The valley of Virginia has been more written about locally than the eastern parts. Beside the old history of Kercheval,[682] W. H. Foote has embraced it in the second series of his _Sketches of Virginia_ (Philad., 1855), and it has recently been treated in J. Lewis Peyton’s _History of Augusta County, Va._ (Staunton, Va., 1882), a region once embracing the territory from the Blue Ridge to the Mississippi. Norfolk has been made the subject of historical study, as in W. S. Forrest’s _Norfolk and Vicinity_ (1853), but with scant attention to the period back of its rise to commercial importance. The ecclesiastical element forms a large part of Virginia history in the earlier times. Some general references have been given in another place.[683] At the opening of our present period, there were of the established church in Virginia fifty parishes, with one hundred churches and chapels and thirty ministers,—according to Bray’s _Apostolic Charity_ (London, 1700).[684] The church history has been well studied by Dr. Hawks,[685] Bishop Perry,[686] and Dr. De Costa,[687] in this country, and by Anderson in his _History of the Colonial Church_ (1856),—a book which Doyle calls “laborious and trustworthy on every page.” Bishop Meade has treated the subject locally in his _Old Churches and Families of Virginia_,[688] as has Dr. Philip Slaughter in his _Saint George’s Parish_, _Saint Mark’s Parish_ and _Bristol Parish_,[689] and he has given a summary of the leading churches of colonial Virginia in a section of Bishop Perry’s _Amer. Episc. Church_ (vol. i. p. 614). The dissenting element was chiefly among the Presbyterians, whose later strongholds were away from the tide-water among the mountains. The Reverend Francis Mackemie[690] had been principal leader among them, and he was the first dissenter who had leave to preach in Virginia. Their story is best told in C. A. Briggs’ _American Presbyterianism_ (p. 109), and in both series of W. H. Foote’s _Sketches of Virginia_ (Phil., 1850, 1855). The Baptists in Virginia did not attain numerical importance till within the decade preceding the American Revolution, and they had effected scarcely any influence among the opponents of establishment during the period now under consideration.[691] The Huguenots brought good blood, and affected religious life rather individually than as a body.[692] [Illustration]