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Show TRAVELS THROUGH NORTH AMERICA: fi1me its former courfe. The water does not defcend perpendicularly, excepting in one part clofe to the Virginian ihorc, where th~ height is about thirty feet, but comes rufhing down with tremendous 11npctuofity over a ledge of rocks in fevcral difrcrcnt falls. The bell: view of the c;~taract is fi·om the top of a pile of rocks about fixty feet above the level of the water, and which, owing to the bend in the river,· tuated nearly oppo!itc to the falls. The river comes from the r:6nt, then gradually turning, precipitates itfelf down the falls, and ' 1ds along at the foot of the rocks on which you ll:and with grea i: veloc1 The rocks are of a Date colour, and lie in firata; the furf.1ce of them in many plac s is glofiy and fparkling. From hence I followed the courfe of the river downwards as far as George Town, where I again croiled it; and after pafiing through the federal city, proceeded along the Maryland {hore of the river to Pifcatoway, and afterwards to Port Tobacco, two fma11 towns iituated on creeks of their own name, which run into the Patowmac. In the neighbourhood of Pifcatoway there arc feveral very fine views of the Virginian fuorc; Mount Vernon in particular appears to great advantage. I obfcrved here great numbers of the poifonous vines which grow about the large trees, and are extremely like the common grape vines. 'If handled in the morning, when the branches arc moifi: with the dew, they infallibly raife blifl:ers on the hands, which it is fometimes difficult to get rid of. Port Tobacco contains about eighty houfes, moil: of which are of wood, and very pcor. There is a large Englifh cpifcopalian church on the border of the town, built of fione, which formerly was an ornament to the place, but it is now entirely out of repair; the windows are all broken, and the road is carried through the church-yard over the graves, the paling that furrounded it having been torn down. Near the town is Mount Mifery, towards the top of which is a medicinal fpring, remarkable in fummer for the coldnefs of the water. From Port Tobacco to Hoe's Ferry, on the Patowmac River, the country is flat and fandy, and wears a moil: dreary afpect. Nothing is to be feen here for miles together but extenfive plains, that have been worn APPEARANCE 0 F THE C 0 UN TRY. 79 worn out by the culture of tobacco, overgrown with yellow [edge,* and intcrfperfcd with groves of pin and cedar trees, the d:Hk green colour of which forms a curious contrail: with the yellow of the fcdge. In the midfl: of thefc plains are the remains of fcver;ll good houfcs, which fhcw that the country was once very different to what it IS now. Thefe were the houfcs, moll: probably, of people who ori-· gir ~lly fcttled in Maryland with Lord Baltimore, but which have now been fuffered to go to decay, as the land around them is worn out ' and the people find it more to their intcrefi: t<;> remove to another part or the country, and clear a piece of rich land, than to attempt to reclaim thcfe cxhaufied plains. In confcquence of this, the country in many of the lower parts of Maryland appears as if it had be n dcfcrted by one half of its iulJ abitants. Such a numb r of roaus 111 different directions crofs over thcfe flats, upon none of which thcr is any thing like a direCt ion poll:, and the face of a human being is fo rarc;ly met with, that it is fcarc ly po!Tible for :1 traveller to find out the direCt way at once. lnfiead of twelve miles, the difbncc by the 11raight road fi-om Port Tobacco to the ferry, my horfe had certainly travelled twice the number before we got there. The ferry-houfe was one of thofe old dilapidated manfions that formerly was the rc!idencc perhaps of fome wealthy planter, and at the time when the fields yielded th ir rich crops of tobacco would have afforded fome r frdhmcnt to the weary traveller; but in the flate I found it, it was the picture of wretchednefs and poverty. After having waited for two hours and a half for my breakfall:, the mofi: I could procure was two eggs, a pint of milk, and a bit uf cake bread, fcarcely as big as my hand, and but little better than dough. This I had alfo to divide with my fervant, who came to inform me, that there was abfolutely nothing to eat in the houfe but what had been brought to me. I could not but mention this circumfiance to fcveral perfons when I got • This fedge, as it is called, is a fort of coarfe grafs, fo hard that cattle will not eat it, which fprings up fpontaneoully, in this part of the country, on the ground that has been left wafie; 1t conunonl y grows about two feet hlgh; toward~ winter it turns yellow, and remains fl:anding until the enfuing fummcr, when a new growth difplace that of the former year. At its Jirft fpringing up it is of a bright green colour. into |
