صور الصفحة
PDF
النشر الإلكتروني

continue; but that one race must be driven out by the other, or exterminated, or again enslaved. I have argued on the supposition that the emancipated negroes would be as efficient as other free laborers. But whatever theorists, who know nothing of the matter, may think proper to assume, we well know that this would not be so. We know that nothing but the coercion of slavery can overcome their propensity to indolence, and that not one in ten would be an efficient laborer. Even if this disposition were not grounded in their nature, it would be a result of their position. I have somewhere seen it observed, that to be degraded by opinion, is a thousand fold worse, so far as the feelings of the individual are concerned, than to be degraded by the laws. They would be thus degraded, and this feeling is incompatible with habits of order and industry. Half our population would at once be paupers. Let an inhabitant of New York or Philadelphia conceive of the situation of their respective States, if one half of their population consisted of free negroes. The tie which now connects them, being broken, the different races would be estranged from each other, and hostility would grow up between them. Having the command of their own time and actions, they could more effectually combine insurrection, and provide the means of rendering it formidable. Released from the vigilant superintendence which now restrains them, they would infallibly be led from petty to greater crimes, until all life and property would be rendered insecure. Aggression would beget retaliation, until open war-and that a war of extermination were established. From the still remaining superiority of the white race, it is probable that they would be the victors, and if they did not exterminate, they must again reduce the others to slavery-when they could be no longer fit to be either slaves or freemen. It is not only in self defence, in defence of our country and of all that is dear to us, but in defence of the slaves themselves, that we refuse to emancipate them.

obliterate the every memory of it. These will be resisted. The blacks will be tempted to avenge themselves by oppression and proscription of the white race, for their long superiority. Thus matters will go on, until universal anarchy, or kakistocracy, the government of the worst, is fully established. I am persuaded that if the spirit of evil should devise to send abroad upon the earth all possible misery, discord, horror and atrocity, he could contrive no scheme so effectual as the emancipation of negro slaves within our country.

The most feasible scheme of emancipation, and that which I verily believe would involve the least danger and sacrifice, would be that the entire white population should emigrate, and abandon the country to their slaves. Here would be triumph to philanthropy. This wide and fertile region would be again restored to ancient barbarism-to the worst of all barbarism-barbarism corrupted and depraved by intercourse with civilization. And this is the consummation to be wished, upon a speculation, that in some distant future age, they may become so enlightened and improved, as to be capable of sustaining a position among the civilized races of the earth. But I believe moralists allow men to defend their homes and their country, even at the expense of the lives and liberties of others.

Will any philanthropist say that the evils, of which I have spoken, would be brought about only by the obduracy, prejudices and overweaning self estimation of the whites in refusing to blend the races by marriage, and so create an homogeneous population. But what if it be not prejudice, but truth, and nature, and right reason, and just moral feeling? As I have before said, throughout the whole of nature, like attracts like, and that which is unlike repels. What is it that makes so unspeakably loathsome, crimes not to be named, and hardly alluded to? Even among the nations of Europe, so nearly homogeneous, there are some peculiarities of form and feature, mind and character, which may be generally distinguished by those accustomed to observe them. Though the exceptions are numerous, I will venture to say that not in one instance in a hundred, is the man of sound and unsophisticated tastes and propensities so likely to be attracted by the female of a foreign stock, as by one of his own, who is more nearly conformed to himself. Shakspeare spoke the language of nature, when he made the Venetian senator attribute to the effect of witchcraft, Desdemona's passion for Othello-though, as Coleridge has said, we are to con ceive of him not as a negro, but as a high bred, Moorish chief.

If we suppose them to have political privileges, and to be admitted to the elective franchise, still worse results may be expected. It is hardly necessary to add any thing to what has been said by Mr. Paulding on this subject, who has treated it fully. It is already known, that if there be a class unfavorably distinguished by any peculiarity from the rest of society, this distinction forms a tie which binds them to act in concert, and they exercise more than their due share of political power and influence and still more, as they are of inferior character and looser moral principle. Such a class form the very material for demagogues to work with. Other If the negro race, as I have contended, be inferior to parties court them and concede to them. So it would our own in mind and character, marked by inferiority be with the free blacks in the case supposed. They of form and features, then ours would suffer deteriorawould be used by unprincipled politicians of irregular tion from such intermixture. What would be thought ambition, for the advancement of their schemes, until of the moral conduct of the parent who should voluntathey should give them political power and importance rily transmit disease, or fatuity, or deformity to his offbeyond even their own intentions. They would be spring? If man be the most perfect work of the Creacourted by excited parties in their contests with each tor, and the civilized European man the most perfect other. At some time, they may perhaps attain politi-variety of the human race, is he not criminal who would cal ascendancy, and this is more probable, as we may desecrate and deface God's fairest work; estranging suppose that there will have been a great emigration of it further from the image of himself, and conforming it whites from the country. Imagine the government of such legislators. Imagine then the sort of laws that will be passed, to confound the invidious distinction which has been so long assumed over them, and if possible to

