and sure foundation, with prospect of continued prosperity. In Upper
Canada, most things appear to be on an artificial footing, and must
consequently experience change. The States present a wider and a better
field for the exercise of industry than Upper Canada; and the British
emigrant, who must live by his own exertions, makes a sacrifice of his
immediate interests, and in all probability the interests of his
posterity, by preferring Upper Canada to the United States as a place of
settlement.
Many people may prefer Canada to the States, from having friends already
settled there. Such a reason is not creditable to their friends in
Britain, whom they leave behind. The person who makes up his mind to
leave the place of his nativity, ought to employ his industry and
capital in the best field, and endeavour to bring his friends who may
have settled less fortunately to him.
CHAPTER VIII.
_Illinois—Climate—Face of the
country—Prairies—Soil—Salt—Lead—Iron—Coal—Water
Communication—History—Towns—Government—Education—Kentucky
Population—New Englanders—Pioneers—Manners and Customs._
Some of the western United States, forming part of the extensive and
fertile valley of the Mississippi, are so different in character from
the Eastern States and the Canadas for agricultural emigration, as to
merit particular consideration. The region alluded to lies north of
latitude 38°, and from 7° of west longitude from Washington to the rocky
mountains. Much of this tract is imperfectly known, having never perhaps
been trod by civilized man, and embraces the states of Indiana,
Illinois, Missouri, and the Michigan, North-west, and Missouri
territories. My personal observation extended to a portion of four of
the mentioned divisions, which enabled me to form an opinion of their
characteristics, which are said to be pretty uniform; and for the sake
of precision Illinois shall be noticed.
The State of Illinois extends from north latitude 37° to 42½°, and from
west longitude 10° 35′ to 14° 25′. It is bounded on the south by the
river Ohio, on the west by the Mississippi, on the north by the
north-west territory, and on the east by lake Michigan and Indiana. The
length is 382 miles, the area 57,900 square miles, or 37,056,000 acres,
which is nearly the size of England and Wales.
The climate of Illinois partakes of the general character of North
America, but from the absence of hills, and small elevation above the
level of the sea, this region is milder than any other of the same
latitude, The winter in the southern parts seldom exceeds six weeks. At
Shawneetown, which is in the southern part of the State, the average
temperature of July, in 1819, was 87°, of December 43°, and the mean
annual temperature 64°. At Prairies des Chiens, which is a few miles
beyond the northern boundary of the State, the temperature in July 1820
was 74°, in December 16°, and the average of the year 48° 5ʹ.[6]
Footnote 6:
Melish’s View of the United States.
The diseases in Illinois are such as are common to the upper Mississippi
valley, amongst which intermitting and remitting bilious fevers often
occur. From the variations of temperature, inflammatory complaints and
diseases of the lungs are frequent in this and almost every other part
of North America. I met several young men, suffering under consumption,
travelling in the steam-boats of the west, although this malady is much
more frequent in the eastern states. By an official report of the deaths
in the city of New York, from 24th November to 1st December, 1832, in a
newspaper lying before me, 14 cases of consumption, out of a total of
92, are recorded, which is the highest number of any disease on the
list; and the same paper states 5 of consumption, out of 62, at
Philadelphia, which occurred during the previous week. Fever, dyspepsia,
and consumption, are the maladies of Illinois, the two first being most
common in the south, and the latter in the north. The health of an
emigrant may, in some measure, be preserved by care. Exposure to sudden
changes of temperature without proper clothing, and uncomfortable houses
in inclement weather, seldom fail of engendering disease.
The mouth of the Ohio, in the south-west angle of the state, being about
300 feet above the level of the sea, and lake Michigan, in the
north-east angle, being 589 feet, while there is no range of hills or
elevated ground intervening, the surface of the country must necessarily
be level, which is more particularly the case towards the southern part
of the state. The rivers, which intersect the country in every
direction, have formed deep channels for the conveyance of water, and no
great extent of the surface is marshy. The space which I travelled over
on foot, between Chicago, on lake Michigan, and the village of
Springfield in Sangamon county, a distance of about 200 miles, the
surface, with exception of a few miles at the commencement and
termination of the journey, was undulating, the swells being long and
considerable, without a lake, pond, or marsh being visible, except in
one instance. On approaching Springfield, the surface became level
without being wet, and from this village until I crossed the Mississippi
the wettest parts of the surface might have been rendered dry by the
ordinary means of ditching.
The feature in the surface of Illinois, which chiefly distinguishes it
from the eastern states and the Canadas, is the prairies, or tracts
which are free from timber. I imagine prairies to be natural
productions; they may be termed grass fields, and are of every size and
shape, being separated from each other by tracts of forest. Americans,
whose ideas of an uninhabited country are associated with interminable
forests, have speculated on the origin of prairies, which they regard as
an anomaly in nature, and assign their existence to man. A Scotchman,
accustomed to the bleak naked mountains, and artificial forests of his
own country, may take an opposite view of a prairie, and support his
opinion by the state of the earth’s surface after the flood, which would
be without trees. But the forest and prairie surfaces of Illinois stand
in the relation of water and land on the face of the earth, both being
the handiwork of nature, and forming bays, peninsulas, straits,
isthmuses, lakes, islands, and every other form of outline which charm
the eye and delight the imagination. To the individual who has long been
immured in the forest, the effect of prairie scenery is enchanting; and
the inhabitant of a cultivated and thickly peopled country, who can gaze
on the lovely, the lonely, and the rich prairies of Illinois without
emotion towards God and his fellow-creatures must be void of feeling.
The different published accounts of Illinois represent one-half of the
surface of the state to be prairie, but it is probable none of the
writers, or any one individual, has had a proper opportunity of forming
an opinion on the subject. In the course of my journey,
nineteen-twentieths of the country appeared to be prairie; but the
forest tract is chiefly in the south, which I did not visit. It is
however certain a vast extent of prairie lies north of latitude 39°. An
English traveller informed me he found the prairie country unchanged 500
miles to the west of Illinois. And if such is the case, its breadth in
latitude 40° will exceed 1000 miles.
There is a considerable extent of the surface thinly covered with trees,
interspersed with the same kind of herbage as clothes the prairies,
called barrens, or oak-openings, from the wood which grows on them. They
may either be considered thin forest, or wooded prairie, as they partake
of the nature of both; but in an agricultural point of view, they must
be classed as prairie, from the herbage they afford. The soil of
Illinois, like many other parts of the world which has come under my
notice, is variable, and the different habitations of the varieties of
sunflower and other tall-growing plants, often distinctly marked changes
of soil on the prairie. The prevailing soil between Chicago and
Springfield, was black sandy loam, and occasionally considerable tracts
of clay or heavy loam intervened. In this distance of nearly 200 miles,
I did not pass over, in all, 10 miles of bad soil, which was light
coloured sand. The surface, which is forest, oak-openings, or prairie,
has no relation to quality of soil, all of which abound with soils of
every description.
On no part of the prairie did I observe heath, or other thriftless
vegetation, occupying the entire surface, with exception of a dwarfish
species of hazel, in a few instances, to a limited extent. Besides the
many beautiful flowering plants which adorn the prairies, they are
covered with four or five tall-growing kinds of grass, and the moist and
dry soils could be distinguished by the luxuriance of different species.
From the grass attaining between three and four feet in height, and
being seared by a powerful sun, the surface of the prairies is scorched
by fire every autumn, originating by human, and, it is presumed, also
occasionally by natural means. The annual burning seems to have
destroyed all the grasses which possess fibrous roots, and are
propagated by seed; those which at present exist having strong roots,
which resist the effects of fire, and propagate themselves without seed.
This property of the grasses is illustrative of the economy of nature,
by furnishing plants for every situation and circumstance that may
arise. The burning is not attended with much danger, as the turning of
one or two sods by the plough is deemed a sufficient protection against
fire for a hay stack in the midst of the prairie; and the inhabitants
either save their buildings by this means, or by burning the grass
immediately around them, before the general conflagration takes place.
The burning, in all probability, is conducive to health, by consuming
vegetation, which would otherwise putrify on the surface, and by
checking the luxuriance of its growth, which the unconsumed matter would
produce by natural decay. There is a ruling Providence in every thing!
The mineral productions of the state have been imperfectly explored.
Salt is manufactured in many situations. Near Shawneetown is the most
extensive establishment, where about 138,000 bushels are made yearly.
Salt is also made in the neighbourhood of Brownsville, in Madison
county, and in other parts. The saline reservations given to the state,
by the general government, consist of 206,128 acres. One of the most
remarkable gifts which bountiful nature has lavished on the valley of
the Mississippi, appears to me to be the inexhaustible supply of salt
water. The government of the country seem fully to appreciate the gift,
and have wisely made the springs public property, by which the community
will obtain the indispensable article of salt at the cheapest rate.
Lead abounds in the north-east angle of the state, in the neighbourhood
of Galena. The mineral is found on both sides of the Mississippi, and
supposed to extend over several thousand square miles. The ore is found
in detached masses, and not in veins, which renders the digging a matter
of chance. The quantity of lead manufactured here, in 1829, was
13,343,150 lbs.; and the population of the region is stated at
10,000.[7] There are also lead diggings in the State of Missouri, about
70 miles south-west of St Louis, and which were wrought by the French
about a century ago. The price of lead, at Galena, is from 2 to 3 cents
per lb. When at Springfield, I met a young gentleman from Leith, in
Scotland, who had travelled by way of New York, the Erie canal, and lake
Michigan, provided with a considerable quantity of shot, which he
imagined the country could not furnish.
Footnote 7:
Guide to the valley of Mississippi. Philadelphia, 1832.
Iron ore is said to exist in the southern part of the state; and copper
ore in the lead region around Galena. But I believe neither of them have
been manufactured.
Coal, of bituminous quality, has been found on the banks of the
principal rivers, in different parts of the state, and, from having been
seen on the banks of the river Missouri, it is supposed to extend over
the whole of the upper part of the Mississippi valley. But, in the
present state of the country, no particular examination of the field has
been made. Coal has, however, been wrought in many places on the banks
of rivers by quarrying; and is found above the level of the waters.
Several steam-mills, at St Louis, use coal for fuel.
Iron is manufactured in Wabash county, and limestone is found over the
whole State. I observed abundance of sandstone in the channel of the
Illinois; and perhaps almost every mineral which is useful to man will
be found on examination.
Illinois is favourably situated for water communication, the interior of
the state being intersected by the Kaskaskia, Rock, and Illinois rivers,
which are navigable at all seasons of the year. The State is said to
contain between three and four thousand miles of boatable waters, a
description of navigation which cannot be well defined, as every rill,
in so level a country, will float a boat of small size, on melting of
the snow in spring. There is no doubt, however, of the water
communication being extensive, which will be farther improved by
connecting the navigable point of the Illinois with lake Michigan. To
the formation of a canal for this purpose, Congress granted the State
480,000 acres of land. The undertaking has not been commenced; and the
extent of rock discovered in the intended line, may render a railroad
necessary. The navigable rivers Wabash, Ohio, and Mississippi form the
boundaries of three sides, and lake Michigan is on the fourth. The
external communication is as remarkable as the internal.
The Mississippi connects the State of Illinois with New Orleans to the
south; the Ohio opens a communication with Baltimore, Philadelphia, and
New York to the west. To the north, lake Michigan communicates with lake
Superior and the world of waters which flow into the gulf of St
Lawrence. The western communication, by the Missouri, is only limited by
civilisation, a steam-boat belonging to the American Fur Company having
sailed 1400 miles up the river, from its junction with the Mississippi.
So little is known about the western sources of the Missouri, that the
limits of navigation, in this direction, must at present be conjectural;
and it does not seem to require a stretch of imagination to conceive, as
population advances, a communication opened between the head waters of
this river and the Pacific ocean. Should such an event take place, the
empires of China, Japan, and Russia will be brought near, and Illinois
become one of the most central and favourable trading situations in the
world.
Illinois was originally discovered by the French, who penetrated by way
of Canada, in 1673. They founded the villages of Kaskaskia, Cahokia, and
others in 1683. When the country became part of the United States, it
formed part of the territory north-west of the Ohio. In 1801, it was
included with Indiana as a territory. In 1809, it was made a separate
territory. And became one of the United States in 1818.
