r. Thus there
was little occasion for the development of any sense of individual
responsibility for the work. As a rule the methods adopted were crude.
Little machinery was used, and that of the simplest. Hoes, heavy and
clumsy, were the common tools. Within a year I have seen grass being
mowed with hoes preparatory to putting the ground in cultivation. Even
today the Negro has to be trained to use the light, sharp hoe of the
North. Corn, cotton and, in a few districts, rice or tobacco were the
staple crops, although each plantation raised its own fruit and
vegetables, and about the cabins in the quarters were little plots for
gardens. The land was cultivated for a time, then abandoned for new,
while in most places little attention was paid to rotation of crops or
to fertilizers. The result was that large sections of the South had been
seriously injured before the war. As some one has said:

"The destruction of the soils by the methods of cultivation prior
to the war was worse than the ravages of the war. The _post bellum_
farmer received as an inheritance large areas of wornout and
generally unproductive soils."

Yet all things were the master's. A failure of the crop meant little
hunger to the black. Refusal to work could but bring bodily punishment,
for the master was seldom of the kind who would take life--a live Negro
was worth a good deal more than a dead one. Clothing and shelter were
provided, and care in sickness. The master must always furnish tools,
land and seed, and see to it that the ground was cultivated. There was
thus little necessity for the Negro to care for the morrow, and his
African training had not taught him to borrow trouble. Thus neither
Africa nor America had trained the Negro to independent, continuous
labor apart from the eye of the overseer. The requirements as to skill
were low. The average man learned little of the mysteries of fruit
growing, truck farming and all the economies which make diversified
agriculture profitable.

Freedom came, a second sharp break with the past. There is now no one
who is responsible for food and clothing. For a time all is in
confusion. The war had wiped out the capital of the country. The whites
were land poor, the Negroes landless. It so happened that at this time
the price of cotton was high. The Negro knew more about cotton than any
other crop. _Raise cotton_ became the order of the day. The money
lenders would lend money on cotto