USA > West Virginia > Barbour County > The history of Barbour County, West Virginia, from its earliest exploration and settlement to the present time > Part 10
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GEOGRAPHY, GEOLOGY AND CLIMATE.
The highest peaks in the State are where the ranges of mountains cross the highest part of the plateau. There are many other mountains in the State which, when measured from base to summit, are as high as those just men- tioned, but they do not have the advantage of resting their bases on ground so elevated, consequently their summits are not so far above sea level. To express it briefly, by a homely comparison, a five-foot man on three-foot stilts is higher than a six-foot man on the ground; a one thousand-foot moun- tain on a three thousand-foot plateau is higher than a two thousand-foot mountain near the sea level.
Exact measurements showing the elevation of West Virginia in various parts of its area, when studied in connection with a map of the State, show clearly that the area rises in altitude from all sides, culminating in the nest of peaks clustered around the sources of the Potomac, the Kanawha and Monongahela. The highest point in the State is Spruce Mountain, in Pen- dleton County, 4,860 feet above sea level; the lowest point is the bed of the Potomac at Harper's Ferry, 260 feet above the sea; the vertical range is 4,600 feet. The Ohio, at the mouth of Big Sandy, on the boundary between West Virginia and Kentucky, is 500 feet; the mouth of Cheat, at the Penn- sylvania line, is 775. The general level of Pocahontas County is about 3,000 above the sea. The bed of Greenbrier River where it enters Poca- hontas is 3,300 feet in elevation. Where Shaver's Fork of Cheat River - leaves Pocahontas its bed is 3,700 feet. A few of the highest peaks in Po- cahontas, Pendleton, Randolph and Tucker Counties are: Spruce Knob, Pendleton County, 4,860 feet above sea level; Bald Knob, Pocahontas County, 4,800; Spruce Knob, Pocahontas County, 4,730; High Knob, Ran- dolph County, 4,710; Mace Knob, Pocahontas County, 4,700; Barton Knob, Randolph County, 4,600; Bear Mountain, Pocahontas County, 4,600; Elleber Ridge. Pocahontas County, 4,600; Watering Pond Knob, Pocahontas Coun- ty, 4,600; Panther Knob, Pendleton County, 4,500; Weiss Knob, Tucker County, 4,490; Green Knob, Randolph County, 4,485; Brier Patch Moun- tain, Randolph County, 4,480; Yokum's Knob, Randolph County, 4,330; Pointy Knob, Tucker County, 4,286; Hutton's Knob, Randolph County, 4,260.
We do not know whether the vertical upheaval which raised the plateau, or the horizontal compression which elevated the mountains, has yet ceased. We know that the work of destruction is not resting. Whether the uplift is still acting with sufficient force to make our mountains higher, or whether the elements are chiseling down rocks and lowering our whole surface, we cannot say. But this we can say, if the teachings of geology may be taken as warrant for the statement, every mountain, every hill, every cliff, rock, upland, even the valleys, and the whole vast underlying skeleton of rocks must ultimately pass away and disappear beneath the sea. Rain and frost, wind and the unseen chemical forces, will at last complete the work of destruction. Every rock will be worn to sand, and the sand will go out with the currents of our rivers, until the rivers no longer have currents, and the sea will flow in to cover the desolation. The sea once covered a level world; the world will again be level, and again will the sea cover it.
There is greater diversity of climate in West Virginia than in almost any other area of the United States of equal size. The climate east of the Alleghanies is different from that west of the range; while that in the high plateau region is different from both. The State's topography is responsi-
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ble for this, as might be expected from a vertical range of more than four thousand feet, with a portion of the land set to catch the west wind, and a portion to the east, and still other parts to catch every wind that blows. Generally speaking, the country east of the Alleghanies has the warmer and dryer climate. In the mountain regions the summers are never very hot, and the winters are always very cold. The thermometer sometimes falls thirty degrees below zero near the summit of the Alleghanies, while the highest summer temperature is seldom above ninety degrees, but the record shows ninety-six. The depth of snow varies with the locality and the altitude. Records of snow six and seven feet deep near the summits of the highest mountains have been made. At an elevation of fifteen hundred feet above the sea there was snow forty-two inches deep in 1856 along the mountains and valleys west of the Alleghanies. In 1831, at an elevation of less than one thousand feet, snow accumulated three feet deep between the mountains and the Ohio River. Tradition tells of a snow in the northwest- ern part of the State in 1780 which was still deeper; but exact measurements were not recorded. The summers of 1838 and 1854 were almost rainless west of the mountains. In the same region in 1834 snow fell four inches deep on the fifteenth of May; and on June 5, 1859, a frost killed almost every green thing in the central and northern part of the State.
