day in the territory, and one-third of his crop was then in.  Besides some servant’s duty to an officer, for which he is well paid, he does the work of a full hand on his place.  He hires one woman and two men, one of the latter being old and only a three-quarters hand.  He has two daughters, sixteen and seventeen years of age, one of whom is likewise only a three-quarters hand.  His wife works also, of whom he said, “She’s the best hand I got”; and if Celia is only as smart with her hoe as I know her to be with her tongue, Harry’s estimate must be right.  He has a horse twenty-five years old and blind in both eyes, whom he guides with a rope,—­carrying on farming, I thought, somewhat under difficulties.  Harry lives in the house of the former overseer, and delights, though not boastingly, in his position as a landed proprietor.  He has promised to write me, or rather dictate a letter, giving an account of the progress of his crop.  He has had much charge of Government property, and when Captain Hooper, of General Saxton’s staff, was coming North last autumn, Harry proposed to accompany him; but at last, of his own accord, gave up the project, saying, “It’ll not do for all two to leave together.”

Another case of capacity for organization should be noted.  The Government is building twenty-one houses for the Edisto people, eighteen feet by fourteen, with two rooms, each provided with a swinging board-window, and the roof projecting a little as a protection from rain.  The journey-carpenters are seventeen colored men, who have fifty cents per day without rations, working ten hours.  They are under the direction of Frank Barnwell, a freedman, who receives twenty dollars a month.  Rarely have I talked with a more intelligent contractor.  It was my great regret that I had not time to visit the village of improved houses near the Hilton Head camp, which General Mitchell had extemporized, and to which he gave so much of the noble enthusiasm of his last days.

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Next as to the development of manhood.  This has been shown, in the first place, in the prevalent disposition to acquire land.  It did not appear upon our first introduction to these people, and they did not seem to understand us when we used to tell them that we wanted them to own land.  But it is now an active desire.  At the recent tax-sales, six out of forty-seven plantations sold were bought by them, comprising two thousand five hundred and ninety-five acres, sold for twenty-one hundred and forty-five dollars.  In other cases the negroes had authorized the superintendent to bid for them, but the land was reserved by the United States.  One of the purchases was that made by Harry, noted above.  The other five were made by the negroes on the plantations combining the funds they had saved from the sale of their pigs, chickens, and eggs, and from the payments made to them for work,—­they then dividing off the tract peaceably among themselves.