Democratic Sentinel, Volume 19, Number 18, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 10 May 1895 — SHARE IN THE PROFIT [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

SHARE IN THE PROFIT

HOW NEGRO FARMERS TILL THE SOUTHERN SOIL Old Plantations Cat Up Into Small Parma, Each Worked by a Tenant Who Pays the Landlord a Portion of the Crops. Measured by Mules. Macon, Ga., correspondence: The tenant system in the cotton belt is unique. Before the war the agricultural sections of the State were divided into extensive plantations—3,ooo, 4,000, 5,000 and sometimes 10,000 acres, owned by one man, under a single management, and worked by gangs of slaves, male and female, directed by overseers, with a “field hand” for every thirty or forty acres, according to the wealth or the generosity of the master. Sometimes they would work fifty acres to a hand, but that was excessive cruelty, and such planters were universally condemned. That system meant 100 slaves for a 3,000-acre plantation, 150 or 160 for a 5,000-acre plantation, and 300 or 400 slaves for 10,000 acres. Nowadays much of the land is allowed to lie idle. The owner retains 200 or 300 acres around his residence

for his own use, and farms the rest of the place, or as much of it as he can, on shares; and the extent of its cultivation is usually governed by the character of the land and the character of the landlord. To a large extent the tenants to-day are the same men and women who lived upon the place as slaves; and they cultivate the same soil as freemen that they did in bondage, some of them being the better and others the worse for the change. And to a remarkable degree the same relations exist between the employer and the employed—the patriarchal system of communism and dependence which is often admirable, but sometimes degrading and oppressive. The uneducated negro is a thoroughly domestic animal, and when he once forms an attachment for a place it is difficult to drive him away. Sometimes the restless, wayward ones wander off from the old plantation and are gone for years, but they will invariably claim a residence there and usually come back sooner or later, and expect to be taken on and given work again. This rule applies only to those plantations where the people were well treated in slave times and since, and where the property has been retained by the same owners. Often when a place is sold, if the negroes do not like the appearance or the behavior of the purchaser, tlfey will evacuate in a bod.v and build cabiqs upon the land of some kindlier man in the neighborhood whom they know, or who may be related to their old master. When the ties of personal attachment ■re cut it does not take them long to move. A couple of men can build a cabin in three or four days with no tools but an ax to hew and trim the wood and a trowel to handle the mortar in building the chimney. It was also the rule for plantations upon which there were hard masters to be entirely abandoned during the war, and when emancipation came, and many of them have never been depopulated. There are many farms in the South upon which po negro is willing to work for any wages or under any conditions. Those farms were the scenes of cruelties during slavery and are cursed—tabooed forever. And there are certain men who can never hire negro labor. If a negro should consent to work for them he would be boycotted by his race; he would be turned out of the church and ostracized in every way. . The prejudices and the vindictiveness of the colored people are as deepo » IS*

rooted as their attachments and their loyalty. But after emancipation a large majority of the slave population in the cotton belt remained in the old cabins or built new ones upon the old plantation, and. their children are now working the lands their fathers and grandfathers tilled, receiving a share of the crop for their labor, or rather, in the way they are pleased to consider it, paying a share of their harvest to the landlord annually for ground rent. Some of the frugal and industrious ones have purchased little farms from their

old misters an<f are constantly adding to their real estate. Some have shown such ability and sagacity that they now own the property on which they worked as slaves—the entire plantation—and now and U»en you hear of an instance where one of these fortunate freemen has given financial aid or a hbtae to his old master er nflstreks or some member of their family wteo ate not too proud to accept charity fronftheir former chattels. i have been told of a colored planter in

