22 
THE HISTORY OF 
Since the surveyors had entered the Dismal, they had laid eyes on no living 
creature : neither bird nor beast, insect nor reptile came in view. Doubtless, 
the eternal shade that broods over this mighty bog, and hinders the sun- 
beams from blessing the ground, makes it an uncomfortable habitation for 
any thing that has life. Not so much as a Zealand frog could endure so 
aguish a situation. It had one beauty, however, that delighted the eye, 
though at the expense of all the other senses : the moisture of the soil pre- 
serves a continual verdure, and makes every plant an evergreen, but at the 
same time the foul damps ascend without ceasing, corrupt the air, and ren- 
der it unfit for respiration. Not even a turkey buzzard will venture to fly 
over it, no more than the Italian vultures will over the filthy lake Avernus, or 
the birds in the Holy Land, over the Salt sea, where Sodom and Gomorrah 
formerly stood. 
In these sad circumstances, the kindest thing we could do for our suffering 
friends was to give them a place in the Litany. Our chaplain, for his part, 
did his office, and rubbed us up with a seasonable sermon. This was quite 
a new thing to our brethren of North Carolina, who live in a climate where 
no clergyman can breathe, any more than spiders in Ireland. 
For want of men in holy orders, both the members of the council and 
justices of the peace are empowered by the laws of that country to marry 
all those who will not take one another’s word; but for the ceremony of 
christening their children, they trust that to chance. If a parson come in 
theyr way, they will crave a cast of his office, as they call it, else they are 
content their offspring should remain as arrant pagans as themselves. They 
account it among their greatest advantages that they are not priest-ridden, 
not remembering that the clergy is rarely guilty of bestriding such as have 
the misfortune to be poor. One thing may be said for the inhabitants of that 
province, that they are not troubled with any religious fumes, and have the 
least superstition of any people living. They do not know Sunday from any 
other day, any more than Robinson Crusoe did, which would give them a 
great advantage were they given to be industrious. But they keep so many 
sabbaths every week, that their disregard of the seventh day has no manner 
of cruelty in it, either to servants or cattle. It was with some difficulty we 
could make our people quit the good cheer they met with at this house, so it 
was late before we took our departure ; but to make us amends, our landlord 
was so good as to conduct us ten miles on our way, as far as the Cypress 
swamp, which drains itself into the Dismal. Eight miles beyond that we 
forded the waters of the Coropeak, /which tend the same way as do many 
others on that side. In six miles more we reached the plantation of Mr. 
Thomas Spight, a grandee of North Carolina. We found the good man upon 
his crutches, being crippled with the gout in both his knees. Here we flat- 
tered ourselves we should by this time meet with good tidings of the survey- 
ors, but had reckoned, alas ! without our host : on the contrary, we were told 
the Dismal was at least thirty miles wide in that place. However, as nobody 
could say this on his own knowledge, we ordered guns to be fired and a drum 
to be beaten, but received no answer, unless it was from that prating nymph 
Echo, who, like a loquacious wife, will always have the last word, and some- 
times return three for one. It was indeed no wonder our signal was not 
heard at that time, by the people in the Dismal, because, in truth, they had 
not then penetrated one third of their way. They had that morning fallen 
to work with great vigour ; and, finding the ground better than ordinary, 
drove on the line two miles and thirty-eight poles. This was reckoned an 
Herculean day’s work, and yet they would not have stopped there, had not 
an impenetrable cedar thicket checked their industry. Our landlord had 
seated himself on the borders of this Dismal, for the advantage of the green 
