FARMERS' REGISTER— TIDE WATER DISTRICT OF VIRGINIA. 



155 



ing a spacious subterranean channel for the passage 

 of the stream. 



" The entrance to tlie natural tunnel on the up- 

 per side of tlie ridge, is imposing and picturesque 

 in a high degree; but on the lower side, the gran- 

 deur of the scene is greatly heightened by the su- 

 perior magnitude of the clills, which exceed in 

 loftiness, and which rise perpendicularly — and in 

 some instances in an impending manner — two or 

 three hundred feet ; and by Avhich the entrance on 

 this side is almost environed, as it were, by an am- 

 phitheatre of rude and frightful precipices. 



" The observer standing on the brink of the 

 stream, at the distance of about one hundred yards 

 below the debouchure of the natural tunnel, has, 

 in front, a view of its arched entrance, rising se- 

 venty or eighty feet above the water, and sur- 

 mounted by horizontal stratifications of yellowish, 

 white and grey rocks, in dej)th nearly twice the 

 height of the arch. On his left, a view of the 

 same mural precipice, deflected from the spring- 

 ing of the arch, in a manner to pass thence in a 

 continuous curve quite to his rear, and lowering 

 in a very impressive manner above his head. On 

 his right, a sapling growth of buck-eye, poplar, 

 linden, &c. skirting the margin of tile creek, and ex- 

 tending obliquely to the right, and upward, through 

 a narrow abrupt ravine, to the summit of the ridge, 

 which is here and elsewhere crowned with a tim- 

 ber growth of pines, cedars, oaks, and shrubberies 

 of various kinds. On his extreme right, is a gi- 

 gantic clilF lifting itself up perpendicularly from 

 the water's edge, to the height of about three hun- 

 dred feet, and accompanied by an insulated clifl", 

 called the chimney, of al)Out the same altitude, 

 rising in the form of a turret, at least sixty feet 

 above its basement, which is a portion of the im- 

 posing cliff just before mentioned. 



" The extent of the tunnel from its upper to its 

 lower extremity, following its meanders, is about 

 150 yards, in which distance the stream falls about 

 ten feet, emitting, in its passage over a rocky bed, 

 an agreeable murmur, Avhich is rendered more 

 grateful by its reverberations upon the roof and 

 sides of the grotto. Tlie discharge of a musket 

 produces a crash-like report, succeeded by a roar 

 in the tunnel, which has a deafening effect upon 

 the ear." 



When time shall have worn the arch of this na- 

 tural tunnel to within forty feet of the top, it will 

 present the spectacle of an arch 200 feet high, and 

 a bridge 450 feet broad ; a spectacle that will cer- 

 tainly rival any thing that is now even to be seen 

 at Rockbridge. g. w, f. 



James River, July 4th, 1833. 



ON THE TIDE WATER DISTRICT OF VIRGINIA. 



To the Editor of the Farmers'' Register. 



An article entitled " General Description of 

 Virginia," placed at the head of your first No. has 

 attracted my attention. It is extracted from the 

 Encyclopedia Americana, a work v/hose title would 

 seem to promise much. How far this promise has 

 been redeemed, it is not my purpose to inquire. — 

 My business is with this particular article, and I 

 take notice of it, because it has gained a place in 

 your paper, and derived a currency from your 

 name, that may give it a potency, which, from its 

 own merit, it could scarcely have wielded. 



The first part of this essay to which I shall call 

 your attention, i.s in that division of the general 



description styled " Face of the Country." We 

 are there informed that " the tidewater, or eastern 

 section, is, in general, low, level, sandy and un- 

 productive, and parts of it exhibit almost as deso- 

 late an aspect, as the pine barrens of Jersey." — 

 Any one acquainted with the country of which 

 this is offered as a description, will be disposed to 

 wonder at the perusal of this sentence. But to de- 

 velope more clearly the notion that our author has 

 formed of eastern Virginia, it is necessary to fol- 

 lovt^ him a little farther. In the paragraph enti- 

 tled "Agriculture, Manufactures, &c." he pro- 

 ceeds, " The old pi-actice of clearing and cultivat- 

 ing land every year until exhausted, then turning 

 it out to recover from its own resources, still conti- 

 nues in majiy places. In others, the three shift 

 system still prevails; that is, 1, a crop of Indian 

 corn ; 2, wheat, rye, or oats ; 3, the year of rest, 

 as it is called, in which the spontaneous vegetation 

 furnishes a scanty subsistence to stock ; after which 

 the soil is again subjected to the scourging process 

 of cropping, while little attention is paid to the 

 application of manures, or the culture of artificial 

 grasses. This destructive system, for the most 

 part, prevails from the sea-board to the head of 

 tidewater, and on the south side of James river as 

 high as the Blue Ridge." 



It is but charitable to suppose that the writer of 

 the sentences that I have quoted, has never seen 

 the country that he describes. And it is unfortu- 

 nate tiiat he did not know where to look for correct 

 information. His ideas seem to have been taken 

 from the American Quarterly Review for March 

 1829. In pages 154-5, the Reviewer says — " It is 

 a curious geological feature, that the tertiary with 

 its covering of sea-sand through Georgia, the Ca- 

 rolinas, Virginia, JNIaryland, Pennsylvania, and 

 New Jersey, should rest immediately upon the 

 primitive, without the intervention of the transi- 

 tive or secondary forms. The coat of sea-sand 

 throughout this whole space is sufficiently entire 

 to give the character of sterility to the soil, when 

 compared with our primitive and secondary re- 

 gions. And where the river basins do excavate 

 it, such is the low level of its plain, that the allu- 

 vions of these rivers and bays of the sea do but 

 deform it with swamps and marshes, instead of 

 imparting fertility to its lands. The swamps and 

 marshes thus created, generate annual diseases ; 

 bilious and intermittent fevers recur as regularly 

 as the seasons, and render this region scarcely 

 habitable, and its population enervated and ineffi- 

 cient. There seems to be no reclamation of these 

 wet and swampy grounds ; they lie too low to be 

 relieved by any natural means. This sandy region 

 is a great deformity upon our fine continent, and 

 affects it like a wretched foreground which de- 

 grades a picture. If j)ushes the population away 

 from the comforts and facilities of the sea, and 

 obliges commerce to wind its way up our crooked 

 rivers, to meet this population at their falls, where 

 it finds health and terra firma. Our foreign com- 

 merce, therefore, sustains much delay, and is bur- 

 thened with many expenses in encountering the 

 river navigation." 



This is, indeed, a Avorse picture than the other, 

 and is, thus far, wider of the truth. But as I find 

 it impossible to believe the author of the article 

 from the Encyclopedia knew any thing of the 

 country that he was describing, I ascribed his opi- 

 nion to a belief in Mr, Walsh's statement. His 