In so recent a settled country, large towns cannot be expected to be
found. Vandalia is the capital, and, like other capitals, situated near
the centre of the state. It stands on the western bank of the Kaskaskia,
and was founded in 1821. The population is stated at 500 souls.
Shawneetown on the Ohio, about nine miles below the mouth of the Wabash,
is the largest town in the State. A number of thriving villages are
rising in every direction, and will acquire population according to
their situations for trade. Galena, situated on Fever river, a few miles
above its junction with the Mississippi, and in the north-west corner of
the State, will rise into importance, from the manufacture of lead in
the neighbourhood. One hundred steam-boat arrivals at this place are
said to have occurred within the year. Chicago on lake Michigan, and
Ottawa on the Illinois, from being situated at the termination of the
communication connecting these waters, will become important places.
Alton, situated on the Mississippi, one mile above the mouth of the
Missouri, and sixteen below the entrance of the Illinois, is centrically
situated for trade, and is soon likely to become the chief shipping port
of the State.
The legislature of Illinois is vested in a General Assembly, consisting
of a Senate and House of Representatives. The members of Senate are
elected for four years, and the representatives for two years. The pay
of the members of each branch of the legislature is $3 a-day. The right
of suffrage is vested in all free whites twenty-one years of age, and
who have resided six months in the State. The votes are given _viva
voce_.[8]
Footnote 8:
Mellish’s View.
The executive is vested in a governor and lieutenant-governor, both
elected for four years. The governor’s salary is $1000, or L.212, 10s.
sterling a-year.
The judiciary consists of a chief-justice, and three associate-judges,
who hold circuit courts. Their salaries are $1000 each.
The taxes are levied by three commissioners in each county. Justices of
the peace are elected by the people every four years, and their
jurisdiction extends over inferior cases. Each county has a judge of
probate, before whom business relating to wills is transacted.
There is no imprisonment for debt, except in case of fraud or refusal on
the part of the debtor to deliver up his property for the behoof of his
creditors. There are no usury laws. And slavery is not allowed since the
adoption of the constitution.
There are fifty-eight counties, and a considerable portion of the
northern part of the State has not been surveyed, which was sold by the
Indians in 1833. The population, in 1800, consisted of 12,282. In 1830,
there were 157,445 inhabitants; and, from the recent emigration, their
numbers must now exceed 200,000.
Congress granted to the State, for the purposes of education, one
thirty-sixth part of the public land, or 977,457 acres, and 3 per cent
on the sales of land. So there can be no doubt of an efficient system of
common free schools being established, wherever the wants of the
population require them. Besides the grant for common schools, 46,080
acres of land have been granted for colleges. Such an institution was
established at Jacksonville in 1829.
The population of Illinois embraces settlers from almost every State in
the Union, and every country in Europe. The inhabitants of the south,
are understood to have come from Kentucky, a slave-holding State, and
were induced to settle in this district from their dislike of slavery.
The emigrating Kentuckians approving of slavery, take up their residence
in the adjoining State of Missouri, where this bondage is tolerated. The
Kentuckians possess different dispositions from the inhabitants of the
other States, and, like the New Englanders, they seem to inherit the
characters of their forefathers. The first settlers of Kentucky, for a
period of between thirty and forty years, waged a cruel and savage
warfare with the Indians. Many thousands perished in the strife, and the
features which such a mode of life could not fail of imparting to their
characters, have descended, with some modification, to their progeny.
The Kentuckians of the present day are men of warm temperament,
high-souled, and fearless; but, at the same time, generous and
hospitable in the extreme. They have been termed the Irishmen of
America. With ill-regulated tempers, they can have little medium of
character, and will be good or bad members of society, according to the
principles they have imbibed. The Kentuckians are said to go armed with
knives, a practice which is thought to be on the decline, and which I
cannot corroborate from observation. This practice has in all
probability descended from the first settlers, and would originate from
the unfortunate circumstances in which they were placed. A few boys in
Britain, who mistake true honour and courage, provide themselves with
pistols and sword-sticks. Perhaps only the fiery youths of Kentucky wear
knives.
In the northern part of Illinois almost all the inhabitants appeared to
have come from New England, and possessed the characteristics of that
people. During my intercourse with them I received some impressions of
their dispositions and movements at variance with what I had been led to
expect. It has been usual to represent this people void of the best
feelings of humanity—the parent with little affection for his
offspring—the boy without filial love, impatient of restraint, and
scampering off from school to obtain independence in the distant
wilderness. But when I found many unmarried young men, after twelve
months’ residence in Illinois, anxiously expecting the arrival of their
parents from New England, and had travelled with old people journeying
from that country to join their sons in Illinois, I attributed the
moving of youth to the western districts to the best of motives, and
assigned to both parties the feelings of domestic affection. The youth
of Britain do not engage in the bustle of the world so early as the
Americans, and family intercourse is consequently more enduring. But it
is the difficulty of earning a subsistence and not affection, which
binds the young men of Britain to the roof of their parents, and in all
probability the emotions of the heart are the same in both countries.
A class of men are said to precede civilisation in America, called
pioneers or squatters, and have been described by travellers as
demi-savages, blackened with iniquity, and shunning their fellow
mortals, by moving to a more remote station, as settlers advance. It is
probable such beings did at one time exist, and may still occasionally
be met with in the lower part of the Mississippi valley. They may be
supposed to have originated in such a state of things as occurred at the
first settlement of Kentucky, and perhaps were altogether confined to
the latitude of this State. In the present day, when the east is densely
peopled, and civilisation in the region of Illinois has reached an open
country, desperate characters are more likely to find subsistence and
concealment in the crowded city than in the prairie. Be this as it may,
there are no such characters in the northern parts of Illinois as the
pioneers of old, and I regard the present frontier men of the prairie as
one of the best and most enterprising portions of the western
population.
The manners and customs of Illinois have been described by Mr Stuart in
his “Three Years in North America,” in terms and spirit so different
from almost any thing that is noticed in the work, that I shall quote
part of his remarks.
“I made enquiry on the road from some passengers, as to the hotels at
Jacksonville, and was told there were two, neither of them good, but
that Bentley’s was the best. I found, on going into the house, that the
tea and supper were nearly finished; and it was not without some
difficulty, and rather uninviting looks from a young lady who was acting
as waiter, that I procured a fresh supply of coffee and eggs. This was
Saturday evening, and the young ladies, after having cleared the table
and again covered it with the necessary articles, sat down to their meal
with me, on a footing of the most perfect equality. I found them very
inquisitive, far more so than any of the New Englanders I ever met with,
but I afterwards learned that these people had lately come from a remote
part of the country, where probably there were no schools. Such silly
conduct, in respect to their own interest, as they were guilty of during
the forty-eight hours I remained with them, is generally the offspring
of ignorance. I found the hotel-keeper a masterpiece of rudeness, and
very soon got a candle and retired to my bedroom. I was told the
breakfast hour was half past seven, but I started from my pillow on the
following morning at six, when I heard other people stirring so early,
and the breakfast had commenced before I was able to get to the parlour.
I asked how this happened; but I found from the answer that it was quite
unnecessary to have any farther discussion with such a barbarian as
Squire Bentley. He did not care for the customs of the British. His
forefathers had left England to avoid tyranny, and they did not care for
seeing foreigners here.
“The tea and supper at the hotel in the evening was even a more
ridiculously managed meal, than any of those which preceded it. The
female waiter, it being Sunday evening, was particularly smartly
dressed, and sat at the end of the table and at some distance from it,
much more intent on placing one leg above the other in a proper position
for showing her foot and ankle than in giving the necessary attendance
at the tea-table—but she was such a good-humoured ‘romp-loving looking
Miss,’ that though she did any thing rather than attend to her duty, I
believe she was the most popular of all the hotel family with the
strangers. Every thing was bad, and the hotel people completely lost
temper when they noticed that we did not even find fault with them, but
laughed at the absurdity of being so treated. Even the bread was
execrable—a most uncommon occurrence in the United States. I soon left
the supper-table, and when sitting in my thinly boarded room, heard the
landlord tell a traveller who had recently arrived, at ten minutes past
nine in the evening, that he must go to bed—he could not wait longer to
show him his room. Candlesticks seemed never to have been
cleaned—snuffers were wanting—and as for shoes, there was no one to
clean them while I was in the house.
“At an early hour on the following morning, the 3d May, I left
Jacksonville, not without thanking Tom Bentley for his civility, and
telling him how utterly unfit he was for his situation.
“Springfield is a straggling village, somewhat longer than Jacksonville,
but the situation is not at all equal to it in point of beauty or
interest. The hotel was very nearly as bad as that at Jacksonville.
Hornden was the name of the landlord. It was difficult to say whether
he, his wife, or his daughter was the sauciest. They certainly were as
rude untutored Americans as I have seen. The lady undertook to wash some
linen for me, and there was no difficulty about it—as I got to her house
early in the afternoon—but she delayed and delayed so, that I was
obliged to carry them away only half dried next morning after seven
o’clock.”
It was my fortune to visit Springfield and Jacksonville, without being
aware at the time of Mr Stuart’s remarks, and my treatment seems to have
been very different from what he describes. At Springfield I put up at
the hotel in which Mr Stuart lodged, and refer to page 241 for the
particulars of my reception. In the interval between his excursion and
mine, the hotel had changed proprietors—and I found no difficulty in
getting linens washed and shoes cleaned. Every individual connected with
the house was attentive and civil.
My intercourse with Jacksonville was of short duration, and I have no
means of ascertaining if I entered Bentley’s hotel. The house in which I
took coffee was situated on the north side of the square, and in all
respects greatly superior to the hotel at Springfield. A smart waiter
attended the stage passengers during coffee, and the hotel keeper
himself was looking after his business at 2 o’clock in the morning, when
the mail started with us.
Mr Stuart mentions two female waiters having seated themselves at table
with him at Jacksonville, “on a footing of the most perfect equality.”
Throughout the whole of my intercourse with the United States, no female
waiter or help of any degree seated herself at table, or even in the
room of a hotel when I was present, and I am unable to determine whether
this was the result of accident or design. Perhaps the young ladies may
have disdained to honour me with their company. Mr Stuart’s treatment on
his arrival at Jacksonville, admits of easy explanation. By his own
account, “on going into the house tea and supper were nearly finished,”
and it was with some difficulty he was admitted to a second table, at
which the establishments of western hotels sit down. Mr Stuart had
refused to seat himself with the rest of the company at the first table,
and in fairness ought to be considered an obtruder at the second one. On
his arrival he plainly showed that he considered himself somewhat
different from the guests of the hotel, by not sitting down at table. If
inferior to them it was right he should mess with the establishment, and
if he had assumed superiority over them, it was right so to punish his
arrogance. In either case he met with his desert. Travellers in America
may derive instruction from his fate. The individual who moves,
snail-like, in a foreign land, canopied with the manners and customs of
his own country, and marking his route with the slime of prejudice, need
not expect civility from the inhabitants.
It is quite evident Mr Stuart had been playing the _great man_ in this
part of the country. His demand of fresh coffee and eggs in the evening,
his questions about breakfast next morning, his allegation that “the
hotel people completely lost temper when they noticed that we did not
even find fault with them,” and that the female waiter put forth her
foot and ankle for his admiration, all denote in a high degree
self-importance.
In the seventh chapter of Mr Stuart’s work there is the following
extract from Professor Silliman, when alluding to an inn in Connecticut.
“This is a peculiarity in the manners of this country not easily
understood by a foreigner, and especially by an Englishman. Such a
person, if uninstructed in the genius of the country, almost of course
presumes that all those he sees in public houses are in servile
situations. If he adopt towards them imperious and harsh language he
gives offence, and produces coldness and possibly resentment, so that
the interview ends in mutual dissatisfaction. If the traveller should
write a book he of course enlarges on the rudeness of American manners,
and it is very possible that even the servants of our inns may give him
some occasion for such remarks, if they are treated as persons of their
condition commonly are in Europe.” Mr Stuart seems to have forgotten
this sensible quotation while in Illinois, and I have no doubt had
himself to blame for any rudeness he may have experienced. The heart is
the source of true politeness, which is often better conveyed by
expression of feature or tone of voice, than by words or gestures. The
possessor of such civility is incapable of, and invulnerable to,
rudeness, and will be well received in every part of the world. At the
time Mr Stuart told Tom Bentley “how utterly unfit he was for his
situation,” he himself committed a flagrant outrage on decorum, and
justly merited any treatment that could have been bestowed on him. There
is a ludicrous anecdote related at Springfield of his demands on
Hornden, which, if true, shows how unlikely it was any American landlord
could comply with them.
