FARMERS' REGISTER. 



169 



be nearly level, even when passing through a very 

 broken and hilly country. 



It is not only that these level ridges may be 

 found and traced through their long and tortuous 

 courses between our great rivers — as between the 

 Potomac and Ra|)pahannock, or York and James 

 rivers, but also branches ol" these principal ridges 

 run out between every two of all their thousands 

 of tributary streams. And thouirh the channels 

 ol' the smaller streams are of various elevation, 

 and generally higher in proportion as they are of 

 email size, or remote from the great waters into 

 which they finally are emptied, the different cha- 

 racters and elevations of the streams have no 

 bearing on the intervening ridges, which, whether 

 separating the largest rivers or the smallest tribu- 

 tary rivulets, preserve nearly the same general 

 elevation, character and appearance, according to 

 their position and distance from the ocean. Thus, 

 it follows that the dividing ridges, presenting these 

 istrongly marked characters, are in fact as nume- 

 rous as the streams which so abundantly water 

 our country ; and which, if pursued to their head 

 springs, and counting every branch of a rivulet, of' 

 course are twenty times more numerous and exlen- 

 yive than appear on the maps. These numerous 

 ridges, and all connected, except where separated 

 by the great rivers that pass through the mountains, 

 form the ribs or Irame-work of this region, and are 

 as close laid, and as much connected with each 

 other, as the iimumerable streams which may be 

 hkened to arteries and veins of the great body. 



From this description it will be gathered that 

 though the surface of the country is in fact very 

 uneven, and in many parts very liilly, still that ail 

 the summits of all the ridge lands form separated 

 parts or curved lines in the same great imagina- 

 ry inclined plane; and which plane I suppose to 

 have been formerly real and continuous through- 

 out, when the earth was deposited by the great 

 overfiovving waters, and before the subsequent ac- 

 tion of streams had cut out and washed away, in 

 {brming their channels, the valleys through which 

 they now flow. 



That the whole tide-water region was once the 

 bottom of the ocean, and for many ages, is mani- 

 fest from the existence of thick beds of fossil sea- 

 shells, which underlie the whole, or nearly the 

 whole, at depths below the present surface vary- 

 ing from a few inches to nearly 100 feel, accord- 

 ing to the dip of the bed of shells, (or marl, as 

 improperly called,) and the thickness or elevation 

 of the now covering upper earth. Afterwards. 

 by some mighty convulsion of nature, this bed of 

 the ocean was "lifted up so as to be elevated far 

 above the sea-water, and fresh-water floods poured 

 over and deposited upon it, in difl'erent strata, 

 earth of various kinds of texture, lioni almost 

 pure sand to the stiff'est clay, but all agreemg in 

 the absence of calcareous earth, and of any en- 

 riching material to form productive soil. The up- 

 per cover of all, which forms the present upper 

 layer, and its surface the thin and poor soil of the 

 highest ridge lands, it may be supposed was the 

 last deposite from the deeply covering and then 

 stiller water, and that this last deposite was left 

 over the wliole land. There is a remarkable um- 

 fbrmity in this soil, in its shallowness, its poverty, 

 the universal and total absence of carbonate of" 

 lime, and the very small proportion of lime in any 

 other form, the absence of stone of every kind, 

 Vol. VTH— 22 



and even of pebbles and gravel. The texture va- 

 ries from the stiffest and most intractable clay to a 

 very sandy soil. Still this does not prevent a ge- 

 neral and femarkable uniformity of character, 

 caused by agreement in otlier particulars. Still, 

 there is every where a mucli jjreater proportion of 

 sand in these soils than would be supposed. The 

 very stiffest soils I have found to contain more 

 than 50 per cent, of pure siiicious sand, but most- 

 ly so finely divided as, when separated, to be in the 

 form of an impalpable powder, more like the finest 

 wheat flour than grit or sand. It is this state of" 

 minute division of the siiicious sand, more than 

 the proportion of argillaceous earth, (or the pure 

 matter of clay,) that gives their difierent degrees 

 of stiffness to all these ridge-land soils. 



The gentle slopes and steeper hill-sides, formed 

 first by the streams cuttins down perpendicularly 

 and deeply through various strata of earth, and 

 these precipitous descents being in time sloped 

 and graduated as they now are — the materials 

 being aiixed by the washing of water, from top 

 to bottom — present soils of various textures and 

 qualities, all of them being much more fertile than 

 the barien ridges, but still li.n' from being valuable 

 at first, and still less lor being retentive of their 

 earliest fertility. Sometimes on these sloping lands 

 the soil is very stiff, sometimes very light, some- 

 times, but very rarely, showing rolled or water- 

 worn stones, and very frequently gravel in great 

 quantity — according as sections of these difierent 

 horizontal strata have been laid bare, by washing 

 through them, or as these materials were carried 

 down by water and spread over other soil. 



Still lower, and only near the tide-waters, the 

 streams have cut through the beds of fossil shells 

 or marl ; and thus mixed with the far greater mass 

 of various poor earths washed down from the 

 higher slopes, have been swept down by the tor- 

 rents, and deposited below, forming the alluvial 

 bottoms, and'almost the only naturally fertile lands 

 of lower Virginia, except some of the higher river 

 banks and borders, which have been ibrmed in a 

 different manner. 



The supposed agricultural character and value 

 of the ridire-lands and slopes were described in the 

 following words, in the ' Essay on Calcareous 

 JVIanures.' 



" With some exceptions to every general cha- 

 racter, the tide-water district of Virginia may be 

 described as generally level, sandy, poor, and free 

 from any fixed rock, or any other than stones 

 rounded apparently by the attrition of water. On 

 much the greater part of the lands, no stone of 

 any kind is to be found, of larger size than gravel. 

 Pines of different kinds form the greater part of a 

 heavy cover to the siiicious soils in their virgin 

 state, and mix considerably with oaks, and other 

 growth of clay land. Both these kinds of soil, 

 alter being exhausted of their little (ijrtility by cul- 

 tivation, and " turned out" to recruit, are soon co- 

 vered by young pines which grow with vigor and 

 luxuriance. This general description applies more 

 particularly to the ridges which separate the slopes 

 on difierent streams. The ridge land* are always 

 level, and very poor — sometimes clayey, more 

 generally sandy, but stiffer than would be inferred 

 fiom the proportion of siiicious earth they contain, 

 which is caused by the fineness of its particles. 

 Whortleberry bushes, as well as pines, are abun- 

 dant on ridge lands — and numerous shallow basins 



