 
thereof,  in  each  of  said  districts  numbered  two,  three,  six  and 
seven,  who  shall  hold  his  office  for  the  term  of  nine  years,  from  the 
first  Monday  of  June,  in  the  year  of  our  Lord  1870.'  The  term  of 
office  of  judges  of  the  supreme  court,  elected  after  the  adoption  of 
this  constitution,  shall  be  nine  years  ;  and  on  the  first  Monday  of 
June  of  the  year  in  which  the  term  of  any  of  the  judges  in  office  at 


ILLINOIS.  427 

the  adoption  of  this  constitution,  or  of  the  judges  then  elected,  shall 
expire,  and  every  nine  years  thereafter,  there  shall  be  an  election 
for  the  successor  or  successors  of  such  judges,  in  the  respective  dis 
tricts  wherein  the  term  of  such  judges  shall  expire.  The  chief 
justice  shall  continue  to  act  as  such  until  the  expiration  of  the  term 
for  which  he  was  elected,  after  which  the  judges  shall  choose  one 
of  their  number  chief  justice. 

§  7.  From  and  after  the  adoption  of  this  constitution,  the 
judges  of  (the  supreme  court  shall  each  receive  a  salary  of  $4,000 
per  annum,  payable  quarterly,  until  otherwise  provided  by  law. 
And  after  said  salaries  shall  be  fixed  by  law,  the  salaries  of  the 
judges  in  office  shall  not  be  increased  or  diminished  during  the 
terms  for  which  said  judges  shall  have  been  elected. 

CIRCUIT    COURTS. 

§  12.  The  circuit  courts  shall  have  original  jurisdiction  of  all 
causes  in  law  and  equity,  and  such  appellate  jurisdiction  as  is  or 
may  be  provided  by  law,  and  shall  hold  two  or  more  terms  each 
year  in  every  county.  The  terms  of  office  of  judges  of  circuit 
courts  shall  be  six  years. 

§  14.  The  general  assembly  shall  provide  for  the  times  of 
holding  court  in  each  county,  which  shall  not  be  changed,  except 
by  the  general  assembly  next  preceding  the  general  election  for 
judges  of  said  courts  ;  but  additional  terms  may  be  provided  for  in 
any  county.  The  election  for  judges  of  the  circuit  courts  shall  be 
held  on  the  first  Monday  in  June,  in  the  year  of  our  Lord  1873, 
and  every  six  years  thereafter. 

§  16.  From  and  after  the  adoption  of  this  constitution,  judges 
of  the  circuit  courts  shall  receive  a  salary  of  $3,000  per  annum, 
payable  quarterly,  until  otherwise  provided  by  law.  And  after 
their  salaries  shall  be  fixed  by  law,  they  shall  not  be  increased  or 
diminished  during  the  terms  for  which  said  judges  shall  be,  respec 
tively,  elected ;  and  from  and  after  the  adoption  of  this  constitu 
tion,  no  judge  of  the  supreme  or  circuit  court  shall  receive  any 
other  compensation,  perquisite  or  benefit,  in  any  form  whatsoever, 
nor  perform  any  other  than  judicial  duties  to  which  may  belong 
any  emoluments. 

§  17.  No  person  shall  be  eligible  to  the  oflice  of  judge  of  the 
circuit  or  any  inferior  court,  or  to  membership  in  the  '  board  of 
county  commissioners,'  unless  he  shall  be  at  least  twenty-five  years 
of  age,  and  a  citizen  of  the  United  States,  nor  unless  he  shall  have 
resided  in  this  state  five  years  next  preceding  his  election,  and  be  a 


428  STATE   CONSTITUTIONS. 

resident  of  the  circuit,  county,  city,  cities  or  incorporated  town  in 
which  he  shall  be  elected. 

COUNTY   COURTS. 

§  18.  There  shall  be  elected  iii  and  for  each  county,  one  county 
judge  and  one  clerk  of  the  county  court,  whose  terms  of  office  shall 
be  four  years.  But  the  general  assembly  may  create  districts  of 
two  or  more  contiguous  counties,  in  each  of  which  shall  be  elected 
one  judge,  who  shall  take  the  place  of,  and  exercise  the  powers  and 
jurisdiction  of  county  judges  in  such  districts.  County  courts  shall 
be  courts  of  record,  and  shall  have  original  jurisdiction  in  all  mat 
ters  of  probate,  settlement  of  estates  of  deceased  persons,  appoint 
ment  of  guardians  and  conservators,  and  settlements  of  their 
accounts,  in  all  matters  relating  to  apprentices,  and  in  proceedings 
for  the  collection  of  taxes  and  assessments,  and  such  other  jurisdic 
tion  as  may  be  provided  for  by  general  law. 

§  19.  Appeals  and  writs  of  error  shall  be  allowed  from  final 
determinations  of  county  courts,  as  may  be  provided  by  law. 

PROBATE   COURTS. 

§  20.  The  general  assembly  may  provide  for  the  establishment 
of  a  probate  court  in  each  county  having  a  population  of  over 
50,000,  and  for  the  election  of  a  judge  thereof,  whose  term  of 
office  shall  be  the  same  as  that  of  the  county  judge,  and  who  shall 
be  elected  at  the  same  time  and  in  the  same  manner.  Said  courts, 
when  established,  shall  have  original  jurisdiction  of  all  probate 
matters,  the  settlement  of  estates  of  deceased  persons,  the  appoint 
ment  of  guardians  and  conservators,  and  settlement  of  their 
accounts ;  in  all  matters  relating  to  apprentices,  and  in  cases  of 
the  sales  of  real  estate  of  deceased  persons  for  the  payment  of 
debts. 

JUSTICES    OF    THE    PEACE    AND    CONSTABLES. 

§  21.  Justices  of  the  peace,  police  magistrates,  and  constables 
shall  be  elected  in  and  for  such  districts  as  are,  or  may  be,  pro 
vided  by  law,  and  the  jurisdiction  of  such  justices  of  the  peace  and 
police  magistrates  shall  be  uniform. 

STATE'S  ATTORNEYS. 

§  22.  At  the  election  for  members  of  the  general  assembly  in 
the  year  of  our  Lord  1872,  and  every  four  years  'thereafter,  there 
shall  be  elected  a  state's  attorney  in  and  for  each  county,  in  lieu  of 
the  state's  attorneys  now  provided  by  law,  whose  term  of  office 
shall  be  four  years. 


ILLINOIS.  429 


GENERAL    PROVISIONS. 

§  29.  All  judicial  officers  shall  be  commissioned  by  the 
governor.  All  laws  relating  to  courts  shall  be  general,  and  of 
uniform  operation  ;  and  the  organisation,  jurisdiction,  powers,  pro 
ceedings  and  practice  of  all  courts,  of  the  same  class  or  grade,  so 
far  as  regulated  by  law,  and  the  force  and  effect  of  the  process, 
judgments  and  decrees  of  such  courts,  severally,  shall  be  uniform. 

§  30.  The  general  assembly  may,  for  cause  entered  on  the 
journals,  upon  clue  notice  and  opportunity  of  defence,  remove  from 
office  any  judge,  upon  concurrence  of  three-fourths  of  all  the  mem 
bers  elected,  of  each  house.  All  other  officers  in  this  article 
mentioned  shall  be  removed  from  office  on  prosecution  and  final 
conviction  for  misdemeanour  in  office. 


ARTICLE  VII. 

SUFFRAGE. 

