They were evidently
laborer and employer to each other, and nothing more.
The state of things on two farms which I visited may serve as
illustrations of the process of regeneration which is going on all
over Virginia. They are two hundred miles apart. On one of two
thousand acres there were, before the war, about one hundred and
fifty slaves of all ages. The owner, at emancipation, put them in
wagons and deposited them in Ohio. His successor now works the
plantation with twelve hired men, who see to his cattle, of which he
raises and feeds large herds. His cultivation is carried on on
shares by white tenants. He has an overseer, makes a snug income,
and spends a good part of his winters in Baltimore and New York. He
laughs when you ask him if he regrets slavery. Nothing would induce
him to take care of one hundred and fifty men, women, and children,
furnishing perhaps thirty able-bodied men, littering the house with
a swarm of lazy servants, and making heavy drafts on the meat-house
and corn-crib, and running up doctor's bills.
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