The manners and customs of a people, like objects in a landscape, may be
coloured by the medium of vision, and they will not only appear
different to individuals, but seemingly vary to the same individual
according as his feelings may alter. It is evident Mr Stuart was out of
humour both at Jacksonville and Springfield, and could not have been a
dispassionate judge of what was passing around him. His situation and
mine in Illinois must have been very different. He had travelled for
some time before in slave-holding countries, where he had fared
sumptuously on canvass-backed ducks and other delicacies, attended by
crouching and despised creatures. For many weeks I had sojourned in the
rudest parts of Upper Canada, Indiana, and Illinois, leading a
demi-savage life, and faring, as it were, by the way sides. He was
travelling with a carriage and pair, accompanied by a store of venison
hams, and whisky. I trudged on foot, quenching my thirst with
indifferent water, and occasionally satisfying my hunger with nuts.
Jacksonville and Springfield must necessarily have presented less
refinement, luxury, and humiliation than he had been accustomed to, and
more civilisation and comfort than I had for some time experienced. From
the state of my feelings consequent on such a transition, it is possible
I may have seen things in too favourable a light, and the truth may
perhaps be found to lie somewhere between Mr Stuart’s account and mine.
Referring to what has been stated at pages 400, 401, and 403, regarding
the amount of the population of the United States, and the progress of
wealth and refinement, it would be unreasonable to expect luxury in so
young a country as Illinois, or to subject the manners and customs of
its inhabitants to serious criticism. Indeed it will appear evident to
every reflecting mind, that such a motley population, scattered over an
extensive territory, cannot yet have amalgamated in feeling or custom,
and that the manners of the different parts of the state will be as
varied as the origin of their population. Rudeness and vulgarity are not
attributes of the native population of the United States; and if found
in Illinois, they must be imports from foreign countries. The
circumstances of the State with regard to refinement are favourable to
young men entering on life. But every emigrant on leaving Britain must
lay his account with a change, to whatever part of the world he
proceeds; and if he dislike the manners of the people of Illinois, he
can live in retirement.
CHAPTER IX.
_Productions—Animals—Fowls—Country for Sporting—Mode of Selling
Land—Unsold Public Land—Number of Indians—Government
policy towards the Indians— War with Indians—Decrease of
Population—Agriculture—Wages of Labour—Illinois and Upper Canada._
The productions of Illinois are numerous, including wheat, Indian corn,
tobacco, Irish and sweet potatoes, and the castor bean from which oil is
expressed. Cotton and wine are said to be productions of the southern
parts. Almost every kind of fruit attains perfection. Honey is obtained
in great quantities both from wild and domesticated bees, which gather
sweets from the prairie flowers.
The wild animals include bears; grey, black, and prairie wolves; two
varieties of the fox; rabbits, &c. &c. Deer are very numerous throughout
the state. The hare is not found in North America.
The wild-fowl embrace geese, ducks, turkeys, and quails in endless
numbers. The ruffed grouse, or prairie hen, is very plentiful, and one
of the finest of game birds. While walking from Chicago I observed them
often singly, and seldom more than two or three together. In the
neighbourhood of Springfield they were in flocks of from sixty to
seventy, scattered over a considerable space while feeding, and, when
disturbed, rising on wing without concert, in the manner of the British
pheasant.
The prairies of Illinois seem to me the only good sporting country I saw
in America. The ruffed grouse, in size and mode of flying, resemble the
black-cock of Britain, and are every where in great numbers. Quails may
be as easily shot as sparrows in England, and there are abundance of
deer. Fox-hunting might be pursued at a rattling pace over the prairie,
which does not present an interruption of any description, and would
literally form a fox-race. The deer and prairie wolf might be hunted
with dogs, or shot, according to fancy. I recommend the upper
Mississippi valley to British sportsmen, as a country likely to afford
them amusement and instruction. A person may cross the Atlantic with a
brace of dogs in one of the best vessels, and travel to the prairies,
and devote a year to the excursion, living in the best style the country
affords, for the sum of L.200 sterling. If he were economical in
crossing the ocean, and living with settlers, and serving himself while
in Illinois, the expense would be under L.120.
The mode of selling government land in Illinois, is the same as in the
other parts of the Union. When a tract has been surveyed, and brought
into the market for settlement, it is advertised, and a day and place of
sale fixed. Lots are put up and sold to the highest bidder for ready
money. The tracts generally consist of millions of acres, and the sale
is continued from day to day while individuals call for particular lots.
When purchasers are satisfied, a public land-office is opened for the
sale of the remainder, the price of which is invariably $1¼, or 5s. 3¾d.
sterling per acre. A person wishing land goes to the land-office and
selects any lot which pleases him. There is no form of application or
interest necessary, title-deeds and possession being immediately
obtained on payment of the purchase money. Government land is never sold
on credit, and there is no fee of office, nor any other expense, on
receiving titles.
Formerly the price of land was $2 per acre; one-fourth was paid at the
time of purchase, one-fourth at the end of two years, one-fourth at
three years, and the remaining fourth at four years. It was, however,
found that much of the price of land sold on credit could not be
recovered. An act of Congress was passed, limiting the price in future
to $1¼ per acre, ready money, and the purchasers in arrears were
dispossessed of a part of their lands. With this example on record, it
may appear somewhat singular that land should continue to be sold on
credit in Canada. It seems, however, the policy in that country to
enrich the aristocracy at the expense of the poor; and selling
high-priced land on credit is one of the most effectual means that could
be adopted.
There were 28,237,850 acres of unsold public land in Illinois in 1832,
and upwards of 3,000,000 acres recently sold by the Pottowatomy Indians
have since come into the market. By far the greater portion of this
extensive surface is prairie, on which cattle and sheep might be
pastured without challenge, and the whole is open to the selection of
settlers.
The following estimate of unoccupied land, belonging to the United
States Government, is taken from Mellish’s View, published in 1822.
ACRES.
Ohio, 9,000,000
Indiana, 10,000,000
Illinois, 30,000,000
Missouri, 15,000,000
Alabama, 12,000,000
Mississippi, 6,000,000
Louisiana, 10,000,000
Michigan territory, 4,000,000
North-west territory, 2,000,000
Arkansas territory, 15,000,000
———————————
Total, 113,000,000
In addition to the public lands above stated, the United States hold the
preemption right, or exclusive right of purchasing from the Indians
tracts lying in several of the States and territories mentioned, and in
the immense territory of Missouri, the aggregate extent of which may be
stated at not less than 1,000,000,000 acres.
The number of Indians in the valley of the Mississippi, which includes
nearly all that reside on the United States’ territory, is not
accurately known. The following estimate is taken from a Philadelphia
publication of 1832, entitled, “View of the valley of the Mississippi.”
Creeks, 22,500
Choctaws, 18,000
Cherokees, 14,500
Seminoles, 4,000
Chickasaws, 3,500
Sioux, 25,000
Chippeways, 6,000
Blackfeet, 5,000
Assinaboins, 8,000
Pottowatomies, 6,500
Pawnees, 6,500
Omahas and Otoes, 3,180
Delawares, 1,600
Shawanese, 6,350
Kansas, 1,500
Osages, 6,500
Senecas, 400
Senecas and Shawanese, 320
Miamis, 1,000
Wyandots, 450
Kickapoos, 1,800
Peorias, Piankashaws, Weas, and Kaskaskias, 1,000
Wimebagos, 5,300
Sacs, 6,300
Menomonies, 4,000
Crows, 4,500
Arripahas, 4,000
Crees, 3,000
Ottawas, 4,000
Algonquins, 3,000
And about twenty other small tribes, including Mandans,
Arickarees, &c. &c., 25,000
———————
Total, 202,700
As the settlement and future prospects of Illinois are connected with
the Indians, the policy of the United States Government towards them may
be explained by extracts from a report of the Secretary of War to the
President, dated November 25, 1832:—“In the practice of European
states,” says President Adams, “before our revolution, the Indians had
been considered as children, to be governed as tenants at discretion, to
be dispossessed as occasion may require, as hunters to be indemnified by
trifling concessions for removal from the grounds upon which their game
was extirpated. In changing the system it would seem as if a full
contemplation of the consequences of the change had not been taken. We
have been far more successful in the acquisition of their lands than
imparting to them the principles, or inspiring them with the spirit of
civilisation. But in apportioning to ourselves their hunting grounds, we
have brought on ourselves the obligation of providing them with
subsistence; and when we have had the rare good fortune of teaching them
the arts of civilisation and the doctrines of Christianity, we have
unexpectedly found them forming, in the midst of ourselves, communities,
claiming to be independent of ours, and rivals of sovereignty, within
the territories of the members of the Union. This state of things
requires that a remedy should be provided—a remedy which, while it shall
do justice to the unfortunate children of nature, may secure to the
members of our confederation their rights of sovereignty and of soil. As
an outline of a project to that effect, the views presented in the
report of the Secretary of War are recommended to the consideration of
Congress.
“The most important feature in the present policy of the Government, as
connected with this people, is to be found in the efforts that are
making to remove them beyond the limits of the States and organized
territories. A very extensive tract of country, lying to the west and
north of the Arkansas territory, has lately been set apart for the
colonization of the Indians.
“Let such of the emigrating Indians as choose it, continue as heretofore
to devote themselves to the chase in a country where their toils will
amply be rewarded. Let those who are willing to cultivate the arts of
civilisation be formed into a colony, consisting of distinct tribes or
communities, but placed contiguous to each other, and connected by
general laws, which shall reach the whole. Let the lands be apportioned
among families and individuals in severalty, to be held by the same
tenures by which we hold ours, with perhaps some temporary and wholesome
restraints on the power of alienation. Assist them in forming a code of
laws, adapted to a state of civilisation.
“In regard to such Indians as shall still remain within the States and
territories, and refuse to emigrate, let an arrangement be made with the
proper authorities of the States in which they are situated, for
partitioning out to them into severalty as much of their respective
reservations as shall be amply sufficient for agricultural purposes. Set
apart a tract proportioned in size to the number of Indians, to remain,
in common, as a refuge, and subject to all the municipal laws of the
state in which they reside. Let the remainder of the reservation be paid
for by those who hold the paramount right, at such prices as shall be
deemed, in reference to the uses which Indians are accustomed to make of
it, reasonable, and the proceeds to be applied for the benefit of those
of the tribe who emigrate after their establishment in the colony; or be
divided between those who emigrate and those who remain, as justice may
require.
“To the views herein presented, of the condition of the Indians, of the
prospects which await them, and of the only efficient remedy in their
power to seek, or in that of the government to apply, I take the liberty
of adding my own testimonial, founded on an intimate intercourse with
them for eighteen years, both personal and official, under every variety
of circumstances, in peace and war, and in very remote regions, as well
as within our own settlements. The principles laid down in these
extracts, are substantially the same as those which now regulate the
government in all their transactions with the Indians, when the question
of their permanent establishment, or removal, is brought under
discussion. So far as respects the emigrating Indians, this will clearly
appear by reference to the instructions of the commissioners now engaged
in the adjustment of all the unsettled matters connected with the great
plan of colonization.
“With regard, however, to those Indians who refuse to remove, it has not
been deemed expedient for the government, by its own act, either to
partition out to them the land necessary for their support, or to decide
upon the consideration to be allowed for the residue, and to direct its
appropriation. This, so far as regards the general government, has been,
and continues to be, the subject of conventional arrangement, in which
the parties, by mutual discussion, and compromise of opinion, arrive at
a satisfactory result. In these arrangements, where the parties desire
it, adequate tracts of land, in fee, with temporary and wholesome
restraints upon the right to sell, are secured to all who desire to
remain. That this system of guardianship is, however, founded upon a
just and intimate knowledge of Indian character, no one acquainted with
that character will question. I need not now enquire whether a practical
resort to the principles resulting from it will ever become necessary.