more nearly to that of the brute? I have heard it said, as if it afforded an argument, that the African is as well satisfied of the superiority of his own complexion, form and features, as we can be of ours. If this were true,

as it is not, would any one be so recreant to his own as to their happiness. Even if no such feelings or decivilization, as to say that his opinion ought to weigh signs should be entertained or conceived by the slave, against ours-that there is no universal standard of they will be attributed to him by the master, and all his truth and grace and beauty-that the Hottentot Venus conduct scanned with a severe and jealous scrutiny. may perchance possess as great perfection of form as Thus distrust and aversion are established, where, but the Medicean? It is true, the licentious passions of for mischievous interference, there would be confidence men overcome the natural repugnance, and find tran- and good will, and a sterner control is exercised over sient gratification in intercourse with females of the the slave who thus becomes the victim of his cruel adother race. But this is a very different thing from vocates. making her the associate of life, the companion of the bosom and the hearth. Him who would contemplate such an alliance for himself, or regard it with patience, when proposed for a son, or daughter, or sister, we should esteem a degraded wretch-with justice, certainly, if he were found among ourselves-and the estimate would not be very different if he were found in Europe. It is not only in defence of ourselves, of our country and of our own generation, that we refuse to emancipate our slaves, but to defend our posterity and race from degeneracy and degradation.

Are we not justified then in regarding as criminals, the fanatical agitators whose efforts are intended to bring about the evils I have described? It is sometimes said that their zeal is generous and disinterested, and that their motives may be praised, though their conduct be condemned. But I have little faith in the good motives of those who pursue bad ends. It is not for us to scrutinize the hearɛs of men, and we can only judge of them by the tendency of their actions. There is much truth in what was said by Coleridge: "I have never known a trader in philanthropy who was not wrong in heart somehow or other. Individuals so distinguished, are usually unhappy in their family relations-men not benevolent or beneficent to individuals, but almost hostile to them, yet lavishing money and labor and time on the race-the abstract notion." The prurient love of notoriety actuates some. There is much luxury in sentiment, especially if it can be indulged at the expense of others; and if there be added some share of envy or malignity, the temptation to indulgence is almost irresistible. But certainly they may be justly regarded as criminal, who obstinately shut their eyes and close their ears to all instruction with respect to the true nature of their actions.

An effect is sometimes produced on the minds of slave holders, by the publications of the self styled philanthropists, and their judgments staggered and consciences alarmed. It is natural that the oppressed should hate the oppressor. It is still more natural that the oppressor should hate his victim. Convince the master that he is doing injustice to his slave, and he at once begins to regard him with distrust and malignity. It is a part of the constitution of the human mind, that when circumstances of necessity or temptation induce men to continue in the practice of what they believe to be wrong, they become desperate and reckless of the degree of wrong. I have formerly heard of a master who accounted for his practising much severity upon his slaves, and exacting from them an unusual degree of labor, by saying that the thing (slavery) was altogether wrong, and therefore it was well to make the greatest possible advantage out of it. This agitation occasions some slave holders to hang more loosely on their country. Regarding the institution as of questionable character, condemned by the general opinion of the world, and one which must shortly come to an end, they hold themselves in readiness to make their escape from the evil which they anticipate. Some sell their slaves to new masters (always a misfortune to the slave) and remove themselves to other societies, of manners and habits uncongenial to their own. And though we may suppose that it is only the weak and the timid, who are liable to be thus affected, still it is no less an injury and public misfortune. Society is kept in an unquiet and restless state, and every sort of improvement is retarded.