The average annual rainfall for the State of West Virginia, including melted snow, is about forty-seven inches. During some years the rainfall is three or four times as great as in other years. The precipitation is greater west of the Alleghanies than east, and greatest near the summit of these mountains, on the western side. Our rains and snows come from two general directions, from the west-southwest and from the east. Local storms may come from any direction. Eastern storms are usually confined to the region east of the Alleghanies. The clouds which bring rains from that quarter come from the Atlantic Ocean. The high country following the summits of the Appalachian range from Canada almost to the Gulf of Mexico is the dividing line between the two systems of rains and winds which visit West Virginia. Storms from the Atlantic move up the gentle slope from the coast to the base of the mountains, precipitating their mois- ture in the form of rain or snow as they come. They strike the abrupt east- ern face of the Alleghanies, expending their force and giving out the remainder of their moisture there, seldom crossing to the west side. The Blue Ridge is not high enough to interfere seriously with the passage of clouds across their summits; but the Alleghanies are usually a barrier, especially for eastern storms. As the clouds break against their sides there are sometimes terrific rains below, while very little and perhaps none falls on the summit. On such an occasion an observer on one of the Alleghany peaks can look down upon the storm and can witness the play of lightning and hear the thunder beneath him. Winds which cross high mountains seldom deposit much rain or snow on the leeward side.
Whence, then, does the western part of our State receive its rains? Not from the Atlantic, because the winds which bring rain for the country west of the Alleghanies blow towards that ocean, not from it. No matter in what part of the world rain or snow falls, it was derived from vapor taken up by the sun from some sea or ocean. An insignificant portion of the world's rain- fall is taken up as vapor from land. From what sea, then, do the winds blow which bring the rain that falls against the western slopes of the mountains and waters the country to the Ohio river and beyond?
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Take the back track of the winds and follow them to their starting point and that will settle the question. They come from a direction a little west of southwest. That course will lead to the Pacific Ocean west of Mexico. Go on in the same direction two thousand or three thousand miles, and reach the equator. Then turn at right angles and go southeast some thousand miles further and reach that wide domain of the Pacific which stretches from South America to Australia. There, most probably, would be found the starting point of the winds which bring us rain. The evidence to substantiate this statement is too elaborate and complex to be given here; suffice it that the great wind systems of the world, with their circuits, cur- rents and counter-currents, have been traced and charted until they are almost as well known as are the rivers of the world." Not only is the great distance from which our rains come an astonishing theme for contempla- tion, but the immense quantity transported is more amazing-a sheet of water nearly four feet thick and covering an area of twenty thousand square miles, lifted by the sun's rays every year from the South Pacific, carried through the air ten thousand miles and sprinkled with a bountiful profu- sion upon our mountains, hills, vales, meadows and gardens to make them pleasing and fruitful.
The soil of a country is usually understood to be the covering of the solid rock. It is very thin in comparison with the thickness of the subja- cent rock, not often more than four or five feet and frequently less. This is not the place for a chemical discussion of soils; but a few plain facts may be given. What is soil? Of what is it made? In the first place, leaving chemical questions out, soil is simply pulverized rock, mixed with vegetable or animal remains. The rocky ledges underlying a country, become disin- tegrated near the surface; they decompose; the sand and dust accumulate, washing into the low places and leaving the high points more or less bare, and a soil of sufficient depth is formed to support vegetation. A soil in which little or no vegetable humus is intermixed, is poor, and it produces little growth. Sand alone, no matter how finely pulverized is not capable of supporting vegetation, except a few peculiar species or varieties. This is why hillsides are so often nearly bare. The soil is deep enough, but it is poor. The state of being poor is nothing more than a lack of humus, or decaying vegetation. Those poor hillside soils either never had humus in them, or it has been washed out. A soil tolerable fertile is sometimes made miserably poor by being burned over each year when the leaves fall. The supply of vegetable matter which would have gone to furnish what the soil needed, is thus burned and destroyed; and in course of time that which was already in the soil is consumed or washed out, and instead of a fertile wood- land, there is a blasted, lifeless tract. Examples of this are too often met with in West Virginia.