§  1.  Every  person  having  resided  in  this  state  one  year,  in  the 
county  ninety  days,  and  in  the  election  district  thirty  days  next 
preceding  any  election  therein,  who  was  an  elector  in  this  state  on 
the  first  day  of  April,  in  the  year  of  our  Lord  1848,  or  obtained  a 
certificate  of  naturalisation  before  any  court  of  record  in  this  state 
prior  to  the  first  day  of  January,  in  the  year  of  our  Lord  1870,  or 
who  shall  be  a  male  citizen  of  the  United  States,  above  the  age  of 
twenty-one  years,  shall  ba  entitled  to  vote  at  such  election. 
§  2.  A.ll  votes  shall  be  by  ballot. 

§  3.  Electors  shall,  in  all  cases  except  treason,  felony,  or  breach 
of  the  peace,  be  privileged  from  arrest  during  their  attendance  at 
elections,  and  in  going  to  and  returning  from  the  same.  And  no 
elector  shall  "be  obliged  to  do  military  duty  on  the  days  of  election, 
except  in  time  of  war  or  public  danger. 

§  4.  No  elector  shall  be  deemed  to  have  lost  his  residence  in 
this  state  by  reason  of  his  absence  on  business  of  the  United  States, 
or  of  this  state,  or  in  the  military  or  naval  service  of  the  United 
States. 

§  5.  No  soldier,  seaman  or  marine  in  the  army  or  navy  of  the 
United  States  shall  be  deemed  a  resident  of  this  state  in  conse 
quence  of  being  stationed  therein. 

§  6.  No  person  shall  be  elected  or  appointed  to  any  office  in 
this  state,  civil  or  military,  who  is  not  a  citizen  of  the  United 


430  STATE   CONSTITUTIONS. 

States,  and  who  shall  not  have  resided  in  this  state  one  year  next 
preceding  the  election  or  appointment. 

§  7.  The  general  assembly  shall  pass  laws  excluding  from  the 
right  of  suffrage  persons  convicted  of  infamous  crimes. 

ARTICLE  VIII. 

EDUCATION. 

§  1.  The  general  assembly  shall  provide  a  thorough  and  efficient 
system  of  free  schools,  whereby  all  children  of  this  state  may 
receive  a  good  common  school  education. 

§  2.  All  lands,  moneys,  or  other  property,  donated,  granted  or 
received  for  school,  college,  seminary  or  university  purposes,  and 
the  proceeds  thereof,  shall  be  faithfully  applied  to  the  objects  for 
which  such  gifts  or  grants  were  made. 

§  3.  Neither  the  general  assembly  nor  any  county,  city,  town, 
township,  school  district,  or  other  public  corporation,  shall  ever 
make  any  appropriation  or  pay  from  any  public  fund  whatever, 
anything  in  aid  of  any  church  or  sectarian  purpose,  or  to  help 
support  or  sustain  any  school,  academy,  seminary,  college,  uni 
versity,  or  other  literary  or  scientific  institution,  controlled  by  any 
church  or  sectarian  denomination  whatever ;  nor  shall  any  grant  or 
donation  of  land,  money,  or  other  personal  property  ever  be  made 
by  the  state  or  any  such  public  corporation,  to  any  church,  or  for 
any  sectarian  purpose. 

§  4.  No  teacher,  state,  county,  township  or  district  school 
officer  shall  be  interested  in  the  sale,  proceeds  or  profits  of  any 
book,  apparatus  or  furniture  used  or  to  be  used  in  any  school  in 
this  state,  with  which  such  officer  or  teacher  may  be  connected, 
under  such  penalties  as  may  be  provided  by  the  general  assembly. 

§  5.  There  may  be  a  county  superintendent  of  schools  in  each 
county,  whose  qualifications,  powers,  duties,  compensation,  and 
time  and  manner  of  election,  and  term  of  office,  shall  be  prescribed 
by  law. 

ARTICLE  IX. 

REVENUE. 

§  1.  The  general  assembly  shall  provide  such  revenue  as  may 
be  needful  by  levying  a  tax,  by  valuation,  so  that  every  person  and 
corporation  shall  pay  a  tax  in  proportion  to  the  value  of  his,  her  or 
its  property — such  value  to  be  ascertained  by  some  person  or  per- 


ILLINOIS.  431 

sons,  to  be  elected  or  appointed  in  such  manner  as  the  general 
assembly  shall  direct,  and  not  otherwise  ;  but  the  general  assembly 
shall  have  power  to  tax  pedlers,  auctioneers,  brokers,  hawkers, 
merchants,  commission  merchants,  showmen,  jugglers,  innkeepers, 
grocery  keepers,  liquor  dealers,  toll  bridges,  ferries,  insurance, 
telegraph  and  express  interests  or  business,  venders  of  patents,  and 
persons  or  corporations  owning  or  using  franchises  and  privileges, 
in  such  manner  as  it  shall  from  time  to  time  direct  by  general  law, 
uniform  as  to  the  class  upon  which  it  operates. 

§  2.  The  specification  of  the  objects  and  subjects  of  taxation 
shall  not  deprive  the  general  assembly  of  the  power  to  require 
other  subjects  or  objects  to  be  taxed  in  such  manner  as  may  be 
consistent  with  the  principles  of  taxation  fixed  in  this  constitution . 

§  3.  The  property  of  the  state,  counties,  and  other  municipal 
corporations,  both  real  and  personal,  and  such  other  property  as 
may  be  used  exclusively  for  agricultural  and  horticultural  societies, 
for  school,  religious,  cemetery  and  charitable  purposes,  may  be 
exempted  from  taxation ;  but  such  exemption  shall  be  only  by 
general  law.  In  the  assessment  of  real  estate  incumbered  by 
public  easement,  any  depreciation  occasioned  by  such  easement  may 
be  deducted  in  the  valuation  of  such  property. 

§  6.  The  general  assembly  shall  have  no  power  to  release  or 
discharge  any  county,  city,  township,  town  or  district  whatever, 
or  the  inhabitants  thereof,  or  the  property  therein,  from  their  or 
its  proportionate  share  of  taxes  to  be  levied  for  state  purposes,  nor 
shall  commutation  for  such  taxes  be  authorised  in  any  form  what 
soever. 

§  7.  All  taxes  levied  for  state  purposes  shall  be  paid  into  the- 
state  treasury. 

§  8.  County  authorities  shall  never  assess  taxes,  the  aggregate 
of  which  shall  exceed  75  cents  per  $100  valuation,  except  for  the 
payment  of  indebtedness  existing  at  the  adoption  of  this  constitu 
tion,  unless  authorised  by  a  vote  of  the  people  of  the  county. 

§  9.  The  general  assembly  may  vest  the  corporate  authorities 
of  cities,  towns  and  villages,  with  power  to  make  local  improve 
ments  by  special  assessment,  or  by  special  taxation  of  contiguous 
property,  or  otherwise.  For  all  other  corporate  purposes,  all 
municipal  corporations  may  be  vested  with  authority  to  assess  and 
collect  taxes  ;  but  such  taxes  shall  be  uniform  in  respect  to  per 
sons  and  property,  within  the  jurisdiction  of  the  body  imposing 
the  same. 

§   10.   The   general    assembly   shall    not   impos3   taxes  upon 


432  STATE   CONSTITUTIONS. 

municipal  corporations,  or  the  inhabitants  or  property  thereof,  for 
corporate  purposes,  but  shall  require  that  all  the  taxable  property 
within  the  limits  of  municipal  corporations  shall  be  taxed  for  the 
payment  of  debts  contracted  under  authority  of  law,  such  taxes  to 
be  uniform  in  respect  to  persons  and  property,  within  the  jurisdic 
tion  of  the  body  imposing  the  same.  Private  property  shall  not  be 
liable  to  be  taken  or  sold  for  the  payment  of  the  corporate  debts  of 
a  municipal  corporation. 

