more liquor and tobacco, and were less concerned with thenuseful and the material.nCritics damned the British Celts, calling them “drinkersnand gamblers,” “remarkably lazy,” “adverse to industry,nnever working but from necessity,” and “holding that bodilynlabour of all sorts was mean and disgraceful.” One observerncharged that the Irish would “sit upon their hams, likengreyhounds in the sun, and work not one jott.” Reportedlyn”a drunken kind of people,” whose “propensity for intoxicationnhas been remarkable from the earliest times,” Celts alsonused “great quantities of tobacco in all its forms,” and werenmuch addicted to swearing and fighting.nI If’n•Ak^l’n^W->. MnSoutherners, contemporaries claimed, possessed thesensame characteristics. “They are a wild race, with but littlenorder or morals among them,” claimed a Yankee. “They arenindolent, devoted to raising cattle, hunting, and drinkingnwhiskey.” Southerners “only work two days in the week, andnkeep holiday the other days,” reported a traveler. Typicalnwhite Southerners, identified by a contemporary as “thenhardy descendants of the early Scotch and Irish settlers,”nwere “good horsemen, marksmen, and hunters, but are notnremarkable for agricultural industry. They are squattersnrather than farmers.” Moreover, he concluded, “they willnnot work.” The wife of a Southerner insisted that hernhusband “would not take a house or live in one, lest henshould have to work.” Even Confederate Ceneral Robert E.nLee admitted: “Our people are opposed to work. Allnridicule and resist it.”nAfter living in the South, a Northerner concluded that allnSoutherners, white and black, resisted toil. “A neighbour ofnhers owned fifty cows, she supposed, but very rarely had anynmilk and scarcely ever any butter, simply because his peoplenwere too lazy to milk or churn, and he wouldn’t take thentrouble to make them.” Slaves, she said, were as lazy as theirnmasters: “Folks up North talked about how badly thennegroes were treated; she wished they could see how muchnwork her girls did. She had four of them, and she knew theyndidn’t do half so much work as one good Dutch girl such asnshe used to have at the North.”nThe ways of Southerners, like those of their Celticnancestors, frequently shocked observers. “They arenprofane, and excessively addicted to gambling,” explained anYankee. “This horrible vice prevails like an epidemic.nBetting and horse-racing are amusements eagerly pursued,nand often times to the ruin of the parties.” Camblingnfrequently led to quarrels, noted an observer, “which arensometimes ended by the pistol.” Visitors frequently com­n14/CHRONICLESnnnplained about the “roughness” and “wickedness” of Southernnsociety, and the addiction of Southerners to tobacco andnspitting.nDrinking, which most Southerners relished, often led tonviolence. “The men of the South,” insisted a visitor, “arensudden and quick to quarrel. The dirk or the pistol is alwaysnat hand. Fatal duels frequentiy occur.” Southerners werennever pacifists. “The darkest side of the Southerner is hisnquarrelsomeness, and recklessness of human life,” wrote anwayfarer. “The terrible bowie-knife is ever ready to bendrawn and used on the slightest provocation.” The martialnspirit, which Southerners shared with their Celtic ancestors,nremained strong in the South.nDespite their violence and indolence, Celts and Southernersnoffered hospitality that few people could match. Evennsome of the most critical travelers praised the warmth withnwhich Celts and Southerners received them. It was customarynin both the Celtic areas of the British Isles and in thenantebellum South to overwhelm people with hospitality, tonencourage them to eat, drink, and enjoy themselves; it alsonwas traditional in both places, as an 18th-century Scottishnlady explained, “to please your company.” Travelers praisednthe kindness of Southerners, who were “ever ready tonwelcome the wayfarer to their hospitable firesides.” “If younare disposed to be convivial,” noted a traveler, “you mayndine with some one every day.” “They welcomed us toneverything,” said one man.nTheir casual attitude toward life made Celts and Southernersnless materialistic—less oriented toward the making ofnmoney — than most folk. Premodern Celts boasted that theyncoveted no wealth; as pastoralists and warriors, they “despised”ntrade and what they called “mercenary Employments.”nShowing her contempt for money, an 18th-centurynScotswoman, in the words of her debtor, “lighted her pipenwith the note I gave her for the money I owed her.” AnYankee observed that Southerners “are more reckless of thenvalue of money than any people that I have seen.” He alsonnoted that wealth impressed Southerners less than it didnmost other people. Another visitor insisted that there wasn”no part of the world where great wealth confers so littienrank, or is attended with so few advantages, [as in thenSouth].” Still another man contended that Southernersncoveted dogs more than money.nAnother characteristic adopted from the Celts was theninformal and rural ways of Southerners. Visitors reportednthat most people in the South lived unpretentiously inncarelessly built cabins. A traveler described a typical Southernnhome as one “ventilated on an entirely new principle;nthat is to say, by wide cracks in the floor, broad spacesnbetween the logs that composed the walls, huge openings innthe roof, and a window with a shutter that could not benclosed.” Southern roads and bridges — where there werenany—were as poorly constructed and maintained as thosenin premodern Scotland and Ireland. Such was the case, onenman claimed, because Southerners were “extraordinarilynindifferent to practical internal improvements.”nBoth Celts and Southerners spent much time outdoors.nExpert marksmen and anglers, they enjoyed hunting andnfishing. Fast horses and dogs were as much a part of theirnlives as hogs and cattie. One antebellum traveler dined onnvenison and trout brought in by “two little fellows thatn