for the life of a negro man or child-bearing woman was equal to
twelve hundred dollars. Heavy ditching in malarial swamps was therefore
done by Irishmen, whose lives were less important to the planter.
Physicians were promptly called for the slaves, and women in labor were
generally cared for, because a negro baby was worth one hundred dollars.

If there was some public concern for the slaves in the fields and some
beginnings of legislation on the conditions of employment in the
industrial States, there was no thought for the isolated, lean,
heavy-fisted farmer of the Southern up-country or the Western prairies.
Land was still cheap, crops were increasing in bulk and value every
year. Nor did the farmer desire the attentions of society, provided the
new railroads were laid through his districts and rates were not too
exorbitant. He worked hard for a few months, then rested till harvest
time, after which he hunted and fished. During the long cold winters of
the Northwest he sat in his chimney corner or tended his cattle. Few
thought of fertilizing their land; terracing against rains and floods
was almost unknown, and for most farmers plowing was done up and down
the hills, which only hastened the washing-away process so
characteristic of the Southern agriculture. Very few farmers thought it
worth while to rotate their crops when fresh lands were to be had at a
few dollars an acre. The area of the United States seemed limitless, and
hardly a tenth of its arable land had ever been brought under
cultivation. The inventions of 1840-50 enabled the Western farmer to
grow larger crops, and harvest time was not so burdensome; corn-shellers
and grain-fans shortened the hours of labor for the men. Sewing-machines
and the revolving churns from the factories gave some relief to the
women, whose round of labor, milking, cooking, cleaning, washing, and
attending children, was still almost ceaseless. Even the picnics and
barbecues offered little to them, for they must still prepare the great
baskets of food and serve their lords and masters while they deliberated
on "bleeding Kansas," new railroad schemes, or negro slavery.

Whether the lot of the landless and the less talented had improved since
the day of Jackson would be hard to determine. If it was easier to
purchase land, or if there was an actual increase in wages, the number
of the poorer class of Americans had increased both actually and
relatively, and thus competition operate