Excessive tillage of land exhausts it, because it takes out the organic matter and puts nothing back. It does not exhaust the disintegrated rock -the sand, the clay, the dust; but it takes out the vital part, the mold of vegetation. Fertilizers are used to restore the fertility of exhausted land. That process is misleading, in many cases. Too often the fertilizing mater- ial is a stimulant rather than a food to the land. It often adds no element of fertility, but, by a chemical process, compels the soil to give up all the remaining humus; and when the vegetable matter is all gone from the soil, all the fertilizers of that kind in the world would not cause the land to pro-
* See Maury's Physical Geography of the Sea.
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GEOGRAPHY, GEOLOGY AND CLIMATE.
duce a crop. The intelligent farmer does not need be told this. His experience has taught him the truth of it. No land is so completely sterile as that which, through excessive use of fertilizers, has been compelled to part with its vegetable matter. Something cannot be created from nothing. If a soil has no plant food in it, and a fertilizer contains no plant food, the mixing of the two will not produce plant life.
A crop of clover, of buckwheat, of rye, or any other crop, plowed under, fertilizes land because it adds vegetable matter to the soil. Then if the soil is stubborn about yielding up its fertility, a treatment of the proper fertil- izing agent will compel it to do so. Bottom lands along the rivers and creeks are usually more fertile than lands on the hills because rains leach the uplands and wash the decaying leaves and the humus down upon the lowlands. The soil along the river bottoms is often many feet deep, and fertile all the way down. This is because the washings from the hills have been accumulating there for ages faster than the vegetation which annually drew from it could exhaust the supply. It sometimes happens that the surface of a deep soil is exhausted by long cultivation; and that a sub-soil plow, which goes deeper than usual, turns up a new fertile soil which had lain beyond the reach of plant roots for ages. Occasionally a flood which covers bottom lands leaves a deposit of mud which is full of humus. This enriches the land where it lodges, but the mountain districts from which it was carried were robbed of that much fertility.
Disintegrated rock of all kinds cannot be made fertile by the usual addition of vegetable humus. Certain chemical conditions must be complied with. Limestone generally forms good soil because it contains elements which enter into plants. Strata of rock, as we now see them, were once beds of sand and sediment. They hardened and became stone. Sandstone is formed of accumulations of sand; shale is made from beds of clay or mud; limestone was once an aggregation of shells and skeletons of large and small living creatures. When these rocks are broken up, disintegrated and become soils, they return to that state in which they were before they became rock. The limestone becomes shells and bones, but of course pul- verized, mixed and changed; sandstone becomes sand again; shale becomes mud and clay as it originally was. This gives a key to the cause of some soils being better than others. A clay bank is not easily fertilized; but a bed of black mud usually possesses elements on which plants can feed. So, if the disintegrating shale was originally sterile clay, it will make a poor soil; but if it was originally a fertile mud, the resulting soil will be good. If the disintegrating sandstone was once a pure quartz sand, the soils will likely be poor, but if it was something better, the soil will be better. The fertility of limestone soil is mainly due to the animal matter in the rock. It should always be borne in mind, however, that the difference of soils is dependent not so much upon their chemical composition as upon the physical arrangements of their particles.