§  12.  No  county,  city,  township,  school  district,  or  other 
municipal  corporation,  shall  be  allowed  to  become  indebted  in  any 
manner,  or  for  any  purpose,  to  an  amount,  including  existing  in 
debtedness,  in  the  aggregate  exceeding  five  per  centum  on  the  value 
of  the  taxable  property  therein,  to  be  ascertained  by  the  last  assess 
ment  for  state  and  county  taxes,  previous  to  the  incurring  of  such 
indebtedness.  Any  county,  city,  school  district,  or  other  municipal 
corporation,  incurring  any  indebtedness  as  aforesaid,  shall  before, 
or  at  the  time  of  doing  so,  provide  for  the  collection  of  a  direct 
annual  tax  sufficient  to  pay  the  interest  on  such  debt  as  it  falls  due, 
and  also  to  pay  and  discharge  the  principal  thereof  within  twenty 
years  from  the  time  of  contracting  the  same.  This  section  shall 
not  be  construed  to  prevent  any  county,  city,  township,  school 
district,  or  other  municipal  corporation,  from  issuing  their  bonds 
in  compliance  with  any  vote  of  the  people  which  may  have  been 
had  prior  to  the  adoption  of  this  constitution  in  pursuance  of  any 
law  providing  therefor. 

ARTICLE  X. 

COUNTIES. 

§  1 .  No  new  county  shall  be  formed  or  established  by  the 
general  assembly,  which  will  reduce  the  county  or  counties,  or 
either  of  them,  from  which  it  shall  be  taken,  to  less  contents  than 
400  square  miles ;  nor  shall  any  county  be  formed  of  less  contents  : 
nor  shall  any  line  thereof  pass  within  less  than  ten  miles  of  any 
county  seat  of  the  county  or  counties  proposed  to  be  divided. 

§  2.  No  county  shall  be  divided,  or  have  any  part  stricken 
therefrom,  without  submitting  the  question  to  a  vote  of  the  people 
of  the  county,  nor  unless  a  majority  of  all  the  legal  voters  of  the 
county,  voting  on  the  question,  shall  vote  for  the  same. 

§  3.  There  shall  be  no  territory  stricken  from  any  county, 
unless  a  majority  of  the  voters  living  in  such  territory  shall  peti 
tion  for  such  division ;  and  no  territory  shall  be  added  to  any 


ILLINOIS.  433 

county  without  the  consent  of  the  majority  of  the  voters  of  the 
county  to  which  it  is  proposed  to  be  added.  But  the  portion  so 
stricken  off  and  added  to  another  county,  or  formed  in  whole  or  in 
part  into  a  new  county,  shall  be  holden  for,  and  obliged  to  pay  its 
proportion  of  the  indebtedness  of  the  county  from  which  it  has 
been  taken. 

COUNTY    GOVERNMENT. 

§  5.  The  general  assembly  shall  provide,  by  general  law,  for 
township  organisation,  under  which  any  county  may  organise 
whenever  a  majority  of  the  legal  voters  of  such  county,  voting  at 
any  general  election,  shall  so  determine ;  and  whenever  any  county 
shall  adopt  township  organisation,  so  much  of  this  constitution  as 
provides  for  the  management  of  the  fiscal  concerns  of  the  said 
county  by  the  board  of  county  commissioners,  may  be  dispensed 
with,  and  the  affairs  of  said  county  may  be  transacted  in  such 
manner  as  the  general  assembly  may  provide.  And  in  any  county 
that  shall  have  adopted  a  township  organisation,  the  question  of 
continuing  the  same  may  be  submitted  to  a  vote  of  the  electors  of 
said  county,  at  a  general  election,  in  the  manner  that  now  is  or  may 
be  provided  by  law  ;  and  if  a  majority  of  all  the  votes  cast  upon 
that  question  shall  be  against  township  organisation,  then  such 
organisation  shall  cease  in  said  county ;  and  all  laws  in  force  in 
relation  to  counties  not  having  township  organisation,  shall  imme- 
mediately  take  effect  and  be  in  force  in  such  county.  No  two 
townships  shall  have  the  same  name,  and  the  day  of  holding  the 
annual  township  meeting  shall  be  uniform  throughout  the  state. 

§  6.  At  the  first  election  of  county  judges  under  this  constitu 
tion,  there  shall  be  elected  in  each  of  the  counties  in  this  state,  not 
under  township  organisation,  three  officers,  who  shall  be  styled 
*  The  board  of  county  commissioners,'  who  shall  hold  sessions  for 
the  transaction  of  county  business  as  shall  be  provided  by  law. 
One  of  said  commissioners  shall  hold  his  office  for  one  year,  one 
for  two  years,  and  one  for  three  years,  to  be  determined  by  lot ; 
and  every  year  thereafter  one  such  officer  shall  be  elected  in  each 
of  the  said  counties  for  the  term  of  three  years. 

COUNTY    OFFICERS   AND   THEIR   COMPENSATION. 

§  8.  In  each  county  there  shall  be  elected  the  following  county 

officers :  County  judge,  sheriff,  county  clerk,  clerk  of  the  circuit 

court,  (who  may  be  ex-ojficio  recorder  of  deeds,  except  in  counties 

having  60,000  and  more  inhabitants,  in  which  counties  a  recorder 

F  F 


434  STATE   CONSTITUTIONS. 

of  deeds  shall  be  elected  at  the  general  election  in  the  year  of  our 
Lord  1872,)  treasurer,  surveyor  and  coroner,  each  of  whom  shall 
enter  upon  the  duties  of  his  office,  respectively,  on  the  first  Mon 
day  of  December  after  their  election ;  and  they  shall  hold  their 
respective  offices  for  the  term  of  four  years,  except  the  treasurer, 
sheriff  and  coroner,  who  shall  hold  their  offices  for  two  years,  and 
until  their  successors  shall  be  elected  and  qualified. 

§  9.  The  clerks  of  all  the  courts  of  record,  the  treasurer,  sheriff, 
coroner  and  recorder  of  deeds  of  Cook  coiinty,  shall  receive  as  their 
only  compensation  for  their  services,  sal  aides  to  be  fixed  by  law, 
which  shall  in  no  case  be  as  much  as  the  lawful  compensation  of  a 
judge  of  the  circuit  court  of  said  county,  and  shall  be  paid,  respec 
tively,  only  out  of  the  fees  of  the  office  actually  collected.  All  fees, 
perquisites  and  emoluments  (above  the  amount  of  said  salaries) 
shall  be  paid  into  the  county  treasury.  The  number  of  the 
deputies  and  assistants  of  such  officers  shall  be  determined  by  rule 
of  the  circuit  court,  to  be  entered  of  record,  and  their  compensation 
shall  be  determined  by  the  county  board. 

§  10.  The  county  board,  except  as  provided  in  section  9  of 
this  article,  shall  fix  the  compensation  of  all  county  officers,  with 
the  amount  of  their  necessary  clerk  hire,  stationery,  fuel  and  other 
expenses,  and  in  all  cases  where  fees  are  provided  for,  said  compen 
sation  shall  be  paid  only  out  of,  and  shall  in  no  instance  exceed, 
the  fees  annually  collected;  they  shall  not  allow  either  of  them 
more  per  annum  than  $1,500,  in  counties  not  exceeding  20,000 
inhabitants  ;  $2,000  in  counties  containing  20,000  and  not  ex 
ceeding  30,000  inhabitants ;  $2,500  in  counties  containing  30,000 
and  not  exceeding  50,000  inhabitants  ;  $3,000  in  counties  contain 
ing  50,000  and  not  exceeding  70,000  inhabitants;  $3,500  in 
counties  containing  70,000  and  not  exceeding  100,000  inhabi 
tants;  and  $4,000  in  counties  containing  over  100,000  and  not 
exceeding  250,000  inhabitants ;  and  not  more  than  $1,000  addi 
tional  compensation  for  each  additional  100,000  inhabitants: 
Provided,  that  the  compensation  of  no  officer  shall  be  increased  or 
diminished  during  his  term  of  office.  All  fees  or  allowances  by 
them  received,  in  excess  of  their  said  compensation,  shall  be  paid 
into  the  county  treasury. 

