SI 9 dfertdtions reJpeUing Emigration io America. [Nov. 1, 



Open channels for the paflage of the water* ; 

 a foil neither folid nor liquid ; and 

 marfhes covered with aquatic and noifome 

 plants, which ferved only to nourifh ve- 

 nemous infefls, whilft thty fuppreffed the 

 growth of herbi fit for the ufe of man; — • 

 The green enamelled turf, %vhich forms the 

 beauty of the exterior and announces the 

 fecundity of the interior of the earth, was 

 jio where to be feen. On the few fpots 

 which were unencumbered with wood the 

 Indians had built towns, and cultivated 

 maize in fome, and others were covered 

 with a tall wiry grafs, which the ctttle 

 would never touch when they could find 

 ♦he buds of trees, plants, and fucculent 

 herbs, which they preferred to it. Every 

 thing denoted that the New World, the 

 mountains excepted, had lain buried be- 

 neath the fea for agts alter thf O.d one.-^ 

 Later experience has demonltrated this 

 point beyond all doubt. At a very little 

 deptii, from eighteen to tvienty-five feet 

 beneath the upper ftratum, there is found 

 a black falincoizeor n ud, the fmell of 

 which fufficiently difccivers its origin. — 

 The upper ftrata are generally comp .fed 

 of mafl'es of oceanic fliells, v^hi^.h time 

 has converted into calcareous ftones, and 

 in many parts beds of thefe (litlls are 

 found in a continued extent of miles in 

 their original undtcompoled ftate. Thefe 

 ftrata, for above one hundred miles from 

 the Atlantic fhore, are covered with fea- 

 fand intermixed with gravel, and mud 

 waflied down from the Alleghany moun- 

 tains by tlic rains, and inciufted with the 

 remains of decayed vegetaticn. In a 

 Word, natuie feemed to have been in a 

 ftate of infancy, and to have required 

 time to bring her works to perfeflion. — < 

 Thefe matters are all rendered faflsby the 

 authoiity of the American Philofophical 

 Tranfii\ioPs, and the refearches of en- 

 lightened and veiidical travellers, fuch as 

 Volney, &:c. Nothing, therefore, but the 

 extravagant avidity ard credulity with 

 which mankind receive the account of 

 diftant regions, could have ever made 

 them believe that Nature, equal and inva- 

 riable in all her operations, could h-tve 

 done more for a new than an old foil, efpe- 

 cially with the art and indultry of man 

 againft her ; and the amazing luxuriancy 

 ot America muft he reltritted to vallies 

 where the foil has accumulated to a vaft 

 depth, and which are in very inconfide- 

 rabie quantities relatively to the whole.— 

 Even thofe parts nourifn only thofe grains 

 and herbs which nature has adapted to 

 them, and not to thofe of the Old Conti- 

 nent j for Yvhich reafon the European 



agriculturift has every thing to learn ovti 

 again, and experience will only convince 

 him that his labour and expence have 

 been unprofitable. Inftead of a foil cul- 

 tivated for ages, which he may improve 

 at a certain coft, and the replace of which 

 may be afcei tained to a fixpence in an 

 acre, he muft begin to dry up fwamps, to 

 open a paflfage tor ftagnant waters, to de- 

 ftroy rank weeds, to fell trees ufelefg 

 through their immenfe quantity, and 

 finally to produce a new or cultivated na- 

 ture. For want of hands or money he 

 muft do this laborious work himfelf, and 

 he will find the life of an American far- 

 mer very different from that fceneof eafe» 

 repofe, and plenty, which its panegyrifts 

 have chaunted for.h, even though he 

 ihould be fettled in the vicinity of the beft 

 market- town, and on the beft cleared 

 lands in the United States. 



It fhould fecm that thofe panegyrifts 

 have known no more of it, and have 

 treated it in the fame manner as the an- 

 cient poets hnvs funs; to us in the " Gold- 

 en Age." Tney hive painted it in the 

 molt icducing colours ; but they have not 

 known, or have omiitcd to tell us, of the 

 daily cares and hbours ; they have 

 handled the fubjcff as poets and not as 

 agriculturifts, as theorifts and not as prac- 

 tical obfervers : but if thofe writers had 

 themfelves followed the plough for days, 

 expoled to wind and rain ; if they had mow- 

 ed and ftacked hay in the marflies in the 

 heat of a burning fun, devoured by flies, 

 and tormented by gnats and mofquitoes; 

 if they had reaped the harvefts with their 

 backs expofed to the rays of the fun, their 

 face to the exhrdations of the eanh and 

 dropping perfpiration, they would have 

 known, that, if by chance the American 

 farmer gathers rofes,itis only in themidft 

 of thorns. They have not fung thofe fud» 

 denfrofts which at the beginning of fum- 

 mer deftroy in a fingle night all hopes of 

 fruit, apples, and cyder ; thofe eleflric 

 (forms which in the midft of the burning 

 heat of the dog-days overwhelm him with 

 winter's hail, and fcarcely leave him ftraw 

 when he expe^ed grain. They omit 

 thofe gufts which come accompanied with 

 torrents of rain, and walli hi* feed out of 

 the loofe foil ; and thole flocks of bird* 

 which live at the farmer's expence, and 

 pick out of the earth thofe leeds which 

 have efcaped being wafhed away. They 

 do not mention thofe circnmlfances, bc- 

 caufe they have never experienced, or 

 wiflied to conceal, them. But thefe are 

 very fiir from being the whole of the dif- 

 advamagc* attending the American far- 



aier. 



