The coinage, during the year 1830, amounted to Of the gold coined in the course of 1830, there Of the gold found in the United States, amounting CHAPTER XVIII. Cultivation of sugar in Louisiana.-Florida.-Slavery. THE whole produce of sugar in Louisiana, in the year 1828, has been stated at 88,878 hogsheads of 1,000 pounds each. The number of sugar estates above 700, and the capital invested in them about forty-five millions of dollars; but every year the increasing investments, and more than proportionate increase in the quantity of sugar made, renders this estimate but of little use at the present moment. In Florida, also, the cultivation of sugar has made great progress. I am indebted to the kindness of M. Achille Murat* for the following details on the sugar cultivation of Florida; but I have no means at present of ascertaining the amount of capital now invested in the cultivation of the cane in that State. It would appear quite certain that in Florida, with a very moderate capital and some prudence and activity, a very large return is to be obtained for money invested in sugar plantations; and, with * M. Achille Murat, it may be recollected, left Europe some years ago, and purchased land in Florida. He has become an adopted citizen of the United States, where his merit and abilities are duly appreciated. perseverance, a large fortune may be realized with comparative certainty. The cultivation of sugar in that State is as yet in its infancy; but a European can with difficulty imagine the rapidity with which improvements take place in the United States generally; and where the cultivation of the south succeeds, the profits are still more encouraging than in the slower returns of northern industry. A few years ago, the greater part of Florida was almost a wilderness; now Tallahassee is a flourishing town, and great part of the State owes its growing pros perity, as I am informed, to the cultivation of sugar. According to Colonel Murat's computation, a purchase of 240 acres may be made at three dollars an acre; and a plantation stocked with all the necessary tools, provisions, mules, ploughs, clothing for the negroes, &c. for little more than £1000. In this sum is included the value of ten slaves; for the curse of slavery attends the cultivation of sugar in the United States, as elsewhere. Let us hope that it may be practicable at a future time to continue it without this blot upon the growing fortunes of America, although M. Murat certainly holds out little prospect of such a consummation. With this moderate outlay, and no material addition to it for the space of three or four years, a return of nearly 100 per cent. may be obtained. Indeed, land may be purchased at half the sum men tioned above, if at a distance from towns, &c.; and, by a judicious alternation of other crops, as cotton, maize, &c. very little risk or expense need be incurred by the cultivator. The Americans have frequently been reproached for suffering the continuance of slavery for one instant after the declaration of independence. It must be recollected that before that time they were not allowed to abolish it, even after repeated petitions to that effect to the government of the mother country. But any person who has an opportunity of observing personally the effects of the existence of this dreadful evil must, I think, allow that a sudden and unprepared emancipation would probably be productive, in the first instance at least, of evils a thousand-fold greater to all the parties concerned than even its unmitigated continuance. It is not one of the least lamentable effects of slavery, that it is apt to unfit both the oppressor* and the victim * I use not these terms invidiously; Captain Hall, M. Vigne, and many succeeding travellers, bear witness to the general kindness with which the slaves are treated in the United States. But it is a system, wherever it exists, whose whole existence rests upon a foundation of injustice, outrage, and the most atrocious robbery, that of the liberty, I may say the life (or its usufruct) of a fellow-creature. This right of an unoffending individual to his liberty may be disputed by those who argue with Dumont as to the inherent rights of our nature, and would make |