Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 24.djvu/284

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page needs to be proofread.
ABC—XYZ

2GO VIRGINIA Manu factures, has a jail for persons committed for petty offences or awaiting trial. Lunacy, d-c. There are four first-class lunatic asylums, at Williamsburg, Staunton, and Marion, and (for coloured patients) at Petersburg. In 1885-86 there were 1479 patients in the State s three asylums, for which it contributed 345,077. The census of 1880 returned 2411 insane, 1171 males, 1240 females, 1719 white, and 692 coloured. Pauperism is not common in Virginia; in 1870 there were only 3890 paupers, supported by public charity at a cost of $303,081 ; in 1880 the total number was 3138, 2117 of these being in almshouses, of whom 1027 were coloured. Deaf-mutes and blind are well cared for in a noble institution at Staunton, which trained during 1885-86 78 deaf-mutes and 44 blind, with an annual grant of $35,000. The disabled Confederate soldiers of Virginia are aided by the State ($83,040 in 1885-86). There is also, near Richmond, a soldiers home. Agriculture. More than 50 per cent, of the labouring population was in 1880 engaged in agriculture. According to that year s census the laud area was 25,680,000 acres, 19,835,785 of which (0772 of the whole) were embraced in 118,517 farms, although only 8,510,113 acres of such area (only two-sevenths of the whole) were under cultivation (leaving 57 1 per cent, of land in farms unimproved), yet the number of farms increased 60 "5 per cent, and the acreage in farms 9 3 per cent, from 1870. Seventh-tenths of its farms were cultivated by owners ; over half of the remainder were rented for a share of the crop, and the other part for a fixed money rental. The average size of farms was 167 acres ; but there were 53,101 containing from 100 to 500 acres, 5561 with from 500 to 1000 acres, and 1563 containing over 1000 acres each, so that more than half the farms contained from 100 to over 1000 acres each, or a probable average of 300 acres each, large farms being the rule. The farms and their improvements were valued at $216,028,107, their farming implements at $5,495,114, the live stock at $25,953,315; for improvements $1,697,180 and for manures $2,137,283 were spent, and the value of their products was estimated at $45,726,221. The live stock comprised 218,838 horses, 33,598 mules and asses, 54,709 working oxen, 243,061 milch cows, 388,414 other cattle, 497,289 sheep, and 956,451 swine. The wool clip was 1,836,673 Ib ; 1,224,469 gallons of milk were sold; 11,470,923 Ib of butter and 85,535 of cheese were made; 859 acres of barley yielded 14,223 bushels; 16,463 of buckwheat 136,004 ; 1,768,127 of Indian corn 29,119,761 ; 563,443 of oats 5,333,181 ; 48,746 of rye 324,431 ; 901,177 acres of wheat yielded 7,826,174 bushels ; 45,040 acres of cotton 19,595 bales ; the flax crop was 4526 bushels of seed, 16,430 tons of straw, and 66,264 Ib of fibre ; the sorghum crop was 143 ft> of sugar and 564,558 gallons of molasses ; from the sugar maple were made 85,693 R> of sugar and 7518 gallons of molasses ; of hay 286,823 tons were grown on 336,289 acres ; 17,806 bushels of clover seed and 41,722 bushels of grass seed were raised ; there were 1,987,010 barn-yard and 660,147 other fowls, and 8,950,629 dozen eggs were produced during the year ; 1,090,451 Ib of honey and 53,200 of beeswax were made ; on 140,791 acres were grown 79,988,868 Ib of tobacco ; 2,016,766 bushels of Irish potatoes were raised, and on 23,755 acres 1,901,521 bushels of sweet ones ; orchard products were valued at $1,609,663, and market-garden products at $837,609 ; 2,177,770 cords of wood, valued at $3,053,149, were cut; the wool clip was valued $1,836,673 ; 12 acres of hops yielded 1599 Ib, and 127,976 Ib of broom corn were grown ; the crop of pease was 77,758 bushels, and that of beans 45,411. Of the 8,510,113 acres of improved land, 1,152,083 were in permanent meadows, pastures, orchards, and vineyards, and 7,358,030 were under tillage ; of the 11,325,672 acres unimproved in farms, 9,126,601 were in woodland and forest, and 2,199,071 in old fields, &c. Virginia was one of the twenty States that produced over 20,000,000 bushels of Indian corn each, ranking thirteenth; it stood second to Kentucky in acreage and quantity of tobacco grown. The United States com missioner of agriculture estimates that in 1884 Virginia had 4,071,401 acres in crops, producing 44,000,000 bushels of cereals, 2,061,000 bushels of potatoes, 99,763 Ib of tobacco, 366,389 tons of hay, and 13,500 bales of cotton, valued at $39, 050, 052 ; and had on its farms 2,127,023 domestic animals, worth $39,608,536. Manufactures. Though Virginia has great natural advantages for becoming a leading manufacturing State, in 1870 less than 12 per cent, of its population was engaged in manufacturing industries. In 1880, however, its 5710 establishments had invested $26,968,990, employed 40,184 persons (28,779 men), paid $7,425,261 for wages and $32,883,933 for materials, and produced to the value of $51,780,992, a gain of nearly 60 per cent, in ten years. It is estimated 1 that the value of the products in 1885 was $75,000,000, a gain of over 44 per cent, in five years. The sales of products of the manufacturing establishments of Richmond city alone amounted in 1887 to $27,887,340. The pig-iron output in 1887 was worth over $3,000,000. The more important manufactures are those of iron, tobacco, leather, coke, cotton, manures, paper, agricultural implements