My days and nights on the battle-field Author:Charles Carleton Coffin Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: Rich Men in Power. How they look upon Labor. quently dependent. Out of this number are chosen the Council, Assembly, Justices of the Peace, and other officers... more », who conspire together to wield power." Thus a few rich men managed all the affairs of the colony. They were able to perpetuate their power, to hand these privileges to their sons, through successive generations. At the present time there are many men and women in Virginia who consider themselves as belonging to the first families, because they are descendants of those who settled the country. The great estates have passed from the family name, — squandered by the dissolute and indolent sons. They are poor, but very proud, and call themselves noble-born. They look with contempt upon a man who works for a living. I saw a great estate, which was once owned by one of these proud families, near the Antietam battle-field, but spendthrift sons have squandered it, and there is but little left. The land is worn out, but the owner of the remaining acres, — poor, but priding himself upon his high birth, looking with haughty contempt upon men who work, — in the summer of 1860, day after day, was seen sitting upon his horse, with an umbrella over his head to keep off the sun, overseeing his two negro women, who were hoeing corn ! Quarry. Pirates welcomed at Charleston. The Paritani. All of these springs which started in Virginia tinged, entered into, and gave color to society throughout the South. There were great estates, privileged classes, a few rich and many poor men. There were planters, poor white men, and slaves. In those old times pirates sailed the seas, plundering and destroying ships. They swarmed around the West India Islands, and sold their spoils to the people of Charleston, South Carolina. There, fo...« less