150 POMEROY ON FRUIT PLANTATIONS, 
most other districts; of course, necessity, the first 
spur to exertion, is wanting. Many circumstances, 
however, unite now, to fix the attention of the county 
on this article of its produce. 
The plantations may be considered as consisting 
of those in the old orchards, and those of Jater date •, 
of those under the present improved management in 
the hop-grounds, and the single trees, either in hedge¬ 
rows or elsewhere. The old orchards are by no means 
deserving of particular notice, except for the strongly 
contrasted light in which they place the improvements 
already adopted, and to point out those which may he 
more abundantly introduced. There is no variety of 
soil or situation, surface or aspect, through the county, 
that has not its plantations under the old system. 
The leading circumstances of the present manage¬ 
ment, to judge from them, were much undervalued 
by our ancestors. They severally abound with a 
variety of the different kinds of apples or pears, and 
sometimes of both ; and are much crowded, their 
greatest distance being, whether in pasture or tillage, 
twenty feet between the rows; and on an average, 
much less betwixt the trees (frequently, uo order in the 
planting is discoverable); the heads, of course, have 
not sufficient room to spread, but are much entangled 
with each other, and form a shade so thick, as to injure 
materially, not only the fruit, but the crops also that 
grow beneath. In many instances, there is scarce an 
evil to which they are liable (though easily remedied 
with moderate attention) by -which they have not 
suffered in a great degree. If the bark has escaped 
the teeth, not a solitary instance occurs, where the 
trees have been preserved from the rubbing of the dif¬ 
ferent cattle that have access- to them. They are uni¬ 
versally 
