capitol, which have been characterized as "enduring monuments of our shame" -being of Quincy granite, we have now similar ones of native granite-the massive iron railing having been extended from the capitol garden to the corner of Bridge-street, and they are of such beautiful appearance as to contrast most triumphantly with the northern stone.― May we not hope that the building now going up will prove but the beginning of a state-house on such a scale as will challenge as much our future admiration as the existing one does our present execration. I must now beg to be indulged in carrying your readers with me on a visit to one of the most complete and promising little manufacturing establishments to be found anywhere either within our state or out of it. I allude to the chair factory and turnery of Dr. Percival, a few miles from the town. It is most charmingly located in the sand hillsa region that knows no unhealthy season. The water power is supplied from a beautiful lake which, like many others hereabouts, finds its source in the sand hills, whence there comes a never fail ing supply of water. It is as true as it is surprising, of these collections of fresh water, that they are in nowise detrimental to the health of the inhabitants. Issuing out of the white sand beds. a number of minor tributaries concentrate in sand-bottomed beds, and so slight is the deposit of vegetable matter that their beds preserve almost their primitive whiteness. Their surfaces seem but to subserve the cooling exhalation without evolving any of their fatal miasms. which are so generally characteristic of fresh water bayous or lakes, whilst the clear pure and deep mass of water-free of anything harmful, and with bank and bottom of the most inviting character-presents in the heat of summer an invitation to bathing which can hardly be resisted. It is perfectly true that earth presents scarcely a spot where a man may more easily pick up a living than in these same sand hills, and yet the inhabitants for the most part are the most wretchedly inert, and therefore continually stinted people to be found anywhere. This is owing on the one part to the absence of that stimulation which the state is bound to furnish in public schools, and on the other to the heavy drag upon their morals which the state elections biennially impose on them by means of corrupt practices. Freemen are here, as with us in Charleston, openly and shamelessly bartered for, or bought up like cattle in the market, and whilst the politician perjures their souls, the whisky seller perishes their bodies.But amongst these sons of the desert, civilization is creeping in. Oases are springing up everywhere, and by the infusion of mechanical enterprise, we may yet hope to see these so much to be pitied sons of Carolina rendered virtuous, happy and useful people. Almost every mechanical establishment in and about Columbia gives employment to some of the sand-hill boys; and in the factory of Dr. Percival, we were pleased to leam, are several energetic and respectable young men, natives of these diggings, who were at work, and exhibiting all the skill and aptness of their more experienced mechanical tutors. But to the factory itself. It is not on a very large scale. but as complete as it can be for all the purposes contemplated by the enterpris ing and well managing gentleman who projected it. Turning in all its varieties is done here, with the greatest precision and nicety, and with almost incredible rapidity. In the manufacture of chairs, when the circular and vertical saws have answered all the demands tha: may be made on them, there is but little required which the lathe cannot accomplish-and here it is all done to perfection. Chairs of beautiful and varied patterns, some of them original in design, and superior, as affecting comfort and elegance, to any we have ever seen of northern make, are turned off by hundreds. The caning is done here in beautiful style, and some of the female slaves employed in this department, exhibit, after but a brief experience, a facility and quickness really surprising-inasmuch as they perform what is regarded amongst the Yankees a full day's task with the greatest ease and in a more perfect manner. We were shown several specimens of caning from different northern factories, executed by first-class operatives, which, upon comparison with those executed by the women here, were found to be most decidedly inferior to the latter. The painting, both plain and ornamental, is also done here in the best style. But now for the most important item-the cost! The chairs are made at a less cost than in any northern factory-even Schools-Mechanic Arts-Chair-Making. 623 now, whilst a part of the labor here is no interest paid on capital lying idle in paid for in this pioneer factory at a rate a lumber investment. Almost every much beyond what it will be procura- particle of the forest tree is used to adble at as soon as a sufficient number of vantage, even the bark being stripped operatives shall have been drilled on from the edges of the sawed pieces to finthe spot. The sophomores and juniors ish the material, now coming so much are studying faithfully, and are forward into use, for rustic arbors and chairs, &c. scholars-ere long we may look for a for gardens. In every department of graduation of seniors, who will immedi- this model factory we perceive indicaately set about the work of pioneering tions of a thorough perception of the art themselves in other parts of the state. of producing the largest representation of Thus it is always