Thence due south along the western boundary of Maryland,

Down the Potomac river opposite Maryland, to Chesapeake bay,

Thence over Chesapeake bay, Pocomoke bay, and over the intervening peninsula to the Atlantic Ocean,

Along the Atlantic Ocean,

Having an entire outline of

These distances being measured from Tanner's Map of the United States by a scale, may not be minutely correct, but we trust are sufficiently accurate for all the ordinary purposes of geography. It may be necessary to note, that the short line over the peninsula between the Atlantic Ocean and Chesapeake bay, and between Accomac county of Virginia and Worcester county of Maryland, is usually drawn on maps along N. Lat. 38°; it is, however, actually farther north by about two minutes of latitude on the ocean, and declining to the southward, still strikes Pocomoke bay above N. Lat. 38°.

Again, the south-western boundary of Virginia on the state of Tennessee, ought, and is commonly supposed, to extend along N. Lat. 36° 30', but by an error in the original survey this latter demarcation stretches two minutes or more, of latitude, to the north of the curve along which it was to have been-extended.

Total of Spottsylvania county Northampton Patrick Henry Nottaway Brunswick

†Henrico, excl. of Richmond city Fluvanna

City of Richmond
Sussex

Prince George
King William
Prince Edward
Amelia
Surry

Northumberland

Fairfax

Counties.

40

Spottsylvania, ex. of Fredericksburg Town of Fredericksburg

In latitude, Virginia lies between 36° 30', and 40° 37′ N., and in longitude, from 1° 46' E., to 6° 36′ W. from W. C.

The longest straight line that can be drawn in Virginia, is in length 485 miles, and extends from the north-eastern angle on the Atlantic Ocean, to the extreme south-western on Tennessee and Kentucky. Measured carefully by the rhombs, the area of Virginia comes out about 70,000 square miles; therefore the mean breadth is 144 miles very nearly. Nature has so palpably divided Virginia into two sections that her demarcations are obeyed in the legislation of the state, and in the taking of the decennial census by the general government. The following Tables exhibit the counties of each section, with their aggregate population, agreeably to the census of 1830.

Counties.

Madison,

Greensville,

Prince William,

Nelson,

TABLE I. EASTERN VIRGINIA.

King and Queen
Pittsylvania
York
Louisa
King George

Richmond
Charles City
Bedford
Hanover
Princess Ann
Lancaster
Campbell

Town of Lynchburg

Fauquier

James City

Amherst

New Kent

Norfolk Borough

Franklin

Westmoreland

Goochland

Cumberland

Matthews

Middlesex

Elizabeth City,

21,901

28,797

24,806

9,541 of ten and under twenty-four 8,347 oftwenty-four and under thirty-six 4,257 of thirty-six and under fifty-five 2,723 of fifty-five and under one hundred 1,056 of one hundred and upwards 13

Total number of slaves

FREE COLOURED PERSONS.

MALES under ten years of age

1,118 886 499

of ten and under twenty-four of twenty-four and under thirty-six of thirty-six and under fifty-five of fifty-five and under one hundred of one hundred and upwards

419

259

FEMALES under ten years of age

of ten and under twenty-four
of twenty-four and under thirty-six
of thirty-six and under fifty-five
of fifty-five and under one hundred
of one hundred and upwards

Total number of free coloured persons

Total aggregate Slaves and coloured persons included in the foregoing who are deaf and dumb, under fourteen years of age Slaves and coloured persons included in the foregoing who are deaf and dumb, of fourteen and under twenty-five Slaves and coloured persons included in the foregoing who are deaf and dumb, of twenty-five and upwards

Slaves and coloured persons included in the foregoing who are blind

3

3,184

1,111

859 541

406

241

1

3,159

6,343

378,425

11

7

6

45

Measuring the respective counties by the scale from a map, and forming an aggregate area from the parts, does not yield a surface equal to 70,000 square miles, the surface given as that of Virginia in the first part of this article; but the discrepancy arises from fractional loss in each county. If, how ever, we take the reduced area of the counties as usually measured on maps, the difference may stand as an equivalent for the uninhabitable tracts occupied by the mountain chains.