and machinery, builders materials, 1 United Staia Internal Commerce Report, for 18S6. vehicles, lumber, lime, tanning extracts, railway cars and loco motives, flour and mill products, spelter, salt, distilled spirits, canned fruits, vegetables, &c. Communication. The navigable tidal bays, creeks, rivers, Commu- harbours, and roads of Tidewater Virginia furnish more than a nication, thousand miles of channels for commerce ; Richmond, at the head of the tidal waters of the James, 117 miles from Chesapeake Bay, is reached by ocean ships drawing 15 feet of water ; West Point, at York Head, 41 miles from the bay, has 18 feet of depth ; Elizabeth river gives to the fine harbour of Norfolk a channel 25 feet deep ; while Hampton Roads, with its 400 square miles of area, is the largest as well as the most central and commodious landlocked harbour on the Atlantic coast of the United States. Ship canals connect the great waterways of Virginia with those of North Carolina and beyond to the southward ; and, similarly, northward the head of Chesapeake Bay is connected with Delaware Bay. At the beginning of 1888 there were 35 railway companies working 2540 miles of road, all of standard 4 feet 9 inches gauge, except some 256 miles of narrow-gauge short lines. The Virginia rail ways earned $13,825,909 in 1885 at an outlay of $8,999,853, the work done being equivalent to 971,477,375 mile-tons. Virginia early took part in the construction of railways, investing many millions in the stocks of the various lines now reaching nearly every part of the State ; beginning about 1830, it had 147 miles of railway in 1840, 384 in 1850, 1350 in 1860, 1449 in 1870, 1893 in 1880, 2430 in 1885, and 2540, with some 200 miles more in course of construction, at the beginning of 1888. Eight great through railway lines connect its trade and manufacturing centres with those of other States. Finance. For the year ending September 30, 1886, the assessed Finance, value of the real estate of Virginia was $257,607,935, and of personal property $83,152,971, or $340,760,906 of taxable valuation; the taxes were $1,029,936 on real estate, $336,366 on personal property, $39,112 on incomes, $316,293 capitation, $141,755 from railways on a valuation of $34,614,427, $299,343 from liquor and $400,325 from other licences. The receipts of the State were $2,773,437, and its expenses of all kinds $2,755,036; of these $657,610 went to the support of the free public schools and $1,064,097 to the support of the State Government. The rate of taxation is low, and on a low property valuation. The State debt at January 1, 1885, was $28, 961, 829. Militia. In 1880 the natural militia (male persons from eighteen Militia, to forty-four years of age inclusive) was 264,033 (102,426 of them coloured) in a male population of 745,589. The organized militia force is small. In 1885-86 there were 51 equipped volunteer com panies of active militia under the orders of the State, mainly in its cities and larger towns, 43 of infantry (18 of them coloured), 5 of artillery, and 3 cavalry, mustering in all 2904 men. The Virginia military fund is about $11,000 a year. History. The mound-builders of the Mississippi valley had out- History, posts, as evidenced by remains of their earth-works, in the mountain passes of Appalachia. At the time of the arrival of the whites the Powhatans held most of Tidewater, the Mannahoacks the north east and the Monacans the south-w T est of Midland and Piedmont ; the Cherokees held the Tennessee basin parts of the Valley and Appalachia, and Algonkin tribes Shaw r nees, Delawares, &c. the rest of those divisions. Many of the place names are still Indian. Cabot probably entered Chesapeake Bay in 1498 ; when Raleigh s ships, in 1584, brought to England glowing accounts of the Albe- marle Sound region, the whole country was named Virginia in honour of Elizabeth, the virgin queen. The first permanent English settlement in America was made at Jamestown, Virginia, May 13, 1607, by one hundred settlers sent from England by Sir Thomas Gates and Company, who had obtained in April 1606 a charter from James I. to plant two colonies in Virginia, a southern somewhere between 34 and 41, and a northern between 38 and 45 N. lat., but at places not less than 100 miles apart. In 1609 the London Company superseded Gates s, which had merely held its settlement and given to the world the romantic adventures of Captain John SMITH (q.v. ). King James gave the London Com pany, by charter, a sea-front of 400 miles, 200 north and 200 south from Point Comfort, all islands within 100 miles of the coast, and all the country back from this 400 miles of frontage " throughout from sea to sea," and to its colonists all the rights of natural-born Englishmen ; under this charter Virginia had jurisdic tion over her imperial colonial territory, and under it holds the fragment of that colony now called Virginia. The colony of the London Company grew and prospered, and in 1619 Governor Yardley organized at James City, the capital, a few miles inland from Jamestown, the first legislative body that met in North America ; in 1621 the London Company granted the colony a liberal constitution, the general form of which Virginia has always pre served. In August 1619 a Dutch man-of-war sold at Jamestown twenty African negroes, and introduced negro slavery. In 1624 James I. arbitrarily deprived the London Company of its charter, and Virginia became a royal colony, which was, till the revolu

tion, a favourite and generally a loyal royal province governed