Stories of Later American History Part 28

April 9 was a sad day for General Lee. As he stepped out of the door of the house where the terms of surrender had been agreed upon and stood in silence, waiting for his horse to be brought to him, he clasped his hands together as if in deep pain and looked far away into the distance. Then, mounting his steed, he rode back to the Confederate camp, where his officers and men awaited his coming.

[Ill.u.s.tration: General Lee on His Horse, Traveller.]

On his approach they crowded about their beloved chief in their eagerness to touch him, or even his horse. Looking upon his veteran soldiers for the last time, Lee said, with saddened voice: "We have fought through the war together; I have done the best I could for you. My heart is too full to say more." Then he silently rode off to his tent.

These simple, heartfelt words to his "children," as he called his soldiers, were like the man who spoke them. For during the entire war he was always simple in his habits. Rarely did he leave his tent to sleep in a house, and often his diet consisted of salted cabbage only. He thought it a luxury to have sweet potatoes and b.u.t.termilk.

The gentleness and kindness of General Lee was seen also in his fondness for animals. When the war was over his iron-gray horse, Traveller, which had been his faithful companion throughout the struggle, was very dear to him. Often, when entering the gate on returning to his house, he would turn aside to stroke the n.o.ble creature, and often the two wandered forth into the mountains, companions to the last.

Within a year after the close of the war General Lee was elected President of Was.h.i.+ngton College, at Lexington, Virginia--now called Was.h.i.+ngton and Lee University. There he remained until his death, in 1870. His countrymen, in all sections of the Union, think of him as a distinguished general and a high-minded gentleman.

Three years after the close of the war (1868) General Grant was elected President of the United States and served two terms. Upon retiring from the presidency, he made a tour around the world, a more unusual thing in those days than now. He was everywhere received, by rulers and people alike, with marked honor and distinction.

His last days were full of suffering from an illness which proved a worse enemy than ever he had found on the field of battle. After nine months of brave struggle, he died on July 23, 1885. Undoubtedly he was one of the ablest generals of history.

The war, in which these two distinguished commanders had led opposing sides, had cost the nation not only thousands of men, the vast majority in the prime of their young manhood, but millions of dollars. But it had two striking results: it preserved the Union, for it was now clear that no State could secede at will; and it put an end to slavery. The Emanc.i.p.ation Proclamation had set free only those slaves in the States and parts of States which were under the control of Union armies; but after the war the Thirteenth Amendment set free all the slaves in all the States in the Union for all time. These were the benefits purchased by the terrible sacrifice of life.

If we count those who were slain on the field of battle and those who died from wounds, disease, and suffering in wretched prisons, the loss of men was equal to seven hundred a day during the four long years of the war.

When it was over, a wave of intense relief swept over the country. In many homes were glad reunions; in others, saddened memories. But at least a united nation was cause for a new hope, and a patriotism which in time was to bind all sections into closer union.

SOME THINGS TO THINK ABOUT

1. Tell what you can about Lincoln's early life. What kind of boy was he?

2. What was the Emanc.i.p.ation Proclamation? Why did not Lincoln set the slaves free when he became President? What do you admire about him?

3. Why did Lee go with Virginia when this State seceded?

4. Tell as much as you can about Lee, Jackson, Stuart, Sherman, and Sheridan.

5. What kind of boy was Grant? What kind of man? What do you admire about him?

6. What were some of the important results of the Civil War?

7. When did this war begin, and when did it end?

8. Are you locating every event upon the map?

CHAPTER XVII

FOUR GREAT INDUSTRIES

COTTON

Thus far we have been considering mainly the men engaged in exploration, in invention, or in the great national struggles through which our country has pa.s.sed. But while only a small fraction of the people, as a rule, take an active and prominent part in the stirring events of history, many more work hard and faithfully to furnish all with food, clothing, and other things needful in every-day living. What these many laborers accomplish in the fields of industry, therefore, has a most important bearing upon the life and work of men, leaders and followers alike, in other fields of action. With this thought in mind, let us take a brief glance at a few of our great industries.

First, go with me in thought to the South, where the cotton, from which we make much of our clothing, is raised. Owing to the favorable climate of the Southern States, it being warm and moist, the United States produces more cotton and cotton of a better quality than any other country in the world.

No crop, it is said, is so beautiful as growing cotton. The plants are low, with dark-green leaves, the flowers, which are yellow at first, changing by degrees to white, and then to deep pink. The cotton-fields look like great flower-gardens.