§  11.  The  fees  of  township  officers,  and  of  each  class  of  county 
officers,  shall  be  uniform  in  the  class  of  counties  'to  which  they 
respectively  belong.  The  compensation  herein  provided  for  shall 
apply  only  to  officers  hereafter  elected,  but  all  fees  established 
by  special  laws  shall  cease  at  the  adoption  of  this  constitution,  and 


ILLINOIS.  435 

such  officers  shall  receive  only  such  fees  as  are  provided  by  general 
law. 

§  12.  All  laws  fixing  the  fees  of  state,  county  and  township 
officers,  shall  terminate  with  the  terms,  respectively,  of  those  who 
may  be  in  office  at  the  meeting  of  the  first  general  assembly  after 
the  adoption  of  this  constitution ;  and  the  general  assembly  shall, 
by  general  law,  uniform  in  its  operation,  provide  for  and  regulate 
the  fees  of  said  officers  and  their  successors,  so  as  to  reduce  the 
same  to  a  reasonable  compensation  for  services  actually  rendered. 
But  the  general  assembly  may,  by  general  law,  classify  the  counties 
by  population  into  not  more  than  three  classes,  and  regulate  the 
fees  according  to  class.  This  article  shall  not  be  construed  as 
depriving  the  general  assembly  of  the  power  to  reduce  the  fees  of 
existing  officers. 

§  13.  Every  person  who  is  elected  or  appointed  to  any  office 
in  this  state,  who  shall  be  paid  in  whole  or  in  part  by  fees,  shall 
be  required  by  law  to  make  a  semi-annual  report,  under  oath,  to 
some  officer,  to  be  designated  by  law,  of  all  his  fees  and  emolu 
ments. 

ARTICLE  XL 

CORPORATIONS. 

§  1.  No  corporation  shall  be  created  by  special  laws,  or  its 
charter  extended,  changed  or  amended,  except  those  for  charitable, 
educational,  penal  or  reformatory  purposes,  which  are  to  be  and 
remain  under  the  patronage  and  control  of  the  state,  but  the 
general  assembly  shall  provide,  by  general  laws,  for  the  organisa 
tion  of  all  corporations  hereafter  to  be  created. 

§  2.  All  existing  charters  or  grants  of  special  or  exclusive  pri 
vileges,  under  which  organisation  shall  not  have  taken  place,  or 
which  shall  not  have  been  in  operation  within  ten  days  from  the 
time  this  constitution  takes  effect,  shall  thereafter  have  no  validity 
or  effect  whatever. 

§  3.  The  general  assembly  shall  provide,  by  law,  that  in  all 
elections  for  directors  or  managers  of  incorporated  companies,  every 
stockholder  shall  have  the  right  to  vote,  in  person  or  by  proxy,  for 
the  number  of  shares  of  stock  owned  by  him,  for  as  many  persons 
as  there  are  directors  or  managers  to  be  elected,  or  to  cumulate 
said  shares,  and  give  one  candidate  as  many  votes  as  the  number 
of  directors  multiplied  by  the  number  of  his  shares  of  stock  shall 
equal,  or  to  distribute  them  on  the  same  principle  among  as  many 

V   F   2 


436  STATE   CONSTITUTIONS. 

candidates  as  he  shall  think  fit ;  and  such  directors  or  managers 
shall  not  be  elected  in  any  other  manner. 

§  4.  No  law  shall  be  passed  by  the  general  assembly  granting 
the  right  to  construct  and  operate  a  street  railroad  within  any  city, 
town  or  incorporated  village,  without  requiring  the  consent  of  the 
local  authorities  having  the  control  of  the  street  or  highway  pro 
posed  to  be  occupied  by  such  street  railroad. 

BANKS. 

§  5.  No  state  bank  shall  hereafter  be  created,  nor  shall  the 
state  own  or  be  liable  for  any  stock  in  any  corporation  or  joint 
stock  company  or  association  for  banking  purposes,  now  created,  or 
to  be  hereafter  created.  No  act  of  the  general  assembly  authorising  or 
creating  corporations  or  associations  with  banking  powers,  whether 
of  issue,  deposit  or  discount,  nor  amendments  thereto,  shall  go  into 
effect  or  in  any  manner  be  in  force  unless  the  same  shall  be  sub 
mitted  to  a  vote  of  the  people  at  the  general  election  next  succeeding 
the  passage  of  the  same,  and  be  approved  by  a  majority  of  all  the 
votes  cast  at  such  election  for  or  against  such  law. 

§  6.  Every  stockholder  in  a  banking  corporation  or  institution 
shall  be  individually  responsible  and  liable  to  its  creditors,  over  and 
above  the  amount  of  stock  by  him  or  her  held,  to  an  amount  equal 
to  his  or  her  respective  shares  so  held,  for  all  its  liabilities  accruing 
while  he  or  she  remains  such  stockholder. 

§  7.  The  suspension  of  specie  payments  by  banking  institutions, 
on  their  circulation,  created  by  the  laws  of  this  state,  shall  never 
be  permitted  or  sanctioned.  Every  banking  association  now,  or 
which  may  hereafter  be  organised  under  the  laws  of  this  state,  shall 
make  and  publish  a  full  and  accurate  quarterly  statement  of  its 
affairs,  (which  shall  be  certified  to,  under  oath,  by  one  or  more  of 
its  officers,)  as  may  be  provided  by  law. 

§  8.  If  a  general  banking  law  shall  be  enacted,  it  shall  provide 
for  the  registry  and  countersigning,  by  an  officer  of  state,  of  all 
bills  or  paper  credit,  designed  to  circulate  as  money,  and  require 
security,  to  the  full  amount  thereof,  to  be  deposited  with  the  state 
treasurer,  in  United  States  or  Illinois  state  stocks,  to  be  rated  at 
10  per  cent,  below  their  par  value ;  and  in  case  of  a  depreciation  of 
said  stocks  to  the  amount  of  10  per  cent,  below  par,  the  bank  or 
banks  owning  said  stocks  shall  be  required  to  make  up  said  defi 
ciency  by  depositing  additional  stocks.  And  said  law  shall  also 
provide  for  the  recording  of  the  names  of  all  stockholders  in  such 
corporations,  the  amount  of  stock  held  by  each,  the  time  of  any 
transfer  thereof,  and  to  whom  such  transfer  is  made. 


ILLINOIS.  437 


RAILROADS. 

§  9.  Every  railroad  corporation  organised  or  doing  business  in 
this  state,  under  the  laws  or  authority  thereof,  shall  have  and 
maintain  a  public  office  or  place  in  this  state  for  the  transaction  of 
its  business,  where  transfers  of  stock  shall  be  made,  and  in  which 
shall  be  kept,  for  public  inspection,  books,  in  which  shall  be  re 
corded  the  amount  of  capital  stock  subscribed,  and  by  whom  ;  the 
names  of  the  owners  of  its  stock,  and  the  amounts  owned  by  them 
respectively;  the  amount  of  stock  paid  in,  and  by  whom;  the 
transfer  of  said  stock  ;  the  amount  of  its  assets  and  liabilities,  and 
the  names  and  place  of  residence  of  its  officers.  The  directors  of 
every  railroad  corporation  shall,  annually,  make  a  report,  under 
oath,  to  the  auditor  of  public  accounts,  or  some  officer  to  be  desig 
nated  by  law,  of  all  their  acts  and  doings,  which  report  shall  include 
such  matters  relating  to  railroads  as  may  be  prescribed  by  law. 
And  the  general  assembly  shall  pass  laws  enforcing  by  suitable 
penalties  the  provisions  of  this  section. 