Some projectors suggest the education of slaves, with a view to prepare them for freedom-as if there were any method of a man's being educated to freedom, but It must be manifest to every man of sane mind, that by himself. The truth is, however, that supposing that it is impossible for them to achieve ultimate success; they are shortly to be emancipated, and that they have even if every individual in our country, out of the limits the capacities of any other race, they are undergoing of the slave holding States, were united in their purpo- the very best education which it is possible to give. ses. They cannot have even the miserable triumph of They are in the course of being taught habits of regular St. Domingo-of advancing through scenes of atrocity, and patient industry, and this is the first lesson which blood and massacre, to the restoration of barbarism. is required. I suppose, that their most zealous advoThey may agitate and perplex the world for a time. cates would not desire that they should be placed in the They may excite to desperate attempts and particular high places of society immediately upon their emanciacts of cruelty and horror, but these will always be pation, but that they should begin their course of freesuppressed or avenged at the expense of the objects of dom as laborers, and raise themselves afterwards as their truculent philanthropy. But short of this, they their capacities and characters might enable them. But can hardly be aware of the extent of the mischief they how little would what are commonly called the rudiperpetrate. As I have said, their opinions, by means ments of education, add to their qualifications as laborto us inscrutable, do very generally reach our slave po-ers? But for the agitation which exists, however, pulation. What human being, if unfavorably distin- their education would be extended further than this. guished by outward circumstances, is not ready to be- There is a constant tendency in our society to extend lieve, when he is told, that he is the victim of injustice? the sphere of their employments, and consequently Is it not cruelty to make men restless and dissatisfied in to give them the information which is necessary their condition, when no effort of theirs can alter it? to the discharge of those employments. And this for The greatest injury is done to their characters, as well the most obvious reason; it promotes the master's inte

rest.

But are we therefore to refrain from efforts to benefit our race and country? By no means: but these motives, this labor and self distrust, are the only conditions upon which we are permitted to hope for success. Very different indeed is the course of those, whose precipitate and ignorant zeal would overturn the fundamental institutions of society, uproar its peace, and endanger its security, in pursuit of a distant and shadowy good, of which they themselves have formed no definite concep tion-whose atrocious philosophy would sacrifice a generation-and more than one generation-for an hypothesis.

ODDS AND ENDS.

How much would it add to the value of a slave, | assure us that the results may not disappoint our expec that he should be capable of being employed as a clerk, tations, and that we may not do evil instead of good. or be able to make calculations as a mechanic? In consequence, however, of the fanatical spirit which has been excited, it has been thought necessary to repress this tendency by legislation, and to prevent their aequiring the knowledge of which they might make a dangerous use. If this spirit were put down, and we restored to the consciousness of security, this would be no longer necessary, and the process of which I have spoken would be accelerated. Whenever indications of superior capacity appeared in a slave, it would be cultivated; gradual improvement would take place, until they might be engaged in as various employments as they were among the ancients-perhaps even liberal ones. Thus, if in the adorable providence of God, at a time and in a manner which we can neither foresee nor conjecture, they are to be rendered capable of freedom, and to enjoy it, they would be prepared for it in the best and most effectual, because in the most natural and To Mr. T. W. WHITE, gradual manner. But fanaticism hurries to its effect at once. I have heard it said, God does good, but it is by I have been, for many months past, "in a peck of imperceptible degrees; the Devil is permitted to do troubles," lest my non-appearance among your corres evil, and he does it in a hurry. The beneficent pro-pondents might realize, in my own case, the old adage, cesses of nature are not apparent to the senses. You"out of sight out of mind." But no man above the cannot see the plant grow or the flower expand. The grade of a brute beast is willing to be forgotten by his volcano, the earthquake and the hurricane, do their fellow men,-especially by that portion of them with work of desolation in a moment. Such would be the whom he has long maintained friendly intercourse. I desolation, if the schemes of fanatics were permitted to hope, therefore, that this natural feeling will plead my have effect. They do all that in them lies, to thwart excuse for knocking once more at your door for adthe beneficent purposes of Providence. The whole ten-mittance. This would have been done long ago, but I dency of their efforts is to aggravate present suffering, and to cut off the chance of future improvement; and in all their bearings and results, they have produced, and are likely to produce, nothing but "pure, unmixed, dephlegmated, defecated evil."

