Aiken, However, Sixteen Miles Before You Reach The Savannah River,
Has A Pleasant Aspect.
It is situated on a comparatively high tract of
country, sandy and barren, but healthy, and hither the planters resort in
the hot months from their homes in the less salubrious districts.
Pretty
cottages stand dispersed among the oaks and pines, and immediately west of
the place the country descends in pleasant undulations towards the valley
of the Savannah.
The appearance of Augusta struck me very agreeably as I reached it, on a
most delightful afternoon, which seemed to me more like June than March. I
was delighted to see turf again, regular greensward of sweet grasses and
clover, such as you see in May in the northern states, and do not meet on
the coast in the southern states. The city lies on a broad rich plain on
the Savannah river, with woody declivities to the north and west. I have
seen several things here since my arrival which interested me much, and if
I can command time I will speak of them in another letter.
Letter XLIV.
Southern Cotton Mills.
Barnwell District, South Carolina, _March_ 31, 1849.
I promised to say something more of Augusta if I had time before departing
from Cuba, and I find that I have a few moments to spare for a hasty
letter.
The people of Augusta boast of the beauty of their place, and not without
some reason. The streets are broad, and in some parts overshadowed with
rows of fine trees. The banks of the river on which it stands are high and
firm, and slopes half covered with forest, of a pleasant aspect, overlook
it from the west and from the Carolina side. To the south stretches a
broad champaign country, on which are some of the finest plantations of
Georgia. I visited one of these, consisting of ten thousand acres, kept
throughout in as perfect order as a small farm at the north, though large
enough for a German principality.
But what interested me most, was a visit to a cotton mill in the
neighborhood, - a sample of a class of manufacturing establishments, where
the poor white people of this state and of South Carolina find occupation.
It is a large manufactory, and the machinery is in as perfect order as in
any of the mills at the north. "Here," said a gentleman who accompanied
us, as we entered the long apartment in the second story, "you will see a
sample of the brunettes of the piny woods."
The girls of various ages, who are employed at the spindles, had, for the
most part, a sallow, sickly complexion, and in many of their faces, I
remarked that look of mingled distrust and dejection which often
accompanies the condition of extreme, hopeless poverty. "These poor
girls," said one of our party, "think themselves extremely fortunate to be
employed here, and accept work gladly. They come from the most barren
parts of Carolina and Georgia, where their families live wretchedly, often
upon unwholesome food, and as idly as wretchedly, for hitherto there has
been no manual occupation provided for them from which they do not shrink
as disgraceful, on account of its being the occupation of slaves.
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