BURNING BRUSH. 43} 



" The process of preparing new lands begins as early in the 

 winter as the housing and managing the antecedent crop will 

 permit, by grubbing the undergrowth with a mattock ; felling 

 the timber with a poll-axe ; * lopping off the tops, and cutting 

 the bodies into lengths of about eleven feet, which is about the 

 customary length of an American fence rail, in what is called 

 a worm or panel fence, f During this part of the process 

 the negro women, boys, and weaker laborers, are employed 

 in piling or throwing the brush-wood, roots, and small wood, 

 into heaps to be burned ; and after such logs or stocks are 

 selected as are suitable to be mailed into rails, make clap- 

 boards, or answer for other more particular occasions of the 

 planter, the remaining logs are rolled into heaps by means of 

 hand-spikes arid skids; but the Pennsylvania and German 

 farmers, who are more conversant with animal powers than 

 the Virginians, save much of this labor by the use of a pair 

 of horses with a half sledge, or a pair of truck wheels. 



" The burning of this brush-wood, and the log piles, is a 

 business for all hands after working hours ; and as nightly 

 revels are peculiar to the African constitution, this part of 

 the labor proves often a very late employment, which affords 

 many scenes of rustic mirth. When this process has cleared 

 the land of its various natural incumbrances (to attain which 

 end is very expensive and laborious), the next part of the 

 process is that of the hoe ; for the plough is an implement 

 which is rarely used in new lands when they are either 

 designed for tobacco or meadow. There are three kinds of 

 the hoe which are applied to this tillage : the first is what is 

 termed the sprouting hoe, which is a smaller species of mat- 

 tock that serves to break up any particular hard part of the 

 ground, to grub up any smaller sized grubs which the mat- 

 tock or grubbing hoe may have omitted, to remove small 

 stones and other partial impediments to the next process. 

 The narrow or hilling hoe follows the operation of the 

 sprouting hoe. It is generally from six to eight inches wide, 

 and ten or twelve in the length of the -blade, according to 

 the strength of the person who is to use it ; the blade is thin, 

 and by means of a movable wedge which is driven into the 

 eye of the hoe, it can be set more or less digging (as it is 

 termed), that is, on a greater or less angle with the helve, at 



* This is a short, thick, heavy-headed axe, of a somewhat oblong shape, with which the 

 Americans make great dispatch. They treat the English poll-axe with great contempt, and 

 always work it over again as old iron before they deem it fit for their use. 



t The worm or panel fence, originally of Virginia, consists of logs or mailed rails from 

 about four to six or eight inches thick and eleven feet in length. A good fence consists of 

 ten rails and a rider, ft la called a worm fence from the zigzag manner of Its construction, 



