record of the rainfall for many years. He published, in the Southern Planter and Farmer, November, 1879, the record from 1851 to 1878, both inclusive, a period of twenty-eight years. Estimating snow at nine for one of water the average yearly precipitation was 39 4-7 inches. The maximum was 52 inches in 1861, the minimum 23 7-8 inches in 1872. It was 28 inches in 1856, and only in these years and 1851 did it fall below 30 inches; only twice in the whole period did it exceed 50 inches, and in one of these by but an eighth of an inch.

Captain William G. Crenshaw began a record of the rainfall at "Hawfield" in 1880, and it has been diligently and carefully continued since his death to this time. His son, Mr. S. Dabney Crenshaw has kindly furnished the following data.

ANNUAL RAIN FALL AT HAWFIELD, ORANGE COUNTY

Mr. Jefferson, in his "Notes on Virginia," gives 47. 038 inches as the average of the five years from 1772 to 1777, in Albemarle. Grouping the five years in Mr. Newman's record between 1859 and 1863, very nearly the same average is found.

According to a "Gazetteer of Virginia," prepared by the United States Geological Survey in 1904, the mean magnetic declination in 1900 was 30 35', and the mean temperature 55° to 6o° Fahrenheit.

The elevation above the sea is from 300 to 1,200 feet; area 349 square miles.

CHAPTER XIV.

Social and Economic.

In the early days, almost as a matter of necessity, the "simple life" was the rule for the rich and poor alike.

There was little comfort in the modern sense, and no luxury. The houses were small and rude, few having glazed windows. All the lumber was sawn by hand, usually with a "pit saw": such nails as were used were wrought in the blacksmiths' shops, and almost every article of domestic use was made at home.

There are several houses yet standing in the County built of pit-sawn lumber and with wrought nails. On nearly every plantation there were negro carpenters, smiths, shoemakers, brick masons, etc., and, generally speaking, all the implements of agriculture, which were few and rude, and all house furnishings, were homemade. There were few books and little light at night to read by; the local roads were mostly bridle paths, and, except on rare occasions, horseback was the only mode of travel. A "bridal tour" consisted in the bride's going to the groom's home on the same horse, "riding behind him."

Visiting neighbors spent the day at least, and "calls" were unknown. The well-to-do got their clothes and wines and some furnishings from England, the poorer

people wore homespun. Indeed almost down to the war, homespun and homemade garments were not uncommon, whether woolen, hempen or cotton. The negro women were taught to card, spin and weave, and to cut and make the clothes of the children and servants. The ladies had their imported silks and linens, not many of a kind, which lasted a long time and were handed down to their daughters. The planters wore broadcloth on public occasions, with short breeches, silk stockings and knee buckles. Pewter was far commoner than silver or china ware. The return on an execution in 1737 shows "a gun and sword, an old chafing dish, a servant woman, a pewter salt, a pewter dram cup, and a piece of a looking glass. '

When the tobacco was hauled to Fredericksburg to market, the return load was usually family supplies, and often oysters in the shell, which, piled in the cellar and sprinkled occasionally with salt water, appear to have "kept" a long time.

Ordinaries, where "entertainment for man and beast" was provided, were very common, and the gentry were usually the proprietors.

The scale of prices was rigorously regulated by the county court every year. Thus, in 1735, this order is entered:

"The Court doth set and rate liquors; Rum, the gallon, eight shillings; Virginia brandy, six shillings; Punch, or Flipp, the quart, with white sugar, one and three pence, with brown sugar, one shilling; French brandy, sixteen shillings; Punch of same, two and six pence; Frill or Madeira wine, quart, two shillings; a hot dyet (diet) one shilling; a cold dyet, six pence; a lodging with clean sheets (always thus in the ratings) six pence;" and so on for

oats, pasturages, etc. this county sell and presume not to sell

"Ordered that the several ordinary keepers in retail liquors at the above rates, and that they at any other rates, and that if any person do not pay immediately that he pay for the same at the Fall in tobacco at ten shillings the hundred weight."

These ratings during the Revolution constitute a fine historical setting for later experience in Confederate times, as a gill of brandy or rum, two pounds two shillings; of whiskey one pound four shillings; a hot dinner, three pounds, six; a cold dinner, or second table, three pounds. The cost of a small drink of whiskey was thus about $3.50, a price it never attained in the Confederacy.

So in October, 1778, Joseph Woolfolk's executors were bonded in £10,000; in 1779 Reuben Daniel's executors in £30,000; and a negro, condemned to be hung, was valued at $3,333.

They looked after the morals of the people more closely then than now. The church wardens kept an eye on sinners, bound out orphans and the children of parents who did not take care of them, kept down immoral conduct as well as they could, and appear to have been an excellent sort of local inquisitors. In 1742 the court orders the church wardens to bind out Dodson's children, "he taking no care of their education, nor to bring them up in Christian principles," one of many like instances. In 1743 Pat Leonard is ordered to the stocks "for calling the sheriff a liar. Next year three men were presented by the grand jury for Sabbath breaking and riotously entering the German chapel and disturbing the congregation assembled for