Part 4

Along the coast lay the great rice-plantations, containing thousands of acres and worked by hundreds of slaves; their proprietors constituting the landed aristocracy of the State. In the interior, the plantations were smaller, there were fewer slaves, and their owners were “farmers” rather than “planters,” devoting themselves to the cultivation of a variety of crops instead of confining their efforts to the exclusive production of a single staple.

Thus in a very important particular South Carolina differed from both Virginia and Georgia—the two members of the State-sisterhood which in many respects she most closely resembled: for in Georgia the sea-board bore so small a proportion to the interior that the influence of the coast-dwellers could not be a very appreciable factor in the general equation. And in Virginia, a difference of climate produced a corresponding difference in the mode of life of the country gentry—Virginia planters for the most part making their homes on their plantations the year round, whereas Carolina planters were compelled by considerations of health to abandon their plantations during the summer months. Though some went no farther than to settlements among the pine woods or along the seashore near at hand, the great majority either spent their summers in Charleston—the center of South Carolina refinement and cultivation—or traveled abroad into the great outside world, thereby rubbing off their rusticity and keeping themselves in touch with passing events and current interests. Necessarily, the combined advantages of wealth, education and travel produced in the coast-folk a polish of manner and a breadth of mind not possessed by the dwellers of the interior of the State who, year in and year out, vegetated contentedly on their native soil.

The difference between the denizens of the two sections was inevitable. The trouble was that, instead of regarding their superior advantages as entailing upon them corresponding duties towards their less favored neighbors, the people of the sea-board arrogated to themselves the position of critics, and looked down with scarcely veiled condescension and contempt upon their rustic brethren of the interior; by whom, it is unnecessary to say, this attitude was deeply resented.

But having meted out the blame that of right belonged to the “low-country” in this matter, justice demands the statement that—as in all family disputes—the provocation was by no means entirely on one side. Except in the matter of politics, the coast had little in common with the interior. As a class, the people of the “up-country” were ignorant and unpolished. Their lack of breeding disgusted, their want of cultivation repelled, their marvelous thrift and instinct for money-getting absolutely bewildered the low-country intelligence. And when brought together the people of the coast recoiled with the feeling that they were in contact with an alien race.

Both sections were in fault and both paid the penalty. The development of the interior was greatly retarded by its obstinate antagonism to all that savored of the more advanced civilization of the coast; and the coast suffered in its turn, by frequently finding itself in a weak minority as regarded measures of sectional advantage. Each faction of the State Legislature was determined to consult solely its own interests whenever these appeared to conflict.

Such was the condition of affairs up to the period of the Civil War. At its close, a new era dawned in the life of South Carolina. Previous conditions were now reversed. The sea-board—formerly the garden spot of the State—was left depopulated, beggared, ruined; while the interior had escaped from the terrible ordeal almost unscathed.

It was also evident that in recuperative power, there could be no comparison between the two sections; the conditions which had formerly operated adversely to the progress of the interior now conducing to its development.

First, and chief of its advantages, were to be reckoned climatic conditions permitting of white agricultural labor.

Secondly, the greatly lessened disparity in numbers between whites and blacks in its population.

Thirdly, a hardier and more homely mode of life, which enabled its people to adapt themselves with greater readiness to the new order of things.

Fourthly, the varied character of its industries; and

Lastly, a staple (cotton) naturally suggestive of manufacturing enterprise.

When these combined advantages are taken into account, and the section possessing them compared with the coast, whose sole source of revenue lay in the fertile, but miasma-laden rice fields, for the cultivation of which negro labor was an absolute necessity, it is seen at once how completely “old things had passed away!”

The mere reversal of former conditions, however, was certainly not calculated in itself to heal the sectional breach. But, fortunately, ameliorating agencies were at work—the gradual spread of education—increasing intercourse between the sections, the result of improved facilities of travel, and also of business enterprises in which both were interested. And far above and beyond all else in mollifying power, the four years of fellowship in suffering for a common cause, which linked the erstwhile jarring sections together in a closer brotherhood than would probably have been brought about by generations of peace and prosperity.

The frightful race-problems with which South Carolina found herself confronted at the close of the Civil War, and the grim burlesque of government which followed, known as the “Reconstruction” period, during which chaos and crime ran riot in the land, served to weld still more firmly the new made bond. And when in 1876, after years of almost superhuman patience under provocation, the people of South Carolina decided that endurance had ceased to be a virtue, and rose in their righteous indignation; and in the face of overwhelming odds, by one supreme effort the State righted herself, “low-country” and “up-country” rejoiced together in true fraternal spirit.

Since that time the bond has continued to strengthen. And instead of being as of old, “a house divided against itself,” the State of South Carolina is gradually becoming one harmonious and homogeneous whole.