If it should, no doubt every arrangement which justice and humanity call
for, will be liberally made.
“In your message to the Senate, of February 22d, 1830, you explained
your views of the question of jurisdiction over the Indian tribes living
within the respective States and territories, and stated, that in your
opinion, and in the words of the above report, they were subject to the
municipal laws of the State in which they reside, in all cases where
such laws are extended over them.
“The progress of events, since 1828, has confirmed, if confirmation was
wanting, the correctness of these principles, and their adaptation to
the actual and prospective condition of the Indians. The circle of
civilisation and improvement has extended, and various tribes have
retired, or are retiring before it. The experience of the four years
which have intervened, does not afford one consolatory hope that the
insulated bands who have reserved and occupy tracts surrounded by our
settlements can permanently retain these possessions and prosper. There
are moral, political, and physical causes all in operation, which cannot
be counteracted, and which forbid such an expectation. And, in fact, the
whole history of our intercourse with our primitive people teaches no
one lesson more important than this; and it will be fortunate for their
posterity, and for our responsibility, if, in its practical application,
both parties should become satisfied that the system provided by the act
of May 28th, 1830, offers the only rational prospect of a durable and
happy residence for the Indians. A few individuals, almost always
half-breeds, and their connexions, engrossing the intelligence and means
of these small communities, may become assimilated to our institutions,
and eventually planted amongst us with safety. But this should never be
permitted at the sacrifice of more important interests, and to the utter
disregard of the fate which awaits the unfortunate mass of these tribes,
persuaded or almost compelled to remain where they must rapidly decline,
and at length disappear. And the causes which enacted this law are not
less obvious in their origin, than they are certain in their operation.
Their progress is onward, and regret them as we may and must, no human
power can arrest their march, or avert their consequences. These efforts
have been made for generations, and in every mode which wisdom and
philanthropy could suggest; and yet, in not one solitary instance has it
produced any permanent or general beneficial effect. And we may survey
our whole cultivated territory in the vain expectation of discovering
one aboriginal community, however small, which has withstood the
ceaseless pressure of civilisation, and which holds out the slightest
prospect of moral or physical improvement, or even of eventual
subsistence, for the great body of the individuals composing it. If such
a community exists, it is unknown to me; and, in fact, if one is
believed to exist, it is only by those who are unacquainted, with its
actual condition, and with the internal history of its wants, its
dissensions, and its oppressions.
“The Choctaw treaty of 1830, allowed that tribe three years to emigrate.
In 1831, about 5000 of them removed to their new possessions between the
Canadian and Red rivers. They are highly gratified with the climate and
country, and satisfied with the exchange they have made. From the
returns which have been received, it is estimated that about 7000 more
will cross the Mississippi this season, and the residue of the tribe,
amounting to about 6000, will follow the next.
“General Coffee has succeeded in concluding a treaty with the
Chickasaws, which will lead to their entire removal, and to their
location in the west. The basis of this treaty is different from any
heretofore assumed in our negotiations with the Indians. The whole value
of the country ceded is assigned to the Chickasaws, and the United
States become, in fact, trustees to make the necessary arrangements for
their benefit.
“It is stipulated that the ceded territory shall be surveyed and sold,
and the whole proceeds, deducting only the actual expenses, applied to
the various objects enumerated, connected with the temporary
subsistence, removal, and permanent establishment of these Indians. A
residuary fund is to be invested in some productive stock, and the
income to be annually appropriated for the public and private objects
stipulated in the treaty. A country for the residence of the tribe is to
be provided by themselves, and it is probable they will be able to make
a satisfactory arrangement for that purpose with the Choctaws, a kindred
people, who are in possession of a much larger district than is required
by their numbers.
“No pecuniary benefit will result to the United States from this treaty;
but should it be ratified, it will constitute an important era in our
Indian relations. It will probably lead to the establishment of the
principle that, in future cessions of land, the full value shall be
secured to the grantors, with such deductions only as may be necessary
to carry into effect the object of the treaties. The advantages to be
derived by the United States from these arrangements will be limited to
the removal of the Indians from their present unsuitable residences, and
to their establishment in a region where we may hope to see them
prosperous, contented, and improving. And it cannot be doubted but that
a course so consistent with the dictates of justice, and so honourable
to the national character, would be approved by public sentiment. Should
we hereafter discard all expectation of pecuniary advantage in our
purchases from the Indians, and confine ourselves to the great objects
of their removal and reestablishment, and take care that the proceeds of
the cessions are appropriated and applied to their benefit, and in the
most salutary manner, we should go far towards discharging the great
moral debt which has come down to us as an inheritance from the earlier
periods of our history, and which has been unfortunately increased
during successive generations by circumstances beyond our control. The
policy would not be less wise than just. The time has passed away, if it
ever existed, when a revenue derived from such a source was necessary to
the government. The remnant of our aboriginal race may well look for the
value, and that usefully applied, of the remnant of those immense
possessions which have passed from them to us, and left few substantial
evidences of permanent advantage. One great objection to a removal that
has been urged by the more discreet Indians, and by many of our own
citizens, who are honestly seeking their improvement, is the prospect,
judging by the past, that their location west of the Mississippi would
be temporary, as they would be soon pressed for new cessions, and would
yield, as they have heretofore yielded, to successive applications for
this purpose. Although the nature and objects of their removal, and the
spirit of the act of Congress which introduced the system, are opposed
to such attempts, still the apprehension is entertained, and has proved
injurious. Probably no course would better satisfy them upon this
subject than the introduction of a principle which would secure to them
the full value of the property, under all circumstances, thus lessening
in their view any wish on our part to acquire it, and ensuring to them,
if not the power and disposition to retain it, at least the means of
converting it to the greatest advantage.”
The policy of the United States with regard to the Indians is to place
them to the west of the Mississippi, and it has been so successful, that
a treaty, for the removal of the last body, was concluded at Chicago in
September, 1833, and in 1836 there will scarcely be a resident Indian to
the east of the Mississippi.
The Indians are a quiet inoffensive race, and generally conduct
themselves well towards the white people. The united tribes of Sacs and
Foxes, which inhabit the banks of the Mississippi north of Illinois, are
an exception, being a restless fierce people. They made war on the
United States in 1831, commencing hostilities in the neighbourhood of
Prairie des Chien. They created a good deal of alarm in the northern
part of Illinois and Michigan, but were easily subdued. Their chief,
Black Hawk, noticed at page 29, was taken prisoner, and, after two
years’ confinement, suffered to depart. The Sacs and Foxes have retired
beyond the Mississippi, and even ceded some territory to the west of the
river. The chastisement they got, and the increase of population at
Galena, will keep this tribe in subjection in time to come.
What the ultimate effect will be of removing the Indians to the west of
the Mississippi, I am at a loss to conjecture, and doubt if it will be
so beneficial as the United States’ Government seem to contemplate. Not
being fully aware of the causes alluded to in the report of the
secretary of war, which decrees the poor Indians residing amongst white
men to certain annihilation, it is unnecessary to speculate on their
removal, or what effects may come into operation in their new
territories. I believe, however, it is a fact that the Indians are
decreasing in number in the Canadas, as well as in the United States,
even after considerable advances in civilisation have taken place, and
Christianity obtained a footing amongst them. It is a common opinion
that the Indian tribes were extremely numerous in former times, but
there is no very good evidence of the fact. The French penetrated from
Detroit to New Orleans between 1670 and 1719, establishing trading ports
and villages in many parts of the valley of the Mississippi. At the
commencement of the eighteenth century the Sacs and Foxes made a
desperate effort to take the fort at Detroit from the French, and for
forty years subsequent to that period they caused great trouble and
embarrassment to them, which was terminated by a successful expedition
into the remote regions west of Green Bay.[9]
Footnote 9:
Secretary of War’s Report.
Had the Indians been very numerous in the valley of the Mississippi when
it was first discovered, they would not likely have established
villages, more especially when engaged in war with the Sacs and Foxes,
who reside still in the same regions, and are now, perhaps, more
powerful than at the time alluded to. The progress of the Indians
towards annihilation does not seem to have been rapid for 160 years, and
it is a melancholy reflection to think it is connected with civilisation
and the intercourse of the whites, and that their removal to the
wilderness and exclusion from white people, has been adopted as the
means of preserving the race. Leaving naturalists to determine the
properties belonging to colour, I shall simply remark, the dark man of
North America, like the dark rat of Britain, seems destined to be
exterminated by the light-coloured species.
CHAPTER X.
_Prairie Agriculture—Capital required—Crops and Prices—Wages of Labour
compared with Land and Produce in Illinois and Britain—Future
prospects—Sheep Husbandry—Illinois and Upper Canada—Illinois and
Britain—The Canadas and Illinois estimated by the standard of
Nature—Emigrant Information._
The agriculture of forest land in Illinois, is the same as in other
parts of America, but is seldom followed, the cultivation of the prairie
being so much more simple and profitable. It has formerly been observed,
that the grasses have strong creeping roots, and that six oxen are
required to plough the land for the first time. The plough which is used
in breaking up the prairie has a very broad share, which cuts a turf
seventeen or eighteen inches wide, by two or three in depth. The thinner
the turf is cut the less grass is found to grow afterwards, which must
be owing to the neck, or vital part of the plants, being near the
surface. After the first ploughing the soil becomes friable, and is
easily cultivated. The breaking up of the prairie is often performed by
contract at $2 per acre. It is common to drop Indian corn into every
third furrow of the first ploughing, and the ground is not afterwards
operated upon until the crop is reaped, when it is sown with wheat, and
simply harrowed. Thus two important crops are obtained by once ploughing
and harrowing. A bushel of Indian corn was stated to be sufficient seed
for ten acres, and half a bushel of wheat sows one acre. The first crop
of Indian corn commonly yields fifty bushels per acre, and the following
wheat crop twenty-five bushels. When Indian corn is not sown as a first
crop, the ground is sown with wheat, which is covered by the harrow.
Grass seldom springs after the land has been ploughed, and weeds do not
appear for some years afterwards. When Indian corn is grown on land
which has been some time cultivated, it is planted on hills four feet
square, the intervals being ploughed in both directions; and a boy with
a horse is capable of managing the cleaning process of fifty acres.
There is but little diversity in prairie agriculture, which is almost
entirely confined to the growing of wheat, oats, and Indian corn.
Natural herbage affords both hay and pasturage, and the supply is at
present inexhaustible. In the tract which I travelled, the seeds of
clovers, or artificial grass, never had been sown. But there can be no
doubt of the soil and climate being capable of producing in abundance
almost every description of plant.
A great many cattle are reared on the prairies which are occupied in
common by the inhabitants. The grass was quite withered when I saw it,
and the cattle were in good condition, although by no means fat. They
are seldom taken under cover during winter, and when snow is on the
ground they are foddered with hay. It is customary in some parts to
fatten oxen with Indian corn during winter; and the fine animals seen at
New York, and alluded to in page 32, had been fed on Indian corn for two
successive winters; it is daily strewed on the ground to the best of the
animals; a secondary description succeeds to what the first may have
left, and swine are allowed to pick up the refuse. It is by means of the
Indian corn of the western states that the people of New Orleans, the
cities on the Atlantic, and the Canadas are chiefly supplied with salted
beef and pork.
There is perhaps no country in the world where a farmer can commence
operations with so small an outlay of money, and so soon obtain a
return, as in Illinois. This arises from the cheapness of land, and the
facility with which it is cultivated, and will appear more evident from
the following statement:—“Suppose a settler with sufficient capital to
purchase and stock a farm and maintain himself for six months. The farm
to consist of two hundred acres, thirty-five of which being forest and
the remainder prairie. If the purchase was made in spring, the expense
might be thus stated:—
Purchasing 200 acres of land, at $1¼ $250
Fencing two fields of 40 acres with an eight rail fence, 80
Ploughing by contract 80 acres, at $2 160
Seed for 80 acres of Indian corn, 10 bushels at 15 cents, 1.50
Cutting and harvesting stalks of Indian corn, and harvesting the
crop, at $3 per acre, 240
Seed for 80 acres of Wheat, sown after Indian corn, 45 bushels
at 45 cents, 20.25
Harrowing Wheat, 20
Cows 4, at $8, young Cattle 8, at $5, Pigs $10 82
Buildings and household furniture, 600
Maintenance of family for six months, and purchasing seeds of
vegetables, potatoes, and poultry, 150.25
—————
Total, $1604
With an expenditure of $1604, or L.340, 17s. sterling, is obtained the
dairy produce of 4 cows and the improvement of 8 cattle grazing on the
prairie, and 3200 bushels of Indian corn, besides vegetables and the
improvement of a lot of pigs and poultry.
