Page:Economic History of Virginia Vol 1.djvu/188

 the warriors who were in possession of several wives indulged in it freely, while those who were unmated either partook of it sparingly, or not at all.

Tobacco as cultivated by the tribes of Virginia was inferior in size and flavor to the same plant in the West Indies. In Virginia it rarely exceeded a yard in height. It bore a small yellow flower resembling that of henbane, and had short, thick leaves, which were discovered, when tasted, to be weak in flavor, but at the same time very biting to the tongue. The plant of the West Indies, on the other hand, sprang up to the height of nine or twelve feet, with very expansive leaves, and with a flower as large as the bell flower of England. The difference in size and flavor was probably attributable to the difference in climate rather than to any difference in methods of cultivation.

The authors of the first Virginian narratives have left a detailed account of the manner in which the Indian land was prepared for maize, and the system pursued in planting and cultivating it, but they failed to give a full description of the aboriginal methods respecting the corresponding processes for tobacco. Hariot informs us that the natives in the region of Roanoke, a division of country in which the same original customs prevailed as in Virginia proper, sowed their tobacco apart, but he did not intend by this to convey the notion that the seed were scattered broadcast. There is no reason to doubt that the first settlers of Jamestown, who very soon began the production of tobacco for sale in England, adopted their general manner of planting from the Indians, which consisted of inserting the seed in the pulverized soil of their garden plats at regular intervals, as was done in the