census taken by the United States; second, | States census returns. The two last columns the slave population; thirdly, the number of exhibit the population, according to the state representatives in Congress for each decen- census, which is always one year in advance nial period; fourthly, the number of free of the federal reckoning: colored persons, all according to the United culent vegetables that everywhere meet the eye, and other productions which minister to the comfort or necessities of her people, it is needless, in this place especially, to direct your notice. So remarkable, indeed, is her topographical condition, that wheatt and the sugar-cane grow profitably side by side; and the orange and the olive ripen under the provident care of the same family of cultivators, who extract the saccharine matter of the maple, but essay in vain to secure the maturity of the native corn of America.‡ Slaves are not enumerated in our state | While the woods abound in game, including census, but the numbers above set down are the deer and turkey, the ocean which leaves taken from the report of the Controller- her southern border, and the numerous General, founded on the tax returns of the streams, both salt and fresh, that penetrate state. In the United States census, slaves are every part of her surface, yield almost every enumerated for the purpose of representation. variety of the choicest fish. In relation to medicinal and culinary plants, her catalogue SOUTH CAROLINA-AGRICULTURAL AND is large. To tobacco, indigo* and hemp, which PHYSICAL CAPABILITIES OF; TERRITORY; once were staple commodities; fruits and esCLIMATE; SOILS; SWAMPS; NAVIGATION; HEALTH; NATURAL MANURES; MINERALS; AGRICULTURE; PRODUCTS.*-What, then, are the agricultural capabilities of South Carolina? In richness, variety and abundance, perhaps no part of the habitable globe, of the same territorial extent, exceeds them. Of the four great materials for human clothingcotton, wool, silkt and flaxt-her climate and soil are peculiarly adapted to the first three, and, in locations, to the last. Of the prominent articles of food, she produces rice, wheat, Indian corn, oats, rye, barley, sweet and Irish potatoes, and the different varieties of the pea tribe. For the habitation of man, the earth, her granaries and forests, furnish 1. South Carolina is most favorably situ an inexhaustible supply. Iron, so essential ated, not only with regard to the states of to the wants of every class in society, is the Union, but to the other portions of the superior in quality, it has been ascertained, globe. Midway between the frozen regions to any found in the country. Gold, not too of the north and the burning heats of the abundant to divert from other and more tropics, in her climate, seasons and producprofitable pursuits, but an inconsiderable tions, it has been justly represented that she amount of capital, excites the enterprise and enjoys most of the advantages of all. If we rewards the labor of a portion of our citizens. except tropical fruits, to which frost is fatal, In other minerals, hereafter to be noticed, her capacity successfully to rear all the grains, she is neither deficient in quantity nor value. fruits and esculent roots, which enrich more southern countries, is nearly certain. Her latitude for cotton enjoys an extraordinary advantage. Much further south, the forcing nature of a vertical sun develops the plant too rapidly, thereby running it into weed and We are obliged to Gov. Seabrook for his most able and elaborate essay upon the agricultural capacities of South Carolina, and the means of improving them" prepared at the request of the State Agricultural Society." From this essay, we make such extracts as appear above, and regret space will not admit of more. Governor Seabrook passes in review the whole duty of the state and its citizens, in regard to public wealth. He is particularly excellent in the discussion of "agricultural societies"--" the pine lands"--" reclamation of swamps"-" deep plowing"-" drainages"--"manure"-" peat"-" sheep-walks"-" the grasses""rotation of crops"-"the cow pea," &c. In 1759, South Carolina exported 10,000 lbs. of raw silk. Linam Virginicum, or Virginia flax, is an indigenous plant, and of the same family with linum usitatissimum, or common flax. To comprehend this subject in all its relations a more detailed examination is necessary. * Except in Orangeburg, where it is still a source of profit to a few planters, indigo is nowhere grown in South Carolina. That it is not inferior to that of India, has, I understand, been recently proved. + Wheat is cultivated in the state, with advantage, as low as N. L. 32° 30'. From bleak, cold winds, the northern side of the glassy mountains, it is said, will not produce maize. Between 32° 4′ 30′′ and 35° 12′ north latitude. and 1° 30' and 6o 54' west longitude from the capitol at Washington; or 78° 25′ and 85° 49′ west longitude from Greenwich. SOUTH CAROLINA-CAPABILITIES, TERRITORY, CLIMATE, ETC. foliage;-it is, from the same cause, most exposed to the ravages of the caterpillar and other insects. Further north, the season is too short to mature an abundant crop of balls, while the staple degenerates, and becomes less valuable. 