The attention of the settler and his family is supposed to be confined
to the cultivation of vegetables, tending the cows and pigs, and
planting and husking Indian corn.
In the spring of the second year, 80 acres additional would be
fenced, ploughed, planted with Indian corn, and harvested at
the same expense as the first year $481.50
Harvesting 80 acres of wheat at $3 240
——————
Total 721.50
Supposing the Indian corn of the second year equal to the first crop,
the wheat to yield 22 ½ bushels per acre, and cost 2 ½ bushels in
thrashing—the farmer in eighteen months after settling would have
expended $2325.50, or L.484, 4s. 6d. sterling. In the same time he would
have reaped 6,400 bushels of Indian corn, and 1600 bushels of wheat, and
enjoyed abundance of vegetables, dairy produce, beef, pork, and poultry.
With this produce and expenditure the farmer and his family do not
perform any laborious work. It is presumed the farm would, with some
ploughing, to destroy weeds amongst the Indian corn, afterwards continue
to yield yearly 3200 bushels of Indian corn, and 1800 bushels of wheat.
The data of the preceding statements are unfavourable for industrious
and frugal emigrants, being framed for a person disliking to work; and
Mr Ferguson’s estimate of buildings, and maintaining a family having
been taken, which is too high for ordinary settlers. The crops are
estimated considerably lower than what I was told the land of Illinois
generally yields; but from knowing how prone farmers are to speak of
good crops, and conceal indifferent ones, I have made considerable
deductions from the accounts received, with the view of avoiding
exaggeration.
If an industrious man were to purchase the farm, and perform a
considerable portion of the work himself, the result would be different.
A saving might also be effected on the buildings and living to the
extent of $250. If to this sum be added $150 for work performed
personally above the other case, the same produce would be obtained with
an outlay of L.389 sterling. A person who would be content at first with
cheap houses, little household furniture, and labour with his own hands,
might reap the same produce with an outlay of L.300 sterling. The
expense of buildings and living until a crop is reaped, must in a great
measure depend on the individual himself, and the nature of his family.
But the advantages of the country will be best seen by simply viewing
the produce of an acre of land for two years, and the cost of obtaining
it.
Purchasing an acre of land, $1.25
Ploughing, 2
Seed of Indian corn, 0.02
Harvesting, &c. 3
Seed for Wheat crop, 0.50
Harrowing Wheat, 0.25
Harvesting Wheat, 3
——————
Total, $10.02
With an outlay of $10.02, or L.2, 2s. 7d. sterling, there is obtained 40
bushels of Indian corn, and 22½ bushels of wheat.
A person with little capital might commence farming on a smaller scale
than has been taken for illustration; government selling lots of 80
acres. Supposing a farm of this extent, consisting of fifteen acres of
forest, and the remainder prairie, the expense would stand thus:—
Purchasing 80 acres, at $1 ¼ $100
Fencing into two fields of 30 acres, and one of 5 acres for a
garden, 80
Ploughing by contract 35 acres, at $2 70
Seed for 30 acres of Indian corn, .60
Vegetable seeds and potatoes, 10
A Cow $8, pigs and poultry $4 12
Assistance in harvesting corn, 20
Seed for 30 acres of Wheat, 15
Harrowing Wheat, 7.50
Buildings and furniture, 150
Household expenses, 40
Ploughing 30 acres in spring, at $2 60
2 Oxen for ploughing and harrowing, 14
Assistance in harvesting Wheat, 30
————
Total, $609
With an expenditure of $609, or about L.130 sterling, and the farmer’s
labour, 2,400 bushels of Indian corn and 675 bushels of wheat would be
obtained, besides the produce of a cow, vegetables, pigs, and poultry
for family use.
Notwithstanding the enormous quantity of produce exhibited by the
preceding statements, high wages and low prices prevent much money being
realized. By referring to the statement of the produce of an acre of
land for two years, it will be seen the cost is $10.02, and Indian corn
being estimated at 15 cents per bushel, and wheat at 45 cents, the
produce amounts to $6 and $10.12 ½ for Indian corn and wheat
respectively; or the outlay is L.2, 2s. 7d., and the produce is L.3,
10s. 7d., subject to the charges of fencing, thrashing, and marketing.
Every thing, however, has been done by contract, and in future the
purchase of the ground and part of the expense of ploughing would be
saved. In the view there is a profit on hired labour, and an industrious
man would obtain almost the whole of the produce by labouring himself.
In a country where Nature is so bountiful and land so abundant and
cheap, the wages of labour must necessarily be high. Accordingly, an
ordinary mechanic obtains $1 per day, with board, including washing; and
superior workmen, engineers, and millwrights, get from $2 to $3. Farm
labourers are engaged at from $100 to $120 a-year. Female house-servants
obtain $1 in private families, and from $2 to $2½ a-week in hotels. As
compared with the prices of produce and land, wages may be stated thus:—
If an ordinary mechanic work five days in the week he will earn
throughout the year, besides board, $260; or of Indian corn about 1733
bushels; or of wheat about 580 bushels; or of beef about 13,000 lb.; or
of land about 200 acres.
An ordinary farm labourer will get during the year, besides his board,
$100; or of Indian corn about 667 bushels; or of wheat about 222
bushels; or of beef about 5000 lb.; or of land about eighty acres; which
is a sufficient extent of surface for any labouring man to possess.
Female house-servants in private families get in the year $52, which
would purchase forty acres of land, and in hotels what would purchase
eighty acres of land.
How very different is the situation of farm labourers in England,
Scotland, and Ireland, compared with those in Illinois. Supposing the
weekly wages of labourers to be 10s., 8s., and 3s. 6d., without board,
in England, Scotland, and Ireland respectively, and they do not exceed
these sums, the Englishman will earn during the year about seventy
bushels of wheat, or of beef about 1560 lbs.—the Scotchman about
sixty-two bushels of wheat, or of beef about 1400 lbs.—the Irishman
about thirty bushels of wheat, or of beef about 750 lbs. But when the
board of the workman, or simply what he himself would consume, is taken
from these numbers, they will appear quite insignificant compared with
the wages of Illinois.
An ordinary farm labourer in Illinois gets the value of eighty acres of
land yearly: In Britain, when due allowance is made for the board of the
labourer, he does not get one-tenth of an acre of good land. When wages
are compared with land, the farm labourer of Illinois is about 800 times
better rewarded than in Britain.
The wages of female servants, compared with the price of land, are also
remarkable. I am sure there are many of my excellent countrywomen who,
if they could reach Illinois, would cheerfully earn a farm for their
fathers, husbands, or lovers, by engaging in service. Perhaps in almost
every case individuals, on their arrival in the country, would act
prudently by working for hire for the first twelve months, even if they
possess a little capital. By so doing, the knowledge which they would
obtain of the country, and the intercourse of the people, would perhaps
be of as much importance to them as the increase of funds. In the case
of a family without funds, the members might separate entirely or
partially, as circumstances admitted, and afterwards again unite when
they had obtained the means of purchasing and farming land.
The land in Illinois to which the comparison of wages refers, is of fine
quality, situated in the best climate of America, and, considered as a
workshop, is not greatly surpassed by any portion of the earth. The view
which I have taken of the reward of farm labourers in Illinois and
Britain may appear excessive, yet it will bear investigation. The
British labourer’s reward of one-tenth of an acre would yield a mere
trifle annually; but the Illinois labourer’s reward of eighty acres
might afford sustenance for himself and family for ever. The man who
gives his services one year for hire in Illinois, and invests his wages
in the purchase of land, obtains the services of nature on a large scale
in perpetuity, and by leading a life of industry and economy for five or
six years, he would be enabled to purchase and sufficiently stock eighty
acres of land, which would for ever support himself and family.
Illinois may justly be called “the poor man’s country,” if any part of
the world deserves the title. The extraordinary reward which the
labourer receives, and the bountifulness of Nature, are favourable to
the poor, and no person who has health and strength, and leads an
industrious and a virtuous life, can continue without the means of
subsistence in Illinois.
The future prospects of Illinois appear to be highly favourable.
Referring to what has been stated regarding the progress of wealth at p.
400, and the channels of trade at p. 424–5, it will be found that almost
all the elements of prosperity exist in the country. The soil,
grass-covered surface, climate, internal facilities of commerce,
cheapness and extent of land, and the systems of governing and educating
the people, are not surpassed by any other portion of America, and
inhabitants are alone wanting to complete its greatness.
The price of Government land being the same over the United States, the
prairies of Illinois will be preferred by all judicious settlers to the
forests which lie nearer the Atlantic, while the arrangements which have
been made with the Indians will tend for a time to check population from
proceeding to the west of the districts already surveyed. The advantages
of the country have only been made public of late years, and less seems
to be known regarding it in the eastern portions of the United States
and the Canadas than in Britain. Emigrants have, however, been streaming
in to Illinois for a year or two from the different parts of Europe and
the eastern parts of America, and their number is likely to increase. I
have frequently alluded to the anxiety of people in the eastern States
and the Canadas to sell their lands. This desire proceeds from the
advantages of a prairie country, in which many of the farmers in other
portions of America obtain better farms than those which they formerly
possessed, and at a twentieth part of the price at which they sell their
original ones. There is consequently a class of comparatively wealthy
settlers attracted to the west, independent of the natural movement of
the United States people, alluded to at p. 400, 401. But however great
the influx of population may be, there is sufficient room for all who
are likely to desire a settlement. Illinois being about the size of
England, might furnish a greater supply of food, from the general
superiority of its soil, and seems to me to be nearly capable of
sustaining the whole inhabitants of England in addition to its present
population, or nearly seventy times the inhabitants it now possesses.
The settlement of the prairies in the western parts of the United States
will affect the whole population of the Union. The profits of farming in
the present state of the country regulate the wages of labour generally,
and the facility with which prairie land is cultivated compared to
forest land, will attract the operatives of every profession, and
thereby have a tendency to keep up wages. Although the price of forest
and prairie land is the same, the greater productiveness of the latter,
and small capital required to bring it into a state of cultivation, will
keep down the price of the necessaries of life by furnishing a greater
supply. Thus the prairies of the west, by attracting population from the
eastern States, will have a tendency to keep up the wages of labour
there, and prevent a rise in the price of farm produce in the thickly
peopled parts of the country.
The inexhaustible supply of coal in Illinois is a strong feature in the
future greatness of the country, both as enabling the whole surface to
be devoted to the production of human food, and furnishing fuel for
culinary and manufacturing purposes. From the natural advantages of the
country, and consequent great reward of industry, population will be
attracted to it, and manufactures of all kinds will either spring up
within the State, or the communication with the cities on the Atlantic
will become more accessible than it is at present. The towns of
Pittsburg and Buffalo seem likely to become the great depots of produce
passing between the eastern and western States. Pittsburg is situated at
the head of the steam-boat navigation of the river Ohio—it is the chief
seat of hardware manufactures in the United States, and has been termed
the Birmingham of America. Pittsburg already communicates with the city
of Philadelphia by a railway and canal, and a railway is forming to
connect it with Baltimore. There is also, I believe, a canal in progress
to open a communication between Pittsburg and the Erie canal,
unconnected with lake Erie. Buffalo is situated at the junction of the
Erie canal with lake Erie, and is one of the best commercial situations
in the United States, being connected with the country to the westward
by the great lakes and canals, with New York by the Hudson and Erie
canal, and it will also soon communicate with Boston by a railway. These
two towns are likely to become the centres of diverging lines of
railroads and other modes of communication between the eastern and
western States, which form the only means of preventing the depopulation
of the countries on the Atlantic, as the abundance and cheapness of food
in the west would soon induce manufacturers to emigrate and establish
themselves there.
