45 



kind. His cattle were small, but all much 

 better than the land. 



He praised the soil very highly. I asked 

 him if he was acquainted with the land at 

 Mount- Vernon. He said he was ; and 

 represented it to be rich land, but not so 

 rich as his. Yet his I thought very poor 

 indeed ; for it was (as it is termed in 

 America) gullied ; which I call broken land. 

 This effect is produced by the winter's frost 

 and summer's rain, which cut the land 

 into cavities of from ten feet wide and ten 

 feet deep (and upwards) in many places ; 

 and, added to this, here and there a hole, 

 makes it look altogether like marl-pits, or 

 stone-quarries, that have been carried 

 away by those hasty showers in the sum- 

 mer, which no man who haqlfiot seen them 

 in this climate could form any idea of, or 

 believe possible. They are called gusts. 

 A small cloud appears first, and very 

 quickly gathers and blackens the sky. The 

 wind begins to blow, with thunder and 

 lightning so tremendous that a stranger 