137 but the alluvial bottoms of the former are greatly surpassed in richness by the river swamps of the latter. In its capacity for permanent improvement, the granite half of the state has been more highly favored by nature than the alluvial. This is mainly ascribable From the Sea Islands, the best cotton to the open texture, permeable to water, of known to commerce is exported. So cir- its clayey subsoil, and the potash in the soil cumscribed are the limits in which it can be and subsoil formed by the decomposition of grown, that a half degree (32° 10' to 32° 40′ the felspar and mica of the granite. In a north latitude) of the sea-coast of North few localities, however, the depth of the America, seems to be the precise point substratum and its proximity to the surwhere the length, strength and firmness of the face, offer serious obstacles to its higher fibre are most happily blended. In reference productions. These, among other causes, to rice, our state enjoys almost a monopoly. seem yet to be operating against the cultiva2. South Carolina includes 30,213 square tion of perhaps the greater part of those miles, or 19,435,680 acres. Of this area, peculiar soils known as the "Flat Woods" there is as little land in one body, the highest of Abbeville; those in the neighborhood of authorities assure us, unsusceptible of re- Dutchman's Creek and Wateree Creek in munerating culture, as the United States can Fairfield; and the Black Jack lands of Chesfurnish. Undistinguished by mountains, with ter. Deriving their fertility from the horntheir agricultural disadvantages, it is worthy blende* disintegrated rocks which lie below of remark that the spurs that make out from the close clay subsoil, it would appear that the great range which separates the waters falling into the Atlantic Ocean and into the steady industry, incited and directed by ordiGulf of Mexico, are capable of profitable til-nary skill, was alone wanting to preserve and lage to their very summits. 3. As a difference of twelve degrees of latitude exists between the western and eastern hemispheres, the countries of the latter which are subject to the same atmospherical influences with South Carolina, comprise the most delightful and fruit-bearing portions of France, Italy, Turkey in Europe, Russia, Tartary, and China. 4. Between the primitive and alluvial formations, the state is nearly equally divided. The soils, though of every kind, may be said to comprehend six varieties,† each the best suited to a certain crop, yet all of them capable of advantageously producing threefourths of the vegetable products grown in its limits. While local differences are every where observable, the surface and soil of the upper districts present a great similarity; and this is equally true of the lower country. In the former, the lands are broken and hilly; in the latter, level; oak is the natural growth of the one; pine of the other. Clay is the soil of much the larger portion of the state; and, except in the immediate vicinity of the ocean, is almost the universal substratum. A close, stiff land predominates generally in the parishes, and an open sand on the Sea Islands. The high lands of the country, above the falls of the rivers, are naturally much superior to those of the pine-covered region, * Messrs. Ruffin and Tuomy, late agricultural surveyors of the state. t1. Tide swamp, now appropriated to the culture of rice; 2, inland swamp, to rice, cotton, corn, peas, &c.; 3, salt marsh, to long cotton; 4, oak and pine, to long cotton, corn, potatoes, &c.; 5, oak and hickory, to short cotton, corn, &c.; 6, pine barren, to fruits, vegetables, &c. perpetuate the uncommon productiveness, which, in spite of long-continued and improvident tillage, still distinguishes these remarkable tracts of land. In reference to the soils of the primitive country, to one more peculiarity only, shall I now advert. Where the rocks lie horizontally, it is known that the soils derived from clay states frequently suffer from the impenetrable nature of the subsoil and the position of the underlying rocks. In the regions to which they are confined in this state, they "are all highly inclined, presenting their edges to the surface and allowing the water to percolate between the strata. 5. The swamps, covering 2,000 square miles of land of inexhaustible fertility, are capable of thorough and economical drainage, and conversion into active and available capital. The pine lands, embracing about 6,000,000 of acres, constitute the most neglected secWhile in some quarters, tion of the state. they are erroneously regarded as valuable only for the abundance and quality of their timber, in others, the belief is equally unsound, that their productive capacity is limitand feeble soil. That, in all its relations, it ed to plants which flourish solely in a thin is a district of country of immeasurable value to our community, will hereafter be attempted to be shown. 