NORTH AMERICA* 
477 
towards the tops or extremities of the branches 
they became trifid, haftated, and lately lance- 
olate : it is a delicate plant, of a yellowifh lively 
green, and would be an ornament in a garden. 
Sat off again to Cambelton, continuing yet up 
the North Weft about fixty miles ; crofted over 
this branch, and foon after crofted the Roanoke, 
and then refted a few days at Mr. Lucas’s a wor- 
thy old gentleman, a planter on Meherren river. 
Obferved ftrolling over his fences and ftables, a 
very fingular and ufeful fpecies of the Gourd 
(Cucurbita lagenaria) ; its neck or handle is 
above two feet in length, and not above an inch 
in diameter ; its belly round, which would 
contain about a pint ; it makes excellent ladles, 
funnels, &c. At a little diftance from Mr. Lu- 
cas’s, at the head of a fwamp near the high road, 
I obferved a very curious fpecies of Prinos, which 
grows feven or eight feet high, the leaves broad, 
lanceolate, fharply ferrated, nervous, and of a 
deep green colour ; but its ftriking beauty con- 
fids in profufe clufters of fruit, colledted about 
the cafes or origin of the laft fpring’s fhoots ; thefe 
berries are nearly round, about the fize of mid- 
dling grapes, of a fine clear fcarlet colour, cover* 
ed or invefted with an incarnate mift or nebulae. 
Being now arrived on the South border of Vir- 
ginia, and the hoary frigid feafon far advanced, I 
fhall pafs as fpeedily as pofilble from hence to 
Pennfylvania, my native country ; fince thofe 
cultivated regions of Virginia and Maryland, 
through wich I defign to travel, have been over 
and over explored, and deferibed by very able 
men in every branch of natural hiftory. 
After leaving Meherren, l foon arrived at 
Alexandria 
