Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this file which includes the original illustrations. See 55381-h.htm or 55381-h.zip: (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/55381/55381-h/55381-h.htm) or (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/55381/55381-h.zip) Images of the original pages are available through Internet Archive. See https://archive.org/details/cu31924028782781 Transcriber’s note: Enclosed italics font in _underscores_. Superscripts are denoted by a carat before a single superscript character or a series of superscripted characters enclosed in curly braces, e.g. M^r. or M^{ister}. [Illustration] AFTER THE WAR: A SOUTHERN TOUR MAY 1, 1865, TO MAY 1, 1866. by WHITELAW REID. [Illustration: Decoration] Publishers: Moore, Wilstach & Baldwin, 25 West Fourth Street, Cincinnati. New York, 60 Walker Street. London: Sampson Low, Son & Co. 1866. Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1866, by Moore, Wilstach & Baldwin, In the Clerk’s Office of the District Court of the United States for the Southern District of Ohio. PREFACE. With the exception of the unhealthy summer months, I spent the greater part of the year following the close of the Rebellion, in traveling through the late Rebel States, passing first around their entire coast line; and, on subsequent trips, crossing by various routes through the interior. I have sought, in the following pages, to show something of the condition in which the war left the South, the feelings of the late insurgents, the situation and capacities of the liberated slaves, and the openings offered, under the changed condition of affairs, to capital and industry from without. A couple of months, this spring, spent on the great cotton plantations of the Mississippi Valley, enabled me to make a closer study of the character of the average plantation negro than tourists have ordinarily found practicable; and the concluding chapters are mainly devoted to these observations. * * * * *