SOCIAL CONDITIONS

In the peculiar internal State-relations which we have been considering, South Carolina was unique. But in the social and domestic conditions now to be described, she was a true type and representative of the other Southern States.

It is an accepted truth that in all lands economic conditions determine social relations. In the South, the stability of the former insured a corresponding stability in the latter. To borrow a figure from geology, there were no “faults” in the stratification of Southern society. Each stratum rested secure and well-defined upon the one beneath it, with none of the perplexing sudden “dips” and “out croppings,” common in other parts of America. In that land of belated nineteenth century chivalry and feudalism, the long-exploded axiom that it took “three generations to make a gentleman” still held sway as the law governing social usage. As is the case with all laws, however, there were exceptions to this one. Men of force of character and intellectual gifts stepped over class barriers at one stride, and took their place at once in the very fore front of the social ranks.

Divisions and subdivisions of society existed, but into these intricate complexities it is not necessary to enter here. Enough to say that the “upper-crust” was composed exclusively of the landed proprietors and professional men. Of trade, this class had a holy horror, although they recognized “degrees” in infamy; holding with Cicero that, while the “retail” trader was to be regarded as “unmitigatedly base,” the “wholesale” trader might be accounted “mitigatedly” so.

Next to this topmost layer came the factors. The factor combined in his own person the functions of banker, commission merchant, and general factotum. He sold the planter’s crop, invested his proceeds, negotiated his loans, and advanced him money when required. Socially, the factor was the connecting link between the mercantile class and the landed gentry, to whom, indeed, he was often closely allied by blood. For it was the Southern custom to pass into a counting-house and thereby convert into “factors,” such planters’ sons as were considered incapable of receiving a classical or professional education, and showed no special aptitude for any particular calling.

Below the factor class were innumerable gradations gradually descending until, at the bottom of the social scale, were to be found the poor whites, or “crackers,” as they were contempteously termed. Of this element nothing need be said, as its influence was _nil_; the Old South being practically composed of but two classes—its aristocracy and its negroes.

In those old days the tone of public morals was pure and high. As a rule, a Southern gentleman’s word was as good as his bond; for any imputation on his honor he regarded as a disgrace, and disgrace was the one thing he dared not face. To these people wealth was not the be-all and the end-all of existence. Not that they underrated its importance or despised its advantages, but their whole manner of life was a protest against making wealth the standard by which to gauge the sum of human achievement, affixing, as it were, a money value to all things in the heavens above and in the earth beneath.

Again, they were—not obstructionists indeed—but strong conservatives; holding that change is not necessarily synonymous with improvement, but that it sometimes means retrogression rather than advance. And holding this creed, they were not carried away by every vagary which presented itself, whether masquerading in the guise of social panacea or political hocus-pocus.

The conditions of Southern life naturally tended to produce and foster individuality, and perhaps the most marked trait in Southern character was an almost fierce independence and a hot resentment of any semblance of control. The Southerner was quick tempered and somewhat over hasty in taking offence at fancied slights. But there was nothing vindictive or malevolent in his nature, and, his outburst of temper over, if cool reflection showed him to have been in the wrong, he did not hesitate frankly to acknowledge himself in fault, and make ample apology for his mistaken judgment and hot words. As a class, Southerners undoubtedly held a very good opinion of themselves; and sometimes, where mental ballast was lacking, this comfortable consciousness of being at quits with the world went to the head, and effervesced in silly superciliousness and irritating condescension. But for the most part, the people bore themselves with irreproachable courtesy and the quiet dignity which springs from self-respect. As a race they were a brave, fearless people, truthful, honest, and generous to a fault.

Besides this common heritage however, the folk of the Carolina coast possessed certain endowments peculiarly their own—a finished grace of manner, a keen sense of humor, and a power of quick repartee—their birthright by virtue of descent from a Huguenot ancestry. This French element was in truth, a very appreciable quantity in the Carolina equation, exercising considerable formative influence on character as well as manners. Unlike the French settlers in other parts of the United States, the Carolina Huguenots, notwithstanding the inhospitable reception given them on their arrival in the colony, held their own manfully in their adopted country; and soon established such friendly relations with their English neighbors, that in the course of a generation or so, by intermarriage with these, they had ceased to be a distinctive class of the population, and were only to be traced by their French names, which they had bestowed upon half the families in the lower section of the State.

One trait remains to be mentioned—a trait common to the entire South. I allude to the ardent patriotism and intense State-love of the people. This is proved by the records of the Civil War, which show how gladly substance and life were both devoted to the service of their beloved country. Even now, a thrill runs through one, at the recollection of the heroic self-sacrifice and whole-hearted devotion of the united Southern people to their “Lost Cause.”

