IN VIRGINIA. 441 



about five miles fquarc (25rquare miles.) The foil belovv 

 the furface, is a white loamy fand, and if the water fxlling 

 upon, orrifingin it, had a free difcharge to the ocean, it 

 would probably be pcrfe(ftly dry : this, however, the fand 

 hills prevent, and the water is difcharged into the fea to 

 the fouthward, and into the mouth of the Chefapeak to 

 the northward, byfmall creeks, which find vent from the 

 wefterly extremities of the fwamp. Lynhaven creek is 

 the moft confiderable of thefe drains. The fwamp, or as the 

 neighbouring inhabitants call it, the Defart, is overgrown 

 with aquatic trees -and fhrubs ; the gum, (L.Jlynicijf!ii'Uj 

 the cyprefs (cup. dijlicha) the maple (acer rubrum)K\\t 

 tree improperly called the fycamore (pLtattns occidentalis ) 

 the magnolia glauca, the wax myrtle (myrica cer'ifera) and 

 the reed (ar. tedla) are the principal. Of thefe many thou- 

 fands are already buried in the fand, which over-tops their 

 fummits, and threatens the whole foreft with ruin. Their 

 deftrudlion is flow, but inevitable. Upon the extreme edge 

 of the fand hills towards the fwamp, the wind oppofed by 

 the tops of the trees, forms an eddy : the fand carried along 

 with it is precipitated, and runs down the bank into the 

 fwamp. its flope is very accurately in an angle of 45°. 

 By gradual accumulation, the hill climbs up their trunks, 

 they wither flowly, and before they are entirely buried, they 

 die. Moll of them lofe all their branches, and nothing 

 but the trunk remains to be covered with fand, but fome 

 of the cyprefs retain life to the lafi:.* 



The Defart abounds in deer, bears, racoons, and opof- 



fums. Its llcirts are more thickly peopled than the llerility 



3 M of 



* That the fwamp with its trees extended to die fea coaft, perhaps ixjithin 

 a century, is very evident from this circumftance : between die fiimmit of 

 the fand hills (fee the drawing) and the fea Ihore, and more efpecially on the 

 Chefapeak fide, the undecaycd, though moftly dead bodies of trees ftill ap- 

 pear in great numbers. Being on the windward fide of the fand hills, the/ 

 have not been more than half buried. At the light houfe there are none of the 

 treei, (fee die feifli'^n) but to the wellward and fouthward are many. 