Virginia is perhaps, of all the states of the United States, the one whose natural features are most contrasted. Similar to Maryland and North Carolina, Virginia is subdivided into three very distinct physical sections. First, the eastern, or sea sand alluvial section below the head of the Atlantic tides. Second, the middle or hilly section, from

Comparatively there are few and only confined tracts of Virginia actually level. Such character of surface is restricted to the two counties of Northampton and Accomac, on the Eastern shore, and southward of the Chesapeake bay and James river, to the counties of Princess Anne, Norfolk and Nansemond, with an aggregate area of 2200 square miles, or less than the 31st part of the whole area of the state. Westward from Chesapeake bay, the country gradually rises into hill and dale, though some flat and even marshy land skirts the wide mouths of the rivers, which are discharged into either the Atlantic Ocean or Chesapeake bay. Virginia and Maryland occupy the central part of that physical section of the Atlantic slope of the United States, so remarkable for deep and wide rivers. Except, nevertheless, in extent, greater depth and relative position, Chesapeake bay differs in nothing essential froni Pamlico and Albemarle Sounds to the south, and Delaware bay to the north. ginia and Maryland, the confluents of the Chesapeake seem to imitate that great recipient, and Pocomoke, Nantikoke, Choptank and Chester rivers on the east, and James, York, Rappahannoc, Potomac, Patuxent and Patapsco on the west, widen into expansive bays before their final discharge into their common recipient.

In Vir

These minor bays become gradually more shallow, and more confined in width approaching the head of tide-water, but they all retain the distinctive character of bays, as far as the ocean tides penetrate inland. Below the head of the tides there are 36 counties, comprising an area of 9,989 square miles, or about two-thirteenths of Virginia. This section is that designated alluvial, but departing from the inner margin and proceeding towards the Atlantic, it is evident that the respective extremes were formed at very great difference in time. The primitive rock is only laid bare where traversed by the rivers, and in the intermediate spaces the hills very gradually merge into level planes towards the

ocean.

The Blue Ridge traverses Virginia, 260 miles in a general direction from south-west to north-east, and except where traversed by Roanoke and James rivers, is a continuous ridge, and it is also in all its range in Virginia a county limit. Falling from this finely delineated chain, is an inclined plane, containing 15,386 square miles, terminated by the head of the Atlantic tides. This truly beautiful section, if we merely regard the fall of water, has a declivity from about 300 to 500 feet, but the descent

of the rivers gives but a defective idea of the slope in the arable soil; which latter, towards the Blue Ridge, rises in many places to at least 1000 feet above the ocean level. The face of nature, though exhibiting little of grandeur, is rich and pleasing in the ever varying outline of hill, valley and river scenery. On the higher extreme, beside the elegant back ground of the Blue Ridge, other detached mountain chains rise, and give intimation that the solid structure of the country is Appalachian, and that the outer ridges or chains of that system influence the great bends of the rivers. This mountain influence is seen in the courses of Roanoke, James, Rappahannoc and Potomac rivers.

Between the head of tide-water and Blue Ridge are comprised 29 counties of Virginia, and 15,386 square miles. Taking the two eastern sections together, we have a surface of 27, 190 square miles, comprising 65 counties, or not quite 420 square miles to the average of the counties. This combined extent is the region denominated Eastern Virginia, and the population of which by the census of 1830, is represented by Tables II. and III. On this part of Virginia the white population is within a small fraction of 14 to the square mile; the slaves and free coloured united, very near 17 to the square mile; and the aggregate of all classes, within a small fraction of 30 to the square mile.