6. South Carolina is most bountifully supplied with water. The base of her triangular form is washed by the ocean, and one of her lateral sides rests on a river accessible to vessels more than one-half its * Hornblende contains about 12 per cent. of lime, and about 30 per cent. of iron. length, and small boats 100 miles beyond. | mourning, the people of Abbeville, Union, Many bold and navigable streams, with numerous tributaries coursing through her territory in every direction, disembogue into the Atlantic at distances from each other the most suitable for the purposes of intercommunication and traffic. Before reaching the point where all traces of their distinctive character are lost for ever, by united contributions, they form a bold channel between the main land and the Sea Islands the entire width of the state. Apart from the creeks and inlets of the sea, there is now an inland navigation equal to about 2,400 miles. 7. Greenville is the only division of our domain without the benefit of navigation. In all the districts, however, water courses abound, which afford remarkably eligible sites for mills. The rocks cross the streams nearly at right angles, and hence form a series of natural dams across their beds, and make falls that vary from five to eighty feet in comparatively short distances. In perhaps no equal extent of territory are there so many advantages of this sort presented. In connection with this subject it is proper to add, that the metropolis of the state is only seven miles from the ocean; that its harbor is spacious, well protected from storms, and at all times accessible. 8. Surprising to many as may be the declaration, South Carolina, in reference to her whole population, is a very healthy country, and by no means a sickly one with regard to her white inhabitants. If the alluvial region, and a few of the middle districts are subject to fevers in summer, the whole state in winter is comparatively exempt from the diseases to which more northern climes are peculiarly liable. The assertion, too, is with entire confidence made, that, even during the hot months, in perhaps one-half of her limits, foreigners may reside not only with impunity, but with renovated constitutions. In the neighborhood of every locality in which mephitic exhalations show the fatality of their power, there are sites for settlements where vigorous health, under the ordinary safeguards, is always secured. The entire sand-hill country and pine lands generally, as well as our towns and villages, furnish the most signal evidence of the salubrity of their atmospheric influence. It may here be appropriately observed that, while from causes, several of which are among the arcana of nature, the lower division is becoming gradually but steadily healthier, a portion of the middle zone is decidedly more liable to maladies of a fatal character. If a better system of drainage and other improvements in the cultivation of the ground, do not satisfactorily account for the one, certain agricultural practices are perhaps sufficient to explain the other. For the diseases which occasionally clothe, in the habiliments of Chester, and York, it is supposed that the planters of those districts are competent to the diminution of the sources whence they spring. It is not unworthy of especial remark, that the atmosphere of the swamps and marshes, so poisonous to the white man, is at all times innocuous to his slave. If it were not for this merciful provision of an all-wise Being, the alluvial region of South Carolina, in the immediate vicinity of its water courses, would soon become a dreary waste, and tenanted only by the beasts of the forest. Of the cities of the Union, Charleston, and, it may be added, Columbia, show a lower mortality among their acclimated inhabitants than any others. With regard to the former, the number of deaths from all fevers (the epidemic of the state), except from yellow fever, for the last eighteen years, is 656, and in any one year 81, in a population of between 30 and 40,000. From yellow fever, which has prevailed as an epidemic but twice in twenty-two years, for the same period, the aggregate number of deaths is 646. The average mortality for the last six years, all classes included, is 1 in 51; blacks alone,* 1 in 44; white alone, 1 in 58.† 9. The natural means of resuscitating the soil are abundant, and widely diffused. A large portion of the lower country shows exhaustless beds of the richest marl. Limestone, though obtainable only in York, Spartanburg, Laurens, and Pickens, exists in such quantities in the first two districts, that, by railway communications, the entire primitive region will, at no distant day, be furnished with this earth, so essential to the nutrition and development of plants. While the seashore parishes possess unfailing supplies of salt mud, salt grass, and shell lime, two-thirds of the state are most amply furnished with swamp mud and peat. "In Charleston," says De Bow's Review of May, 1847, "the mortality under 5 years is 31 per cent.; in Boston it is 46. There are more deaths in Philadelphia, from all fevers, including typhus and malarial, than from all fevers in Charleston, including yellow fever. From 1820 to 1830, in Philadel phia, the deaths from fevers were thirteen and fivetenths per cent. on all the deaths. In Charleston, the average mortality from fevers was eleven and for the last eighteen years, including two epidemics, four-tentbs; leaving out yellow fever, which attacks almost exclusively strangers, the mortality from other fevers will not be found to exceed seven per cent. + It appears from tables furnished a writer in the Commercial Review, by Dr. G. Emerson, that the average mortality in Philadelphia, among the colored population, from 1821 to 1840, inclusive, was one in time it was one in forty-four. In Boston the average twenty-six; in Charleston, we know that for that mortality, it is said, (see writer in Boston Medical and Surgical Journal, November, 1842,) is one in tion, have vital statistics ceased to be published at fifteen. Why, in reference to the colored populathe North? Let the abolitionists answer. 