LIFE OF WILSON. 
Ixxxvii 
teen. I shall set off, on finishing this letter, to Georgetown 
and Alexandria. I will write you, or some of my friends, from 
Richmond.” 
TO MR. D. H. MILLER. 
Charleston, February 22, 1809. 
Dear Sir, 
“ I have passed through a considerable extent of country 
since I wrote you last; and met with a variety of adventures, 
some of which may perhaps amuse you. Norfolk turned out 
better than I expected, I left that place on one of the coldest 
mornings I have experienced since leaving Philadelphia. 
^ 
I mentioned to you in my last that the streets of Norfolk 
were in a most disgraceful state; but I was informed that some 
time before, they had been much worse; that at one time the 
news-carrier delivered his papers from a boat; which he poled 
along through the mire ; and that a party of sailors, having no- 
thing better to do, actually lanched a ship’s long-boat into the 
streets, rowing along with four oars through the mud, while 
one stood at the bow, heaving the lead, and singing out the 
depth. 
“ I passed through a flat, pine covered country, from Nor- 
folk to Suffolk, twenty-four miles distant; and lodged, in the 
way, in the house of a planter, who informed me that every 
year, in August and September, almost all his family are laid 
up with the bilious fever; that at one time forty of his people 
were sick; and that of thirteen children, only three were living. 
Two of these, with their mother, appeared likely not to be long 
tenants of this world. Thirty miles farther, I came to a small 
place on the river Nottaway, called Jerusalem. Here I found 
the river swelled to such an extraordinary height, that the old- 
est inhabitant had never seen the like. After passing along the 
bridge, I was conveyed, in a boat termed a jffat, a mile and 
three-quarters through the woods, where the torrent sweeping 
along in many places rendered this sort of navigation rather 
