BARRENNESS OP TIDE-WATER DISTRICT, 37 



crop of wheat, if it would produce four or five bushels to the acre. 

 If the sandiness, or exhausted condition of the soil, denied even 

 this small product of wheat, that crop was probably not attempted; 

 and, instead of it, or oats, the field was exposed to close grazing, 

 from the time of gathering one crop of corn to that of preparing 

 to plant another. No manure was applied, except on the tobacco 

 lots ; and this succession of a grain crop every year, and afterwards 

 every second year, was kept up as long as the field would produce 

 five bushels of corn to the acre. When reduced below that pro- 

 duct, and to still more below the necessary expense of cultivation, 

 the land was turned out to recover under a new growth of pines. 

 After twenty or thirty years, according to the convenience of the 

 owner, the same land would be again cleared, and put under similar 

 scourging tillage, which, however, would then much sooner end, 

 as before, in exhaustion. Such a general system is not yet every- 

 where abandoned j and many years have not passed since such was 

 the usual course on almost every farm. 



How much our country has been impoverished during the last 

 fifty years, cannot be determined by any satisfactory testimony. 

 But, however we may differ on this head, there are but few who 

 will not concur in the opinion, that [up to 1831] our system of 

 cultivation has been every year lessening the productive power of 

 our lands in general and that no one county, no neighbourhood, 

 and but few particular farms, have been at all enriched since their 

 first settlement and cultivation. Yet many of our farming opera- 

 tions have been much improved and made more productive. Driven 

 by necessity, proprietors direct more personal attention to their 

 farms better implements of husbandry are used every process 

 is more perfectly performed and, whether well or ill directed, a 

 spirit of inquiry and enterprise has been awakened, which before 

 had no existence. 



Throughout the country below the falls of the rivers, and perhaps 

 thirty miles above, if the best land be excluded, say one-tenth, the 

 remaining nine-tenths will not yield an average product of ten 

 bushels of corn to the acre ; though that grain is best suited to our 

 soils in general, and far exceeds in quantity all other kinds raised. 

 Of course, the product of a large proportion of the land would fall 

 below this average. Such crops, in very many cases, cannot re- 

 munerate the cultivator. If our remaining wood-land could be at 

 once brought into cultivation, the gross product of the country 

 would be greatly increased ; but the nett product very probably 

 diminished ; as the general poverty of these lands would cause more 

 expense than profit to accompany their cultivation under the usual 

 system. Yet every year we are using all our exertions to clear 

 wood-land, and in fact seldom increase either nett or gross products 

 because nearly as much old exhausted land is turned out of cul- 

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