10. Of minerals and the primitive rocks, | exceed 2,000,000, or about one-tenth of her the number of the former is 28; of the arable lands. latter, 9. 11. The botany of the state consists of about 3,000 species of plants; of these, 2,000 are flowering, and 1,000 unprovided with flowers as parts of their organs of fructification. In relation to the former, about 65 are naturalized; that is, foreign plants, introduced and now growing wild. There are about 150 grasses, of which 15 are natives; 30 species of esculent, (for man,) of which 3 or 4 are naturalized; and about 70 more used in medicine, agriculture and the arts, of which five or six are naturalized. 12. As a member of the Union, South Carolina in population occupies the eleventh rank; in territorial extent, the twenty-second; in the value of her agricultural exports, the fifth; in the value of the goods, wares and merchandise of the growth, produce and manufacture of the United States,* the thirteenth. The very large contribution of this state to the national wealth, which is determined by the amount and value of her domestic exports, and not her imports, comes, too, from a limited part of her soil. The estimated number of acres in cultivation in 1820, was 1,221,000; at present it does not 1820. 12. Taking the census of 1840 as a basis of calculation, South Carolina produces, communibus annis: Cotton... Rice.. Sugar. Oats. Tobacco.. Silk cocoons. .lbs. 61,710,274 60,590,861 Barley, buckwheat, hops, and wax. 30,000 968,354 1,486,208 14,722,805 44.738 51,519 299,170 24,618 2,698,313 2,080 19,989 $537,684 735 If we divide their income, about $31,000,000, by the whole population, 594,398, the share of each is $52; of the white population alone $119. Of rice, wheat and potatoes, the quantity per head is 108 lbs.; if one-half of the amount of Indian corn be added, the quantity of bread food per head, omitting inferior productions, is 120 lbs. Of cotton and wool, the share to each inhabitant is 104 lbs. If the white population be divided into families of 4, (64,777,) there will be of horses and mules, 2 to each; of meat cattle, 8%; of sheep, 3%, and of swine, 13%. In reference to the whole population, the proportion of each, in meat cattle, sheep and hogs, is about 2%. Supposing three$11,119,565 fourths of the white families (48,582) to be 13,482,757 engaged in agriculture, and that 2,000,000 11,138,992 of acres are in cultivation, each family tills 11,017,391 41 acres, and realizes $476, or $11 60 an 8,990,048 acre. 8,598,257 8,091,542 EXPORTED FROM CHARLESTON IN $8,690,539 1834.. 7,136,366 1836. 6,671,998 1837. 7,833,713 1838. 10,876,475 1839. 7,468,966 1821 1822. 1823. 1824. 1825. 1826 1840. .11,224,298 10,318,822 8,284,405 SAVANNAH, GEORGIA.-Our immediate 7,010,631 object in this article is to institute a brief in8,578,515 quiry into the present condition of the trade 8,366,250 of the city of Savannah; to examine some of its peculiar advantages for a general and flourishing commerce, both foreign and domestic; to survey for a moment those rich portions of country that in all probability will ere long become tributary to her commercial greatness; also to cast a glance over those numer ous avenues and intersections that already in their downward course to the ocean are seek ing a resting-place in Savannah. This city may claim for itself that happy medium of climate-that juste milieu of tem perature that quickens without enervating— that enjoys the crescive power of the tropical 640,000 year of high prices. regions, without their noxious influences. 474,000 300,000 340,000 490,000 390,000 280,000 Situated on the thirty-second parallel of north latitude, and eighty-one degrees west from Greenwich, it enjoys a winter climate which, for softness and genial comfort, is unsurpassed if not unequaled. Its proximity to the Atlantic The years 1840 and 1841, remarks the Hon. W. J. (distant but seventeen miles,) brings it within Grayson, (collector,) are omitted, the record in the the reach of the refreshing sea-breezes, which office being incomplete. The first and second quarters of 1840 amounted to $192,000, and the last quar-temper the fervors of a summer solstice with ter of 1841 to $116,000. a renovating coolness. The Savannah River admits vessels drawing fourteen and a half feet of water to the wharves of the city; and it is but seldom now, in this age of improved models, that any freighting ship, at least of American structure, is compelled from want of water to stop short of the city. When this is the case, however, (and this happens more frequently with for eign ships than our own,) Four Mile Point offers a safe and commodious anchorage, where vessels of almost any draught may load and unload. The