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CHAPTER XII....concluded
In reference to the Southern States I had the opinion of an eminent Irishman, one who laid down the highest dignity in the Church for an humble position, in which he is honoured and beloved. His knowledge of the country is intimate and extensive, and his experience goes back more than thirty years. I was anxious to have his opinion as to the suitability of the South for the Irish emigrant, as I knew he had recently been in most of its States; and it is thus given:--
`During my late trip to the South I made various enquiries regarding the prospects there for Irish emigrants. The result of these enquiries was, that a great field was open for them; but I feel convinced that it could scarcely be made useful for them in a temporal or spiritual point of view without more combination and organised efforts than I think it at all likely, at least at present, to be obtained amongst our people, or any parties that could be induced to act for them or to direct them. If such organisation could be effected, I believe the South would offer a better field for emigration than any other part of the country.'
Bishop Lynch insists on `industry and sobriety' as the grand essentials to the Irishman's success in the South: and when I was in Charleston he afforded me the opportunity of witnessing, in the person of a countryman from the county Kildare, as good an illustration as I could desire to behold of the happy exercise of these noble qualities. Some three or four miles outside the city we arrived at a snug prosperous-looking place, a good house surrounded by a farm of rich land, in which acres of vegetables and green crops of various kinds were then in luxuriant growth, being cultivated in a manner that would satisfy even a London market gardener. Twenty-three years ago the owner of this valuable property--worth more than $20,000--arrived in America, with little money in his pocket, but with some knowledge of farming, and a speciality for the cultivation of vegetables. He remained 'knocking about' the northern cities for six months, living from hand to mouth, taking such day work as he could obtain. 'This won't do,' said the boy from Kildare to himself; `it's all well for the day, but there's nothing for the morrow or the next day; I must try and get something to make me independent.'
So in pursuit of independence he came down South, where he entered the employment of a gentleman of famous name in America, but whose parents were both 'full-blooded Irish,' and whose approbation the boy from Kildare won by the success with which he cultivated vegetables and green crops. Had there been a priest or a church within convenient distance, the young Irishman would have willingly remained in his good employment, continuing to lay aside the greater portion of his wages; but as many as eight months would pass before he could gratify the pious longing of his Catholic heart; and so, at length, and much against his will, he quitted the great man's service. With his earnings he came to Charleston--not into the city, unless to say his prayers and make necessary purchases or sales--and set to work, like a sensible Irishman, at the business he best knew. But without entering into the details of years of honest and sober industry, it is sufficient to say that his fine farm is his own property, and that he has given to his children a liberal education. Kindly, good-natured, active and full of health, this man, though now of middle age, is as simple in manner--as natural and as Irish--as he was the day he saw the last of 'Kildare's holy shrine.' Possibly I am somewhat prejudiced in his favour; for a more pleasant cup of tea I never drank in America than that which I received from the hands of his wife--the more pleasant because of a previous and somewhat extended exploration round and thround the famous city of Charleston. A sober man, he was 'not a bit the worse of the climate;' and his looks fully justified his words. This man's capital was industry, intelligence, and good conduct: and in America, perhaps more surely than in any country under the sun, this kind of capital is sure to create the other capital--the dollar and the dollar's worth.
When in Augusta, Georgia, I fell in with perhaps one of the best persons to offer a practical opinion as to the suitability of the South for the settlement of the Irish. Names are not necessary to be mentioned in most instances, but in this instance the name of my authority for the following statement may be given. Mr. H. C. Bryson, from the north of Ireland, has been engaged for forty years in the cotton trade; and he holds that the temperate portions of Alabama, South Carolina, Georgia, and Mississippi, are well suited to the settlement and healthful labour of the Irish. He mentioned many cases in point, where the Irish had settled, gone on prosperously, and maintained the most robust health. One illustration, and that a very striking and comprehensive one, will, however, suffice. In the year 1850, about fifty Irish families, all from the county Tipperary,--Burkes, Keilings, Keatings, Hyneses, Hartys, Mahers, &c.,--made their way down from the North, and settled in Talliafero county, Georgia. They were hard-working, sober people, but amongst them all they did not possess a hundred dollars. One of the men had to bring one of his children on his back, while the other little ones trotted alongside him. In a very short time after, these hard-working, sober people, who would not 'hang about the cities,' were in comfortable circumstances, entirely the result of their labour and industry--that capital which money cannot always purchase. These Irishmen in the South raise corn, cotton, and stock; and in all they do, they are more careful and particular than many of the people around them. Mr. Bryson has often sold from five to ten bales of cotton for each of them, at $125 the bale. 'They are more particular,' says Mr. Bryson, 'and take more pains with their corn and their cotton, than most of their neighbours. They are all strong and hearty; in fact, I never heard of one of them being ill--and I know every man of them well. But this I attribute rather to their frugal life and temperate habits than to any other cause. They have a fine school of their own, and can go to their church as well as the best people in the country; they have good houses, abundance of everything they can desire--and I assure you they could entertain you as well as any men in the State. They are a credit to any country. But the Irishman, when he comes out here, is among the most industrious of all.'