Editor of the Southern Literary Messenger.

was so thrown "all a-back" on the last occasion, by the fearful anathemas of certain popes of the press, (as our modern newspaper editors may justly be called,) for being "too old fashioned," that I have hardly yet recovered sufficient courage to show my antiquated If Wilberforce or Clarkson were living, and it were phiz again, among your numerous fashionable visitors. inquired of them "Can you be sure that you have pro- Some short time ago, however, I was just beginning, moted the happiness of a single human being?" I once more, to excogitate a few addenda to my former imagine that, if they considered conscientiously, they "Odds and Ends," when I was startled by the sight of would find it difficult to answer in the affirmative. If my own name, in your Messenger. Not even imaginit were asked "Can you be sure that you have not ing that any other person would so fall in love with it been the cause of suffering, misery and death to thou-as to counterfeit the signature, and being most deplosands?"—when we recollect that they probably stimulated the exertions of the amis des noirs in France, and that through the efforts of these, the horrors of St. Domingo were perpetrated, I think they must hesitate long to return a decided negative. It might seem eruel, if we could, to convince a man who has devoted his life to what he esteemed a good and generous purpose, that he has been doing only evil-that he has been worshipping a horrid fiend, in the place of the true God. But fanaticism is in no danger of being convinced. It is one of the mysteries of our nature, and of the divine government, how utterly disproportioned to each other, are the powers of doing evil and of doing good. The poorest and most abject instrument, that is utterly imbecile for any purpose of good, seems sometimes endowed with almost the powers of omnipotence for mischief. A mole may inundate a province-a spark from a forge may conflagrate a city-a whisper may separate friends; a rumor may convulse an empire-but when we would do benefit to our race or country, the purest and most chastened motives, the most patient thought and labor, with the humblest self distrust, are hardly sufficient to

rably forgetful, I began to ask myself, “Is it I? Can I already have done and forgotten what I supposed I was just about to do; or am I dreaming?" The thought suddenly flashed across my mind, that Cogia Hassan, or "the sleeper awakened," when in a somewhat similar predicament, as recorded in the "Arabian Nights Entertainments," had severely pinched himself to make sure of his personal identity. I resorted instanter to the same rousing process, and immediately discovered upon beginning to read, that "a fresh hand had taken hold of the bellows." The perusal of a few lines only, convinced me thoroughly of his blowing it far better than I had ever done, or could do; and I was on the point of publicly surrendering my name in his behalf, and praying for an act of our legislature to sanction the transfer, (as the law requires,) when it occurred to me, that I owed it to myself, before such petition to our beneficent law-makers, at least to attempt some selfvindication against the alarming charge of being "too old fashioned." This, however, is no easy task, in the entire absence of all those specifications which the law requires in every case of indictment, showing the how and

the wherein the alleged offence has been committed, and moreover, in a case where the accused has scarcely a chance of being tried by a jury of his peers. The only plan I can think of to effect my object, if possible, is, by contrasting many old fashions with new ones, in relation to similar things; and if all fails, to throw myself on the mercy of your court. Even then, unless half at least of its members are sexagenarians and past that age, I cannot cherish much hope of acquittal. But the charge against me is still recorded in your Messenger, and not a word have I yet offered in my defence. Now then, or never, let me offer it, unless I am barred by your act of limitation.

Before I begin my contrasts of old and new fashions, I must tell you what a quandary I have been in, relative to the proper application of the term fashion. After half an hour's hard study in Mr. Crabb's admirable work on English synonymes, to determine when I should use that term, or custom, or practice, or habit, 1 gave the matter up in despair, and resolved, "meo perienlo," to make fashion act as a sort of omnium gatherum for every meaning of which Mr. Crabb had constituted the four terms, distributees. Against his apportionment I have not a word to say; for I plead incompetence clearly to understand his rules of choice; and I make this confession in hope of propitiating, in some degree, our newspaper-popes, of whom I am in such mortal dread; and whose next anathema, I fear, I may be against my style. With this propitiatory offering to their acknowledged supremacy in giving the law on all matters of taste, of science, arts, morals, politics and religion; in short, on all subjects about which printers' ink can be shed, I proceed to my array of old fashions against new ones: and first, on the score of economy, in which a greater minuteness of detail will be necessary, than I would enter into, if I could well

avoid it.