water of the river at this point is still fresh and fit for all alimentary purposes. That destructive marine insect so fatal to vessels in salt and brackish water, the sea-worm, so called, is unknown in this river, and should it have gained a lodgment in the bottom of a vessel previous to her entrance into these waters, a very short time is only necessary for the fresh water to destroy them. At this point, also, ships take in their water at low tide for their voyage. The Savannah is navigable for the most part of the year for steamboats of moderate draught to Augusta, two hundred and forty miles above the city of Savannah. The early history of Georgia shows that Savannah was then counted a place remarkable for its healthy location. Built upon a bluff of pure sand forty feet above the level of the river, it seemed for a series of years to have enjoyed a singular and happy immunity from all acute and fatal diseases. We read in the early annals of its settlement, that it was resorted to by invalids and men of leisure during the hot summer months, both for health and pleasure. In process of time, however, as population increased, and agriculture and the clearing of the lands in the neighborhood of the city progressed apace, mephitic and unhealthy influences were developed, and Savannah lost caste for a while, but only for a while, as a healthy city. When it is remembered, that with the influx of foreign population, ill adapted, from exotic constitutions and frequently from lax habits, to the warm climate of this parallel of latitude, came in also debilitating and often fatal diseases, it may well be questioned whether its ill health arose so much from local as from imported causes. Time and circumstances, however, have wrought another change, and what with the draining of contiguous lands and judicious municipal regulations, and the introduction of a better style of living both as to houses and food, and the greater adaptation of system to climate, and the gradual exhaustion of those deleterious influences brought into existence by the original turning up of the soil, exposure by the cutting down the sheltering forests from around the city; what with these causes, we say, and what with the perpetual though gradual, constant, though almost imperceptible rotation of all climates and temperatures, Savannah has again put forth her pretensions, and is now universally allowed to be as healthy a city as any in the United States. The graver portion of our prescribed task remains to be considered, namely, the advantages that Savannah presents to the man of business, the man of unappropriated capital, seeking for its most profitable investmentthe young man of enterprise, rich in stores of industry and knowledge of business, looking anxiously around him for a location in which he may bring forth his talents and his industry to best purpose, the sturdy mechanic with his ever ready hand, watching for a place where his labor may be remunerated with a comfortable subsistence; and we have not yet named the ship-owner, we have reserved him• until now purposely, for he is an important item in our account. The immense amount of produce that is booked in the page of human certainties to find an exit through Savannah to some market by water, either foreign or domestic, must with a moral certainty invite to this port the unemployed ships of the North, and that is saying a good deal; for the North have a greater propensity for building ships than we have for their employment. Our pine forests gradually disappear, they float away North, they are re-edified, they return to us in the form of stately ships. That gigantic tree that the persevering cutter has with so much labor "tottled from its base," and brought to our market-that mighty tree, "meet for the mast of some tall admiral," has vanished, and where is it? It is in yonder floating structure; it has regained its original and dignified perpendicularity; it is the mast of a ship of one thousand tons; it has come to assist in transporting our produce to a foreign market. Thus our own children labor for us; thus cur own products assist us to export our own products. The position of Savannah in relation to other and surrounding states is a mark of nature's favor, and must in time place her high in the scale of commercial eminence. Florida, on the south, with her shallow streams and incompetent harbors, cannot choose but seek, through her valuable inland passages from Savannah, a larger portion of her foreign trade. The rail-roads commencing at Savannah, and reaching on to the west for the space of three hundred and eighty-three miles, traversing regions of endless variety of products, will soon attain to the Coosa and Tennessee rivers, a distance of four hundred and thirty miles, uninterrupted except by a single portage of inconsiderable length, at Macon; and this link will doubtless be supplied ere long, and one vast chain stretch its formidable and fruitful length from the waters of the Tennessee to the waves of the Atlantic. The same point, viz., the Tennessee River, is reached by another element and other regions, untouched by the first line, find an easy and practicable channel for their trade by the means of the Savannah River to the city of |