to account each negro present when the misconduct took
place will deny all about the same. I therefore thought, and yet believe,
that for the good order of the plantation and faithful performance of their
duty, it was proper to have some faithful and trusty hand whose duty it
should be to report to me those in fault, and that is the only dread they
have of John, for they know he is not authorized to beat them. You mention
in your letter that you do not wish your negroes treated with severity.
I have ever thought my fault on the side of lenity; if they were treated
severe as many are, I should not be their overseer on any consideration."
In the same letter Cain mentioned that the pork made on the place the
preceding year had yielded eleven monthly allowances to the negroes at the
rate of 1050 pounds per month, and that the deficit for the twelfth month
had been filled as usual by a shipment from Savannah.

From 407 bales in 1841 the cotton output fell rapidly, perhaps because of
restriction prompted by the low prices, to 198 bales in 1844. Then it rose
to the maximum of 438 bales in 1848. Soon afterwards Cain's long service
ended, and after two years during which I. Livingston was in charge, I.N.
Bethea was engaged and retained for the rest of the ante-bellum period. The
cotton crops in the 'fifties did not commonly exceed three hundred bales
of a weight increasing to 450 pounds, but they were supplemented to some
extent by the production of wheat and rye for market. The overseer's wages
were sometimes as low as $600, but were generally $1000 a year. In the
expense accounts the annual charges for shoes, blankets and oznaburgs were
no more regular than the items of "cotton money for the people." These
sums, averaging about a hundred dollars a year, were distributed among
the slaves in payment for the little crops of nankeen cotton which they
cultivated in spare time on plots assigned to the several families. Other
expense items mentioned salt, sugar, bacon, molasses, tobacco, wool and
cotton cards, loom sleighs, mules and machinery. Still others dealt with
drugs and doctor's bills. In 1837, for example, Dr. Jenkins was paid $90
for attendance on Priscilla. In some years the physician's payment was a
round hundred dollars, indicating services on contract. In May, 1851, there
are debits of $16.16 for a constable's reward, a jail fee and a railroad
fare, and of $1.30 for the purchase of a pair of handcuffs, two padlocks
and a