754 



F A R M E R S R E GIST E R. 



[No. 12 



its malignant influence, and among the residents 

 of winch there exists generally a true love for the 

 land of their birth. This is the narrow peninsula 

 east of the Chesapeake — and the remarkable dif- 

 ference there exhibited, shows the rich reward 

 which follows mere contentment and industry. 

 With a soil that is generally far from fertile, and 

 where their valuable means for fertilization have 

 been but little used, the lands sell high, rent high, 

 and both landlords and tenants are satisfied, com- 

 fortable, and thriving. There is no peculiar cause 

 for this state of things, except that lor this people 

 it may be said that there is no "western country.'' 

 But however heavily all these evils may press 

 on the interests of agriculture, there also exist, 

 abundant inducements to exert our energies to 

 throw oft' the burden. If even partial success 

 should reward the effort, the agriculture of Vir- 

 ginia might reach a point of very high improve- 

 ment and prosperity. Let us keep in view con- 

 tinually the causes which have depressed agricul- 

 ture, and now prevent its rising from its liillen 

 state — and let us also look to the glorious and rich 

 reward offered for successful exertions for relief 

 Fallen as it is from its former high estate, Vir- 

 ginia is still a country to be proud of— a rich in- 

 heritance, lor which we have reason to be most 

 thankful for possessing. A large proportion of 

 the soil of the state is naturally and highly pro- 

 ductive — and there are many farms, and some 

 districts, of which the general husbandly may be 

 compared with the best of the United States. 

 The ruggedness of a larjje part of the mountain 

 region is well compensated by its fertile soil and 

 mineral wealth — its beautiful scenery, and pure, 

 invigorating air. The low country, though gene- 

 rally poor, is as susceptible of profitable improve- 

 ment as any region whatever — and on that ac- 

 count, as well deserves as the rich west itself, to 

 be the object of speculators, treasure hunters, and 

 builders of castles in the air. The intermediate 

 region possesses in some, but a less degree, the 

 advantages of both its western and eastern neigh- 

 bors. In addition — -all parts of the state are now 

 about to derive the advantages of a general sys- 

 tem of inland transportation, which seems now, 

 for the first time, placed on the only stable founda- 

 tion — that is, of yielding early and sufficient profit 

 to the constructors, or stockholders, of canals and 

 railways, as well as of general benefit to the 

 country at large. Above all — as a ground for 

 hope — Virginia's best product has always been of 

 men — and though her sons have deserted her soil 

 in such numbers as to furnish half the population 

 of the new western states, still the stock remains 

 at home, in its original purity and value. There 

 are abundant means still remaining for the. high 

 improvement and permanent prosperity of this 

 commonwealth — and nothing will be wanting to 

 produce that, result, unless it be the ivill, andthe. 

 resolution, to use the offered means. 



The great evils which serve to prevent agricul- 

 ture being prosperous in Virginia, may be sum- 

 med up in the single word, ignorance: but however 

 heavy may be this burden and curse on a nation, 

 its importance cannot be appreciated, and there- 

 fore will never be complained of, by the great 

 mass of any people. The more dark and wide- 

 spread may be the cloud of ignorance which ages 

 of misrule may have caused to overshadow a 

 country, the more contented will be the mass of 



the people with their destitution of light. In be- 

 nighted Spain and Turkey, rebellions lor unnum- 

 bered wrongs, are matters of every day occur- 

 rence: but not a complaint has been uttered, or 

 even the ground for it suspected, that the govern- 

 ments of these countries have permitted .and 

 caused the almost extinction of knowledge — 

 which is the fruitful source of all the other evils 

 felt. The few persons who may understand the 

 cause, are utterly powerless for its removal, or mit- 

 igation. 



In the legislature of Virginia only can be found 

 combined the intelligence to know, 2nd to proper- 

 ly estimate, the evils which are crushing our ag- 

 ricultural interests — and the power to guard against, 

 or to remove them. To the sense of justice and 

 of policy, no less than to the patriotism of that bo- 

 dy, we have to appeal— and upon the success of 

 that appeal, sooner or later, will depend whether 

 Virginia is to rise — or to sink, without a remain- 

 ing hope. The will of the legislature alone will 

 he potential: the mere disposition to grant aid, if 

 earnestly felt, and barely commenced to be put in 

 action, will soon ripen into a judicious and effective 

 general system for the resuscitation and support of 

 agriculture, and of agricultural interests. And 

 the cost of these measures, (the only, but great 

 obstacle. — ) will merely be a sum utterly con- 

 temptible compared to the value of the least of the 

 expected results — and much less than of many 

 customary legislative proceedings of the least 

 possible value. The legislative expense ol se- 

 lecting a person to perform the mere ordinary 

 mechanical services of a printer, has, for two ses- 

 sions, been as great as would well support a pro- 

 fessorship for the two years. No richer endow- 

 ments need be desired for agricultural professor- 

 ships, and for all such other aids to agricultural 

 knowledge as are now wanted, than lb divert to 

 these ends, the cost of barely three or four days of 

 the excess of debate of every legislative session — 

 or of the tenth part, only, of the average expense 

 of discussing abstract political, or mere, party ques- 

 tions, or resolutions, which have led to no direct 

 results whatever; but of which the indirect effects, 

 for twenty years past, ha v e been becoming more 

 and more destructive of the true interests of Vir- 

 ginia. 



APPENDIX. 



Many of the circumstances which affected the early 

 condition of agriculture in Virginia, and which were 

 necessarily excluded by the proper limits for an address 

 (and one of secondary importance) to a public meeting, 

 are yet highly interesting. Extracts exhibiting such 

 will be embraced in the first of the following notes — 

 none of which (it is proper to say) were attached to 

 the foregoing address, when sent in to the society by 

 whose order it was prepared, and is now published. 



note a. page 748. 



From the first settlement of Virginia, in 1C07, until 

 1613, there was no such thing as distinct landed, or in- 

 deed other private property which was the fruit of 

 individual labor or enterprise. This was one of the 

 many unwise provisions of the charter of the London 

 Company, (the corporation that settled and owned Vir- 

 ginia until its dissolution in 1624,) or of the regula- 