The third or Great Valley section, is in many respects the most remarkable of the physical portions of Virginia. Lying between the Blue Ridge and the main Appalachian chains, and extending from the great bend of Potomac between Harper's Ferry and Hancock's town, about 300 miles to the northern border of Ashe county, North Carolina, and embracing 13,072 square miles, the mean breadth is 43 miles very nearly. This valley, as it is called, is a real mountain table land. By reference to Tables III. and IV., Article UNITED STATES, page 240 of this volume, the reader will perceive that there is a difference of from 300 to 1400 feet between the relative elevation along the opposite sides of Blue Ridge. The tables referred to, expose also another remarkable phenomenon, that the Great Valley of Virginia rises from little more than 300 feet along the Potomac, to upwards of 2000 feet on the opposite extreme on North Carolina.

The surface of the Great Virginia Valley is in an especial manner broken and diversified, and in every part containing zones of highly productive soil. It is indeed the continuation of the Kittatinny valley of Pennsylvania and Maryland, and contains along the Blue Ridge a continuation of that immense limestone formation which, in fact, in an opposite direction, extends over New Jersey, New York and Connecticut into Massachusetts. The declivity of that part of this lengthened valley which is contained in Virginia, presents some peculiar features. The northern and nearly one half declines to the north-eastward towards the Potomac, and is there drained by the Shenandoah, Cacapon and South Branch of Potomac. Southward from the sources of Potomac and Shenandoah, is a middle

slope drained eastwardly through the Blue Ridge by James and Roanoke rivers. The extreme southern part falls to the north-westward, and gives descent to New River, or the higher part of Great Kenhawa. We thus discover that this table land is partly on the Atlantic slope and partly on the Ohio Valley; and that the inflected line that separates the sources of James and Roanoke of the former, from those of Great Kenhawa of the latter river system, passes the mountain valley obliquely.

Politically the Great Valley of Virginia is subdivided into 17 counties, and containing 13,072 square miles; each county contains within a small fraction of 770 square miles. The aggregate population is 205,818, or a little above 15 to the square mile; but of these the whites comprise upwards of three-fourths.

Passing the table land, between Blue Ridge and Alleghany mountains, brings us on the Ohio section of Virginia. The extreme length of this western slope is within a small fraction of 300 miles, from the northern boundary of Tennessee, to the extreme northern angle of Brooke county; the greatest breadth 135 miles over the Kenhawa valley, but both extremes being narrow, the mean width is about 94 miles; area 28,337 square miles. The surface is in the far greater part mountainous or very hilly. The chains of the Appalachian system stretch over it very nearly parallel to the general course of Ohio river, in that part of that stream which bounds Virginia on the north-west side. The soil is as varied in quality as the surface is in feature, as every grade of fertility and of sterility may be found, the latter, however, greatly the prevailing characThe elevation of the water at the junction of the Ohio and Great Kenhawa being 533 feet above the ocean level, and that point being only about 40 miles above the extreme lowest point of Western Virginia at the mouth of the Great Sandy river, we may regard all the land surface of the Ohio section as rising above 500 feet. The relative oceanic elevation of Wheeling is 634 feet; therefore the Ohio river as a base to the great inclined plane, and as a recipient for the water of the western section of Virginia, forms in itself a deep valley, lying at a mean of upwards of 560 feet above the Atlantic Ocean, or on a level with Lake Erie, about mid-course along Virginia.

ter.

The dividing ridge between the sources of the Ohio confluents and those of the Atlantic Ocean, is the apex of the two opposing planes before us, having its highest elevation in the mountain valleys, from which rise on one side the sources of James and Roanoke rivers, and on the other those of Great Kenhawa. On the region from whence these rivers rise, the mean height of the farms exceeds 1600 feet. From these elevated valleys the Ohio sources flow like radii from a common centre. The different branches of Monongahela rise in Lewis and Randolph counties, and flowing northwardly over Harrison, Monongalia and Preston, and receiving numerous confluents, continue northward to meet those of Alleghany, and form the Ohio at Pittsburg.