It may become a question, at no very remote period, whether the
communication between the eastern and western States will be cheaper by
water conveyance or railroads. The waters are shut by frost for a
portion of the year, the navigation of canals is necessarily slow, and
that of rivers often uncertain from want of water, and at all times
expensive by the tear and wear of vessels in struggling against the
stream. On the other hand, the level surface is admirably fitted for
railroads, and the western countries abound in coal and iron. There is
no way of so effectually connecting the east and west as by means of
railroads. Government commenced a national road, the construction of
which has been suspended by President Jackson, to extend from Washington
to Jefferson on the Missouri, a distance of nearly 1000 miles, and
running through the prairie country. The funds arising from the sale of
land might easily form a railroad between Jefferson and Pittsburg, which
would be connected with the seaport towns on the Atlantic.
The value of farm produce and land in the different sections of the
country will be affected in opposite ways by the opening of the
communication between the east and west. By lessening the expense of
transport, a greater quantity of produce will flow from the west to the
east, and there will be less difference in price, either by produce
falling in the east or rising in the west. If prices fall in the east,
the value of land will fall there; and if prices rise in the west, the
value of land will increase there. Facilitating the intercourse between
the countries will extend the market for western produce, and operate
like an influx of inhabitants; and the natural effects will be, a rise
in the value of produce and land in that quarter.
The west will be farther benefited by the opening of communication
lowering the price of the manufactures and luxuries of the east. In a
very few years, the prices of Illinois and New York will vary only
according to the expense of transport from one place to the other; and
the difference will annually decrease with an increase of traffic and a
facility of communication.
The prices of wheat and Indian corn included in the preceding
statements, represent the general prices in Illinois at the time of my
visit; and they were then low from the want of commercial population. A
change in this respect was, however, then taking place, which has since
progressed. Steam grist-mills have been erected at Jacksonville and
other places, and pork-killers from Cincinnati[10] have established
themselves at Alton. Commerce has followed agriculture, and the
consequent competition must have the effect of enhancing the price of
farm produce. With an unlimited range of pasturage for the rearing of
cattle, and Indian corn at fifteen cents, or seven-pence-halfpenny
Sterling per bushel, the farmer might comfortably live by stock, without
cultivating any portion of his land.
Footnote 10:
In 1833, 300,000 pigs were killed at Cincinnati.
Sheep husbandry has received considerable attention in some parts of the
United States of late years, although it is generally imperfectly
understood. The chief object with flockmasters has been to improve the
quality of wool, without regard to the carcass of the animal, wool being
much dearer than mutton. Many of the sheep are of the Saxony or Merino
blood, or a mixture of these breeds; and their wool is now selling at
two shillings and sixpence sterling per pound. This high price is owing
to sheep husbandry being foreign to the habits and tastes of American
farmers, and the limited funds and cleared surface possessed by forest
settlers; and, perhaps, a thorough knowledge of the management of sheep
can only be acquired from practice. From these causes, the demand for
wool in the United States, with a rapidly increasing population, will,
in all probability, long exceed the supply.
There is a general belief in Britain, that the American population
dislike mutton, which is, however, certainly not the case. I saw many a
leg of mutton discussed at table during my tour; and was often assured
that good hind quarters of mutton sold as high as the best beef. Good
beef is, however, to be had in almost every village, while good mutton
is a rare commodity, which is partly owing to the breeds of sheep, and
their want of food during winter.
In a communication addressed to the State Agricultural Society of New
York, by Henry D. Grove, who resides in Rensseller county, and is a
native of Germany, Mr Grove has, by his own account, devoted much
attention to wool-growing in Germany, and for five years in the State of
New York. In both countries his flock consisted of full-blooded Saxon
sheep, and he considers his situation in America, in about forty-two and
a half degrees of north latitude, superior to Saxony for growing fine
wool. I have no means of judging between the merits of Saxony and the
State of New York as wool-growing countries; but from what came under my
notice, I think there is no obstacle to sheep-farming in America but
what arises from the severity of the winter, which might be obviated by
providing shelter and food for the animals.
Mr Grove considers sweet dry pastures, pure water, and pure air, as the
chief essentials of wool-growing; and as these exist in many parts of
Illinois, and may perhaps be made universal by digging wells, there can
be little doubt of its capabilities for sheep husbandry. Not having seen
a sheep while in Illinois, I cannot determine if the prairie grasses are
calculated to maintain this animal; but as horses and cattle thrive well
on them, it is probable sheep will likewise do so. If, however, this
should be found not to be the case, it would be an easy matter to
convert the prairie into pasturage, composed of clovers and other
grasses, by sowing their seeds. The winters in the southern parts of
Illinois are so short, that no great quantity of food would be required
to maintain sheep while the ground was covered with snow; and the
facility with which Indian corn is raised, would render a supply easily
attained, if the cultivation of turnip was found unsuitable. There can
be no doubt of potatoes and turnips being easily preserved during
winter.
I have no certain means of ascertaining the duration of an Illinois
winter in latitude 39. Mr Stuart says he found the cattle in this
meridian, on reaching the State, fat on the 29th April, but I fear this
is too favourable to the climate. I shall, however, assume the ground to
be covered with snow for the period of two months, during which it will
be necessary to feed sheep artificially. Mr Grove, in the communication
formerly alluded to, says, one lb. of oil-cake is equal to two lbs. of
good hay; and that for twelve or thirteen years he found his “flock did
extremely well whenever he proportioned their food according to
nutritiousness, and in such a manner as that two lbs. of good hay would
give to each animal.” It may be assumed that Indian corn, which weighs
about sixty lbs. per bushel, is as nutritious as oil-cake for feeding
sheep. An acre of Indian corn therefore, yielding forty bushels, will
maintain forty sheep during winter, with the assistance of straw; and if
hay or potatoes were given, a smaller quantity would suffice. If the
Indian corn were bought, and the sheep allowed one lb. daily, each would
cost seven-pence halfpenny sterling for two months keeping.
Much of the prairies of Illinois cannot be stocked with sheep until the
different varieties of the wolf are extirpated, which will be easily
effected with an increase of population, and it is only in the
neighbourhood of well-peopled places, and with care during night, that
they can be safely kept at present. The time will, however, soon arrive
when much of the unsold prairies will be covered with sheep, and then
perhaps almost the whole surface of occupied farms will be devoted to
providing winter-food for the flocks.
The value of wool is remarkable, compared with land. Suppose the fleece
of a Merino sheep weighs three lbs., and sells at sixty cents per lb.,
the wool of one sheep will nearly purchase an acre and a half of land.
Wool could be transported from Illinois to the eastern States for three
or four cents a-pound, and there can be no question that it costs less
labour in producing and carrying to market than any other agricultural
commodity whatever.
The climate and soil of Illinois seem favourable to every description of
agriculture. The luxuriance and productiveness of Indian corn has been
noticed at page 394. If this crop were succeeded by wheat, accompanied
by clover sown in spring, the herbage of which to be eaten by sheep in
autumn after the wheat is reaped, and ploughed down for manure to Indian
corn in the following spring, I have no doubt alternate crops of wheat
and Indian corn might be grown without the aid of manures.
In whatever point of view Illinois is regarded, as adapted for herds and
flocks, for wheat and India corn, for manufactures and commerce, or for
the abode of population generally, it will be found to be one of the
most favoured portions of North America, and with the exception of
population, possessing all the elements of future prosperity and
greatness. Time will supply inhabitants, which the want of at present,
however, forms one of the many advantages of the country for
agricultural emigration.
When contrasting Illinois and Upper Canada, I shall not again allude to
the governments of the countries, or to their channels of trade, but
confine myself chiefly to their agricultural peculiarities.
The most northerly portions of Illinois lie in the same latitude with
the most southerly parts of Upper Canada; and on a general view of the
countries, the one is four degrees to the north of the other. After
considering the different published accounts of an American winter, I
have been led to conclude, that between thirty-five and fifty degrees of
north latitude, the length of winter increases nearly two weeks with
each degree of latitude, consequently the winter of Illinois may be
stated about two months shorter than that of Upper Canada. Then, in
point of climate, Illinois has greatly the advantage in maturing all the
valuable products of the soil, and by affording time for cultivating the
farm properly. Live stock will also suffer much less during winter, and
the artificial supplies of food necessary for this season, are much
easier attained.
The settler of Upper Canada has to struggle with the forest before he
obtains a site for his house. If he ventures to keep a cow, she must
browse on weeds and leaves of trees in summer, and in winter on the
boughs of felled trees; the milk and butter which she yields is of the
worst quality, and scarcely repays the trouble of roaming after her in
the woods. A pig and poultry cannot be maintained at first, and many
years must pass away before the farm can furnish mutton and wool for
family use. Trees must be cut down, chopped into logs, and burned before
even a garden can be formed. The first crops suffer both from the
effects of frost and the want of a circulation of air. The plough cannot
be profitably used until eight years after the forest is cut down;
during the greater part of this period the harrow and scythe move
amongst blackened stumps, and there is difficulty in growing sufficient
food for a family.
The settler of Illinois places his house on the skirts of the forest or
on the open field, as fancy may dictate. The prairie furnishes summer
and winter-food for any number of cattle and sheep, and poultry and pigs
shift for themselves until the crops ripen. With the preliminary of
fencing, the plough enters the virgin soil, which in a few months
afterwards yields a most abundant crop of Indian corn, and on its
removal every agricultural operation may be executed with facility. The
first crops are excellent, and seldom suffer from atmospheric effects.
Pastoral, arable, or mixed husbandry, may be at once adopted, and
produce of all kinds obtained in the utmost profusion.
In Upper Canada the settler is immersed in the forest with roads that
are passable for heavy carriages only when frozen. The Illinois settler
enjoys a prospect of wood and plain, and the open prairie affords good
roads at all times when the weather is dry. In Upper Canada no part of
the surface is productive which has not been cleared. In Illinois the
whole of a prairie farm is productive without being cultivated. In Upper
Canada the forest settler cannot at first produce his own food, and
lives for a time on flour and salt provisions. In Illinois the settler
at once raises on his farm almost every thing he can consume. In Upper
Canada the farmer is not fully repaid for his first operations until the
end of six or seven years. In Illinois the farmer is repaid for his
first operations in course of a few months. The farmer’s reward in Upper
Canada is many years distant, and in Illinois it is almost immediate. In
short, the farmer in Upper Canada at first finds difficulty in growing a
sufficiency of produce for his own use, and the Illinois farmer
difficulty in consuming his produce.
The positions which I have advanced regarding the farming of the two
countries, will appear evident from figures. By consulting pages 117 and
375, it will be found that the expense of bringing an acre of wheat to
maturity in Upper Canada amounts to $.24, exclusive of harvesting,
thrashing, and marketing the crop. The produce cannot be obtained
earlier than eighteen months after entering into possession of the land,
and will not exceed in general cases eighteen bushels per acre. By
referring to page 448 it will be found, that the expense of raising a
crop of Indian corn and wheat on the prairies of Illinois is stated at
$4.02, to which $1 must be added for fencing, making $5.02 for both
crops, exclusive of harvesting, thrashing, and marketing. The crops will
be obtained in eighteen months after entry, and consist of forty bushels
of Indian corn and 22½ bushels of wheat, or, in other words, the farmer,
with about one-fifth of the labour or outlay on an acre in Illinois,
will obtain more than double the produce he could get in the same time
in Upper Canada. But if the calculations were extended to the eighth
year, the difference of produce would still appear to be greater. During
this period an acre in Illinois would, with good management, continue to
yield nearly the same produce; while the land in Upper Canada, after
yielding two successive wheat crops, would be allowed to produce grass
until the stumps rotted. Grass is of little value in Canada, unless near
villages where there is a demand for hay, and it would be unfair to
allow any thing for the land remaining in pasturage for five years, as
in this state it would only be on a footing with the uncultivated
prairie. Then, during eight years, an acre of land in Upper Canada would
yield thirty-six bushels of wheat, and in Illinois 160 bushels of Indian
corn and ninety bushels of wheat.
