no . ■ September 1 748 . 



meter into any place where the fun could 

 {hine upon it, or where he had before heat- 

 ed the wall by his beams; for in thofe cafes 

 my obfervations would certainly not have 

 been exaft. The weather during our Sep- 

 tember and OBober is too well known to 

 want an explanation.* 



5. However there are fome fpontaneous 

 plants in Penjyhania, which do not every 

 year bring their feeds to maturity before the 

 cold begins. To thefe belong fome fpecies 

 of Gentiana, of Afters ^ and others. But in 

 thefe too the . wifdom of the Creator has 

 wifely ordered every thing in its turn. For 

 ajmoft all the plants which have the quali- 

 ty of flowering fo late in autumn, are peren- 

 nial, or fuch as, though they have no feed to 

 propagate themfelves, can revive by fhoot- 

 ing new branches and ftalks from the fame 

 root every year. But perhaps a natural 

 caufe may be given to account for the late 

 growth of thefe plants. Before the Euro^ 

 peans came into this country, it was inhabit- 

 ed by favage nations, who pradtifed agri- 

 culture but little or not at all, and chiefly 



lived 



* The Englijh reader, who is perhaps not fo well acquaint- 

 ed with the weather of the Sivedijh autumn, may form an 

 idea of it, by having recourfe to the Calendarium Flora, or 

 the botanical and ceconomical almanack of S^weden^ in Dr. 

 Linnteus'% Amcen. Academ. and in Mr. Stillingfleet'i S-iuediJh 

 trafts, tranflated from the Amcen. Acad. 2d. edition. F, 



