Page:Economic History of Virginia Vol 1.djvu/235

 had now arrived in Virginia. It was evidently Dale&#8217;s original intention practically to abandon Jamestown, his purpose being to leave there only fifty men with a commander to protect the cattle. The arrival of Gates, his superior officer, seems to have changed this plan. Henrico was situated in a fertile region clear in great measure of forest, and was capable of being easily defended. He first surrounded the site of the proposed town, a plat of seven acres, with a paling, an undertaking which must have been thoroughly performed, a large force of men being employed in it for ten or twelve days. He then erected a second pale across the neck of the peninsula, doubtless along the line of the present Dutch Gap Canal. Two miles inland he raised a third paling, which stretched from the river on the one side of the peninsula to the river on the other side, and in the extensive area thus secured he laid off fields which would furnish a supply of grain sufficient not only for the population then living in Virginia, but for as many colonists as were likely to arrive in the course of the following three years. The separate corn-fields were also surrounded by palings as a protection against the cattle of the settlers, and doubtless also against wild deer.

In order to obtain a range for hogs, Dale determined to build a paling on the south side of the river. This protected a circuit of twelve English miles. A number of rude huts were raised at certain points on the line of the fence and placed under the supervision of commanders. In December, Dale seized upon the lands of the Appomattox Indians lying on the Powhatan near the mouth of