The result of one acre does not fairly exhibit the real advantages of
Illinois. It has formerly been stated that settlers in Canada seldom
clear more than six or seven acres in a year; but to place things in a
favourable view, I shall suppose ten acres to be cleared, with
assistance in logging and burning. In Illinois an industrious settler
would have little difficulty, with the occasional assistance of a boy or
two, in cultivating fifty acres. On this data, the Upper Canada farmer,
at the end of eighteen months, would raise 180 bushels of wheat, and the
farmer in Illinois 2000 bushels of Indian corn and 1125 bushels of
wheat. During this period the Upper Canada farmer would neither have
grass for cow nor sheep, and perhaps scarcely food for a pig; while in
Illinois stock of all kinds may have been kept.
In assuming wheat in Upper Canada to yield eighteen bushels per acre
when land is first cleared, and wheat in Illinois 22½ bushels, the soil
and climate are supposed to be the same in both countries, and twenty
per cent has been deducted from the wheat of Upper Canada on account of
the surface occupied by stumps. Should it be contended that my estimate
of the Upper Canada wheat crop is too low, I would argue my estimate of
the Illinois crop is still more so, and maintain, that whatever produce
the first wheat crops of Upper Canada may yield, those of Illinois must
be twenty per cent better, from the ground being free from stumps.
Indian corn cannot be grown on a large scale amongst stumps; and even
after they are removed, the effect of soil and climate will render the
crop nearly fifty per cent better in Illinois than in Upper Canada.
Mr Ferguson’s calculations seem to me too favourable to Upper Canada;
yet if the expenses of harvesting, thrashing, and teaming be added to
the expenses of the first wheat crop, as stated by him, the value of the
produce, which I think he has greatly overrated, falls L.1, 7s. 6d.
short of the expense it has cost in raising; and no statement which I
received made the value of the first crop cover the expense of producing
it. It is this circumstance which renders the farmers of Upper Canada so
poor after first settlement, and time and frugality the only means of
escaping from their wretchedness. It is this circumstance, joined to the
effects of accumulating interest, which renders inevitable the ruin of
every farmer who purchases on credit, and stamps with folly the recent
proceedings of government in disposing of land. In Illinois the first
crops more than repay the expense of raising them.
The commercial state of the two countries corroborates the nature of the
farming. A newly settled district in Upper Canada continues to import
flour and salt provisions for many years. In Illinois every farmer, soon
after establishing himself, sells produce of all descriptions. The whole
population of Upper Canada, with exception of those on the rivers
Detroit and Thames, may be said to be fed with fresh or salted animal
food from the United States. The difficulties of first settlement in a
densely wooded country are so great that the inhabitants of Upper Canada
could not have existed without the money of Britain, and the provisions
of the western United States.
Viewing soil as a workshop, the prairie farm of Illinois is superior to
the forest one in Upper Canada, not only from containing a better supply
of the materials forming climate, as described at pages 327, 328, but
from being fitted by nature for immediate operations. Place a prepared
workshop, and materials for forming another, before any manufacturer
whatever, and ask him whether he would commence his profession in the
erected shop, or prepare one with his own hands. Such is the situation
of the industrious emigrant farmer with regard to the Illinois prairie
and Upper Canada forest. If choice is made of the latter, the farmer is
like a manufacturer who would erect a workshop with his own hands. The
forest settler, after suffering privations, undergoing much toil, and
patiently waiting till the stumps decay, will at length find himself in
something like the situation of the prairie farmer on his first
settlement. Nay, the first ploughing of forest land after the stumps
have decayed, is more expensive than breaking up prairie land, and the
succeeding crops greatly inferior. I had no opportunity of forming an
opinion of the crops immediately after the stumps decay, but a friend,
capable of judging, told me a field which I saw preparing under such
circumstances, on the banks of the Otanabee, in the Newcastle district,
produced a poor wheat crop in 1834, and that such crops will not average
more than fifteen bushels per acre. A person in the township of
Hinchinbrook, Lower Canada, prepared and sowed a field of stump land
with wheat in 1834, the crop of which did not cover the expense of
raising and carrying it to market. The capitalist who clears Canadian
forest in preference to farming the prairie of Illinois, makes a
sacrifice of property, and the industrious farmer who follows the same
course throws away ten or twelve years of his labour.
However theoretical the view which I have ventured to take of the first
settlers in the two countries may appear to some minds, it will be found
to accord with practice. Throughout all my peregrinations in Upper
Canada, I did not visit or see a settlement of seven or eight years’
standing possessing a stack nor a herd of cattle. Ten or twelve acres of
wheat, which was put into a barn, formed the utmost extent of that crop
on one farm, and the patches of Indian corn seldom exceeded a rood. The
tables of the farmers were indifferently stored, fried salt pork from
the United States being served up in many houses twenty-one times
a-week. In Illinois the state of things was very different with new
settlers. Wheat and Indian corn were seen every where in abundance, and
the tables were amply stored with fresh provisions. In Upper Canada salt
pork was the standard dish at all meals, and in Illinois salted meat was
never placed before me.
A British farmer can have little idea of the Canadian forest from the
trees of his own country, which are mere saplings compared with those of
Upper Canada; and his notions of drilled crops and rotations will ill
accord with the disgusting black stumps which disfigure the fields. In
Illinois he may at once pursue any system and perform any operation. The
best breeds of cattle and sheep will find suitable food in the country,
and the most improved implements of husbandry may be employed. A reaping
machine was used at Jacksonville in 1834, and it is on the lawned
surface of the prairie where this and almost every other description of
agricultural machinery can be introduced with advantage. On the forest
farm of Canada machinery cannot be used, nor stock kept.
Since the prairies of Illinois possess such advantages over Upper Canada
in the present state of agriculture, what may not be expected from them
with the progress of science? Already the crops on nearly one hundred
farms in East Lothian are thrashed by means of steam, and its
application to other operations will in all probability be soon
effected. The coalfield of Illinois is inexhaustible. With steam power
to cultivate the prairie, and to reap, collect the crops of grass and of
wheat, and to separate the grain from the straw, who can set limits to
the quantity of human sustenance which Illinois is capable of affording?
If ever there is such a place as the granary of the world, it will be
the prairies of the western United States of America.
It was difficult for me to form an opinion of the price of wheat in
Upper Canada when I was in the country, the accounts being so
contradictory, and sometimes stated in cash, and sometimes in store pay.
I have stated the expenses and merchants’ profit of sending wheat from
the township of Nichol to Britain at 3s. 7d. sterling per bushel, and
perhaps the average expense of the province will exceed 3s. The wheat of
Upper Canada will sell as high in the London market as the best English
wheat. The farmer of Upper Canada must, therefore, sell his wheat about
24s. a-quarter below the highest London prices. The Illinois farmer has
different markets for his wheat, and can send it to Canada if he
pleases. I have no means of calculating the expense of transport from
Illinois to Canada, which cannot, however, be very heavy, from the
canals being public property, and the dues consequently moderate. The
greater produce of land in Illinois will, however, more than pay the
expense of sending it to Canada, and I consider myself justified in
saying that a farm in Illinois will at all times yield more produce than
one in Upper Canada, and that produce realize more money.
The prices of farm produce being high in Upper Canada is disadvantageous
to the labouring settler who enters on a forest farm, because, being
unable for several years to grow a sufficiency of food for family
consumpt, the dearness of what he purchases exhausts his funds. So long
as a farmer consumes all the produce which he grows, prices do not in
the least affect him, and this is too often overlooked in the Canadas,
where it is so difficult at first to grow produce. Fresh beef is said
occasionally to fetch twenty-five cents per pound at Quebec, while it
can be had in some parts of Illinois at three cents. The settler at
Quebec would feel the high price of beef a hardship, and perhaps never
reap the benefit of it from the difficulty of fattening cattle in his
unfavourable situation. The true value of a crop is expressed by the
price and quantity of produce, diminished by the expense it costs in
raising and marketing.
I also found difficulty in ascertaining the yearly wages of an
agricultural labourer in Upper Canada, from the system of cash and store
pay, and the difference of summer and winter wages. Mr Somerville of
Whitby states the cash wages of the best labourer in Upper Canada at $80
a-year, while in Illinois they are $100. Whether these sums are
perfectly accurate, is of no great consequence, as it is universally
admitted over all Canada that wages are lower there than in the United
States. Indeed it cannot be otherwise, produce being shared between the
farmer and labourer, and land in Upper Canada yielding so much less than
in Illinois.
Labour is more easily obtained in Upper Canada than in Illinois, the
difficulty with which forest land is cultivated preventing labourers
farming on their own account. Whether the agricultural capitalist
derives more profit from employing labour in Upper Canada than in
Illinois, I cannot satisfactorily determine; but from what has been
formerly stated, the investment of capital in clearing forest in Upper
Canada does not in the first instance pay, while farming the prairie is
at once remunerating. From the great return of produce, it is probable
both the capitalist and labourer are better rewarded in Illinois than in
Upper Canada. The higher wages in Illinois, however, bring the farmer
and hired labourer nearer each other in the command of the necessaries
of life than in Canada. But this circumstance ought to form a source of
enjoyment to the capitalist, who should prize the bounty of God the more
from knowing it is also amply shared by the labourer. The landholder of
Upper Canada, who sets himself down in the forest, toils hard for the
first nine or ten years, and cannot command the same comforts and
necessaries of life as the labourer in Illinois. I refer to page 450 for
evidence of the truth of this remark.
As it is the ambition of every agricultural labourer who leaves Britain
for America to become a landholder there, I shall endeavour to show what
are the chances of attaining his object in Upper Canada and Illinois.
Supposing forest land in Upper Canada to be $3 per acre, and a
labourer’s wages $80 a-year with board, he will get the value of about
twenty-seven acres of land. In Illinois, land costs $1¼, and wages being
$100, the labourer gets the value of eighty acres. But taking into
account what has been stated at page 460 regarding the difference of
expense in raising crops on forest and prairie land, I am justified in
asserting the wages of agricultural labour to be about thirty times
higher in Illinois than in Upper Canada, when estimated in reference to
land and what it can be made to produce in the respective countries.
Purchasing extensive tracts of forest land is a hazardous speculation in
Upper Canada, because it is now selling far above its intrinsic value to
actual settlers. The soil continues unproductive while the forest
remains, and it has been already shown that land does not repay the
expense of clearing for years afterwards. Take for illustration a case
where a block of 7000 acres has been purchased at $4 per acre, the block
would cost L.7000 currency. Suppose the proprietor clears 100 acres
yearly for six successive years, at the termination of which he finds
the expense of improvement and his family living has been disbursed by
the crops, and I am much mistaken if such an extent of operations and
successful issue has ever taken place. The legal interest of the country
being 6 per cent, the original purchase money will now amount to L.9520,
or a yearly burden on the cleared portion of nearly twenty shillings per
acre; and if the purchase money was only $2 instead of $4, the yearly
burden would still be ten shillings. Purchasing the prairie of Illinois
is very different, because the whole surface is productive without
cultivation, and keeping but a single sheep on it per acre, would leave
a profit on the outlay. A rise in the value of Illinois land in course
of a few years may be held to be certain, and in the mean time it will
continue productive. A rise in the value of forest land in Upper Canada
for twenty years to come is doubtful, and until then it will remain
unproductive. There is no way of escaping from loss in holding a tract
of forest land in Canada but by selling it.
A party of friends cannot conveniently settle themselves together in the
forest of Upper Canada. Each family would be shut out from the others’
occupying a small clearance, with bad roads of communication, and the
larger the party and the extent of each family’s possessions, the
greater these and other inconveniences would become. A party may occupy
a portion, or the whole, of a prairie in Illinois with the best effects.
Each family might settle within sight of the whole party, with good
roads of communication, and although the possessions of each might be
extensive, circumstances would be the same, with exception of the
distance of separation. The skirts of the prairie would afford forest,
scattered trees, or lawn for adorning residences, but Upper Canada being
an interminable forest, the members of which do not answer to stand when
singled out, there is but little choice of natural beauty of situation.
