New y^'Jey, Raccoon. 199 



fprigs of branches. I have already men- 

 tioned * that they eat without any danger 

 the fpoon- tree, or Kalmia latifoiia, which is 

 poifon to other animals. In the long and 

 fevere winter, which commenced here upon 

 the tenth of December, 1740, and con- 

 tinued to the thirteenth of March, old 

 ftile, during the courfe of which there fell a 

 great quantity of fnow, the flags were 

 found dead in the fnow, but chiefly higher 

 up the country, where the fnow was deeper. 

 Nobody could determine whether their 

 death was the confequence of the great 

 quantity and depth of fnow, which hin- 

 dered their getting out, or whether the 

 froft had been too fevere, and of too long 

 duration, or whether they were fhort of 

 food. The old people likewife relate, that 

 vaft. numbers of flags came down in the 

 year 1705, when there was a heavy fall 

 of fnow, near a yard deep, and that they 

 were afterwards found dead in the woods, 

 in great numbers, becaufe the fnow was 

 deeper than they could pafs through. 

 Numbers of birds were likewife found 

 dead at that time. In that fame winter, 

 a ftag came to Mat Jong into the ftables, 

 and ate hay together with the cattle. It 

 was lb pinched by hunger, that it grew; 

 tame immediately, and did not run away 

 N 4 from 



* See vol. i. page 338. 