CHARLESTON, S. C. H. E. BELIN

(_Conclusion next month._)

INDIAN AGRICULTURE IN SOUTHERN WISCONSIN

Early writers and travellers were lamentably negligent in recording many phases of Indian life which it would be desirable to know, especially those related to the economic activities of these primitive people. An undue amount of “historical divination” is required in arriving at satisfactory or even plausible conclusions concerning some of these matters. The real influence which aboriginal agriculture exercised upon the exploration, settlement, and development of the Western lands, is well worth our study. The new comer often received therefrom suggestions as to what crops would most likely flourish on the various soils and in the different rain-belts; not to mention the direct effect upon lines of supplies bought or stolen from the retreating tribes—these are interesting questions, but we must not expect much specific information concerning them. The methods of hunting and fighting; of making weapons, utensils, and implements; of dancing, singing, wooing, are all told by early chroniclers with painstaking minuteness and detail, but the products of the soil are noticed by them only in parenthetical phrases or general observations. There is hardly a line yet found, relating to the agricultural tools used, or the sort of ground chosen for fields—absolutely nothing as to yield, and next to nothing concerning the importance of these crops to the Indians themselves.

For a long time the Sauk and Foxes had their principal villages near the Wisconsin River, at the east end of Sauk Prairie, just opposite the northwest corner of Dane County. These Indians were somewhat above the average of the tribes of this region in civilization; they lived in more compact and larger settlements, hence naturally depended more on their corn-fields than did their more nomadic neighbors to the west. Their corn was planted along the edge of the woods which fringe the Wisconsin, and this belt is choice corn-land to-day. Some small parts of it have been kept in grass from the time of the earlier white settlement, and in those places old Indian corn-hills may still be seen, the sod holding them in shape. The Indian cultivated the growing corn by hoeing toward the hill; and as this became the mellowest spot, the corn was planted each succeeding year in the same little mound, which grew to be a foot or more in height.

“There was a large settlement of Sauk at the lower end of Sauk Prairie. I have often examined the remains of their tillage there, and should suppose they raised corn in one lot of at least four hundred acres * * * the four hundred acres is covered with well formed, regular corn-hills.”[4] Just what this writer means by “regular” is not quite clear—probably that the hills were of uniform size, and approximately the same distance apart, for it does not appear that the Indians often planted corn in rows, there being, with their mode of culture, very little occasion for such methods.[5] The Indians of northern Michigan at the present day generally care for their corn much as did their ancestors of a century ago; and the few who attempt its cultivation with a horse cultivator do not take the precaution to plant the corn in rows, but run here and there wherever there happens to be sufficient room between the hills.

Whether or not the Wisconsin Indians, like those of Ohio or New England, girdled trees so as to rid the land of them, and leave it in a suitable condition for cultivation by their rude and ineffective tools, is not stated; but the probability is that little of such work was necessary.[6] The field at Sauk Prairie just mentioned, lay along the border of the woodland; and as the prairie was burned off nearly every year, it is reasonable to suppose that the fire crept into the woods for a greater or less distance, killing the trees and leaving a considerable belt neither distinctively prairie nor woods. Naturally this would become overgrown with weeds and saplings, which could be much more easily eradicated than the heavy growth of trees or grass. The prairie sod was altogether too tough to be subdued by the Indians, and nowhere do we find them tilling any considerable area of genuine prairie soil.

There are one or two direct references to Indian fields within Dane County. While stationed at Fort Crawford, Jefferson Davis visited this section and left in his journal some remarks pertinent to our subject: “While on detached service in the summer of 1829, I think I encamped one night about the site of Madison. The nearest Indian village was on the opposite side of the lake. * * * The Indians subsisted largely on Indian corn and wild rice.”[7] Probably he referred to the place now known as Winnequah, on the eastern shore of Lake Monona, where a few Indian corn-hills are still discernable. The nature of the land here at the time of the Indian occupancy, cannot now be estimated with the same accuracy as in the case of the Sauk district. It is not on the edge of a prairie; but from the condition of the present woods about Winnequah, and the sandy nature of the soil, it is altogether likely that there were sufficient open spots for all the corn-fields which the small villages of Indians would be likely to cultivate.