`I think,' adds Mr. Bryson, `that the cotton raised by men of this class--men who work at it themselves, and who have an interest in what they are doing--is the finest grown of any. It is better handled, and more carefully picked, None of these men owned a slave, and so much the better for them; for they have lost nothing by the change, while others lost the greater part of their capital.
I spoke of the health enjoyed by the Irish who are farming. In Locust Grove there are a good many of them, and for the last ten years I don't know of an adult among them dying, save one--for I don't count a poor fellow who came home from the Army of Virginia to die; and that one that I do count was Murdoch Griffin, but he was sixty-eight years old when he died, and he had hard work in his day. Griffin started, about thirty-five years since, without a dollar in his pocket; and when he died his property was worth $70,000 in gold. Any Irishman that goes into the country with his family can do well, and make a fortune.'
This was the testimony of a shrewd observant Northern Irishman,--as good an authority on the subject of which he spoke as could be found in the whole of the United States.
And in the city of Augusta, in which there are several Irish doing a good business, and holding a good position, there is an Irish settlement, known by the name of Dublin, which is occupied by a hard-working, industrious, thrifty, and sober population, to whom the houses and the land on which they stand belong.
An able and experienced Irishman--himself one of the most successful citizens of Memphis, Tennessee--remarked to me one day: 'The trouble is, that the Irish don't go on the land as much as they ought. I never knew an Irishman that pulled up pegs, and went on the land, that did not do well. All have done well that went into the country. It is now the easiest thing in the world to get land, and good land too, at fair terms. Take an example in a man from your own part of Ireland, to show you how an Irishman may purchase a good property here. A man from Cork, a mere labourer, went out to Brownsville, ditching--in other words, fencing, to keep in cattle. That was in 1862. I know that man to have $3,300 in bank, and $1,500 besides; that is, nearly $5,000 in all. He has not yet invested in land, but he intends doing so. He is looking about him, and he will be sure to pick up a splendid thing for the money. This Cork man of yours now hires a couple of negroes, and does work by contract.'
`But the climate?' I enquired.
`Climate!--all nonsense about the climate. Climate! Why, you have more sunstrokes in one month in New York than there are for a whole year in the entire of the South. If a man drinks, the climate will tell on him--may kill him; but if he is a sober man, there is no fear of him. That is my experience; and I have a pretty long one, I can tell you. The land, sir, is the thing--the country the place for our people. The land will give a man everything but coffee, tea, or sugar; these he can buy, and live like a king. I know an Irishman, who was a porter in a hotel, at $25 a month. He went five miles out of the city, and leased forty acres, took a dairy, bought cows, and brought his milk into the city. He is now the owner of eighty acres of valuable land, with a fine house, and every comfort for himself and his family. The land, sir! the land, sir! is the place for our people; tell them so.'
I do not venture to suggest to the Irishman in America, or the Irishman who intends to emigrate to America, to what State of the Union he should go in search of a home. All I say is this: if he is a farmer, a farm-labourer, a peasant--that is, a man born and bred in the country--let him go anywhere, so that he goes out of the city. Turn where he may, he is always sure to find a market for his labour; and having obtained the employment best suited to his knowledge and capacity, he can put by his dollars, and look around him to see if anything in the neighbourhood would suit him, or is within his reach; or if there be no fair opening for him, no prospect of making a home there, then he has only to push on farther, and he will be certain to find the land and the home to his liking. With money in his pocket and strength in his arms, and a determination to employ both to the best advantage, surely there is little fear of the Irishman who desires to make a home for himself in the New World.
In a word, the peasant--the man of the spade, the plough, and the barrow--for the country, the land, the soil. So the artizan, the mechanic, the handycraftsman, for the city, the workshop, the factory--for the place and occupation which are best suited to his skill, his capacity, and his training. One would not, at least ought not, recommend a watchmaker, or an engineer, or a gas-fitter, or a house-painter, or a boiler-maker, to go into the forest and hew down trees, or to the prairie and turn it up with a plough and a team of oxen. The city is their right place. But, even with the mechanic, discrimination is necessary. Young and rising cities may offer better opportunities to the skilled workman than old cities, in which the competition is fierce, the special trade may be overdone, and the cost of living is out of all proportion to the payment, however liberal that may be. In new places the prudent man may secure his lot, or his two lots, even a block, on reasonable terms; and as time goes on--a short time in the States--the town extends, the population increases, and property rises in value; and thus, with comparatively little outlay, a prudent man may become rich, with small trouble and no risk. Then, in rising places, the demand for certain classes of skilled labour is greater, and its remuneration larger, than in places already built and long settled. The prudent artizan may thus have two strings to his bow, and both of them serviceable: he may work at greater advantage, and speculate with greater certainty of profit. There are in America thousands of Irishmen--not a few of them 'millionaires'--who, prudent and far-seeing, have risen with the fortunes of new places, in which they secured a large interest by timely and judicious investment. I have met with several of these men, and I heard from their own lips the story of their good fortune.
Taking all things into consideration, I do not know of any of the States which affords a more favourable illustration of the policy I desire to urge on my countrymen than California; where the Irish, besides being engaged in many profitable pursuits, are also found largely distributed over the land, and where the knowledge of farming which they brought with them from the old country has been turned by them to the best account.
I shall therefore glance at that magnificent State, to ascertain in what position the Irish are there to be found.
END OF CHAPTER XII.
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