18 



FORESTS, FOREST LANDS AND FOREST PRODUCTS. 



ORIGINAL DISTRIBUTION OF THE PINES. 



The distribution of the pines and the respective area occupied by 

 each in this State has changed a great deal since the tirst explora- 

 tion of the country. 



Long-leaf pine (P. jjalustris Mill.). — The distribution of no tree 

 has been more affected than that of the long-leaf pine by the trans- 

 formation from a wilderness to a civilized country. The long-leaf 

 pine formerly extended over the entire area under consideration, 

 growing upon the drier portion of the sand. In the southern 

 and south-eastern counties it formed a forest of pine, unmixed with 

 other trees, but in the northern and western counties it was confined 

 to the sandy or gravelly drift along the higher and drier ridges, 

 here intermixed with short-leaf pine and scattering oaks, while 

 poplar and loblolly pine occupied the lowlands. 



Early in the last century the production of tar and turpentine 

 was a profitable industry north of Albemarle sound, the commodi- 

 ties being taken to Xorfolk or Xansemond, Va., for market.* The 

 crude turpentine was shipped to England and there distilled. The 

 largest bodies of 2:»ine which then yielded turpentine were the one 

 on ''Sandy Ridge," lying to the north of Edenton, and another 

 east of Chowan river, in Gates county, and extending north into 

 Xansemond county, Ya. Before 1850 these had cea.-^ed to be of 

 economic consideration, such trees as had withstood the fires and 

 wind having been converted largely into building material. Xow 

 only isolated trees are to be seen here, scattered among black-jacks 

 on the highest land. That they ever occupied much of the land 

 might be questioned but for tlie tar-kiln mounds with which these 

 counties are studded, the land having now a heavy growth of lob- 

 lolly pine, and the mounds even bearing trees of this latter species 

 two or three feet in diameter. 



Southward these pines occurred only scattered over the high, 

 sandy land lying between Albemarle sound and Washington. Xow 

 a tree of this species is rarely seen here. Between Washington and 

 Xewbern on a high sand ridge, with an area of 35,000 acres, 

 was the finest body of pine in the Pamlico peninsula, but there is 



*Wm. B3-rd, Westover ;MS., Petersburg. Va.. 1S4.1. p. 27. t,This manuscript was written in 1729). 