§  10.  The  rolling  stock,  and  all  other  movable  property  be 
longing  to  any  railroad  company  or  corporation  in  this  state,  shall 
be  considered  personal  property,  and  shall  be  liable  to  execution 
and  sale  in  the  same  manner  as  the  personal  property  of  indi 
viduals,  and  the  general  assembly  shall  pass  no  law  exempting 
any  such  property  from  execution  and  sale. 

§  11.  No  railroad  corporation  shall  consolidate  its  stock,  pro 
perty  or  franchises  with  any  other  railroad  corporation  owning  a 
parallel  or  competing  line ;  and  in  no  case  shall  any  consolidation 
take  place,  except  upon  public  notice  given,  of  at  least  sixty  days, 
to  all  stockholders,  in  such  manner  as  may  be  provided  by  law. 
A  majority  of  the  directors  of  any  railroad  corporation,  now  incor 
porated  or  hereafter  to  be  incorporated  by  the  laws  of  this  state, 
shall  be  citizens  and  residents  of  this  state. 

§  12.  Railways  heretofore  constructed,  or  that  may  hereafter 
be  constructed  in  this  state,  are  hereby  declared  public  highways, 
and  shall  be  free  to  all  persons  for  the  transportation  of  their  per 
sons  and  property  thereon,  under  such  regulations  as  may  be  pre 
scribed  by  law.  And  the  general  assembly  shall,  from  time  to 
time,  pass  laws  establishing  reasonable  maximum  rates  of  charges 
for  the  transportation  of  passengers  and  freight  on  the  different 
railroads  in  this  state. 

§   13.  No  railroad  corporation  shall  issue  any  stock  or  bonds, 


438  STATE   CONSTITUTIONS. 

except  for  money,  labour  or  property  actually  received,  and  applied 
to  the  purposes  for  which  such  corporation  was  created ;  and  all 
stock  dividends,  and  other  fictitious  increase  of  the  capital  stock 
or  indebtedness  of  any  such  corporation,  shall  be  void.  The  capital 
stock  of  no  railroad  corporation  shall  be  increased  for  any  purpose, 
except  upon  giving  sixty  days'  public  notice,  in  such  manner  as 
may  be  provided  by  law. 

§  14.  The  exercise  of  the  power,  and  the  right  of  eminent 
domain,  shall  never  be  so  construed  or  abridged  as  to  prevent  the 
taking,  by  the  general  assembly,  of  the  property  and  franchises  of 
incorporated  companies  already  organised,  and  subjecting  them  to 
the  public  necessity  the  same  as  of  individuals.  The  right  of  trial 
by  jury  shall  be  held  inviolate  in  all  trials  of  claims  for  compensa 
tion,  when,  in  the  exercise  of  the  said  right  of  eminent  domain, 
any  incorporated  company  shall  be  interested  either  for  or  against 
the  exercise  of  said  right. 

§  15.  The  general  assembly  shall  pass  laws  to  correct  abuses 
and  prevent  unjust  discrimination  and  extortion  in  the  rates  of 
freight  and  passenger  tariffs  on  the  different  railroads  in  this  state, 
and  enforce  such  laws  by  adequate  penalties,  to  the  extent,  if 
necessary  for  that  purpose,  of  forfeiture  of  their  property  and 
franchises. 

ARTICLE  XII. 

MILITIA. 

§  1.  The  militia  of  the  state  of  Illinois  shall  consist  of  all  able- 
bodied  male  persons,  resident  in  the  state,  between  the  ages  of 
eighteen  and  forty-five,  except  such  persons  as  now  are,  or  here 
after  may  be,  exempted  by  the  laws  of  the  United  States,  or  of 
this  state. 

§  2.  The  general  assembly,  in  providing  for  the  organisation, 
equipment  and  discipline  of  the  militia,  shall  conform  as  nearly  as 
practicable  to  the  regulations  for  the  government  of  the  armies  of 
the  United  States. 

§  3.  All  militia  officers  shall  be  commissioned  by  the  governor, 
and  may  hold  their  commissions  for  such  time  as  the  general 
assembly  may  provide. 

§  4.  The  militia  shall  in  all  cases,  except  treason,  felony,  or 
breach  of  the  peace,  be  privileged  from  arrest  during  their  attend 
ance  at  musters  and  elections,  and  in  going  to  and  returning  from 
the  same. 


ILLINOIS.  439 

§  5.  The  military  records,  banners  and  relics  of  the  state, 
shall  be  preserved  as  an  enduring  memorial  of  the  patriotism 
and  valour  of  Illinois,  and  it  shall  be  the  duty  of  the  general 
assembly  to  provide,  by  law,  for  the  safe  keeping  of  the  same. 

§  6.  No  person  having  conscientious  scruples  against  bearing 
arms  shall  be  compelled  to  do  militia  duty  in  time  of  peace  :  Pro 
vided,  such  person  shall  pay  an  equivalent  for  such  exemption. 


ARTICLE  XIII. 

WAREHOUSES. 

§  1.  All  elevators  or  storehouses  where  grain  or  other  pro 
perty  is  stored  for  a  compensation,  whether  the  property  stored  be 
kept  separate  or  not,  are  declared  to  be  public  warehouses. 

§  2.  The  owner,  lessee  or  manager  of  each  and  every  public 
warehouse  situated  in  any  town  or  city  of  not  less  than  100,000 
inhabitants,  shall  make  weekly  statements  under  oath,  before  some 
officer  to  be  designated  by  law,  and  keep  the  same  posted  in  some 
conspicuous  place  in  the  office  of  such  warehouse,  and  shall  also  file 
a  copy  for  public  examination  in  such  place  as  shall  be  designated 
by  law,  which  statement  shall  correctly  set  forth  the  amount  and 
grade  of  each  and  every  kind  of  grain  in  such  warehouse,  together 
with  such  other  property  as  may  be  stored  therein,  and  what  ware 
house  receipts  have  been  issued,  and  are,  at  the  time  of  making- 
such  statement,  outstanding  therefor ;  and  shall,  on  the  copy 
posted  in  the  warehouse,  note  daily  such  changes  as  may  be  made 
in  the  quantity  and  grade  of  grain  in  such  warehouse ;  and  the 
different  grades  of  grain  shipped  in  separate  lots  shall  not  be  mixed 
with  inferior  or  superior  grades  without  the  consent  of  the  owner 
or  consignee  thereof. 

§  3.  The  owners  of  property  stored  in  any  warehouse,  or 
holder  of  a  receipt  for  the  same,  shall  always  be  at  liberty  to 
examine  such  property  stored,  and  all  the  books  and  records  of  the 
warehouse  in  regard  to  such  property. 

§  4.  All  railroad  companies  and  other  common  carriers  on 
railroads  shall  weigh  or  measure  grain  at  points  where  it  is 
shipped,  and  receipt  for  the  full  amount,  and  shall  be  responsible 
for  the  delivery  of  such  amount  to  the  owner  or  consignee  thereof, 
at  the  place  of  destination. 

§  5.  All  railroad  companies  receiving  and  transporting  grain 
in  bulk  or  otherwise,  shall  deliver  the  same  to  any  consignee  there- 


440  STATE   CONSTITUTIONS. 

of,  or  any  elevator  or  public  warehouse  to  which  it  may  be  con 
signed,  provided  such  consignee  or  the  elevator  or  public  warehouse 
can  be  reached  by  any  track  owned,  leased  or  used,  or  which  can 
be  used,  by  such  railroad  companies ;  and  all  railroad  companies 
shall  permit  connections  to  be  made  with  their  track,  so  that  any 
such  consignee,  and  any  public  warehouse,  coal  bank  or  coal  yard, 
may  be  reached  by  the  cars  on  said  railroad. 

