ican agriculture.

The Indians were fortunate in not having to contend with many of the
weeds, insects and plant-diseases which now plague farmers and
gardeners. Practically all of these pests, some of quite recent date,
are of Old World origin and have been introduced by white men, into
America.

Birds and small animals gave the Indians more concern than all their
other pests combined. It was customary to build in their gardens
small watch-houses in which the young folks took turns in staying to
scare away crows and other troublesome birds.

The same hills were used year after year and became in time quite
sizable mounds, remains of which have persisted, in some localities,
until modern times. In the southwestern parts of Michigan, the early
settlers found large tracts of ridged land, evidently relics of
Indian agriculture. It is now thought that these areas were corn
fields in which the seeding was made in continuous rows instead of
hills. A French artist in Florida in 1564 pictured the Indians
seeding their crops in rows.

After a few years of failure in their attempts to grow American
crops, the English colonists adopted the Indian method of seeding,
but usually neglected the weeding, and were subjected to ridicule for
their shiftlessness by the painstaking squaws. In using work-animals
for cultivating corn, it was found advantageous to destroy the weeds
by stirring the ground in the intervening spaces.

THE SETTLEMENT OF JAMESTOWN

On the 26th day of April, 1607, three small ships carrying 105
colonists passed between Cape Charles and Cape Henry into Chesapeake
Bay for the purpose of founding a colony in the land called Virginia.
The voyagers took seventeen days to investigate the advantages and
disadvantages of that region for such an undertaking.

First consideration for selecting the site was its possibilities for
defense against a foreign foe, especially the Spaniards, in Florida
and the West Indies. This was no idle fear. Spain and England had for
many years been in conflict. Moreover, Spain claimed all of the
Americas by the right of discovery.

The second most important thing for consideration was adequate harbor
facilities. In both of these particulars, the site selected about
thirty miles up the James River left little to be desired. The
Jamestown peninsula jutted out into the river far enough to give an
unobstructed view for several miles. The character of the land on
either side of the river