that a mechanical mercantile value at the smallest possischool, like a literary one, continually ble outlay of domestic means. The masends forth its graduates to enlighten terials at the very doors cost almost noand benefit society. But we return to thing; the water power, never failing, our assertion, that to make a chair costs works without wages; and the manual here less than any where at the north; labor, costing even now as little as norand how can it be otherwise? The pow- thern labor, may be and will be, under a er which nature supplies in this sand- Percival's skilful and eminently practihill lake is as constant and regular in cal management, made, by the judicious action as it is exhaustless in quantity, intermingling of slave male and female and keeps within its proper metes and labor with that of the native whites, bounds without any restraint of bank or and their imported tutors, cheaper than it dam, for just at its narrow mouth is can possibly be had for in any northern placed the mill-race, which a single flood- locality. Here then, with all the elegate controls. Around, and in sight of ments of cost at the lowest rate, the wares the mill, grows the very kind of trees of this factory would contend successfulthat this manufacture requires for its ly, even for a foreign market, with the materials: oak, bird's-eye and straight- keenest Yankee competition. As to the grained maple, walnut, beach, hickory, home market, the Doctor will have unbirch, elm and China-tree woods, which disputed possession to the extent that he together furnish almost all the materials can supply the various styles called for that even the highest art in chair-ma- in the trade. It costs quite as much to king calls for. The trees are merely bring a Windsor chair from New-Hampstripped of their limbs, and, in the green shire or Massachusetts, (the principal state, without even stripping off the bark, seats of this kind of manufacture,) to Coare put under the saws, which by vari- lumbia, as the original price of it in the ous cuttings soon reduce them to the home market. We will call it precisediminutive shapes of the trade-then by ly the same. Thus it will be seen that, a quick and most perfect process they even admitting the cost of manufacture are seasoned in a few days, and after- here to be as much as at the north, which wards finished up for sale. By this means it is not, they will yield a profit of one the lumber is laid down at the mill at hundred per cent. if sold at the price the smallest possible cost, no expense of which the northern chairs cost laid down large lumber storehouses is incurred, and here. ART. XIII-INTERNAL IMPROVEMENTS. LETTER OF HON JAMES ROBB-NORTH ALABAMA AND SAVANNAH RAIL-ROAD-RAIL-ROADS OF INDIANA AND ILLINOIS. THE HON. JAMES ROBB, in a letter to Col. de Russy, a pamphlet copy of which he has kindly furnished us, argues with ability the question of state subscription to rail-road works, and thus refers to the three great lines of improvement in which Louisiana is now so much interested. The Opelousas or Great Western Rail-road may be constructed from NewOrleans to the Sabine River, at a cost not exceeding fifteen thousand dollars per mile, estimating iron, materials and descending the Mississippi and Ohio labor at their present cost. The almost unbroken surface of country over which it will be located will render it the cheapest road in the world for the transportation of freight and passengers; and, without being able to estimate its business, which in time will prove of the greatest magnitude, I assume that its expenses will be less, in proportion, than any great road in Europe or America; and that, in any event, it will prove one of great profit to the state and its stockholders. You who know better than I do the country which is to be peopled and improved by means of this great improvement, can best judge of the accuracy of my prediction. The Vicksburg and Shreveport Road, while not commencing with the advantages of the Opelousas Road, which has its terminus opposite a city of 150,000 inhabitants, is of the highest importance to the state and the region of country through which it passes, and is such as to possess the strongest claims to the most favorable consideration of the Legislature. I fully concur in the accuracy of the memorial submitted by Mr. Coleman, President of this company, and am convinced that the friends of this improvement have not overrated its importance, and that it cannot fail to prove highly productive, and when completed, become the great highway of emigration to the extensive territories of Western Louisiana and Texas. The Great Northern Road may be constructed, at the present cost of iron, materials and labor, to the Tennessee River, at a cost of ten millions of dollars, or about twenty-three thousand dollars per mile; and the careful inquiries and reports of those charged with the examination of that portion of the route crossing the swamps and prairies, furnish conclusive testimony in favor of the practicability of the route adopted. A large portion of the road traverses a country of resources and fertility which is capable of supplying a business which alone would give support to the road, independent of other sources. rivers, and enable the passenger leaving St. Louis or Louisville, to reach NewOrleans in sixty hours, without incurring the delay and dangers of a voyage of a thousand miles on the Mississippi River. Aside from its advantage in this respect, it will have its connection with the Mobile and Ohio Road, reaching to the Ohio