§  6.  It  shall  be  the  duty  of  the  general  assembly  to  pass  all 
necessary  laws  to  prevent  the  issue  of  false  and  fraudulent  ware 
house  receipts,  and  to  give  full  effect  to  this  article  of  the  constitu 
tion,  which  shall  be  liberally  construed  so  as  to  protect  producers 
and  shippers.  And  the  enumeration  of  the  remedies  herein  named 
shall  not  be  construed  to  deny  to  the  general  assembly  the  power 
to  prescribe  by  law  such  other  and  further  remedies  as  may  be 
found  expedient,  or  to  deprive  any  person  of  existing  common  law 
remedies. 

§  7.  The  general  assembly  shall  pass  laws  for  the  inspection  of 
grain,  for  the  protection  of  producers,  shippers  and  receivers  of 
grain  and  produce. 

ARTICLE  XIV. 

AMENDMENTS   TO    THE    CONSTITUTION. 

§  1 .  Whenever  two-thirds  of  the  members  of  each  house  of  the 
general  assembly  shall,  by  a  vote  entered  upon  the  journals  thereof, 
concur  that  a  convention  is  necessary  to  revise,  alter  or  amend  the 
constitution,  the  question  shall  be  submitted  to  the  electors  at  the 
next  general  election.  If  a  majority  voting  at  the  election  vote 
for  a  convention,  the  general  assembly  shall,  at  the  next  session, 
provide  for  a  convention,  to  consist  of  double  the  number  of  mem 
bers  of  the  senate,  to  be  elected  in  the  same  manner,  at  the  same 
places,  and  in  the  same  districts.  The  general  assembly  shall, 
in  the  act  calling  the  convention,  designate  the  day,  hour  and 
place  of  its  meeting,  fix  the  pay  of  its  members  and  officers,  and 
provide  for  the  payment  of  the  same,  together  with  expenses 
necessarily  incurred  by  the  convention  in  the  performance  of  its 
duties.  Before  proceeding,  the  members  shall  take  an  oath  to 
support  the  constitution  of  the  United  States,  and  of  the  state  of 
Illinios,  and  to  faithfully  discharge  their  duties  as  members  of  the 
convention.  The  qualification  of  member  shall  be  the  same  as 
that  of  members  of  the  senate,  and  vacancies  occurring  shall  be 


ILLINOIS.  441 

filled  in  the  manner  provided  for  filling  vacancies  in  the  general 
assembly.  Said  convention  shall  meet  within  three  months  after 
such  election,  and  prepare  such  revision,  alteration  or  amendments 
of  the  constitution  as  shall  be  deemed  necessary,  which  shall  be 
submitted  to  the  electors  for  their  ratification  or  rejection,  at  an 
election  appointed  by  the  convention  for  that  purpose,  not  less  than 
two  nor  more  than  six  months  after  the  adjournment  thereof; 
and  unless  so  submitted  and  approved  by  a  majority  of  the  electors 
voting  at  the  election,  no  such  revision,  alterations  and  amend 
ments  shall  take  effect. 

§  2.  Amendments  to  this  constitution  may  be  proposed  in 
either  house  of  the  general  assembly,  and  if  the  same  shall  be  voted 
for  by  two-thirds  of  all  the  members  elected  to  each  of  the  two 
houses,  such  proposed  amendments,  together  with  the  yeas  and 
nays  of  each  house  thereon,  shall  be  entered  in  full  on  their  respec 
tive  journals ;  and  said  amendments  shall  be  submitted  to  the 
electors  of  this  state  for  adoption  or  rejection,  at  the  next  election 
of  members  of  the  general  assembly,  in  such  manner  as  may  be 
prescribed  by  law.  The  proposed  amendments  shall  be  published 
in  full  at  least  three  months  preceding  the  election,  and  if  a 
majority  of  the  electors  voting  at  said  election  shall  vote  for  the 
proposed  amendments,  they  shall  become  a  part  of  this  constitution. 
But  the  general  assembly  shall  have  no  power  to  propose  amend 
ments  to  more  than  one  article  of  this  constitution  at  the  same 
session,  nor  to  the  same  article  oftener  than  once  in  four  years. 

SEPARATE   SECTIONS. 

MUNICIPAL   SUBSCRIPTIONS   TO    RAILROADS   OR    PRIVATE 
CORPORATIONS. 

No  county,  city,  town,  township  or  other  municipality,  shall 
ever  become  subscriber  to  the  capital  stock  of  any  railroad  or 
private  corporation,  or  make  donation  to  or  loan  its  credit  in  aid 
of  such  corporation  :  Provided,  however,  that  the  adoption  of  this 
article  shall  not  be  construed  as  affecting  the  right  of  any  such 
municipality  to  make  such  subscriptions  where  the  same  have 
been  authorised,  under  existing  laws,  by  a  vote  of  the  people  of 
such  municipalities  prior  to  such  adoption. 

THE    END. 


LONDON  :    PRINTED    BY 

SPOTTISTVOODE    AND    CO.,    NEW-STREET    SQUARE 
AXD    PARLIAMENT    STREET 


\ 


V 


May,    1879. 


CHATTO     &    WINDUS'S 


Ht'at  of 


4iV 


ON  BOOKS  AND  BOOK-BUYERS. 


BY    JOHN    RUSKIN. 

"/  say  we  have  despised  literature  ;  what  do  we,  as  a  nation,  care 
about  books?  Hoiv  much  do  you  think  we  spend  altogether  on  our 
libraries,  public  or  private,  as  compared  with  what  we  spend  on  our 
horses  ?  If  a  man  spends  lavishly  on  his  library,  you  call  him  mad 
— a  bibliomaniac.  But  yoti  never  call  one  a  horse-maniac,  though  men 
ruin  themselves  every  day  by  their  horses,  and  you  do  not  hear  of  people 
ruining  themselves  by  their  books.  Or,  to  go  lower  still,  how  much  do 
you  think  the  contents  of  the  book-shelves  of  the  United  Kingdom,  public 
and  private,  would  fetch,  as  compared  with  the  contents  of  its  wine- 
cellars  ?  What  position  would  its  expenditure  on  literature  take  as  com 
pared  with  its  expenditure  on  luxurious  eating?  We  talk  of  food  for 
the  mind,  as  of  food  for  the  body :  now,  a  good  book  contains  such  food 
inexhaustible :  it  is  provision  for  life,  and  for  the  best  part  of  us  ;  yet 
how  long  most  people  would  look  at  the  best  book  before  they  would  give 
the  price  of  a  large  turbot  for  it!  Though  there  have  been  men  who 
have  pinched  their  stomachs  and  bared  their  backs  to  buy  a  book,  whose 
libraries  were  cheaper  to  them,  I  think,  in  the  end,  than  most  men's 
dinners  are.  We  are  few  of  us  put  to  such  a  trial,  and  more  the  pity  ; 
for,  indeed,  a  precious  thing  is  all  the  more  precious  to  us  if  it  has  been 
won  by  work  or  economy  ;  and  if  public  libraries  were  half  as  costly  as 
public  dinners,  or  books  cost  the  tenth  part  of  what  bracelets  do,  evtn 
foolish  men  and  women  might  sometimes  suspect  there  was  good  in  read 
ing  as  well  as  in  munching  and  sparkling  ;  whereas  the  very  cheapness 
of  literature  is  making  even  wiser  people  forget  that  if  a  book  is  worth 
reading  it  is  worth  buying." — SESAME  AND  LILIES  ;  OR,  KING'S 
TREASURES. 


