crops are the same, those of most consequence being corn, rye, oats and
grass. Fruit is a more precarious crop, from a greater liability to
severe frosts after the swelling of the buds in the spring. Snow has
fallen several inches in the month of April.'[A]

The Western Virginia portion of Alleghania, which in the
counter-secession programme of its inhabitants was to have formed the
State of 'Kanawha,' embraced in its total population of 284,796 only
10,820 slaves. Its area is 4,211 square miles larger than the entire
State of Maryland. With this we have 'Middle Virginia,' in the valley of
the Shenandoah, which extends east of the main Alleghany range to the
Blue Ridge. This region also is broadly distinguishable in respect to
slavery from the Atlantic counties. With 200,262 freemen according to
the census of 1850, it has only 44,742 slaves, and there is reason to
believe that this population has largely diminished in favor of freedom.
Yet again we have the mountain district of South-western Virginia, where
in its ten counties the proportion of freemen to slaves is nearly ten to
one, or 76,892 to 8,693. As regards internal resources, beautiful
scenery, and all that conduces to pleasant life and profitable labor,
this portion of Virginia far surpasses the eastern division, and will
eventually attract the great mass of immigration.

The reader is aware that Eastern Kentucky, embracing the counties along
the western base of the Cumberland Mountains, 'has nobly responded to
the cause of the Union.' 'They represent a population which from the
first outbreak have been on fire with loyal zeal, repudiating all
sympathy with this war of slavery against the Union.' The proportion of
slaves to freemen in these counties, according to the census of 1850, is
as follows:--