River, and from thence by the Central Railroad of Illinois to Chicago and the northern lakes; also the Memphis and Charleston Road, terminating at Chattanooga. From this point railroad communication is already open to Charleston and Savannah; and from it there is now in progress of construction an entire line of rail-road via Knoxville in East Tennessee to Alexandria on the Potomac, for all of which the means of completion have been secured by the liberal aid of the states of Tennessee and Virginia. While communication with the Pacific is carried on, either by the Isthmus of Darien or Tehuantepec, or any other route than by a direct railroad to the Pacific by a northern line, the Great Northern Road will absorb the entire travel between the countries on the Pacific and the states located east of the Mississippi and Ohio rivers. What will be the commerce of such a road, leading as it does from a city of one hundred and fifty thousand inhabitants, and of the largest export of raw produce in the world? We have some additional facts in regard to the Shreveport Road, furnished us in the address of the President, N. D. Coleman, Esq. The direct influence of the road, here advocated, upon the northern parishes of Louisiana, has been noticed. Its effects upon New-Orleans, our commercial mart, will now claim our attention. It has been deduced that 300,000 bales of cotton will be the increased product of the northern parishes, by the completion of our road. It will be but a reasona ble calculation to suppose there must follow an increased production of cotton in that tier of counties in Arkansas, only a short distance north of our route, We however rely on its important say that it will amount only to 50,000 connections, and the facilities it will bales. In like manner, the counties in afford to travel and rapid intercommuni- Texas, north of the line of the Opelousas cation, as most likely to prove its great Railroad, will be induced, by the facili and chief source of profit. The comple- ties offered by our road, to extend the tion of this road to the Tennessee culture of cotton to the amount of 50,000 River will at once command the travel bales. The total amount of increase, North Alabama and Savannah Rail-road. then, will be 400,000 bales of cotton, all of which will reach New-Orleans by way of the road to the river, and by the river from Vicksburg. The value of this augmentation can scarcely be estimated. If, however, each bale leaves only $5 for storage, pressing, commissions, &c., it amounts to two millions of dollars. But the commercial and monetary transactions, predicated of this large amount of cotton, will take a much wider range, and secure much more beneficial results; perhaps it may contribute to the estabfishment of a direct importing trade. If the Vicksburg, Shreveport and Texas Road shall be extended through the northern portion of Texas, it will not have progressed far before it reaches the grain-growing regions of that state. The country between latitudes 32 and 33°, north and northeast of Austin, is adapted to the growth of wheat, at the rate of 50 bushels per acre, weighing from 60 to 64 pounds to the bushel. The facilities offered by the road are destined to superinduce the manufacture of flour in that section, which will find its market in the city of New-Orleans. So far, then, as New-Orleans is concerned, the Vicksburg, Shrieveport and Texas Rail-road, occupies in fact, and should occupy, in the estimation of all Louisiana, especially of New-Orleans, a very high degree of importance. It is estimated that the road will be 206 miles long, and cost, including bridges, buildings, motive power &c., $3,145,339. Under the title of the North Alabama and Savannah Rail-road, an article lately appeared in the Savannah Republican, which we extraet: "Permit me to call your attention to a projected line of rail-road, not put down on any map, but which, when carefully examined, will be found vastly to contribute to the trade and commerce of Savannah, and the increase of tonnage and passengers going over the Western and Macon and Central rail-roads. "If you will examine the map of Tennessee, Alabama and Georgia, and draw an air line from Memphis, Tennessee, to Savannah, Georgia, it will at once appear that Decatur, North-Alabama, Griffin and Macon, Ga., are nearly upon that line. A line of road, therefore, reaching from Memphis, Tenn., to Savannah, via Decatur, to Griffin, would at once be pre 625 ferred above all others to Baltimore, Philadelphia and New-York, for all descriptions of freight from the south and southwest seeking those points; also for all merchandise shipped from the northern cities seeking the south and southwest within its influence or range. It would also control a vast amount of travel which will otherwise take the East In Tennessee and Virginia Rail-road. fact, it is the only route, including all roads already made, or in contemplation, which will carry freight or passengers as quick as the East Tennessee and Virginia route from north to south via Memphis. "The road from Memphis to Decatur will be comleted in three years at farthest (a distance of less than two hundred miles,) under the charter of the Memphis and Charleston R. R. Co., and the only portion of this contemplated new route to build is from Decatur, Alabama, to Griffin, in Georgia, a distance of about 170 miles; and it is rather a remarkable fact that following the air line from Decatur to Griffin leads us through, or very near to, the only practicable route known from North to Middle Alabama, to wit: