when there was a constant prospect of an assault by the Indians, the law required that the ground immediately adjacent to every house should be palisaded. This provision was only temporary.[1] At a later period, many of the planters were in the habit of keeping the area about their dwellings enclosed by a stout fence. Fitzhugh selected locust for this purpose, the fibre of this tree being remarkable for its endurance.[2] The same wood was for a similar reason employed by other planters.
Before entering into a description of the different contents of the plantation house and its out-buildings in the seventeenth century, it will be interesting to consider very briefly what several of the earliest writers who were familiar with the Colony thought necessary that the person taking up his residence there should import in the way of clothing and utensils. The Company advised that in addition to bringing with him certain articles of apparel to which reference will be made hereafter, the emigrant should carry over a pair of canvas sheets, seven ells of fine and five ells of coarse canvas, and one coarse rug; for kitchen utensils, one iron pot, one kettle, a spit, one large frying-pan, two skillets, several platters, dishes, and wooden spoons.[3] Williams recommended, as we have already seen, that the emigrant should bring with him an iron pot, a gridiron, a large and a small kettle, skillets, frying-pans, dishes, platters, spoons, and knives.