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derful  shillingsworths — the  best  aids  to  memory,  for  the  collections  they  relate  to, 
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Institute  of  the  Fine  Arts,  1878.     Containing  95  Illustrations, 
chiefly  from  Drawings  by  the  Artists,      is. 

The  Walker  Art  Gallery  Notes,  Liverpool,  1878. 

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CHATTO  &  WINDUS,  PICCADILLY. 


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Part  /.  Dcmonolatry.  II-  The  Demon.  III.  The  Dragon.  IV.  The  Devil. 
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CHATTO  &  WIND  US,  PICCADILLY.  11 

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the  most  cheerful  of  men — will  understand  what  we  mean  ;  and  those  who  do  not 
-must  take  it  on  trust  from  us  that  this  is  a  remarkably  entertaining  volume.'* — 
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12 


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my  '  Elements  of  Drawing,'  were  unrivalled  in  masterfulness  of  touch  since  Rem 
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LOVE  STORIES  by  the  Author  of  "  That  Lass  o'  Loivrie's." 
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Lowrie's." 

AUTHOR'S  NOTE.— These  love  stories  ("  Pretty  Polly  Pemberton,'"  "Kathleen 
Mavourneen"  "Lindsay's  Luck  ")  were  written  for  and  printed  in  Peterson  s 
Ladies'  Magazine"  Owing  to  the  fact  that  this  magazine  was  not  copyrighted, 
a  number  of  them  have  been  issued  in  book-form  without  my  consent,  and  repre 
senting  the  sketches  to  be  my  latest  work.  If  these  youthful  stories  are  to  be  read 
in  book-form,  it  is  my  desire  that  my  friends  should  see  the  present  editian ,  which 
I  have  revised  for  the  purpose,  and  which  is  brought  out  by  my  own  publishers.— 
FRANCES  HODGSON  BURNETT. 

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forget-me; flying  away  back  into  fairy-land.  A  more  Perfectly  aream-like  im 
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but  wearisome.  .  .  .  The  book,  as  a  whole,  is  the  most  important  addition 
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are  tokens  of  fine  fancy  and  delicate  literary  perception,  as  well  as  descriptive 

touches  here  and  there  worthy  of  Charles  Kingsley We  can  only  end 

as  we  began,  by  heartily  recommending  this  book,  full  as  it  is  of  knowledge  and 
the  results  of  independent  research,  and  all  communicated  with  a  glow  of  enthu 
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ful" — NONCONFORMIST  . 


CHAT  TO  &   WIND  US,  PICCADILLY.  21 

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hard  against  the  better  cause  just  now  that  one  feels  specially  impelled  tooffcr 
one's  thanks  to  those  who  stand  firm,  particularly  when  they  state  our  case  so 
admirably  as  you  have." — GOLDWIN  SMITH. 

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"  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Macquoid  have  been  strolling  in  Normandy  and  Brittany, 
and  the  result  of  their  observations  and  researches  in  that  picturesque  land  of 
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these  characters.  .  .  .  The  wanderings  of  the  tourists,  their  sojournings  in  old 
inns,  their  explorations  of  ancient  towns,  and  loiterings  by  rivers  and  other  plea 
sant  spots,  are  all  related  in  a  fresh  and  lively  style.  .  .  .  The  illustrations, 
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CtlATTO  &  WIND  US,  PICCADILLY.  23 

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„    -,,   TT   ,,  WILLIAM  SENIOR. 

gtma.     By  W.  H.  MALLOCK. 

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"  Hitherto  Thomas  Moore  has  been  mostly  regarded  as  one  of  the  lighter  writers 
merely — a  sentimental  poet  par  excellence,  in  whom  the  '  rapture  of  love  and  of 
"wine  '  determined  him  strictly  to  certain  modes  of  sympathy  and  of  utterance,  and 
these  to  a  large  extent  of  a  slightly  artificial  character.  This  volume  will  serve  to 
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CHATTO  <5r*  WIND  US,  PICCADILLY. 


Muses  o 


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jair : 

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Ariadne.  By  OUIDA. 

Friendship.  By  OUIDA. 


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and  ALFRED  CONCANEN. 
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andj.  MAHONEY. 
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MY  MISCELLANIES.     By  WILKIE  COLLINS.     With  Steel  Por 

trait,  and  Illustrations  by  A.  CONCANEN. 
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Du  MAURIER  and  F.  A.  FRASER. 
MAN  AND  WIFE.    By  WILKIE  COLLINS.  Illustrated  by  WILLIAM 

SMALL. 
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Du  MAURIER  and  EDWARD  HUGHES. 
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FILDES  and  HENRY  WOODS. 
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Du  MAURIER  and  J.  MAHONEY. 
THE  LAW  AND  THE  LADY.      By  WILKIE  COLLINS.      Illus 

trated  by  S.  L.  FILDES  and  SYDNEY  HALL. 
THE  TWO  DESTINIES.     By  WILKIE  COLLINS. 
THE  HAUNTED  HOTEL.     By  WILKIE  COLLINS.     Illustrated  by 

ARTHUR  HOPKINS. 
DECEIVERS  EVER.     By  Mrs.  H.  LOVETT  CAMERON. 


CHATTO  S"   WINDUS,  PICCADILLY.  27 

THE  PICCADILLY  NOVELS— continued. 

JULIET'S  GUARDIAN.     By  Mrs.  H.  LOVETT  CAMERON.     Illus 
trated  by  VALENTINE  BROMLEY. 

FELICIA.      By  M.   BETHAM-EDWARDS.     With  a  Frontispiece  by 
W.  BOWLES. 

"A  noble  novel.  Its  teaching  is  elevated,  its  story  is  sympathetic,  and  the  kind 
of  feeling  its  perusal  leaves  behind  is  that  more  ordinarily  derived  from  music  or 
poetry  than  from  prose  fiction.  Few  works  in  -modern  fiction  stand  as  high  in  our 
estimation  as  this." — SUNDAY  TIMES. 

OLYMPIA.     By  R.  E.  FRANCILLON. 

UNDER  THE  GREENWOOD  TREE.     By  THOMAS  HARDY. 

FATED  TO  BE  FREE.     By  JEAN  INGELOW. 

THE  QUEEN  OF  CONNAUGHT.     By  HARRIETT  JAY. 

THE  DARK  COLLEEN.     By  HARRIETT  JAY. 

"A  novel  which  possesses  the  rare  and  valuable  quality  of  novelty.  .  .  .  The 
scenery  will  be  strange  to  most  readers,  and  in  manv  passages  the  aspects  of  Nature 
are  very  cleverly  described.  Moreover,  the  book  is  a  study  of  a  very  curious  and 
interesting-  state  of  society.  A  novel  which  no  novel-reader  should  miss,  and  which 
people  who  generally  shun  novels  may  enjoy.'' — SATURDAY  REVIEW. 

THE  WORLD  WELL  LOST.     By  E.  LYNN  LINTON.     Illustrated 

by  J.  LAWSON  and  HENRY  FRENCH. 
THE    ATONEMENT    OF   LEAM    DUNDAS.       By   E.    LYNN 

LINTON.    With  a  Frontispiece  by  HENRY  WOODS. 

PATRICIA  KSMBALL.     By  E.  LYNN  LINTON.      With  a  Frontis 
piece  by  G.  Du  MAURIER. 
"  Displays  genuine  humour,  as  well  as  keen  social  obseT!<ation.     Enough  graphic 

portraiture  and  witty  observation  to  ftirnish  materials  for  half  a  dozen  novels  of 

the  ordinary  kind." — SATURDAY  REVIEW. 

THE  WATERDALE  NEIGHBOURS.     By  JUSTIN  MCCARTHY. 

MY  ENEMY'S  DAUGHTER,     By  JUSTIN  MCCARTHY. 