Plants do not feed exclusively upon the soil. As a matter of fact, a large part of the material which enters into the construction of the stems and leaves of some plants is derived from the air. Some plants prosper without touching the soil. A species of Chinese lily flourishes in a bowl of water with a few small rocks in the bottom. On the other hand there are plants that will wither in a few minutes if taken from the ground. This shows that some plants extract more material from the soil than other. It is a common saying that buckwheat rapidly exhausts land. 6
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Some lands are more affected by drought than others, when both receive the same rainfall. This may be due to the character of the under- lying rocks, although usually due to a different cause. If the soil is shallow and the subjacent rocks lie oblique and on edge, they are liable to carry the water away rapidly by receiving it into their openings and crevi- ces, thus draining the soil. But if the subjacent rocks lie horizontally, water which sinks through the soil is prevented from escaping, and is held as in a tub, and is fed gradually upward through the soil by capilliary attraction. This land will remain moist a long time. But the more usual reason that one soil dries more rapidly than another, is that one is loose and the other compact. The compact soil dries quickest. The smaller the interspaces between the ultimate particles which make up the soil, the more rapidly water raises from the wet subsoil by capilliary attraction, and the supply is soon exhausted. The more compact the soil the smaller the spaces between the particles. In loose ground the interspaces are larger, the water rises slowly or not at all, and the dampness remains longer beneath the surface. In the western countries where the summers are hot and rainless, the farmers irrigate their land, thoroughly soaking it from a neighboring canal. If they shut the water off and leave the land alone, in a few days it is baked, parched, hard and as dry as a bone. But the farmer does not do this. As soon as the water is turned off, he plows and harrows the land making the surface as loose as possible. The result is, the imme- diate top becomes dry, but a few inches below the surface the soil remains moist for weeks. The water cannot escape through the porous surface. The same rule applies everywhere. If two cornfields lie side by side, especially in a dry season, and one is carefully tilled and the surface kept loose, while the other is not, the difference in the crops will show that in one case the moisture in the soil was prevented from escaping and was fed to the corn roots, while in the other case it rose to the surface and was blown away by the wind, leaving the corn to die of thirst.
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CHAPTER IX,
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AMONG OLD LAWS.
" Yet I doubt not through the ages one increasing purpose runs, And the thoughts of men are widened with the process of the suns." -Tennyson.
The settlement of the territory now embraced in West Virginia com- menced about 1730, and before the close of the eighteenth century there were cabins or colonies in the valleys of all the principal rivers of the State. The first settlers were governed by the laws in force in Virginia from the earliest occupation of our territory until 1863. A proper consideration of the history of our State requires that mention be made of some of the old laws. They should be studied to show the progress of society during the past century. There are persons who speak of the "good old times " as though everything were better than now, and who speak of the people of a hundred years ago as if they were greater, purer, nobler than the men of today, and as if, when they died, wisdom died with them. The historian knows that this belief is erroneous. Not only are there men now living who are as upright, wise and patriotic as any who ever lived, but society, in all its branches and departments, has grown better. Only the pessimist refuses to see that the human race is climbing to a higher level, and not retrograding.
To bring this truth nearer home to the people, let a retrospective view of the customs and laws prevailing here a century ago be taken. That the people of Virginia tolerated barbarous laws long after the close of the Rev- olutionary War is proof that the laws were not obnoxious to a majority of the people, otherwise they would have changed them. Before proceeding to a statement of the Acts of the Virginia Legislature, let it be remembered that at that time Washington was President of the United States and the great men of Virginia, at the close of the last century and the beginning of this, were in their prime. They were responsible for the bad laws as well as for the good; if not directly, at least indirectly, for they were looked upon as leaders. Patrick Henry, who had exclaimed, "give me liberty or give me death," was yet living and practicing law; John Randolph, of Roan- oke, was entering his career of greatness; James Monroe, soon to be Presi- dent of the United States, was a leader in Virginia; George Mason, the author of the Bill of Rights, had not yet lost his influence; James Madison, also to be President of the United States, was a leader among the Virgin- ians; William Wirt, one of Virginia's greatest lawyers, was in his prime; Edmund Randolph, Governor of Virginia, was in politics; John Marshall, the famous Chief Justice, was practicing in the courts; Thomas Jefferson, the author of the Declaration of Independence, was in the height of power;
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and the list might be extended much further. Yet, with all of these truly great men in power in Virginia, the Legislature of that State passed such laws as will be found below:
On December 26, 1792, an Act was passed for the purpose of suppress- ing vice, and provided that for swearing, cursing or being drunk the fine should be eighty-three cents for each offense, and if not paid, the offender should have ten lashes on the bare back. For working on Sunday the fine was one dollar and sixty-seven cents. For stealing a hogshead or cask of tobacco found lying by the public highway, the punishment was death.
