THE DIVIDING LINE. 
63 
bread bags. Though, as rough as the woods were, the soil was extremely 
good all the way, being washed down from the neighbouring hills into the 
plain country. Notwithstanding all these difficulties, the surveyors drove 
on the line four miles and two hundred and five poles. 
In the mean time we were so unlucky as to meet with no sort of game 
the whole day, so that the men were obliged to make a frugal distribution of 
what little they left in the morning. We encamped upon a small rill, where 
the horses came off as temperately as their masters. They were by this 
time grown so thin, by hard travel and spare feeding, that henceforth, in pure 
compassion, we chose to perform the greater part of the journey on foot. 
And as our baggage was by this time grown much lighter, we divided it, 
after the best manner, so that every horse’s load might be proportioned to the 
strength he had left. Though, after all the prudent measures we could take, 
we perceived the hills began to rise upon us so fast in our front, that it would 
be impossible for us to proceed much farther. 
We saw very few squirrels in the upper parts, because the wild cats de- 
vour them unmercifully. Of these there are four kinds : the fox squirrel, the 
gray, the flying, and the ground squirrel. These last resemble a rat in every 
thing but the tail, and the black and russet streaks that run down the length 
of their little bodies. 
26th. We found our way grow still more mountainous, after extending 
the line three hundred poles farther. We came then to a rivulet that ran 
with a swift current towards the south. This we fancied to be another 
branch of the Irvin, though some of the men, who had been Indian traders, 
judged it rather to be the head of Deep river, that discharges its stream into 
that of Pee Dee ; but this seemed a wild conjecture. The hills beyond that 
river were exceedingly lofty, and not to be attempted by our jaded palfreys, 
which could now hardly drag their legs after them upon level ground. Be- 
sides, the bread began to grow scanty, and the winter season to advance 
apace upon us. We had likewise reason to apprehend the consequences of 
being intercepted by deep snows, and the swelling of the many waters 
between us and home. The first of these misfortunes would starve all our 
horses, and the other ourselves, by cutting off our retreat, and obliging us to 
winter in those desolate woods. These considerations determined us to stop 
short here, and push our adventures no farther. The last tree we marked 
was a red oak, growing on the bank of the river ; and to make the place 
more remarkable, we blazed all the trees around it. 
We found the whole distance, from Coratuck inlet to the rivulet where we 
left off, to be, in a straight line, two hundred and forty-one miles and two 
hundred and thirty poles. And from the place where the Carolina commis- 
sioners deserted us, seventy-two miles and three hundred and two poles. 
This last part of the journey was generally very hilly, or else grown up with 
troublesome thickets and underwoods, all which our Carolina friends had the 
discretion to avoid. We encamped in a dirty valley near the rivulet above- 
mentioned, for the advantage of the canes, and so sacrificed our own conve- 
nience to that of our horses. There was a small mountain half a mile to 
the northward of us, which we had the curiosity to climb up in the afternoon, 
in order to enlarge our prospect. From thence we w^ere able to discover 
where the two ledges of mountains closed, as near as we could guess, about 
thirty miles to the west of us', and lamented that our present circumstances 
would not permit us to advance the line to that place, which the hand of Na- 
ture had made so very remarkable. 
Not far from our quarters one of the men picked up a pair of elk’s horns, 
not very large, and discovered the track of the elk that had shed them. It 
was rare to find any tokens of those animals so far to the south, because 