LINLEY  ROCHFORD.     By  JUSTIN  MCCARTHY. 

A  FAIR  SAXON.     By  JUSTIN  MCCARTHY. 

DEAR  LADY  DISDAIN.     By  JUSTIN  MCCARTHY. 

MISS  MISANTHROPE.     By  JUSTIN  MCCARTHY.     Illustrated  by 

ARTHUR  HOPKINS. 
THE  EVIL  EYE,  and  other  Stories.      By  KATHARINE  S.  MAC- 

QUOID.    Illustrated  by  THOMAS  R.  MACQUOID  and  PERCY  MACQUOID. 
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mendation  is  merited  by  the  illustrations." — ACADEMY. 

NUMBER  SEVENTEEN.     By  HENRY  KINGSLEY. 
OAKSHOTT  CASTLE.     By  HENRY  KINGSLEY.     With  a  Frontis 
piece  by  SHIRLEY  HODSON. 

"A  brisk  and  clear  north  wind  of  sentiment — sentiment  that  braces  instead  of 
enervating— blows  through  all  his  works,  and  makes  all  their  readers  at  once 
healthier  and  more  glad." — SPECTATOR. 


28  BOOKS  PUBLISHED  BY 

THE  PICCADILLY  NOVELS — continued. 

OPEN  !    SESAME  !      By  FLORENCE   MARRY  AT.      Illustrated  by 
F.  A.  ERASER. 

"  A.  story  which  arouses  and  sustains  the  reader's  interest  to  a  higher  degree 
than,  perhaps,  any  of  its  author's  former  works." — GRAPHIC. 

WHITELADIES.     By  Mrs.  OLIPHANT.     With  Illustrations  by  A. 

HOPKINS  and  H.  WOODS. 
"  A  pleasant  and  readable  book,  written  with  practical  ease  and  grace." — TIMES. 

THE  BEST  OF  HUSBANDS.     By  JAMES  PAYN.     Illustrated  by 

J.  MOYR  SMITH. 

FALLEN  FORTUNES.     By  JAMES  PAYN. 

HALVES.    By  JAMES  PAYN.    With  a  Frontispiece  by  J.  MAHONEY. 
WALTER'S  WORD.     By  JAMES  PAYN.     Illustrated  by  J.  MOYR 

SMITH. 

WHAT  HE  COST  HER.     By  JAMES  PAYN. 
LESS  BLACK  THAN  WE'RE  PAINTED.     By  JAMES  PAYN. 
BY  PROXY.     By  JAMES  PAYN.    Illustrated  by  ARTHUR  HOPKINS. 

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HER  MOTHER'S  DARLING-.     By  Mrs.  J.  H.  RIDDELL. 

THE  WAY  WE  LIVE  NOW.     By  ANTHONY  TROLLOPS.     With 

Illustrations. 
THE  AMERICAN  SENATOR.     By  ANTHONY  TROLLOPE. 

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fidelity  itself  in  expressing  English  life,  is  never  guilty  of  caricature."— 
FORTNIGHTLY  REVIEW. 

DIAMOND  CUT  DIAMOND.     By  T.  A.  TROLLOPE. 

11  Full  of  life,  of  interest,  of  close  observation,  and  sympathy.  .  .  .  When 
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DAY  REVIEW. 

BOUND  TO  THE  WHEEL.     By  JOHN  SAUNUERS. 
GUY  WATERMAN.     By  JOHN  SAUNDERS. 
ONE  AGAINST  THE  WORLD.     By  JOHN  SAUNDERS. 
THE  LION  IN  THE  PATH.     By  JOHN  SAUNDERS. 

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its  details  with  elaborate  conscientiousness,  and  the  result  is  a  very  vivid  picture 
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BY  CELIA'S  ARBOUR.     By  W.  BESANT  and  JAMES  RICE. 
READY-MONEY  MORTIBOY.    By  W.  BESANT  and  JAMES  RICE. 


CHATTO  &  WINDUS,  PICCADILLY.  29 

THE  PICCADILLY  NOVELS — continued. 

MY  LITTLE  GIRL.     By  W.  BESANT  and  JAMES  RICE. 
THE  CASE  OF  MR.  LUCRAPT.  By  W.  BESANT  and  JAMES  RICE. 
THIS  SON  OF  VULCAN.     By  W.  BESANT  and  JAMES  RICE. 
WITH  HARP  AND  CROWN.     By  W.  BESANT  and  JAMES  RICE. 
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tiboy."  COLLINS. 


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POPULAR  NOVELS— CHEAP  EDITIONS— continued. 


The    Queen    of   Hearts.      By 

WILKIE  COLLINS. 
My  Miscellanies.     By  WILKIE 

COLLINS. 
The  Moonstone.     By  WILKIE 

COLLINS. 
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COLLINS. 
Poor  Miss  Finch.     By  WILKIE 

COLLINS. 
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COLLINS. 
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COLLINS. 
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WILKIE  COLLINS. 
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COLLINS. 

Roxy.  By  EDWARD  EGGLESTON. 
Felicia.      By  M.   BETHAM-ED- 

WARDS. 
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FONBLANQUE. 

Olympia.  By  R.  E.  FRANCILLON. 

Dick  Temple.  By  JAMES 
GREENWOOD. 

Under  the  Greenwood  Tree. 
By  THOMAS  HARDY. 

An  Heiress  of  Red  Dog.  By 
BRET  HARTE. 

Fated  to  be  Free.  By  JEAN 
INGELOW. 

The  Queen  of  Connaught.  By 
HARRIETT  JAY. 

The  Dark  Colleen.  By  HAR 
RIETT  JAY. 

Number  Seventeen.  By  HENRY 

KlNGSLEY. 

Oakshott  Castle.    By  HENRY 

KlNGSLEY. 

The  Waterdale  Neighbours. 
By  JUSTIN  MCCARTHY. 


My   Enemy's  Daughter.       By 

JUSTIN  MCCARTHY. 
Linley  Rochford.     By  JUSTIN 

MCCARTHY. 
A   Fair    Saxon.       By   JUSTIN 

MCCARTHY. 
Dear  Lady  Disdain.  By  JUSTIN 

MCCARTHY. 
The  Evil  Eye.     By  KATHARINE 

S.  MACQUOID. 
Open!  Sesame!    By  FLORENCE 

MARRYAT. 

Whiteladies.  By  Mrs.  OLI- 
PHANT. 

The  Best  of  Husbands.      By 

JAMES  PAYN. 

Walter's  Word.     By  J.  PAYN. 
The  Mystery  of  Marie  Roget- 

By  EDGAR  A.  POE. 
Her  Mother's  Darling.  By  Mrs. 

J.  H.  RIDDELL. 
Gaslight    and  Daylight.       By 

GEORGE  AUGUSTUS  SALA. 
Bound  to  the  Wheel.    By  JOHN 

SAUNDERS. 
Guy  Waterman.  J.  SAUNDERS. 

One   Against  the  World.     By 

JOHN  SAUNDERS. 
The  Lion  in  the  Path.  By  JOHN 

and  KATHERINE  SAUNDERS. 
Tales  for    the  Marines.      By 

WALTER  THORNBURY. 
The  Way  we  Live  Now.      By 

ANTHONY  TROLLOPE. 
The  American   Senator.       By 

ANTHONY  TROLLOPE. 
Diamond  Cut  Diamond.      By 

T.  A.  TROLLOPE. 

An  Idle  Excursion.  By  MARK 
TWAIN. 

The  Adventures  of  Tom  Saw 
yer.  By  MARK  TWAIN. 

A  Pleasure  Trip  on  the  Conti 
nent  of  Europe.  By  M.  TWAIN. 


CHATTO  &-  WINDVS,  PICCADILLY.  31 

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33 


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