The agriculturists of Britain, who have long been accustomed to obtain
high prices for produce, and consequently to finger much cash, may be
apt to treat with contempt the idea of farming in a country where prices
are so low as they are in Illinois. I have already remarked that the
British farmer collects the corn-law tax, the results of nature’s
assistance, and part of what flows from his own capital, and the
operatives’ labour, all of which he pays in the name of rent and taxes;
so it is only that portion of the cash which sticks to his own pocket
that is really valuable to him. When conversing on this subject, a
farmer once remarked to me that he paid money away as fast as it was
received, and derived no advantage from the cash which resulted from
high prices beyond the temporary pleasure of looking at it.
It is far from my intention to undervalue the advantages enjoyed by the
farmers of Britain, or to ridicule them for discharging, through the
medium of high prices, just debts, which I consider to be one of the
most pleasing employments in life. But while sensible of the general
benefits of cash, let me ask British farmers what is the use of money to
them beyond the means it affords of purchasing things? The industrious
farmer of Illinois may not perhaps be able to accumulate much money, but
although not rich in _cash_, he cannot fail of being rich in _things_.
The view which I have ventured to describe of cash and things, as
affecting the farmer of Britain and Illinois, is not visionary. Take for
illustration a favourable case in Britain. Suppose a farmer to have
rented 300 acres for a period of thirty years, during which he has
maintained and educated a family, and to die worth five thousand pounds.
This sum will do little more than place two sons in a situation similar
to what he occupied, that is to say, it will purchase twice the farming
apparatus he himself possessed. A farmer occupying the like extent and
for the same period in Illinois, might educate and maintain a family in
the fullest abundance, and would find no difficulty during his lifetime
in placing a dozen of sons in a similar position with himself by the
means of things, whatever might be the state of prices. If a son, on
attaining his fifteenth year, were to work for hire, or to be
industrious on his father’s farm until reaching the age of twenty-one,
the results of his own labour would enable him to purchase and stock a
farm without assistance from the father. But in a case where the son may
not have been industrious, the farmer could have little difficulty in
providing him with a farm, when the fleece of a sheep purchases an acre
and a half of land. A farm is almost as easily stocked as it is
purchased, one ploughing and harrowing being sufficient to procure a
crop of Indian corn and one of wheat; while the produce of an acre of
the former will furnish seed for 320 acres, and an acre of the latter
seed for forty-five acres.
Hitherto the case of farmers and their sons has only been alluded to. It
is unnecessary, however, to notice the situations of widows, daughters,
and infant-children, after what has been stated at pages 336–7 and
344–5. When a British tenant, who has farmed on lease, is descending the
vale of years, with local attachments for the spot where he was born
deeply-seated in his heart, the caprice of landholder, agent, or factor
may uproot the best feelings of his nature, and set him aside to make
room for another. But the farmer of Illinois has the assurance of
terminating his days on the spot which has been the scene of his
operations in manhood, unmolested by any one.
The farmer may change the scene of his operations from Britain to
Illinois, and benefit by the transition, but the like prospect cannot be
held out to the Illinois farmer. The following is an extract from a
letter lately received from my brother Charles:—“I do not regret the
step which I have taken in settling myself on the banks of the
Mississippi, and shall be stimulated to active exertion by the thought,
that every tree I cut down, every sod I turn, and every animal I rear,
brings me nearer Scotland. I have reason to believe these hopes will be
realized. Allowing, however, that they will not—that a livelihood is the
most I shall obtain, and that I am compelled to spend and end my days
here—what of that? at the longest, life is not so very long, and when
accompanied with virtue, it has attractions almost any where. But I
still look to Scotland as containing all I truly love in this world, and
shall never relinquish the hope of being able to end my days at home.”
In Britain the state of every thing at present is so different from
Illinois, that there is not much prospect of any emigrant farmer
realizing such a fortune in Illinois as will enable him to return and
live in Britain. The rate of interest in Illinois being nearly three
times more, and the price of provisions nearly three times less than in
Britain, a change of residence from the former to the latter would be
attended with an immense loss of income to the capitalist. On the other
hand, a change from Britain to Illinois would greatly augment his
income. Britain and Illinois cannot, however, long continue so
dissimilar as they are at present. The necessaries of life are likely to
approach nearer each other in price, by a rise in the one country and a
fall in the other, and ultimately the youthful emigrant of the present
day may be enabled to return to Britain in his old age.
Some of the opinions which I have expressed of the Canadas and Illinois,
as adapted for agriculture, may be tested by the standard of nature.
From the junction of the north branch of the river Ottawa with the St
Lawrence below Montreal, to Goderich in the west of Upper Canada, and
from thence to the southern point of Illinois, the eye is only relieved
by two inconsiderable eminences in Lower Canada. Lakes Huron and
Michigan being situated in the highest parts, and only 589 feet above
the level of the sea, this tract of country may be considered an immense
valley, the Canadas running from the lakes in a north-easterly
direction, and Illinois running south. On a general view, there is so
little difference of elevation, that the countries may be considered of
the same altitude, and their climates affected only by latitude. The
medium latitude of Lower Canada may be stated at 46°, of Upper Canada,
44°, and of Illinois, 40. Supposing winter to increase in duration two
weeks with each degree of latitude, the winter of the medium of Illinois
may be stated at two months, of Upper Canada at four months, and of
Lower Canada at five months. The summers of the countries lengthen
inversely with the winters.
Judging from what came under my notice, I am inclined to think the
surface of Illinois is superior soil to the Canadas, and the lower
province better than Upper Canada. There is, however, much good and bad
soil in all the countries, and in order to avoid the semblance of
partiality, the soil of the Canadas and Illinois shall be assumed to be
similar in quality.
I have formerly denominated soil a workshop; air, moisture, light, and
heat, raw materials, termed climate; plants and animals, machinery;
certain minerals and labour, oil for the machinery which manufacture
farm produce. Nature and man perform distinct parts in the manufacture,
and the farmer’s success depends on the aid which he is enabled to
afford her. Man is subordinate to nature, and a superabundant or a
diminished supply of moisture or of heat, which form part of the
materials she supplies, may arrest the manufacture, and impair or
destroy the machinery furnished by man.
The workshop or soil of the Canadas and Illinois has been assumed to be
similar, but the raw materials of nature are not at all times furnished
to the workshops of these countries in the same proportions, and this
variation of supply or difference of climate, affects the manufacturing
results of the farms, both with regard to the quantity and quality of
fabrics.
The winters of Lower Canada, Upper Canada, and Illinois being
respectively five, four, and two months in length, manufacturing will be
altogether suspended in the countries for corresponding periods. The
effects of suspended heat, or presence of cold, on animal machinery, is
increased by intensity as well as duration, and labour or furnishing of
oil is impracticable in winter. Manufacturing proceeds only when winter
is absent, and is increased by the intensity and length of summer, when
oil can be supplied. Winter being absent seven months in Lower Canada,
eight in Upper Canada, and ten in Illinois, the relative quantities of
fabrics manufactured in the workshops are not truly represented by these
numbers; and when all the effects of climate and of labour on animal and
vegetable machinery are duly considered, the average farming results, as
regard quantity, may be stated in Lower Canada at six, in Upper Canada
at seven and a half, and in Illinois at ten. But farming depends greatly
on the aid afforded nature, and the stated results of the countries are
supposed to arise from similar management.
Climate not being alike congenial to all plants and animals, the results
of the farm will be affected in quantity and quality by the machinery
which is employed and the care bestowed on it. It is almost unnecessary
to illustrate this position. The north of Scotland yields finer oats
than the south of England, but falls far short in the growth of wheat.
The wheat of Lower Canada is inferior to the wheat of the upper
province, and the growth of Illinois is superior to the wheat of Upper
Canada. Lower Canada does not produce autumn sown wheat, and Upper
Canada is not, like Illinois, congenial to the growth of Indian corn,
the “meal, meadow, and manure” of the farm. Taking into consideration
the winters and summers of the countries, the qualities of their wheat,
and the importance of Indian corn, the average farming results,
combining the quantity and quality of human sustenance, may be stated in
Lower Canada at five, in Upper Canada at eight, and in Illinois at
twelve. This calculation is meant to apply to soil under cultivation,
and to embrace the results of nature, capital, and labour.
I formerly assumed the results of nature in American farming to be
represented by the number 3. They will, however, necessarily vary with
the climate of the different parts of the country and the system of
management pursued. From what has been already stated regarding the
agriculture of the Canadas and Illinois, nature’s part in the produce
arising from cultivation may be stated thus—
Nature in Lower Canada produce will be represented by 2
—— in Upper Canada by 3
—— in Illinois by 4
It has already been mentioned, that a person possessing his own land has
nature for his servant; and if the estimates of her assistance in the
different countries approximate to accuracy, the farmer in Illinois
receives from nature double the assistance of the Lower Canada farmer,
and upwards of thirty per cent more than the farmer in Upper Canada.
The assistance which farmers in the different countries derive from
nature on first settlement is not fully displayed by the numbers two,
three, and four. It has formerly been assumed that a person in the
Canadas may clear ten acres of forest land in a year, and reap from it a
crop of wheat at the end of eighteen months, and that a person in
Illinois may reap in the same time a crop of Indian corn and a crop of
wheat from fifty acres. But the stumps of trees in the Canadas will
occupy two acres out of the ten, and thereby limit nature’s assistance
to eight acres. Nature’s assistance to the farmer in eighteen months
after settlement may be thus expressed:—
In Lower Canada, 8 multiplied by 2 on a wheat crop, 16
In Upper Canada, 8 multiplied by 3 on a wheat crop, 24
In Illinois, 50 multiplied by 4 on an Indian corn crop, 200 400
In Illinois, 50 multiplied by 4 on a wheat crop, 200 „
From the preceding statement, the farmer in Illinois receives from
nature twenty-five times the assistance of the Lower Canada farmer, and
nearly seventeen times the assistance of the farmer in Upper Canada. But
if nature’s contribution to the advantages which the Illinois settler
derives from the prairie be estimated, he may be said to receive from
nature thirty, and twenty times the assistance of the farmer in Lower
and Upper Canada respectively. It is the assistance which the farmer
derives from nature in degree, as well as in extent, which gives the
prairies of Illinois such advantages over the forests of Canada.
The British emigrant reaches Lower Canada by the river St Lawrence, the
navigation of which is closed by ice from November till May. Upper
Canada may be reached by the St Lawrence, or by way of New York and the
Erie canal. When the emigrant has a delicate family, and is encumbered
with heavy luggage, the route by New York is the best, more especially
if the place of his destination communicates with lakes Erie, St Clair,
or Huron. The routes to Illinois are by the St Lawrence and New York,
through the western lakes to Chicago on lake Michigan, or by New York
and the canal communicating with the river Ohio and lake Erie. Illinois
may also be reached by way of New York, Philadelphia, and from thence to
Wheeling on the Ohio, or by way of Baltimore and Wheeling. But the most
economical way for a family and luggage to proceed is by way of New
Orleans and the Mississippi, navigation seldom being interrupted by this
route, and steam-boats leaving New Orleans every two or three days for
the town of St Louis and the Ohio.
The expense of the best cabin passage from Liverpool to New Orleans,
including bedding and wine, is from L.30 to L.35 sterling, and the
passage from New Orleans to St Louis, L.5, 6s. A steerage passage from
Liverpool to New Orleans is from L.4 to L.5, exclusive of bedding and
provisions, and from New Orleans to St Louis, L.1, 14s.
The agricultural implements of Britain are ill adapted for the forest
settler; and as a general rule, the implements of the country are
suitable for what is required of them. Cotton goods are nearly as cheap
in the United States as in Britain, but woollens are higher.
The household furniture of Britain is unsuitable for agricultural
emigrants. Cooking apparatus adapted for the country can be had every
where. Crockery, glass, and hardware may be taken, and bedding
materials, with exception of feathers.
THE END.
EDINBURGH: PRINTED BY BALLANTYNE AND CO., PAUL’S WORK, CANONGATE.
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TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES
Page Changed from Changed to
41 with dark faces. Barberry, with dark faces. Barberry,
elder, and aller were growing elder, and alder were growing
● Typos fixed; non-standard spelling and dialect retained.
● Enclosed italics font in _underscores_.