its commerce is chiefly with the other States. Population in BOOK 1790, 393,751, and in 1820, 638,829. Area 43,300 square LXXX. miles. Carolina. South Carolina exhibits the character peculiar to the South slave States, perhaps in a higher degree than any other section of the Union. The planters are the most opulent of their class, and it is only in this State that the slaves exceed the free inhabitants in number. To the distance of one hundred miles from the sea, the country is low, flat, sandy, and unhealthy. The rivers here are bordered with marshes, in which are produced large crops of rice. Above this, and reaching to the foot of the mountains, is a fertile country, beautifully diversified with hill and dale, and richly wooded. In addition to many of the fruits of the northern States, South Carolina produces oranges, limes, lemons, figs, and pomegranates. The low country is universally occupied by planters, who cultivate the ground by slaves; in the upper country the population consists chiefly of farmers, who work with their own hands. Cotton, the great staple of the State, is of three varieties. The black seed cotton is grown on the sea islands, and in the low country: it produces a fine white fleece, of a silky appearance, very strong, and of a long good staple. Green seed, or upland cotton, chiefly cultivated in the middle and upper country, produces a white fleece, good, but of shorter staple, and inferior to the other. It adheres so closely to the seed, that, till the invention of the cotton gin, by Mr. Whitney, it was not worth cleaning. That invention has been of incalculable benefit to the southern States. The Nankeen cotton, raised chiefly in the middle and upper country for family use, retains the Nankeen colour as long as it is worn. The cultivation of rice is necessarily limited to lands that admit of irrigation—to swamps on bays, creeks, and rivers overflowed by the tide, and to inland swamps with reservoirs of water. Inland plantations yield from 600 to 1500 pounds of clean rice per acre; tide plantations from 1200 to 1500, and the best as high as 2400 per acre. Rice is sown in the tide lands BOOK about 20th March, and in the inland swamps about the seLXXX. cond week of April. The land is previously turned up with the plough or hoe, and then drilled by the same instrument into trenches. In these the rice is sown from one to two bushels per acre. The tide planters then flow the fields with water, keeping it on from two to four days. This kills the worm and starts the grain, which appears five or six days afterwards. It is commonly hoed three times during its growth, and in the second hoeing the grass is picked up by the hand from the trenches, and the rice is then overflowed from ten to twenty days. As the water is gradually drawn off, the plants branch, and on the number of branches depends the size of the crop, each branch producing one ear of from 100 to 300 grains. Three months after sowing it begins to joint, blossom, and form the ear. It is then overflowed till harvest, which commences in the end of August near the sea, and in September is general through the State. The rice grounds, thus alternately wet and dry, infect the air with noxious exhalations, and spread bilious and intermitting fevers among the negroes who labour them, and the white settlers who live in their vicinity. A single plantation has often rendered a considerable town unhealthy. Rice was introduced into Carolina from Madagascar only in 1693. The Carolinians, says Dr. Ramsay, combine the love of liberty, hospitality, charity, and a sense of honour, with dissipation, indolence, and a disposition to contract debts. Hunting and dancing are favourite diversions, and music is cultivated with much diligence and success. The planters, who form the leading class, and have large incomes, live at their ease, are high minded, and possess much of that dignity of character which belongs to our independent country gentlemen. The farmers, who have few or no slaves, are active, industrious, and more simple in their manners. The women are generally well educated, and many of them possess refined manners, and cultivated minds. Their natural vivacity is tempered by sweetness of disposition and discretion. They are affectionate wives, daughters, and mo LXXX. thers; they enjoy prosperity without ostentation, and bear BOOK adversity with patience and dignity. "Indolence, ignorance, and dissipation," in the opinion of Mr. Hall," are leading traits in the character of the planters of the southern States." The manners of the lower classes are depraved and brutal; those of the upper, corrupted by power, are frequently arrogant and assuming. Unused to restraint or contradiction of any kind, they are necessarily quarrelsome; and in their quarrels the native ferocity of their hearts breaks out. Duelling is not only in general vogue and fashion, but is practised with circumstances of peculiar vindictiveness. "It is usual when two persons have agreed to fight, for each to go out regularly and practise at a mark, in the presence of their friends, during the interval which precedes their meeting: one of the parties therefore commonly falls." It may be added, that the roads, bridges, inns, and public conveyances, are worse in the southern than in the northern states; agriculture and the mechanic arts are in a more backward state; education and knowledge are less generally diffused, and the press is much less active; there is less inland trade, and less shipping in proportion to the population; less, in short, of intellectual activity, and of the spirit of enterprise and improvement. The exports of South Carolina exceed those of any one of the southern States, except Louisiana, which is properly the outlet of the whole western country. Cotton and rice are the leading articles, after which may be classed timber, pitch, tar, turpentine, beef, pork, indigo, and tobacco. Charleston, the principal town, contained 24,780 inhabitants in 1820; it is the most considerable port for trade between Baltimore and New Orleans. The population of South Carolina in 1790 was 240,073, including 107,094 slaves. In 1820 it was 502,741, including 258,475 slaves; so that the number of the latter has increased faster than that of the freemen. Area 50,080 square miles. As there is a great uniformity both in the physical circumstances of the southern States, and the character of the population, it will not be necessary to speak of the Georgia. BOOK others much in detail. Georgia, like the State last deLXXX. scribed, consists of two tracts of land, an alluvial plain towards the coast, covered with sands, intermixed with swamps; and a rolling upland country of good soil towards the mountains. The produce and exports are similar to those of South Carolina, and it has few manufactures, except of the domestic kind. The first settlement in this State was farmed in 1733 by colonists from Britain, who were sent out with a grant of money by Parliament. The population of Georgia in 1790, was 82,548, and in 1820, it had increased to 340,989, of whom 149,656 were slaves. (a) Area 58,200 square miles. Alabama. Alabama was raised to the rank of a State only in 1819. In soil, climate, and productions, it resembles South Carolina and Georgia; but it should be mentioned that, in the latter State, as well as in Alabama, the sugar cane is now cultivated to some extent. Cotton is the staple. The State has wisely made provision, in laying out the public lands, for the support of schools. Population in 1820, (b) 127,901, of whom 41,859 were slaves. Area 50,800 square miles. Mississippi. Mississippi was received into the Union, as an independent State, in 1817. The soil, produce, and climate, are similar to those of the preceding States. Cotton is the staple, and sugar is cultivated to some extent. The population was 75,448 in 1820, exclusive of Indians, of whom there are great number in the State. Area 43,350 square miles. Louisiana. Louisiana was the name originally given to the vast country west of the river Mississippi; but it is now restricted to a district at the mouth of this river, extending from the Mexican Gulf to the thirty-third parallel, and which was erected into a State in 1811. The southern section of this State includes the Delta of the Mississippi. The country about the mouths of the river for thirty (a) [Population of Georgia, in 1824, 392,899, of whom 170,618 were people of colour.]-AM. ED. (b) [The census of Alabama in 1820, as given above, was imperfect. It was completed the following year, and the amount of the population was raised to 144,317: and in 1824, the population was 197,000.]—AM. ED. miles is one continued swamp, destitute of trees, and co- BOOK LXXX. |