The Southern States, March, 1894: An illustrated monthly magazine devoted to the South — John Shaqi
The Southern States, March, 1894: An illustrated monthly magazine devoted to the SouthVarious
History
The Southern States, March, 1894: An illustrated monthly magazine devoted to the South
Various
Agriculture -- Southern States -- Periodicals; Southern States -- Industries -- Periodicals; Southern States -- Periodicals
These settlers can truly be regarded as to the advance guard of a
race movement that will eventually make of Southern Alabama, Southern
Mississippi and a portion of Western Florida an American Italy. The
coming of Italians to Alabama can no longer be considered as an
experiment. As has been previously stated, the settlement in Baldwin
county was made some six or eight years ago. These people can live on
less than either Americans or negroes, for they have been accustomed
to the strictest economy at home. The great fault of the colored
race, and to a large extend of their white employers in the South, is
wastefulness. When negroes can make a living on land in the section of
country under consideration, Italians will surely be able to do so.
They have the utmost confidence in their ability to do so. The negro
is not satisfied unless he has meat to eat every day in the year. The
workers on farms and in orchards and vineyards in Italy are accustomed
to live on bread, fruit and vegetables for weeks at a time. Their
repasts often consist of a piece of bread and a bunch of grapes, or a
piece of bread and an onion.
That this class of immigrants will greatly benefit the section to which
it has been attracted, to use a Gallicism, goes without saying. They
will make good citizens, for they would not seek rural life if they
were the adherents of any special political propaganda. Experience
has fully demonstrated the fact that all foreigners holding extreme
opinions in regard to government and social order that come to this
country, Russian Nihilists, German Socialists, French Anarchists,
Irish Dynamiters, and Italian Red Republicans, make their homes in
cities, and generally in large ones. The quiet of country life is
distasteful to them. They must live in the midst of agitation and
turmoil, and constantly attend gatherings where they deliver or listen
to incendiary or socialistic harangues, or existence becomes almost
unendurable to them. These settlers in South Alabama, on the contrary,
are well satisfied with the institutions of the country to which they
have come in search of homes, appreciate the safety and security that
are caused by the supremacy of law and order, and look forward to
prosperous and happy lives in a land where war is unknown, where the
balance of power does not trouble the souls of statesmen, and where
no immense armaments are maintained by imposing heavy and grievous
burdens on the people. They have come to stay, and many will follow in
their footsteps. The region to which they have betaken themselves has
for years been a market garden for the West. It will now also become
an orchard and a vineyard. We are living in an age of progress, and
wonderful changes and developments are ahead of us.
LETTERS FROM NORTHERN AND WESTERN FARMERS, GIVING THEIR EXPERIENCE IN
THE SOUTH--VI.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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