214 



FARMERS' REGISTER— CLIMATE OF VIRGINIA. 



CLISIATE or VIRGINIA. 



To the Editor of the Fanners' Register. 



JBrayneJield, Caroline co. Va. July 8, 1834. 



Revolution has not been confined alone to man. 

 Nature is deeply marked with the footsteps ol^its 

 caprice. The sea now niurmurs over the ruin.s of 

 imperial Carthage— islands spring into hfe from 

 the bosom of the ocean— the relics of a gigantic 

 race both in the moral and physical world are 

 wide scattered over the hills and valleys of our 

 western country, and though we believe the world 

 to be old, it has existed but as a day in the march 

 of nature, and we but as the restless pilgrims of an 

 hour. Philosop.hv may tremble at the grandeur 

 ol' the scene, while wisdom is left to gather light 

 from the feeble glimmerings of its own brief ex- 

 perience. 



All climates have felt the power of this control- 

 ling agent, and from a series of latent and visible 

 causes', most of them have become radically 

 changed. In the annals of that clime of the vine 

 and the olive, Palestine, we have the testimony of 

 holy writ to prove the severity ol' its winters — 



''The waters are hid as with a stone, and the 

 face of the deep is frozen." Job xxxviii. 30. 



'-He giveth snow like wool. He scattereth the 

 hoar frost like ashes. He casteth Ibrth his ice like 

 morsels. Who can stand before his cold?" Psalms 

 cxlvii. 16, 17. 



The cloudless sky of Italy owes most of its 

 boasted glory to the favoring influence of this 

 change. In the Georgics of Virgil we find the 

 young husbandman advised to protect his stock 

 from the injurious effects of ice and from ^'glaciem 

 ve'ntosque nivales,'''' while Horace often writes hke 

 a sea-coal poet, borrowing his inspiration from a 

 cheerful fire, and his boldest metaphors from the 

 terrors of winter. Ca?sar* and Juvenal frequently 

 allude to the existence of severe cold; and Ovid 

 in his unmanly wailings from the shores of the 

 Euxine, tells us that oxen and carriages passed 

 over that sea on the ice — that wine Avas presented 

 to him congealed, and that the snows of winter 

 Avere not dissolved until the ensuing summer. The 

 countries of Europe and Asia whose history is fa- 

 miliar to us from the recollections of youthful stu- 

 dy, are all characterized by the same gradual 

 amelioration of climate, and Ave may safely assert 

 that every extension of agricultural improvement 

 produces a gradual decrease of cold, of half of a 

 degree to each progressive century. From the 

 philosophical tables of Kirvvan, it will appear that 

 the several places in Europe at Avhich his obser- 

 vations Avere made, possess tAvelve degrees more 

 of heat, than American provinces lying in the 

 same parallel of latitude. This result cannot be 

 sustained by a comparison drawn from the earlier 

 days of Europe, and Ave may fairly conclude that 

 the increase of population in that countrj^, and its 

 exchange from the pursuits of hunting and feudal 

 Avar, tolhe clearing of forests, and the imi)rove- 

 ment of land, in giving to the earth a greater fa- 

 cility to retain heat, has produced a corresponding 

 mildness of temperature. 



* In the time of Csesar the reindeer, elk, and wild 

 bull were natives of the Hercynian forest, which over- 

 shadowed a great part of Germany and Poland. The 

 two former are now found only in extreme northern 

 latitudes. 



At the discoA-ery of our continent it presented 

 an immense forest untouched by hurinin labor. 

 The majestic rivers of the new world, lAvelling by 

 every shower, inundated the Avhole country, and 

 left in their track numerous marshes and extensive 

 lakes. The Avoods were hid Avilh rank luxuriance, 

 Avhile the exuberant undergrowth of herbs, shrubs, 

 and Aveeds, gave to the prospect that gloomy and 

 repulsive solitude which was so aptly described by 

 the first settlers as the loilderness. The earth 

 could not retain the heat of the sun, nor could this 

 eflect be produced by the mass of foliage. The 

 air stagnated in the forest. Offensive exhalations 

 arose fiom the numerous marshes, and the accu- 

 mulated decay of vegetation, Avhile the whole 

 land Avas rife with the pestilence of malaria. 



We cannot ahvays arrive at definite conclusions 

 of the climate of any country by bai'ely measuring 

 its degrees of distance from the equator. Its cha- 

 racter is controlled by many other direct causes. 

 Extent of territory — nature . of soil — height of 

 mountains and elevation above the sea, greatly af- 

 fect it. The extent of our northern seas, Avith 

 the ice Avhich continues there from 5^ear to year, 

 gives to CA^ery Avind Avhich bloAAS over them an 

 intense cold. A chain of gigantic mountains 

 spread their snoAA'-capped summits throughout the 

 heart of our continent. The Avinds Avhich bloAV 

 OA^er them become deeply surcharged with cold, 

 whose piercing scA-erity is not diminished until it 

 has extended far doAvn upon our southern sea 

 coast. Our daily experience attests the truth of 

 this fact, for Avho in Virginia has not been chilled 

 by the duration of a north Avest Avind, or even its 

 sudden shilling to that point? 



The climate of Virginia has not been stationary 

 in this revolution of nature, but has rapidly ad- 

 A^anced in the van of its progress. To trace its 

 characteristics, is to fblloAV the A^arying passions of 

 the coquette — noAv enticing by seductive smiles — 

 and now chilling by capricious froAvns. Yet it is 

 the chme under Avhose genial influence we have 

 been bred, and Ave can easily forget its vicissitudes 

 in the glittering canopy of lite and beauty Avhich it 

 throAvs around every scene. Those Avho haA'e 

 dAvelt amid the sunny clime of Italy — the fierce 

 heat of Spain, and the elastic air of France, can 

 appreciate from the test of comparison, the soft- 

 ness of a Virginian day — and how splenetic soeA'er 

 Ave may be, it iiCA^er has gloom enough to make us 

 "damn it as a lord." 



Captain John Smith in his faithful and spirited 

 History of the Colony of Virginia, makes many 

 allusions to its climate, and with a proper allow- 

 ance for his zeal in coloring the adAantages of a 

 settlement in the colony, Ave may receive his state- 

 ments as the honest opinions of a careful and ac- 

 curate observer. 



"The sommer (says he) is hot as in Spaine, the 

 winter cold as in France or England. The heate 

 of sommer is in June, July, and August, but com- 

 monly the cool breezes assAvage the A-ehemency 

 of the heate. The chief of the Avinter is halte De- 

 cember, Januaiy, February, and halfe March, 

 The cold is extreme sharpe, but here the proverbe 

 is true "that no extreme long continueth.* Some- 

 times there are great droughts, other times much 

 raine, yet greater necessitie of neither, by reason 

 Ave see not but that all the raritieof needful fruites 

 in Europe may be thei* in great plentie by the 



Smith's Histoiy of Virginia, Vol. I. 113. 



