WEST VIRGINIA. 



63 



hundred miles, and which has heen conducted with scarcely more expense than 

 for one hundred miles by railroad. Nor has live stock been neglected. A fair 

 proportion of sheep and wool have been produced, and horned cattle are profit- 

 ably grown and fatttjned. A few of these products are given in the following 

 table : 



Counties. 



Gallons of 

 sorsrhum. 



Pounds of Pounds of 

 honey, butter. 



Bushels of 

 potatoes. 



Products of 

 orchards. 



Value of 



slaughtered 



animals. 



Wetzel . . . 



Tyler 



Pleasants . 



Wood 



Jackson .. 



Total 



6,270 



11,900 



4,514 



7,266 



14,316 



5,507 

 6,014 

 1,711 

 690 

 2,155 



124,1^2 



130,527 

 30, 500 

 12, 175 



111,506 



14,430 

 23, 733 



7,747 

 33, 166 

 32, 630 



$7, 510 



11,997 



5,868 



2,460 



9,281 



44,266 



16,07 



409,050 111,706 



37, 116 



|28, 182 

 35, 150 

 15, 284 

 51,682 

 40, 260 



170,55^ 



The price of lands in this section varies wonderfully with the state of im- 

 provement, fertility, and accessibility. Farms on the Ohio river, mostly im- 

 proved, with timber for fuel skirting the adjacent hills, an orchard in bearing, 

 and comfortable farm buildings, command from fifty to one hundred dollars 

 per acre. The upland, nearly all susceptible of cultivation, with a surface un- 

 dulating, rolling, or hilly, in some places with ridges marking a very sharp 

 outline, if brought under good cultivation, in favorable localities, brings twenty- 

 five or thirty dollars per acre. Less improved, further from railroad or river, 

 or rougher or poorer, can be bought for ten and fifteen, and some even for five 

 dollars. 



The Ohio bottom lands produce corn, as do the best prairie and bottom lands 

 in the country, more according to culture than to difference in quality, at the 

 rate of fifty to one hundred bushels per acre. The average of wheat, which is 

 grown on the hills, more generally in loam than upon aluminous soils, among 

 stumps and roots, and sometimes rocks, and greatly exposed to the raids of 

 innumerable inhabitants of adjacent forests, is about the same as in Ohio, per- 

 haps fourteen bushels per acre, while occasional fields produce two or three 

 times that amount. 



Wood county has a great variety of soils. The northern portion is a sandy 

 loam, productive, excellent for fruit and vegetables, easily kept in condition 

 with light dressings of manure and judicious culture. On the Little KmawlKi 

 the soil is pretty stiff with clay, and in the soitthem portion of the county a 

 limestone soil is found. A fair crop of corn here is about fifty bushels per acre. 



The surface of Jackson county is rolling. Many of the hills have a lime- 

 stone soil ; some localities are characterized by heavy clay. Some of the bot- 

 tom lands are clay, and others alluvion based on sand or gravel. 



A considerable trade in grain has been carried on with New Orleans ; and 

 apples have been a source of revenue in the same trade, the Roxbury, Golden 

 Russet, and Yellow Bellflower being favorites, and producing abundantly. 

 Tobacco is a lucrative crop here. The soil is well adapted to the growth of a 

 superior quality. Corn and grass are the principal crops. There is a tendency 

 to a greater prominence in sheep husbandry. Five hundred sheep have 

 recently been introduced from Brooke county, notwithstanding the unsettled 

 Btate of the country, and the exposure to loss from guerillas. A beginning has 

 been made in grape-growing, which promises to be successful. 