Capt. Jonathan Carver, who made a trip through the northwest in 1766, in speaking of the Winnebago Indians remarks: “The land adjacent to the lake [Winnebago] is very fertile, abounding with grapes, plums, and other fruits, which grow spontaneously. The Winnebagoes raise on it a great quantity of Indian corn, beans, pumpkins, squashes, and watermelons, with some tobacco.”[8] Carver also gives an interesting description of the kind of corn grown by the Indians. We should infer from what little he says that it is very similar, although not identical, with the corn raised by the New England Indians in the seventeenth century: “One spike generally consists of about six hundred grains which are placed closely together in rows to the number of eight or ten, and sometimes twelve.”[9] He does not tell us whether or not it is dented; but since he finds it maturing as far north as Lake Winnebago, and especially as the ears are long and slender, it is safe to infer that it was the hard flint variety known as “Yankee corn.” In case the four hundred acres near Sauk Prairie produced such remarkably large ears—averaging, we should judge, at least a foot in length, the aggregate yield must have been very great. Reasoning from this, it is easy to believe the various reports of discoveries of fifty thousand bushels of corn in _cache_ by armies in the Ohio Valley, and to the southward. However, the element of uncertainty is by no means a negligible quantity, and the reader must draw his own conclusions as to the probable amount of farm produce raised by the Wisconsin Indian.

For the most part, the practices and methods of these Indians resembled those of the tribes farther east. The Sauk and Foxes were scattered up and down the Wisconsin and Fox rivers; wherever found, they depended for a living, in part, on the cultivated product of the soil.[10] In raising a crop of corn, or other field products, the Indians had many difficulties with which to contend, even more perplexing than those connected with subduing the native soil. Perhaps the depredations of blackbirds and crows were the worst; for as soon as other food began to fail them in the fall, they pounced upon the corn, usually when it was about in the milk or “roasting ear,” and wrought sad havoc. The Indians were always inordinately fond of the tender, green corn, and this fact, together with the danger of loss by birds or frost from leaving it out until maturity, induced them to gather it early. They were familiar with the fact that corn may be cured while yet in the green state, and still be desirable food; this fact, as well as the method of storing, appears in the following quotation:[11] “I observed several women with bags on their heads and shoulders, appearing heavily laden, bent down and not raising their faces from the path they were upon. I never saw individuals contend more with a load that almost mastered them, than did some of these females. Following them a short distance to a place where they stopped, I found they were making a _cache_ of the ripe maize of the season. A sort of cave had been hollowed out in the side of the hill, about eight feet in diameter at the bottom, and not more than two or three at the top. To this _cache_ the women were bringing the corn, a distance of about three miles, and some very young girls were in the cave storing it away. * * * The ears of maize are gathered and cured whilst the corn is in the milk, and the bags when filled with it are laid in the cave upon layers of dry grass, one layer above another. When the cave is full, straw is put in and covered over with dry earth. They cure the corn in the milk, because the blackbirds are numerous enough to devour it all if it were left to ripen in the field.[12] From this it is seen that the agricultural methods of Wisconsin Indians were not different from those farther east and south—the women do the work; the corn is gathered before fully ripe, and put in _caches_ for safe keeping.

It would be hazardous to attempt any estimate of the quantity of corn raised, even by any one tribe. The Sauk and Foxes appear to have depended more on products of the soil than did their neighbors. The four hundred acres raised near where Sauk City now stands, is good evidence of a total product of no slight proportions, for these Indians had many other villages scattered along the line of the Fox and Wisconsin rivers. Speaking of these tribes as a whole, Worden remarks: “The Sacs and Foxes raise corn, beans and melons, and derive a great part of their subsistence from agriculture and gardening.”[13]

Indian improvidence is usually spoken of as though the red man had no regard whatever for the morrow; but Pike credits the Osage with the virtue of rigid economy in saving their corn and beans for seasons when the chase is likely to fail in supplying the larder.[14] The same author mentions the drying of pumpkins, for winter use, by the Indians of the plains. In the same strain Father Allouez, who visited the Western Indians in the early part of 1670, says of the Outagami: “These savages * * * are settled in an excellent country,—the soil, which is black there, yielding them Indian corn in abundance. They live by hunting during the winter returning to their cabins towards its close, and living there on Indian corn that they had hidden away the previous Autumn; they season it with fish.”[15] Again, in speaking of the Oumamis, [Miami], he mentions the fact that on the first of May they still had corn which they offered him to eat; and of the Potawatomi, that their land is “very good for Indian corn, of which they plant fields, and to which they very willingly retire to avoid the famines that are too common in these quarters.” These famines were usually the result of drouth which, by drying up the forage plants, drove the big game away to other sections,[16] leaving the poor Indians dependent on fish and the grain in stock—the latter being, unhappily, seldom or never found in quantities sufficient to tide over a famine of any consequence.[17]

A traveller in 1669 makes this record on his visit to Green Bay: “I found here only one village of different nations—Ousaki, Pouteouatami, Outagami, Orenibigoutz (i. e. Ouinipegouk)—about six hundred souls. * * * All these Nations have their fields of Indian corn, squashes, beans, and tobacco.”[18]