ALEXANDER WILSON. lxiii 



chance places, I found it altogether impracticable. I coasted along 

 their borders, however, in many places, and was surprised at the 

 great profusion of evergreens, of numberless sorts, and a variety of 

 berries that I knew nothing of. Here I found multitudes of birds, 

 that never winter with us in Pennsylvania, living in abundance. 

 Though the people told me the alligators were so numerous as to 

 destroy many of their pigs, calves, dogs, &c, yet I have never been 

 enabled to put my eye on one, though I have been several times 

 in search of them with my gun. In Georgia, they tell me, they 

 are ten times more numerous, and I expect some sport among 

 them. I saw a dog at the river Santee, who swims across when 

 he pleases, in defiance of these voracious animals. When he hears 

 them behind him, he wheels round and attacks them, often seizing 

 them by the snout. They generally retreat, and he pursues his 

 route, seizing any one that attacks him in the same manner. He 

 belongs to the boatmen, and when left behind always takes to the 

 water. 



" As to the character of the North Carolinians, were I to judge 

 of it by the specimens which I met with in taverns, I should pro- 

 nounce them to be the most ignorant, debased, indolent, and dissi- 

 pated portion of the Union. But I became acquainted with a few 

 such noble exceptions that for their sakes I am willing to believe 

 they are all better than they seem to be. 



" Wilmington contains about 3000 souls, and yet there is not 

 one cultivated field within several miles of it. The whole country 

 on this side of the river is a mass of sand, into which you sink up 

 to the ankles, and hardly a blade of grass is to be seen. All about 

 is pine barrens. 



"From Wilmington I rode through solitary pine savannas and 

 cypress swamps as before, sometimes thirty miles without seeing a 

 hut or human being. On arriving at the Wackamaw, Pedee, and 

 Black river, I made long zigzags among the rich nabobs, who live 

 on their rice plantations, amidst large villages of negro huts. One 

 of these gentlemen told me, that he had ' something better than 

 six hundred head of blacks ! ' 



" These excursions detained me greatly. The roads to the plan- 

 tations were so long, so difficult to find, and so bad, and the hospi- 

 tality of the planters was such, that I could scarcely get away again. 



