183S] 



FARMERS' REGISTER 



659 



(STATEMENT— CONTINUED.) 



Fluvanna, do. 

 Gonso Socco, do. 

 Goochlund and Flu- } 

 vanna, do. < 



Good Hope, do 

 Green Mountain, do. 

 Groom's, do. 

 Independent, do. 

 James River, do. 

 Little Bird. do. 

 MeGehee's, do. 

 Mint, do. 

 Monteai^le, do. 

 New York, do. 

 Omohundro, do. 

 Peru Ridije, do. 

 Rapin Ann, do. 

 Shaw's do. 

 Somerville, do. 

 Spring Hill, do. 

 VValton's New, do. 



76 Companies. 



20th 



30th •' 

 •iOth February, 

 241 h March, 

 30ili " 

 24ili " 



Totals. 



100.000 

 100,000 



50,000 



50.000 



50,000 



200.000 



100^000 



50,000 



100,000 



100,000 



50,000 



100,000 



50,000 



100,000 



100,000 



50.000 



20,000 



100,000 



50-000 



100,000 



85,795.000 



300,000 

 500,000 



250,000 

 500,000 

 500,000 

 500,000 

 500,000 

 500.000 

 500,000 

 500,000 

 500,000 

 500,000 

 500,000 

 500,000 

 500.000 

 500.000 

 50,000 

 500,000 

 500,000 

 500,000 



#30,000,000 



1,000 



500 



1,500 



1.000 



1,000 



1,000 



400 



500 



400 



1,000 



1,000 



200 



1,000 



300 



500 



1,000 



1,000 



500 



1,000 



1,000 



197,800 Acres. 



Note. — An act prescribing general regulations for the incorporation of Mining Companies, pass- 

 ed 12th February, 1837. 



Some persons possibly may view the foregoing 

 statement as a decissive proof of the enterprise 

 and sagacity of our citiz'Mis in cutting out new 

 roads to wealth, and of the patriotic wisdom of 

 our legislatures, for five years past, in stimulating 

 them to the intoxicating pursuit; whilst others, 

 too inert, or too old and dull, to keep up with our 

 grand march of mind, may behold in it evidence, 

 clear as proofs from holy writ, of a most morbid 

 state of public sentiment — embracing both the 

 g-jvernors nnd the gov ermd. 'J'o dec:de between 

 such widely variant opinions, I shall leave to wiser 

 heads than my own, and will only ask of my air- 

 ricultural brethren to take the matter into their 

 most serious consideration, as one in which all 

 their best interests are deeply and dangerously 

 concerned. Should there still be some who have 

 not yet gone too deep under ground to return, wil- 

 lingly, once more to work on the fop of it, they 

 will pardon me, I hope, for expressing my firm 

 belief that they will find their old acquaintance, 

 the ploughs, hoes, spades, and axes of our pro- 

 fession, much safer reliances forcomtortable living, 

 than the stone-crushers, (brcing-pumps, earth-sift- 

 ers, and smehing-furnaces, with the use of which 

 they have lately been laboring so hard to make 

 themselves familiar. 'J'he former are friends, that 

 since the days of their invention, many centuries 

 asro, have never yet failed any man who would 

 use them with skill, industry and perseverance; 

 whereas the latter are the implements and ma- 

 chines of a most fiiscinating lottery, in the various 

 schemes of which there are many wherein all the 

 tickets prove to be blanks, although all are sold as 

 prizes; while, in the rest, the number of blank? 

 can never be certainly known, until it is entirely 

 too late to count. 



In some of these sevenfy-six-hunting-clubs, (as 

 they may properly be called, J the parties seem to 

 have taken lor their guide the old sportsman's 

 proverb, so cheering to young huntsmen, which 

 tells us that — '■'where you are least aware, there 

 starts the hare.'''' But if report say true, in many 

 of these clubs no game has yet been started, nor 



even a solitary trail struck, unless it be a very 

 cold oiie, although their hunting grounds alto- 

 gether comprise several thousand square miles, 

 and the huntsmen have been quite as ardent and 

 active as Dr. Douterswivel himself is represented 

 in Scott's 'Antiquary,' to have been, when the old 

 beggar, Edie Ochiltree, humbugged him into dig- 

 ging among the graves and ruins of St. Ruth's 

 Pnorv, for gold and silver, which alas ! was not 

 to be found. 



But to speak seriously, 1 know not how this 

 matter may strike others; to me the tabular state- 

 ment just presented, is a most appalling expose of 

 the present condition of a large, a very large por- 

 tion of our community. We seem to be verging 

 very near, if we have not already reached a state 

 resembling that of worn-out sensualists, who feel 

 as if they could hardly support existence, without 

 continual resort to the most stimulating and ex- 

 citing drinks, viands and condiments, that the mas- 

 ter caterers for morbid appetites can supply; and 

 what is still worse, to be insensible of our condi- 

 tion, or utterly reckless of its fatal consequences. 

 It is, I think, perfectly manifest, that there is now 

 raging among us, and with rapidly increasing vir- 

 ulence, a highly danirerous spir-it'of speculation — 

 dangerous both in a moral and political view; that 

 it has withdrawn, and is still withdrawing from 

 most of the regular trades and callings, essential 

 in providing the necessaries and comiforts of life, 

 an enormous capital, much of which bids fair to 

 be entirely wasted: and that thereby it has inflict- 

 ed a deep and lasting wound on all the best inter- 

 ests of the state, but on none more than on agri- 

 culture. It is moreover, a truly gambling spirit, 

 and produces near the same results; for it unfits a 

 man, if indulged only a sliort time, for every stea- 

 dy, regular profession, by making all of them ap- 

 pear "weary, stale, fiat and unprofitable.'''' How 

 it may end, it is fearful to anticipate, especially 

 when viewed in combination v/ith that maddening 

 party-s])irit which treats ali national concerns as 

 matters of far interior interest to the desperate^ 

 the deadly struggle tor party- supremacy. 



