546 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
[Oct. 7, 1911. 
particular part of the sea bottom was elevated 
in such a way that the new land could not drain 
properly for lack of slope, and because of the 
growth of the retarding vegetation. The vege¬ 
table deposit of centuries has overlaid it with 
a spongy soil, in some spots so deep that one 
may thrust a pole down ten or twelve feet with¬ 
out striking solid subsoil. Along the western 
border of the swamp the ancient coast line may 
yet be seen, the swamp meeting the “bench, as 
the geologists term it, as clearly as the ocean 
meets the shore line further eastward. The 
swamp extends between fifty and sixty miles 
north and south, from Willoughby Spit in Vir¬ 
ginia, to Albemarle Sound in North Carolina. It 
is from twelve to thirty miles wide, and Lake 
Drummond lies nearly in the center, though 
north of the State boundary line. At least five 
rivers find their sources in the swamp, though 
their actual spring beds cannot be detected. 1 hey 
ooze from somewhere under the surface of the 
marshy deposit. Approximately the swamp s area 
embraces 1,500 square m les, but the shape is 
irregular, with the greatest east and west diam¬ 
eter near the State line. The western margin, 
where shows the ancient sea beach ca led the 
Nansemond escarpment, varies in height from 
five to thirty feet above the level of the swamp. 
The Dismal Swamp Canal, dug about a cen¬ 
tury ago, traverses the area east of the center, 
and has the effect of draining the region east of it, 
while retaining in the portion to the west much 
of the water that formerly escaped into the 
sounds. Consequently the western parts of the 
swamp are to-day probably wetter than they were 
a hundred years ago. The surface of Lake 
Drummond is nearly, if not quite, the highest 
portion of the swamp, being normally twenty 
feet or more above mean sea level. 
The main canal is some thirty to forty 
feet wide and so weed grown in certain parts 
as to be scarcely navigable except to the smallest 
boats. This once gave continuous passage from 
Deep Creek on Elizabeth River to Pasquotank 
River in North Carolina. A second canal to 
feed this one was cut into Lake Drummond, 
which was dammed with a lock to store water 
in a dry season. As the mud from the main 
canal was thrown up in high banks, it retarded 
drainage, as we have said, with a result that 
for many miles land to the east is green with 
farms, whi : e across the sluggish ditch to the west 
rises still the primeval wilderness unbroken like 
a wall. In all, perhaps one-fourth of the origi¬ 
nal area of the swamp has been reclaimed along 
its edges, but the still unreclaimed parts are cer- 
tainly extensive enough to suit the hunter, the 
trapper and the lumberman. Much timber has 
been cut and carried off here and there where 
the facilities of removal permitted, but the vast 
forest stands to-day an almost impenetrable 
jungle of giant trees and rank undergrowth, the 
home of wild animals, the haunt of birds and 
fish, and the harboring place of deadly snakes 
without number. 
Turning out from the main canal into the 
feeder which comes down from Lake Drummond 
we found it somewhat narrower than the main 
artery, yet less cumbered with vegetation. On 
the west side of the swamp there is an older 
canal ca'led the Washington ditch that is still 
narrower than the feeder to the east. This 
ditch begins near Suffolk and extends to the 
lake, but shows its ancient construction by the 
heavy timber and the profusion of myrtle, green 
brier, juniper and other growth crowning the old 
banks and overflowing into the water. 
Going back to the eastern feeder the black 
stream mirrored the great trees most clearly, and 
the perspective of the canal was like looking 
through a long tube. One could see litt e of 
the swamp on either side, owing to the density 
of the jungle. But beyond rose towering gums 
and cypresses, together with various swamp and 
water oaks, maples, sycamores, all interlaced wi ll 
enormous creepers. Four miles up this feeder 
we disembarked at a rough landing, climbed the 
banks, and threading a path through high reeds, 
came out at a small clearing. Here are the locks 
that regulate the flow from Lake Drummond; 
also a two-story cottage, and a vegetable garden 
with fruit trees, the home of the keeper of the 
locks. To show that we were not outside the 
confines of civilization despite the wildness of 
the surroundings, the keeper has a .telephone; 
for business purposes, however. When water 
is wanted for the canals eastward, word is sent 
and the supply regulated. 
From the locks to the lake canoes are used, 
the keeper having several flatkoats or dugouts 
made from the whole cypress log. Two hundred 
yards of paddling brought us to an opening 
ahead, under overreaching trees. Then, all at 
once, we were on the open surface of the lake. 