the southern part of this State who maintains his former master and mistress in their old mansion just as they lived, although perhaps not so luxuriously, when he was thelr 'slare, while he resides in a more modest structure on another part of the place. They are childless and feebleminded, and one of their delusions, which he permits them to enjoy and impose upon their friends, is that they still own the old plantation, and that he is their overseer or agent tn charge. Farms are not rented by acres and very rarely for cash, and there is seldom any lease or contract or memorandum. Between white and black men such papers are unknown. The unwritten laws of leasehold are the same all over this section, and have been unchanged since the war. Business follows a universal custom and is conducted entirely upon faith and the knowledge of the habits of men. There are one-mule farms and two-mule farms and four-mule farms. Area is not measured by acres nor by the labor of men, but by the number of mules employed. A negro rents from his old master or his landlord as much land as he can cultivate with one mule, and the annual rental is one bale of cotton. If he has two mules he takes as much land as he can cultivate with them, and the rental is two bales of cotton, and so on. A one-mule farm is usually about forty acres, and a twomule farm from eighty to a hundred acres.

A man can cultivate more than twice as much land with two mules as with one, because he has two or three “hands” to help him, and their combined effort can accomplish more than if they are working independently. Men, women, boys and girls work in the fields together, aud they plow also with steers, cows and heifers; but in estimating the rental nothing but a mule or a horse counts. In addition to the land the tenant receives credit from his landlord, or from some supply store upon the latter’s indorsement, to the extent of $4 a month, or S4B a year, for every mule he works. That buys his seed, his fertilizer, his implements and tools and necessaries of life, such as sugar, tea, coffee and tobacco for his family. The rest of his food he is supposed to raise himself, and he

wants little more than cornmeal, bacon, eggs, chickens and the vegetables of his garden. At the end of the season all the crop is taken to the gin house—there is one upon almost every plantation—where, after the cotton is ginned, the landlord first takes out enough to settle the store account and his own bale or bales for rental. Then the tenant has what is left to dispose of as he pleases. It may be five bales or two or half a bale, or there may be nothing whatever coming to him for the whole season’s labor. With a good crop he ought to harvest from six to ten bales on a one-mule farm, with an ordinary crop from four to six, but sometimes there is a failure and he finds himself in debt both to his landlord and at the store. But if there is any cotton the landlord gets it. A bale of cotton averages 500 pounds and the price at the gin house varies from 5 to 7 cents a pound. Usually the colored tenant lets his cotton go with the rest, and receives his pay when the landlord sells his own. It may be in the winter, or perhaps in the spring; but it is a matter of faith. Sometimes he sells out to his landlord at current rates as soon as the cotton is weighed, and sometimes he hauls his bales to town one after another and gets what he can for them. All the family usually go to town together when the cotton money is due and units in the pleasure of its disbursement. They do not expect or intend to save anything. They will not go home as long as a penny remains. The old woman and the girls want new dresses, shoes, hats and bright ribbons. The old man wants cloth for some new shirts or a pair of shoes. He seldom buys a hat or a coat. He gets those garments from his old master or his landlord, and as they are worn on Sundays and holidays only they last for years. When the necessaries are purchased.

and they are very few, the esthetic fancies of the family run riot. Confectionery and cologne are bought first. They may properly be included with the necessaries of life. Then they invest in tinsel jewelry and bright-colored fans, photograph albums, for which they have no photographs; books, with showy bindings’ which they cannot read; clocks, from which they cannot tell the time, and piaster images, pillow shams, embroidered counterpanes and fancy table cloths;

bright-colored pictures in gilt or silver frames and every variety of article that please the eye and the palate. Then, when the cotton money is expended, the entire resources of the family are exhausted, and the remainder of the year they live upon credit or upon little things they

can sell. Perhaps the old man will cut a load of wood and trade it for dry goods or groceries, or the old woman will save up her eggs and chickens and take them to town, but such sources of supply are meager and unreliable.

A GEORGIA COTTON GIN.

A PRIMITIVE COTTON PRESS.

A LOAD OF GEORGIA PRODUCE.

A COTTOS PICKER.

A GEORGIA FAMILY AT HOME.