A striking evidence of the progress in Virginia of its agricultural progress is the extensive plant of the Virginia-Carolina Chemical Works. The main offices are in Richmond and the works are located near the city. The different fertilizers, which are varied and adapted to all important crops in the South, are distributed all over the
 
country through its many agencies in all the largest cities. It is said that by the application of these to the soil, that two blades of grass will spring up where but one grew before. Thus causing almost worn out fields to put on a grass sward and then heavy crops of tobacco and other products. This beneficial aid to nature appeals to the farmers and encourages them to never despair, but to always resort to the excellent fertilizers which are made and adapted to each crop by the reliable Virginia-Carolina Chemical Company, and then his plantation will always yield a large and remunerative increase over its former productions.

Among the pleasant and interesting customs of the past, was the regular habit of Virginians to gather together just before important elections and hold barbecues, which were always well-gotten up and carried out by a committee appointed for the purpose, who attended to the cooking; there was always a quarter of fat beef, and a whole mutton barbecued to a turn, and when dinner was announced the political speakers adjourned the meeting until the crowd had partaken generously of the meats and also of the good toddies furnished freely to the voters assembled on the festive occasion.

And when dinner was all over, the orators would resume their pleas for votes. The last barbecue of this extensive sort that I remember attending was at the Drewry Mansion, near Manchester. It was a very delightful place for such a meeting of suffragans; it being a handsome dwelling in a beautiful grove of stately old oak trees, commanding from an eminence a magnificent view of the plantation and the winding James River below. Among the speakers on the occasion were George D. Wise and
 
Richard Beirne, who pleased every man present and all returned home well satisfied with the whole outing.

Among the well-known characters of Richmond was one George Dabney Wootton, who came here before the war and was employed by the South, a newspaper published by Mr. Roger A. Pryor, and when the paper was discontinued he scraped together a smattering of what he thought was law, and hung out his shingle at the police court. Many people credited him with having “rats” in his head. One thing is certain, the man possessed inordinate self-reliance, or “brass,” as it is called. He advertised a good deal in the newspapers and a certain Western man, who read his “ads,” came on to the city with a good fat case of law, involving a large amount of money, which he placed in Wootton’s hands, but subsequently finding that it would not be safe under Dabney’s skill, in other words he was not qualified to manage so large a case, he sent and offered him a nice sum of money if he would give up the matter, but the learned attorney declined to withdraw from the case, and said that he proposed to go through with it. His client then had to employ assistant counsel, and obtained the legal service of Col. James Lyons, one of the most eminent lawyers of the bar of Virginia. Of course that settled it so far as Mr. Wootton was concerned.

I remember several years ago, when Mr. Isador Rayner, the United States Senator from Maryland, spoke at the Academy of Music, upon the subject of the tariff. Now, as a matter of fact, this is a generally dull subject, consisting of so much detail, and so many statistics and figures. But on this occasion it was quite the reverse of dull, for he discussed this intricate question in such an interesting manner that our attention was rivetted throughout the address, and every listener was charmed from the beginning
 
to the finish. It was indeed one of the very finest speeches that I ever heard.

A prominent and remarkable man was in his day, Mr. Joseph Mayo, who succeeded Mr. Lambert as the chief magistrate or mayor of Richmond; he was a good lawyer, indeed one of renown, and the author of the celebrated work called “Mayo’s Guide,” a book of high standing, and an authority at the bar for all legal forms used in the Richmond courts. At that time the Mayor performed the office of police judge, and well I do recall seeing him seated in his big chair with all the high dignity of a Roman senator; he was always dressed in a blue dress coat with brass buttons and ruffled shirtbosom. He dispensed even handed justice, and was a highly esteemed citizen of Richmond.

When the army of Northern Virginia, under General Robert E. Lee, was fighting at Spotsylvania Courthouse; occurred the battle at New Market, between the Confederate forces under General Jno. C. Breckenridge, and those under the Northern General Siegel. When Grant withdrew his lines of battle General Lee marched on parallel lines to Grant’s. We stopped at Hanover Junction and there sharp skirmishing took place. The railroad train conveying the cadets of the Virginia Military Institute stopped a short time, and I went on board and inquired if Cadet George Kennon Macon, my brother, was aboard the train, and the answer was, to my distress, that he was not, as he had been wounded in that celebrated charge of the cadets at New Market, in the Valley of Virginia, by a canister shot passing through his arm, and he had to be left behind under the care of those kind and skillful surgeons of the corps—Doctors George Ross, and Marshall. Captain Miles C. Macon, of the Fayette Artillery, my brother, also, was then just recovering from a spell of
 
typhoid fever, which had prevented his being in the engagement at the front, went up to the valley and brought our wounded brother down to our mother’s home in Richmond, and it is needless to say that everything that love and sympathy could suggest or inspire was employed to relieve his pain and hasten his recovery. He was the idol of the family, and his wound was attended to by that most skillful surgeon Doctor Petticolas. It was an ugly wound and he suffered from it to the day............