This portal to the lake is like nothing else 
one is apt to see elsewhere. The lake itself the 
surveyors give a width of six or seven miles, 
but owing to the great quantities of water-bound 
dead trees fringing the shore line from fifty 
yards to near y a mile, the apparent width seems 
not more than three or four miles. It looks in 
fact like a large round bowl in the forest. Owing 
to a peculiarity of the swampish atmosphere the 
further banks looked to be miles and miles dis¬ 
tant, and of a hazy, greenish gray. Many of 
these water-standing forest trees were, as I said, 
dead. Others, in the summer, flaunt forth thin 
shreds of delicate foliage. They are in a sense 
dead yet alive, seeming to intimate that the in¬ 
roads of the waters have left them to fight for 
a declining life alone. 
This water-haunted timberline is the most 
striking feature of the lake, accentuating its 
strangeness, its desolation, its suggesfion of un¬ 
told centuries of wild silence and weird charm. 
Something like it I have seen among the sunken 
lands of the Arkansas and on Reelfoot Lake in 
Tennessee, but the resemblance there was less 
startling, for all the timber so depicted was 
really dead, not slowly dying. The depth of the 
water in the lake was said originally to have not 
exceeded seven or eight feet in most places. 
This has been increased by the digging of vari¬ 
ous small canals in the swamp, and from the 
effect eastward of the embankments of the main 
canal, so that the normal depth is now twelve or 
fifteen feet. The water is of a brownish wine- 
colored hue and rather turbid. When dipped up 
it looks not unlike sherry, yet it is quite potable 
and considered to be healthful. One curious feat¬ 
ure is that despite the large percentage of organic 
matter held in solution, the floor of the lake is 
in large part covered with white sand. After 
heavy rainfalls the water is still more turbid. It 
tastes slightly acid, and when issuing from areas 
where the juniper abounds, it is remarkably so. 
It possesses remarkable preservative properties, 
and one notices that there are none of the 
offensive odors in the Dismal Swamp that are- 
often so common in fresh-water swamps else¬ 
where. In this respect it reminds me much of 
the waters in the Everglades and the big Cypress ■ 
swamps in Florida. 
Except at two or three points the lake is en¬ 
tirely surrounded by unbroken forest. These 
points are small clearings, the remains of old 
lumber camps, where the land is slightly higher. 
A great part of the main body of the swamps 
is covered with water varying from two inches 
to a foot, but in very dry seasons the area of 
comparatively dry swampland extends, while the 
wetter portions are either merely spongy with 
moisture, or with an inch or two, covering all 
but logs and tussocks. The timber growth is a 
mixture of coniferous and deciduous varieties. 
In every direction the ground is cumbered with 
stumps, logs and partially fallen trees in all 
stages of decomposition. Cypress, pine, sweet 
gum, oaks, beech, tulip, black wa'nut, cedar, mul¬ 
berry, elm, black gum, bay, magnolia, hickory,, 
dogwood, sassafras, wild cherry and laurel are 
the prevailing growths. Parasitic leaf fungi are 
abundant; also mosses fairly luxuriant, though 
not so much so as in the big swamplands, further 
south. There are cane-brakes in spots, not un¬ 
like the brakes of the Yazoo and Mississippi 
River bottoms. Wild flowers flourish every¬ 
where in their season. 
At certain points here and there through the 
swamp, where the dry land admits of sporadic 
cultivation, a few farmers have a few acres each, 
which they cultivate, and alternate this during 
the open season, by serving as guides to tourists, 
sportsmen and lumbermen exploring the big tim¬ 
ber. When fire gets out in the dry seasons—as 
it sometimes does—these clearings become refuge- 
places, not only for human beings, but for the 
wild animals that make the swamp their home. 
Wild cattle also, bearing ear marks and brands 
of ownership, flock either to the shores of the 
lake or to these clearings. One woodsman who 
had a few acres and a cabin about a mile west of 
the lake told me that, during one autumn con¬ 
flagration a year or two back, the water moc¬ 
casins, lowland rattlers and other snakes so 
swarmed about his premises that, after trying 
faithfully to kill all in sight, the new comers at 
last invaded his house, and the family was about 
to take to the johnboats, when a drenching rain 
dissipated the plague of serpents as suddenly as 
it began. As proof that he had not been yarn¬ 
ing, he exhibited many bottles of snake oil, and 
numbers of dried skins, which he intended to 
market; but had not had time to visit the city— 
Norfolk, I suppose. 
As to wild game, it is there in abundance; has 
always been there, and probably always wi 1 be; 
for the natural conditions in our great Atlantic 
swamps are vastly more favorable to wild life’s 
conservation than are the mountains, the river 
bottoms or old fields elsewhere. There will be 
bears, deer, turkeys, ducks, geese, ’coons, ’pos¬ 
sums, wi’dcats and the like in the Dismal Swamp 
as long as there are laws to protect, hunters to 
hunt, and nature to foster her wild creatures in 
this, at once the most remote yet most accessible 
of our wildwood haunts east of the Rockies. 
The Forest and Stream may he obtained from 
any newsdealer on order. Ask your dealer to 
supply you regularly. 
