ur feet six inches in length,
but the shape of the cask varied according to the fancy of
the cooper, or roughness of his work. At this period (a
century ago), the tobacco hogshead was made most generally
of white oak; but Spanish oak, and red oak, were sometimes
used, when the usual kind could not be so readily commanded.
Now the hogsheads are made of pine, but are nearly as rough
as those made by the colonial growers.

"Tobacco, if well packed, and prized duly, will resist the
water for a surprising length of time. An instance is
recorded in strong proof of this, which occurred at
Kingsland upon James river in Virginia, where tobacco, which
had been carried off by the great land floods in 1771, was
found in a large raft of drift wood in which it had lodged
when the warehouses at Richmond were swept away by the
overflowing of the freshets; an inundation which had
happened about twenty years before this cask was found."

Tatham gives the following account of a similar instance:--

"On the sixth of October, 1782, I myself was one of a party
who were shipwrecked upon the coast of New Jersey, in
America, on board the brigantine Maria, Captain McAulay,
from Richmond in Virginia, and laden with tobacco. Several
hogsheads, which were saved from the wreck were brought
round to Stillwill's landing upon Great Egg harbor; and
amongst them some which had lost the headings of the cask,
and the hoops and staves, were so much shattered by the
beating of the surf, that it was not thought worth while to
land them, and they were just tumbled out of the lighter
upon the beach, and left to remain where the tide constantly
flowed over them for several weeks, so that the outside was
completely rotten, and they had the appearance of heaps of
manure. In this very bad condition, I still persisted in
trying to save what I supposed might remain entire in the
interior of the lump, and at last prevailed so far over the
ignorance and prejudice by which I had been ridiculed, as to
effect an overhauling and repacking of this damaged
commodity and to save a proportion thereof very far beyond
what I myself had expected. Some of the heart of this was so
highly improved, that I have seldom seen tobacco equal to it
for chewing, or for immediate manufacture; and wha