8 4 



Dr. John David Schoepf. Travels in the Confederation. 1783- 

 84. Elizabethtown Point in New Jersey: 



"Surrounded of millions of musquetoes (Culex pipiens) we were obliged 

 to spend the time until daybrake on the deck of the little vessel. These 

 marshy coasts are the favorite sojourning places of musquetoes, more than 

 usually numerous this year as a result of moist and rainy weather, and 

 grown to an unusual size. Whoever has made the acquaintance of these 

 small enemies of the night's rest will know that the buzzing of a Jew of 

 them is sufficient to banish sleep for hours. I jhad covered myself with a 

 cloak, and a thick sail, and the night being extremely warm I suffered as in 

 a perfect sweat-bath, but the musquetoes found their way through. The 

 complete stillness of the night gave them liberty to swarm about at will, for 

 in windy weather they do not appear, and when high cold winds set in from 

 the northwest such regions as these are for a time swept of musquetoes, 

 either be-numbed by the cold or carried out to sea. 



"After daybrake we were taken to the house of the man who owns the 

 ferry, the only ferry thereabouts, a few hundred 'yards from the landing 

 place, but not beyond the territory of the musquetoes. Before the door 

 stood a great 'vat in which a wet-wood fire was kindled; the musquetoes 

 were kept off by the smoke in which the people of the place were making 

 themselves comfortable. The owner of the ferry was a doctor, no less, and 

 admitted with the greatest candor that he had chosen such an infernal situa- 

 tion only with the praiseworthy design of making, that is, gaining money." 



J. P. Brissot de Warville. "New Travels in the United States 

 of America performed in 1788." London, 1794 — 

 Second edition. Page 145 : 



"The road from New York to Newark is in part over a marsh ; I found it 

 really astonishing; it recalls to mind the indefatigable industry of the 

 ancient Dutch settlers mentioned by Mr. de Crevecoeur. Built wholly of 

 wood, with much labour and perseverance in the midst of water, on a soil 

 that trembles under your feet, it proves to what point may be 'carried the 

 patience of man, who is determined to conquer nature. 



"But though much of these marshes are drained, there remains a large 

 extent of them covered with stagnant waters, which infect the air, and give 

 birth to these musquitoes with which you are cruelly 'tormented, and to an 

 epidemical fever which makes great ravages in summer; a fever known 

 likewise in Virginia 'and in the Southern States, in parts adjacent to the sea. 

 I am assured that the upper parts of New Jersey are exempt from this 

 fever, and from mosquitoes. * * 



1792. Wm. Currie, M.D., Philadelphia. An historic account of 

 the Climates and Diseases of the U. S. of America. 



"The flat and marshy parts of this State (New Jersey) which are very 

 numerous are infested with myriads of musquetoes which give intolerable 