On December 19, 1792, an Act was passed by the Virginia Legislature providing that any person found guilty of forgery must be put to death; and the same punishment was provided for those who erased, defaced or changed the inspector's stamp on flour or hemp. No less severe was the punish- ment for those who stole land warrants. But for the man who made, passed or had in his possession counterfeit money, knowing it to be such, the pen- alty of death was not enough. He was not only to be put to death, but was forbidden the attendance of a minister, and must go to execution "in the blossom of his sin." The design of the law-makers evidently was to add to his punishment not only in this life, but, if possible, send him to eternal punishment after death. It is not in the province or power of the writers of history to ascertain whether the Virginia Assembly ever succeeded in killing a man and sending him to eternal torment in the lake of fire and brimstone because he had a counterfeit dime in his pocket, but the proba- bility is that the powers of the law-makers ceased when they had hanged their man, and a more just and righteous tribunal then took charge of his case.
It is evident that the early Virginia law-makers laid great stress on the idea of clergy to attend the condemned man. If they wished to inflict extreme punishment they put on the finishing touches by denying the priv- ilege of clergy. On November 27, 1789, an Act was passed by the Legisla- ture segregating crimes into two classes, one of which was designated as "clergyable," and the other as "unclergyable." It was provided that the unclergyable crimes were murder in the first degree, burglary, arson, the burning of a Court-House or prison, the burning of a clerk's office, felone- ously stealing from the church or meeting-house, robbing a house in pres- ence of its occupants, breaking into and robbing a dwelling house by day, after having put its owner in fear. For all these offences the penalty was death. A provision was made in some cases for clergy; but, lest the con- victed man's punishment might not thereby be too much lightened, it was stipulated that he must have his hand burned before he was hanged. The same law further provided that, although a man's crime might not be unclergyable, yet if he received the benefit of clergy, and it was subse- quently ascertained that he had formerly committed an unclergyable offense, he must then be put to death without further benefit of clergy. In this law it was expressly provided that there should be no mitigation of punishment in case of women.
By an Act of December 26, 1792, it was provided that the man who apprehended a runaway servant and put him in jail was to receive one dollar and forty-seven cents, and mileage, to be paid by the owner. This law was, no doubt, intended to apply chiefly to slaves rather than to white servants. If the runaway remained two months in jail unclaimed, the sheriff must advertise him in the Virginia Gazette, and after putting an iron
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AMONG OLD LAWS.
collar on his neck, marked with the letter "F," hire him out, and from his wages pay the costs. After one year, if still unclaimed, he was to be sold. The money, after the charges were paid, was to be given to the former owner if he ever proved his claim, and if he did not do so, it belonged to the State.
The law-makers believed in discouraging gossip and tattling. A law passed by the Virginia Legislature, December 27, 1792, was in the follow- ing language: "Whereas, many idle and busy-headed people do forge and divulge false rumors and reports, be it resolved by the General Assembly, that what person or persons soever shall forge or divulge any such false report, tending to the trouble of the country, he shall be by the next Jus- tice of the Peace sent for and bound over to the next County Court, where, if he produce not his author, he shall be fined forty dollars or less if the court sees fit to lessen it, and besides give bond for his good behavior, if it appear to the court that he did maliciously publish or invent it."
There was a studied effort on the part of the Legislators to discourage hog-stealing. It is not apparent why it should be a worse crime to steal a hog than to steal a cow; or why the purloining of a pig should outrank in criminality the taking of a calf; or why it should be a greater offense to appropriate a neighbor's shoat than his sheep. But the early law-makers in Virginia seem to have so considered it and they provided a law for the special benefit of the hog thief. This law, passed by the Legislature December 8, 1792, declared that "any person, not a slave, who shall steal a hog, shoat or pig," should receive thirty-five lashes on the bare back; or if he preferred to do so, he might escape the lashing by paying a fine of thirty dollars; but whether he paid the fine or submitted to the stripes, he still must pay eight dollars to the owner for each hog stolen by him. This much of the law is comparatively mild, but it was for the first offense only. As the thief advanced in crime the law's severity increased. For the second offense in hog-stealing the law provided that the person convicted, if not a slave, should stand two hours in a pillory, on a public court day, at the Court-House, and have both ears nailed to the pillory, and at the end of two hours. should have his ears cut loose from the nails. It was expressly pro- vided that no exception should be made in the case of women. If the hog thief still persisted in his unlawful business and transgressed the law a third time, he was effectually cured of his desire for other people's hogs by being put to death.
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