“A piece of land is cut down, and left under constant cultivation, first in tobacco, and then in Indian corn (two very exhausting plants), until it will yield scarcely anything; a second piece is cleared, and treated in the same manner; then a third and so on, until probably there is but little more to clear.  When this happens, the owner finds himself reduced to the choice of one of three things—­either to recover the land which he has ruined, to accomplish which, he has perhaps neither the skill, the industry, nor the means; or to retire beyond the mountains; or to substitute quantity for quality in order to raise something.  The latter has been generally adopted, and, with the assistance of horses, he scratches over much ground, and seeds it, to very little purpose.”

The tobacco industry was not only ruinous to the soil, but it was badly organized from a financial standpoint.  Three courses were open to the planter who had tobacco.  He might sell it to some local mercantile house, but these were not numerous nor as a rule conveniently situated to the general run of planters.  He might deposit it in a tobacco warehouse, receiving in return a receipt, which he could sell if he saw fit and could find a purchaser.  Or he could send his tobacco direct to an English agent to be sold.

If a great planter and particularly if situated upon navigable water, this last was the course he was apt to follow.  He would have his own wharf to which once or twice a year a ship would come bringing the supplies he had ordered months before and taking away the great staple.  If brought from a distance, the tobacco was rarely hauled to the wharf in wagons—­the roads were too wretched for that—­instead it was packed in a great cylindrical hogshead through which an iron or wooden axle was put.  Horses or oxen were then hitched to the axle and the hogshead was rolled to its destination.

By the ship that took away his tobacco the planter sent to the English factor a list of the goods he would require for the next year.  It was an unsatisfactory way of doing business, for time and distance conspired to put the planter at the factor’s mercy.  The planter was not only unlikely to obtain a fair price for his product, but he had to pay excessive prices for poor goods and besides could never be certain that his order would be properly filled.

Washington’s experiences with his English agents were probably fairly typical.  Near the close of 1759 he complained that Thomas Knox of Bristol had failed to send him various things ordered, such as half a dozen scythes and stones, curry combs and brushes, weeding and grubbing hoes, and axes, and that now he must buy them in America at exorbitant prices.  Not long afterward he wrote again:  “I have received my goods from the Recovery, and cant help again complaining of the little care taken in the purchase:  Besides leaving out half and the most material half too! of the Articles I sent for, I find the Sein is without Leads, corks and Ropes which renders it useless—­the crate of stone ware don’t contain a third of the Pieces I am charged with, and only two things broken, and everything very high Charged.”