Page:Economic History of Virginia Vol 1.djvu/472

 England were built principally with a view to accommodating the largest amount of that commodity which it was practicable to store in the same extent of room, the holds being unusually spacious, while the cabins were very contracted. The number of casks which they carried ranged from two hundred to six hundred, or in point of weight, from one hundred and twenty to three hundred thousand pounds. Fitzhugh asserted that he could load a big vessel with as much facility as a small, but it is significant that the planters, whether they produced large crops of tobacco or purchased a great quantity in addition to what they cultivated, as a rule, in sending their hogsheads to Europe, apportioned them to different ships. In February, 1685, Byrd wrote to his English correspondent that he had recently forwarded thirty in one vessel and ninety-one in another. In 1695, Fitzhugh exported eight hogsheads in one ship, twenty in a second, and thirty-seven in a third. In adopting this course, both Byrd and Fitzhugh, who were representatives of their class, were influenced not so much by apprehension lest in sending all of their tobacco in a single