As the blossoms die they are replaced by the young bolls, or pods, which contain the seeds. From the seeds grow long vegetable hairs, which form white locks in the pods. These fibres are the cotton. When the pods become ripe and open, the cotton bursts out and covers them with a puff of soft, white down.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Cotton-Field in Blossom.]

The height of the picking season is in October. As no satisfactory machine for picking cotton has been invented, it is usually done by hand, and negroes for the most part are employed. Lines of pickers pa.s.s between the rows, gathering the down and crowding it into wide-mouthed sacks hanging from their shoulders or waists. At the ends of the rows are great baskets, into which the sacks are emptied, and then the cotton is loaded into wagons which carry it to the gin-house.

If damp, the cotton is dried in the sun. The saw-teeth of the cotton-gin, as we have seen, separate the cotton fibre from the seeds. Then the cotton is pressed down by machine presses and packed into bales, each usually containing five hundred pounds, after which it is sent to the factory.

Various processes are employed to free the cotton from dirt and to loosen the lumps. When it is cleaned, it is rolled out into thin sheets and taken to the carding-machine. This, with other machines, prepares the cotton to be spun into yarn, which is wound off on large reels. The yarn is then ready to be either twisted into thread or woven into cloth on the great looms.

The United States produces an average of eleven million bales of cotton every year, and this is nearly sixty-seven per cent of the production of the whole world. Cotton is now the second crop in the United States, the first being Indian corn.

WHEAT

Another great industry is the growing of wheat, which is the foundation of much of our food. Wheat is a very important grain and is extensively cultivated.

There are a great many varieties, the two main kinds found in the United States being the large-kernel winter wheat, grown in the East, and the hard spring wheat, the best for flour-making, which is grown in the West.

Minnesota is the largest wheat-producing State, and I will ask you to go in thought with me to that Middle-West region. The farms there are very level, and also highly productive. The big "bonanza" farms, as they are called, range in size from two thousand to ten thousand acres. Some of these are so large that even on level ground one cannot look entirely across them--so large, indeed, that laborers working at opposite ends do not see one another for months at a time.

[Ill.u.s.tration: A Wheat-Field.]

During the planting and harvesting seasons temporary laborers come from all over the country. They are well housed and well fed. The farms are divided into sections, and each section has its own lodging-house, dining-hall, barns, and so on. Even then, dinner is carried to the workers in the field, because they are often a mile or two from the dining-hall.

The height of the harvest season is at the end of July.

In the autumn, after the wheat has been harvested, the straw is burned and the land is ploughed. In the following April when the soil is dry enough to harrow, the seeds, after being carefully selected and thoroughly cleaned, are planted. For the harvesting a great deal of new machinery is purchased every year. One of these huge machines can cut and stack in one day the grain from a hundred acres of land. Then the grain is threshed at once in the field, before the rain can do it harm.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Grain-Elevators at Buffalo.]

Through the spout of the thresher the grain falls into the box wagon, which carries it to the grain-elevator, or building for storing grain.

Here it remains until it is loaded automatically into the cars, which take it to the great elevator centres. The wheat is not touched by hands from the time it pa.s.ses into the thresher until it reaches private kitchens in the form of flour.

The great elevator centres are Duluth, St. Paul, Minneapolis, Chicago, and Buffalo. Some elevators in these centres can store as much as a million or more bushels each. They are built of steel and equipped with steam-power or electricity. The wheat is taken from grain-laden vessels or cars, carried up into the elevator, and deposited in various bins, according to its grade. On the opposite side of the elevator the wheat is reloaded into cars or ca.n.a.l-boats.

In 1914 the United States produced nine hundred and thirty million bushels, or between one-fourth and one-fifth of all the wheat produced in the world.

CATTLE-RAISING

The third great industry is that of cattle-raising. To find the ranches we will go a little farther west, perhaps to Kansas. A wide belt stretching westward from the one-hundredth meridian to the foot-hills of the Rocky Mountains is arid land. It includes parts of Texas, Kansas, Nebraska, the Dakotas, Montana, Wyoming, and Colorado. Although the rainfall here is mostly too light to grow corn and wheat without irrigation, these dry plains have sufficient growth to support great herds of sheep and cattle, and supply us with a large part of our beef. Cattle by the hundred thousand feed on these vast unfenced regions.

On the great ranches of this belt, which, we are told, are fast disappearing, there are two important round-ups of the cattle every year.