A BIT OF HISTORY
"NOW, I shall be at home to-day and glad to assist you in any way
possible," announced Mr. West at the breakfast table.
"That is very kind of you," Percy replied. "I want especially to
learn some of the things you know about the soils of Westover. Can
you show me the best land and the poorest land on the estate?"
"I think I can." said Mr. West. "We have some land that has not
grown a crop in fifty years, and we have other land that still
produces a very fair crop if properly rotated."
"And what rotation do you practice?"
"Well, the system we have finally settled into and have followed for
many years is to plow up the run-out pasture land and plant to corn.
The second year we usually raise a crop of wheat or oats and seed
down to clover and timothy. We then try to cut hay from the land for
two years, and afterward we use the field for pasture for six or
eight years, or until finally it produces only weeds and foul grass.
Then we cover it with farm manure, so far as we can, and again plow
the land for corn. Wheat and cattle are the principal products sold
from the farm."
"In this way," said Percy, "you grow one crop of corn on the same
field about once in ten or twelve years."
"Yes, about that, and also one, or sometimes two, crops of small
grain. We usually have about seventy-five acres of corn, nearly a
hundred acres of small grain, and we cut hay from somewhat more than
hundred acres, thus leaving perhaps five hundred acres of pasture
land, besides about two hundred acres of timber land which has not
been cultivated for many years."
"Was the timber land that we see about here formerly cultivated?"
asked Percy.
"Oh, yes, nearly all of it was under cultivation when I was a boy,
although some had been allowed to go back to timber even before I
was born. On our own farm we have some timber land that, so far as I
have been able to learn, was never under cultivation; and the
character of the trees is different on that land. There you will
find original pine, but on the worn-out land the 'old-field' pine
are found. They are practically worthless, while the original pine
makes very valuable lumber.
"With our system of rotation we keep about all of our farm under
control; but the smaller farms were necessarily cropped more
continuously to support the family, and they became so unproductive
that many of them have been completely abandoned for agricultural
purposes; and even some of the large plantations were poorly
managed, one part having been cropped continuously until too poor to
pay for cropping, while the remainder was allowed to grow up in
scrub brush and 'old-field' pine; and, of course, the expense of
clearing such land is about as much as the net value of the crops
that could be grown until it again becomes too poor for cropping."
"Then the recleared lands are not as productive as when they were
first cleared from the virgin forest?"
"Oh, by no means. In the virgin state these lands grew bountiful
crops almost continuously for a hundred years or more. Virginia was
famed at home and abroad for her virgin fertility. Great crops of
corn, wheat, and tobacco were grown. Tobacco was a valuable export
crop, and there were many Virginians whose mothers came to America
with passage paid for in tobacco. History records, you may remember,
that it was the custom for a time to permit a young man to pay into
a general store house a hundred pounds of tobacco,--and this was
later increased to one hundred fifty pounds,--to be used in payment
of passage for young women who were thus enabled to come to America;
and there was a very distinct understanding that only those who had
come forth with the tobacco were eligible as suitors for the hand of
any 'imported' maiden. As a matter of fact some such arrangement as
this was almost a necessity," said Mr. West, as he noted Adelaide's
almost incredulous look. "Among the first settlers in Virginia,
young men greatly predominated; and in the main the people in the
home country were themselves in poverty. Under the hereditary laws
of England the father's estate and title became the possession of
his eldest son; and in large measure the other children of the
family were thrown absolutely upon their own resources, so that
many, even with royal blood in their veins, were very glad to
embrace any opportunity offered to seek a new home in this land of
virgin richness.
"Of course," he continued, smilingly and in direct answer to
Adelaide's inquiring look, "those young women were in no sense bound
to accept the attention or the offer of any man; but naturally most
of them did become the wives of those who were able to offer them a
husband's love and a home with more of life's comforts perhaps than
they had ever known before. They were at perfect liberty, however,
to remain in the enjoyment of single blessedness if they chose, and
I doubt not," he added, with a twinkle in his eyes, "that some of
them had no other choice."