In by-gone times, our families generally, could adjust their limbs much to their own comfort and satisfaction, in what were familiarly and figuratively called "flag-chairs." These cost from two shillings and sixpence, to three shillings, while those of a more patrician order, and specially intended for company, were only a few shillings more costly. But to compensate, in some degree, for this extra expense, they were covered with good substantial leather, quite strong enough for children's shoes, or dancing pumps; when the then fashionable style of "chicken-flutter and cross-shuffle," required quadruple the strength which similar articles now do, under the "lackadaisical system," of practising this exhilarating amusement, which, (by the way,) seems entirely to have changed its nature by becoming most decidedly soporific. In these days, a large portion of us, have become so very delicate and sensitive in our members, that it is indispensable to their repose from the wearisomeness of existence, to deposite them generally, upon rocking chairs with spring bottoms, costing from fifteen to forty dollars each; or on sofas equally elastic, and covered with expensive materials, at thirty, forty, fifty times the price of the old fashioned receptacles for our basement stories, which formerly supported their superstructures quite as well, quoad all the purposes of health and comfort, as their modern successors do, and at one-eighth or tenth of the expense. For the moral of this fact I refer you and your readers

to the maxims of Dr. Franklin's Poor Richard, where they will find it stated as an axiom, that "other people's eyes cost us more than our own." And between ourselves, I must think, that this most silly and ridiculous passion for show, which I verily believe has existed ever since the Devil tempted our mother Eve to eat the apple of knowledge, is far more virulent in these days of perfectibility, than in those by gone days which I am laboring to vindicate against the anathemas of our newspaper popes.

As to our daily meals, either with or without company, the cheap, homely tables once used for them, would now go near to destroy all appetite among the fashionables of the present race; whilst the substantial viands which they formerly held, and which every body knows as familiarly as household words, have been banished, in a great measure, especially from our large towns and cities, the established arbiters and dictators of all fashions to the country. The successors of these viands are certain Frenchified kickshaws, the very names and substances of which are culinary mysteries, necessarily requiring some explanation before old-times-people can venture to eat any thing: unless, indeed, when simultaneously pressed by resistless hunger and the fear of betraying their rusticity, they could content themselves to follow the laudable example of an old country. gentleman, once at President Jefferson's table, who, (as report says,) incontinently made his dinner,--" entirely of baked Irish potatoes!" they being the only old acquaintance he could recognise among the sophisticated host of materials most abundantly spread before him. But this mystification of eatables, is not the worst of it, since they must be served up, for consistency sake, on very costly tables, and in sets of fine china, cut-glass, and sometimes silver, the first cost alone of which would purchase a full year's allowance of bacon for the largest Virginia family. Add to all this, and, likewise, for consistency sake, those dishes so numerous, so variegated, so exquisitely foreign in composition, taste, and titles, must, "ex necessitate rei," be well washed down with equally exquisite foreign potations, maugre the cost!provided, always, that credit enough to buy them, can once be established. Hence the former comparatively cheap drinks, which were used in "the olden time," at the tables of what were then called, (par excellence) "the gentry," have been nearly excluded, to make way for such a motley multitude of French, Spanish, Portuguese, German, and other foreign wines, that I can no more recollect, even their names and titles than I could remember and repeat all the names and genealogies recorded in the book of Genesis. Yet the many silly adventurers in the still more silly race after gentility, dash through them all, as if they belonged to their mothertongue, although they make quite as sad havoc among them, as the cost of these foreign wines does among their purses. This latter havoc is, not unfrequently such, in a single day, if the party be given by a planter or farmer, (whose only return probably, will be ridicule for his folly,) as to require some months of hard agricultural labor to pay for it. But, if such parties be frequent, the inevitable end of this tragi-comic farce is, that the performers must very soon exchange all the comforts, luxuries, and social intercourse which they enjoyed in the old States, for the coarsest fare, incessant drudgery, and the constant risk of dirks or Bowie knives

lence"--" the Forsythe cotton;" then as common as any other kind, under the title of "nankeen-cotton," although usually so mottled, that the arnotto-dye was generally used to produce uniformity of color; after which, a country congregation of males, thus equipped for Sunday exhibition, looked at a little distance for all the world like an assemblage of the tropical birds,-called Flamingos. Happy then, the country beau whose breeches had most of this Flamingo hue; and still happier the house-wife who had succeeded best in com.

