FROM NAZARETH TO CARLISLE 193 



The Blue Mountains were now to our right. Nearer 

 towards Allen-town, Leheigh Gap appeared in the 

 distant view, and a mile from it we passed the river at 

 a ford. The land of this region seemed to be of mid- 

 dling strength and less stony ; we noticed sand-stone 

 scattered about here and there, but everywhere lime- 

 stone jutted from the soil, for the most part a reddish 

 sandy-clay. The landscape, of low hills following the 

 river, offered a pleasant change to the eye, weary of 

 monotonous and gloomy woods. But not so the in- 

 habitants of the region ; all who met us looked so de- 

 fiant and independent that it was easily seen they were 

 not of the Moravian Brethren whose softer and more 

 pleasing manners were still fresh in our remembrance. 



Allen-town, of which the official name is North- 

 ampton, numbers 40-50 houses ; the first name was 

 that of a fort which in the war before the last stood 

 several miles away towards the mountains, as defence 

 against the Indians, called Fort Allen and now in 

 ruins. 



The road from here to Reading leads over the ridges 

 of connected hills which are counted a part of the 

 afore-mentioned Dry Land. Perhaps three miles from 

 Allen-town is the famous curiosity of the region, the 



a sour gum cut down the fall before, putting out leaves and 

 blooms in the spring. Single branches of certain trees may 

 continue alive regardless of the fact that rings have been cut 

 in them down to the wood, and the connection thus broken 

 between the veins taking up the sap through the bark; of this 

 I saw a remarkable instance in a pear-tree at Hampton Court 

 in England one branch had been widely girdled for many 

 years and nevertheless bore more heavily than any of the 

 others. 



13 



