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[[left margin]] How they have been paid for work [[/left margin]]
Some have purchased land with a view of making homes for themselves. The majority of those engaged in planting have made fair crops, and, by judicial management, will save sufficient to supply themselves for the ensuing year; and, as a general thing, their employers exhibit a better disposition to deal fairly with them. 

[[left margin]] Stature of Contracts for the present year [[/left margin]]
The majority of contracts were entered into at the commencement of the year, and I regret to report that these instruments are generally defective and devoid of justice to the laborer. Written, as they were, by men who claim to be civil officers of the law, whose character for equity and justice may well be doubted; notwithstanding these and other grievances, the freedman are desirous of fulfilling their obligations. In settling accounts of freedmen against unscrupulous employers for their work, I have ignored these contracts as worthless, and submitted the settlement to men