ties of her husband, son, or brother, as the case "mought" be. But this is a digression (to which I am most unfortunately, and I fear incurably, addicted;) let me, therefore, add to the above, two pair of shoes; one for every day, the other for Sundays, with one Sunday coat,-and the summer wardrobe for an oldtimes' gentleman was complete. His external habili ments for winter, were, a good "beaver hat," made, not like Peter Pindar's razors "only to sell," but to last un

being thrust into their vitals, in the new States and territories, if they only crook their fingers at any one out of their own family. Here, if theory can be determined by practice, liberty means that every man shall do as he pleases to the full extent of his physical powers, to indulge his brutish or any other propensities. That there are hundreds and thousands of men in these parts of our country, who deeply deplore such a state of things, I have not the smallest doubt; for I have several personal friends among them, who have assured me of the fact. But all their communica-pounding the arnotto-dye to adorn the lower extremitions contribute to confirm what I have just said; and that they, for the time being, are suffering a sort of moral martyrdom for the sacrifices which they formerly made, in some one or other of the old United States, to obtain the mere soap-suds-bubble of superior fashionand gentility. Most of the competitors in this preposterous,--may I not say, immoral race,--have been taught by the morbid public sentiment on this subject, to lavish their money for that which all the money in the world cannot purchase. They have been most fa-til he was tired of it, and long after; a plain, neat, tally led to believe, that the greatest spendthrift among broadcloth coat, rarely if ever costing more than thirty them will always gain the prize of gentility, in pre- shillings or thirty-six shillings a yard, with the coat of ference to the men most distinguished for their good the previous year, for daily use,—except Sunday, morals, manners, and mental endowments--qualities when the best was put on as a matter of course. The which the wise and the good, whether poor or rich, and breeches, or "inexpressibles"—as it became the modest from time immemorial, have always determined can fashion to call them, before the beaux, who had no alone constitute any just title to the character of a calves to their "spindle-shanks," succeeded in their final real gentleman. Those who are truly entitled to this expulsion-seldom exceeded two pair, neither of them highly honorable distinction, may adopt different exter- very costly; his shoes were the same in number, but nal modes, (all of which may be good,) at distant pe- more water proof; and with them he associated a single riods, of evincing their claims, and therefore I shall pair of stout boots-worn only upon grand occasions,-not now attempt to compare the present with the for- such as musters, county courts, and elections. More mer fashions, any farther than to say, that it is much over, these said boots were made of leather so strong easier now, than in the olden time, to counterfeit the and durable that no fair play could wear them out in gentleman, since in these levelling-downward days, fit much less than three or four years: for be it remem subjects for a penitentiary not unfrequently smuggle bered that boots were not then as now, the wear for themselves into the genteelest society, under the spe- every day in the year. To finish the winter wardrobe, cious disguise of a good suit of clothes and fashionable and furnish a defence against rain or snow, (for mere manners. In by-gone days, such an occurrence was cold was little regarded in those days, even by ladies,) hardly possible, for infinitely greater pains were taken one great coat was kept, of some very strong cloth, to guard against such impostors. To aspire to the costing from ten to twenty shillings a yard, and so lastcharacter of a true gentleman is certainly both honora-ing as to perform most effectual services through several ble and highly improving in every point of view;

"Emollit mores, nec sinit esse feros :"

But to rest our pretensions on the success of the struggle, who shall squander the most money in the vain pursuit, is quite as great a folly, to say nothing of the sin, as we can possibly commit. In this, as in numerous other popular fallacies, we may rest perfectly assured, that "the race is not always to the swift, nor the battle to the strong."

Take another contrast. Fifty years ago, indeed still later, a gentleman's summer dress, especially in the country, usually consisted of a home-made straw-hat, worth perhaps twenty-five cents; a single change of coats of some cheap material; a few pair of nankeen breeches (if I may be pardoned for using so vulgar a term in these days of exquisite refinement ;) and as many pair of thread or cotton stockings, protected, when he rode on horseback, by what were called "leggins," of check or "brown holland." The aforesaid breeches, (by the way,) were made, during the revolutionary war, of what is now called " par excel

winter campaigns.

But now, what do we find to be deemed all essential in forming a gentleman's wardrobe, for both seasons? Not only an entire change of form-against which I shall say nothing,-but a most striking one in the number, materials, and cost of the articles ;--to an amount more than triple what it formerly was, while individual income, especially from agriculture, the paymaster general, has diminished in nearly an equal ratio. In by-gone days, we deemed our heads quite hard enough, if protected by a hat with some brim around it, to

encounter any degree of summer heat, without the smallest risk to our brains of being either addled, baked or roasted. Now, our craniums have become so ex• ceedingly tender, and the consequent hazard of such disaster so imminent, as to render fur caps and bandbox hats for winter, with non-descript noddle covers of silk, for summer,--but umbrellas also-articles of vital necessity, and thereby adding two or three hundred per cent to what may well be called our self-imposed skull tax, for both seasons. Even the beaux and belles among our darkies have adopted the fashion, and have

« السابقةمتابعة »