and spending five days and nights at Baltimore, and two at Norfolk. There was nothing particularly interesting in the few passengers on board the steam-boat. Of our two females, one was a lady from England, who perambulated the deck, clasping in her arms a silken lap-dog, on which she seemed to have fixed her affections; the other, a pretty young woman, whose infant child did not claim from the company half as much attention as the fawning, fondled, officious quadruped of our countrywoman.

I continued on deck the greater part both of the day and night, unwilling to miss any of this magnificent bay, from seven to twenty miles wide, and more than 200 miles long, from the mouth of the Susquehanna to the sea, and receiving in its bosom, I believe, a greater number of extensive rivers than any bay in the known world. It was a beautiful moonlight night, with a most refreshing sea-breeze; and as I walked the deck alone at midnight, I almost felt as if I was homeward-bound, and was bidding a final adieu to the trans-Atlantic world, In imagination, I ascended the rivers, which supplied me with many interesting subjects of reflection, although they have received no poetical licence to converse, like the Severn and the Wye. And first, the Susquehanna, with all the

interesting associations connected with its classical waters, and all the melancholy recollections they suggest of Wyoming, Gertrude, Albert, Waldegrave, and Outalissi; then the Potowmac, which conducted me to Woodlawn, Mount Vernon, and General Washington's tomb, Washington, and the beautiful scenery at Harper's Ferry, where, assisted by the Shenandoah, it forces its way through the Blue Mountains; then the Rappahannock, which I had crossed at its falls; then York River; but here I was a little crest-fallen; for it was at Yorktown, on this river, you will recollect, that Lord Cornwallis, in 1781, was compelled to surrender himself and his army, and with it the last hope of success, in that ill-advised and unnatural contest-not that I regretted the issue; but it is always humiliating to be defeated; and on this occasion, you will remember, he was obliged to march out of the town with cased colours, and shouldered arms-having refused to his prisoner, General Lincoln, the honour of marching out of Charleston, with colours flying.

The next river was James' River, which was the companion of our way, in the rich valley of the Shenandoah, and our subsequent route to Richmond. It received, in its course, the Appomatox, which we crossed at Petersburgh,

and the Rivannah, which threatened to flow over our horses' backs as we waded through it, below Monticello, at the very spot where it carried away Lieutenant Hall and his Jersey waggon, after his visit to Mr. Jefferson. James' River is from 20 to 30 miles wide at its mouth, as I was told, and some of the other rivers from 10 to 15, or 20. As I contemplated our old companions, which we had often forded near their sources, in the summer, transformed into magnificent rivers, which might carry the British Navy on their bosoms, foaming with rage, and agitated with expiring struggles, to escape annihilation in this inland sea, I was amused by tracing them to their humble origin, in the neighbourhood of the Blue Mountains, where, tranquil and unambitious, they pursued their silent course-reflecting, from their unruffled surface, the pendant foliage, or barren cliffs, or blessing with beauty and fertility the lovely vallies through which they flowed,

We reached Norfolk at seven o'clock in the morning; and after breakfast, I went to call on the friends whom I came to see, and at whose house I afterwards met a pleasant party at dinner. Norfolk is admirably situated as a commercial town; but the country round it, as far as the eye can reach, and indeed for a great

distance up the Chesapeake, as we observed in sailing down, is one continued pine forest, on a a flat sandy shore-a regular pine barren-such as I described in my route to Charleston, and my frequent allusion to which made you more tired of them, I dare say, than I was; for the novelty of such scenery rendered them interesting to me to the last. Norfolk, indeed, is within the limits of what is called the Southern Forest, which embraced the maritime ports of Virginia, the two Carolinas, Georgia, and Florida, and consists principally of pine, cedar, and cypress.

Norfolk is within 12 miles of the celebrated dismal swamp, which I wished exceedingly to see; but my time did not allow me to gratify my inclination. This swamp is said to cover 130,000 acres, and is for the most part covered with cypress trees.

The cypress trees, which I saw in great perfection in the swamps in the south, are very majestic, but I think not nearly so beautiful as the elms of New England. They are thus described by Bartram :-" The Cupressus Disticha stands in the first order of North American trees. Its majestic stature is surprising, and on approaching it we are struck with a kind of awe at beholding the stateliness of the trunk, lifting its cumbrous top towards the skies, and casting

a wide shade upon the ground, as a dark intervening cloud, which, for a time, excludes the rays of the sun. The delicacy of its colour, and the texture of its leaves, exceed every thing in vegetation. It generally grows in the water, or in low flat lands, near the banks of great rivers, and lakes that are covered for a great part of the year with two or three feet depth of water; and that part of the trunk which is subject to be under water, and two or three, or five feet higher up, is greatly enlarged by prodigious buttresses, or pilasters, which, in full grown trees, project out on every side to such a distance, that several men might hide themselves in the hollows between. Every pilaster terminates under ground, in a very large, string, serpentine root, which strikes off, and branches every way just under the surface of the ground; and from these roots grow woody cones, called cypress knees, four, five, or six inches high, and from six to 24 inches in diameter at their bases. The large ones are hollow, and serve very well for bee-hives; a small space of the tree itself is hollow, nearly as high as the buttresses. From this place, the tree, as it were, takes another beginning, forming a grand, straight column, 80 or 90 feet high. When the planters fell these mighty trees, they raise a stage round