through Morgan, Marshall, touching the lines dividing De Kalb and Cherokee from St. Clair, and through the centre of Benton county, near Jacksonville, the county seat, thence to near Gadsden, and through Newnan, to Griffin. "This road would, to a very considerable extent, drain the whole of North Ala bama above and below the Muscle Shoals, which region of country is generally known as the Tennessee Valley, making annually from seventy-five to one hundred thousand bales of cotton, varying according to seasons; and with a plank road made to Elkton, Tenn., which is thirty miles north of Decatur, Ala., from ten to twenty thousand bales more would, in all probability, seek its way to Savannah. Upon reaching Coosa Valley from Rome, in Ga, to Talladega county, the road runs through a section of the country, yielding at least twenty thousand bales more, which would be tributary to it. "Thus, it will be perceived that, in the article of cotton alone, the road would intersect a portion of country yielding from one hundred to one hundred and twenty thousand bales, and, with the aid of the plank road, or roads, could contribute one hundred and thirty-thousand bales. "Again, goods purchased in Baltimore, gulf ports, which is sufficient to induce it Philadelphia or New-York would, almost to go that way. But the present rates necessarily, be sent by way of Savannah, charged from the Tennessee River to to supply all the section of country intersected by this contemplated road to Memphis, Tenn., and beyond that point, to a portion of West Tennessee, Mississippi, Arkansas and Texas. Besides, it would induce a considerable carrying trade all along the line of road from St. Louis, Mo., in flour, hides, and other articles of commerce, which she has for exchange for other products of other sections of the country. "And the grand reason why I believe all these anticipated results will be realized, is in the fact, mainly, that Decatur, North Alabama, via this new route to Griffin in Georgia, is nearer Savannah than Chattanooga is to Charleston by rail-road. The distance from Chattanooga to Charleston, by railroad, is four hundred and forty-four miles. The distance from Decatur, Ala., to Griffin is 170 miles; the distance from Griffin to Savannah is 249 miles. Making, in all, the distance from Decatur to Savannah 419 miles. But, allowing the road to diverge at various points, it is sufficient to establish the important fact, that Decatur will be as near Savannah for freight or travel as Chattanooga is to Charleston, making a difference of length by rail-road of 130 miles, and by river of 185 miles, in favor of the new route to Savannah-sufficient, in my estimation, to overcome all competition by other lines. Savannah or Charleston. say $5 per bale including insurance, would not be for a moment submitted to by any planter or shipper, knowing the difference in cost; consequently, no cotton can be expected, with any show of reason, to seek the Atlantic ports, when a communication by rail-road is made to Memphis, unless this projected road is built. "The country through Marshall, and for some distance towards Cherokee, is mountainous and rugged, but presents no formidable obstacle in building the road, it being intersected with valleys running in the direction of Gadsden, which approximates the air line already mentioned. "There can be no question that the freight and travel already mentioned as likely to be brought on this line of road, would yield a considerable revenue, and make it, in fact, a good investment, at fifteen thousand dollars per mile, or probably more. And when viewed in all its important bearings upon Savannah, Baltimore, Philadelphia and New-York, it is presumed no great difficulty would be experienced in realizing capital to build it. "The writer trusts that enough has already been stated to point out its great importance, and to call public attention to it, and speedy action in getting surveys and estimates made by an expe rienced engineer; and if he succeeds to this extent for the present, he will remain satisfied, and will have accomplished the task he has undertaken— being entirely satisfied as to the final result, when estimates and surveys are made." "The distance in miles being so much in favor of this new road, it is confidently believed and maintained, that it is the only possible way to control the cotton of the Tennessee Valley to the Atlantic ports; because the Memphis and Charleston Road can afford to carry cotton from Decatur to Memphis, and by RAIL-ROADS IN INDIANA.-The third steamboat from Memphis to New-Or- annual report of the Bellefontaine and leans, for three dollars per bale, includ- Indiana Rail-road Company states that ing insurance, or, at most, three dollars the road is nearly ready for business, as and twenty-five cents; but, by the road far as the western line of Ohio, at a The road comfrom Decatur via Griffin to Savannah, town called Union. it can be carried at the same rate, be- mences at the town of Galion, on the cause insurance will be saved. In this Cleveland, Columbus and Cincinnati case, I do not at all conceive it doubtful Rail-road, and, in conjunction with the how the large bulk of the cotton will go Indianopolis and Bellefontaine Rail-road, -clearly to Savannah--it being a well- forms a continuous line from Galion to The In ascertained fact, that prices are generally the state capital of Indiana. better for North Alabama cotton at the diana portion of the route, 84 miles to Atlantic ports than are realized at the Indianapolis, is completed, and open for |