OF NORTH CAROLINA. 365 



quarrelling and controversy as often happens about 

 it, and is very diverting. 



Another destroyer of them, is, the art they have, 

 and often practice, of poisoning one another ; 

 which is done by a large white spongy root, that 

 grows in the fresh marshes, which is one of their 

 poisons, not but that they have many other drugs, 

 which they poison one another withal. 



Lastly, the continual wars these savages main- 

 tain, one nation against another, which sometimes 

 hold for some ages, killing and making captives, 

 till they become so weak thereby, that they are 

 forced to make peace for want of recruits, to sup- 

 ply their wars ; and the difference of languages, 

 that is found amongst these heathens, seems alto- 

 gether strange. For it often appears, that every 

 dozen miles, you meet with an Indian town, that 

 is quite different from the others you last parted 

 withal, and what a little supplies this defect is, 

 that the most powerful nation of these savages 

 scorns to treat or trade with any others, of fewer 

 numbers and less power, in any other tongue, but 

 their own, which serves for the lingua of the 

 country, with which we travel and deal ; as for 

 example, we see that the Tuskeruros are most 

 numerous in ISTorth Carolina, therefore their 

 tongue is understood by some in every town of 

 all the Indians near us. And here I shall insert a 

 small dictionary of every tongue, though not al- 

 phabetically digested : 



