386 



BOTANICAL SURVEY OF DISMAL SWAMP REGION. 



carry forward tho greatest quantity of sand, and have amassed hills, which now 

 extend about a mile from the beach. The natural level of the land, elevated little 

 more than 10 feet above high- water mark, has a very gentle declivity to the east. 

 It?is now a swamp of about 5 miles square (25 square miles). The soil l>elow the 

 surface is a white, loamy sand; and if the water falling upon or rising in it had a 

 free discharge to the ocean it would probably be perfectly dry. This, however, the 

 sand hills prevent, and the water is discharged into the sea to Hie southward and 

 into the month of the Chesapeake to the northward by small creeks, which find 

 vent from the westerly extremes of the swamp. Lynnhaven Creek is the most 

 considerable of these drains. The swamp, or, a ; the neighboring inhabitants call 

 it, The Desert, is overgrown with aquatic trees and shrubs. The gum {L. styra- 

 ciflua), the cypress, tho maple (.1. nibrum), the tree improperly called "sycamore" 

 (Platan usoccidentalis), the Magnolia virginiaiia, the wax myrtle (Myrica cm/era), 



4,— The Desert from the high dunes at C;ii>e Henry, Va. 



and the reed (Anmdinaria tecta) are the prin ipal. Of these many thousands are 

 already buried in tho sand, which overtops their summits and threatens the whole 

 forest with ruin. Their destruction is slow, but inevitable. Upon the extreme 

 edge of the sand hills, toward the swamp, the wind, opposed by the tops of the 

 trees, forms an eddy. The sand carried along with it is precipitated, and runs 

 down the bank into the swamp. Its slope is very accurately in an angle of 45 

 degrees. By gradual accumulation the hill climbs up their trunks; they wither 

 slowly, and before they are entirely buried they die. Most of them lose all their 

 branches, and nothing but the trunk remains to be covered with sand; but some 

 of the cypress retain life to the last. * * * 



Since the establishment of tho light (about sixteen yearsago) the hills have risen 

 about 20 feet in height, and have proceeded into the Desert about "AM) yards from 

 a spot pointed out tome by tho keeper. * * The height of the hill at the 



