Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB

and prosperity possible. The negro laborer never crosses a stream until he reaches it. He is, therefore, contented and happy,-jolly and hilarious oftentimes, when, under precisely similar conditions and circumstances, the white laborer will worry and give way to irritability, or senseless passion. The colored laborer enjoys more happiness and contentment; the white laborer more thrift and prosperity. The one is progressive, the other conservative. Great prosperity springs from the exertions of the one; old customs are perpetuated by the other and scarcely any progress is made by him in the development of accumulated wealth. The negroes occupy a unique, but useful place, in the social structure of the United States. They never indulge in strikes, but they always have profitable employment, and their employers become attached to them and they to their employers. There is less suffering and more contentment among them than among any other laborers in the United States.

CHAPTER XIV.

THE WHITE BURLEY AND MANUFACTURING TOBACCO.

While experiments in growing White Burley have been made in all the tobacco-growing States in the South and several in the North, the district where the quality reaches its greatest excellence has greatly increased its boundaries during the past 15 years. This entire district lies on both sides of the Ohio river. The Kentucky White Burley district embraces an area of a little over 10,000 square miles, and includes 34 counties, or parts of counties, all of which adjoin, except two, Breathitt and Bell, forming an irregular figure bounded by the Ohio river on the North and on the other sides by lines drawn from Louisville, Ky., to Danville, and from Danville to Catlettsburg. Bell and Breathitt together only produced a little over 15,000 pounds of tobacco in 1896, and scarcely deserve to be mentioned.

The largest producing counties, taken in the order of their production as reported by the county assessors, in 1894, are Mason with over 5,000,000 pounds; Shelby, Henry, Woodford and Carroll each between 4,000,000 and 5,000,000 pounds. The following counties between 3,000,000 and 4,000,000 pounds,- Harrison, Hart, Grant, Scott, Nicholas, Fleming, Pendleton, Bracken and Fayette. Boone and Trimble produced each between 2,000,000 and 3,000,000 pounds. The counties of Clark, Rourbon, Owen, Franklin and Gallatin produced over 1,500,000 pounds each, and the counties. of Bath, Jessamine, Carter, Mercer and Robertson produced over 1,000,000 each.

[graphic]

FIG. 98. WHITE BURLEY CUT AND HUNG ON STICKS IN THE FIELD.

The Ohio White Burley district lies just north of the Ohio river and immediately opposite the White Burley district of Kentucky. It embraces the counties of Brown, Adams, Clermont, Butler, Scioto, Hamilton, Highland, Licking and Lawrence. All these counties lie on the Ohio river, except Butler, Highland and Licking. Brown produced in 1894 over 3,700,000 pounds; Adams and Clermont each over 2,000,000. None of the other counties produced as much as 500,000 pounds. These figures are taken from the assessors' returns to the Secretary of State for 1894.

If the figures reported by the assessors are correct, they indicate a considerable falling off in the production of the White Burley crop in Ohio in 1894, as compared with the production in 1889. The counties of Brown, Adams and Clermont reported for that year 14,877,959 pounds, but in 1894 only 8,737,639 pounds, showing a falling off of 41 per cent. A comparison of five of the counties in Kentucky that have the largest production shows about an equal amount for both years. Mason, Shelby, Henry, Woodford and Carroll show a production, both in 1889 and 1894, of over 23,000,000 pounds in the aggregate.

The Soils of the White Burley District are among the most fertile in the United States, and in this respect occupy a position in relation to the growth of product diametrically opposite to the character of the soils best fitted for the growth of yellow tobacco. The latter requires conparatively sterile, sandy soils, while the White Burley must have the most fertile, limestone soils for its proper development. A comparison of chemical elements of the two typical soils will be instructive. Take the analysis of the soil of Mason county, Kentucky, where the finest White Burley tobacco is grown, and an analysis of the soil of Granville county, North

Carolina, where the highest grade of yellow tobacco is grown, and we find the following:

[blocks in formation]

The White Burley soil has seven times as much organic and volatile matter in it as the yellow tobacco soil, twice as much alumina, ten times as much oxide of iron, over three and a half times as much lime, nearly ten times as much magnesia, three and a half times as much manganese, nearly seven times as much phosphoric acid, six times as much sulphuric acid, and onetenth more of potash. The yellow tobacco soil has nearly twice as much soda, and nearly 20 per cent more sand.

The topographical features of the White Burley district in Kentucky are greatly diversified. High, rolling ridges, round, domelike knobs, and sharp hills, with here and there level stretches, are its characteristic features. Many streams pass through the district, and these have carved out deep, winding valleys that are three or four hundred feet below the general surface of the country. The great ridge, known as Dry Ridge, which forms the main axis, or backbone, of the region, runs approximately north and south. Upon this the Cincinnati Southern railroad was built. From this ridge, many transverse and subordinate spurs shoot out, but they are so often dissevered by deep hollows, or gorges, that the region presents for the most part a very irregular series of rounded or flat elevations. The coun

« AnteriorContinuar »