MDCCLXXI.

PETER KALM’s TRAVELS.

New Jersey, Raccoon.

December the seventh, 1748.

In the morning I undertook again a little journey, to Raccoon, in New

Jersey.

It does not seem difficult to find out the reasons, why the people

multiply more here than in Europe. As soon as a person is old enough,

he may marry in these provinces, without any fear of poverty; for there

is such a tract of good ground yet uncultivated, that a new-married man

can, without difficulty, get a spot of ground, where he may

sufficiently subsist with his wife and children. The taxes are very

low, and he need not be under any concern on their account. The

liberties he enjoys are so great, that he considers himself as a prince

in his possessions. I shall here demonstrate by some plain examples,

what effect such a constitution is capable of.

Maons Keen, one of the Swedes in Raccoon, was now near seventy years

old: he had many children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren; so

that, of those who were yet alive, he could muster up forty-five

persons. Besides them, several of his children and grandchildren died

young, and some in a mature age. He was, therefore, uncommonly blessed.

Yet his happiness is not comparable to that which is to be seen in the

following examples, and which I have extracted from the Philadelphia

gazette.

In the year 1732, January the 24th, died at Ipswich, in New England,

Mrs. Sarah Tuthil, a widow, aged eighty-six years. She had brought

sixteen children into the world; and from seven of them only, she had

seen one hundred and seventy-seven grandchildren and

great-grandchildren.

In the year 1739, May the 30th, the children, grand and

great-grandchildren, of Mr. Richard Buttington, in the parish of

Chester, in Pensylvania, were assembled in his house; and they made

together one hundred and fifteen persons. The parent of these children,

Richard Buttington, who was born in England, was then entering into his

eighty-fifth year: and was at that time quite fresh, active, and

sensible. His eldest son, then sixty years old, was the first

Englishman born in Pensylvania.

In the year 1742, on the 8th of January, died at Trenton, in New

Jersey, Mrs. Sarah Furman, a widow, aged ninety-seven years. She was

born in New England; and left five children, sixty-one grandchildren,

one hundred and eighty-two great-grandchildren, and twelve

great-great-grandchildren, who were all alive when she died.

In the year 1739, on the 28th of January, died at South Kingston, in

New England, Mrs. Maria Hazard, a widow, in the hundredth year of her

age. She was born in Rhode Island, and was a grandmother of the then

vice-governor of that island, Mr. George Hazard. She could count

altogether five hundred children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren,

and great-great-grandchildren. When she died, two hundred and five

persons of them were alive; a grand-daughter of hers had already been

grandmother near fifteen years.

In this manner, the usual wish or blessing in our liturgy, that the

new-married couple may see their grandchildren, till the third and

fourth generation, has been literally fulfilled in regard to some of

these persons [1].

December the 9th. In every country, we commonly meet with a number of

insects; of which many, though they be ever so small and contemptible,

can do considerable damage to the inhabitants. Of these dangerous

insects, there are likewise some in North America: some are peculiar to

that country, others are common to Europe likewise.

I have already, in the preceding volume, mentioned the Mosquitoes, as a

kind of disagreeable gnats; and another noxious insect, the Bruchus

Pisi, which destroys whole fields with pease. I shall here add some

more.

There are a kind of Locusts which about every seventeenth year come

hither in incredible numbers. They come out of the ground in the middle

of May, and make, for six weeks together, such a noise in the trees and

woods, that two persons who meet in such places, cannot understand each

other, unless they speak louder than the locusts can chirp. During that

time, they make, with the sting in their tail, holes into the soft bark

of the little branches on the trees, by which means these branches are

ruined. They do no other harm to the trees or other plants. In the

interval between the years when they are so numerous, they are only

seen or heard single in the woods.

There is likewise a kind of Caterpillars in these provinces, which eat

the leaves from the trees. They are also innumerable in some years. In

the intervals there are but few of them: but when they come, they strip

the trees so entirely of their leaves, that the woods in the middle of

summer are as naked as in winter. They eat all kinds of leaves, and

very few trees are left untouched by them; as, about that time of the

year the heat is most excessive. The stripping the trees of their

leaves has this fatal consequence, that they cannot withstand the heat,

but dry up entirely. In this manner, great forests are sometimes

entirely ruined. The Swedes who live here shewed me, here and there,

great tracts in the woods, where young trees were now growing, instead

of the old ones, which, some years ago, had been destroyed by the

caterpillars. These caterpillars afterwards change into moths, or

phalænæ, which shall be described in the sequel, in their proper

places.

In other years the Grass-worms do a great deal of damage in several

places, both in the meadows and corn-fields. For the fields are at

certain times over-run with great armies of these worms, as with the

other insects; yet it is very happy that these many plagues do not come

all together. For in those years when the locusts are numerous, the

caterpillars and grass-worms are not very considerable, and it happens

so with the latter kinds, so that only one of the three kinds comes at

a time. Then there are several years when they are very scarce. The

grass-worms have been observed to settle chiefly in a fat soil; but as

soon as careful husbandmen discover them, they draw narrow channels

with almost perpendicular sides quite round the field in which the

worms are settled; then by creeping further they all fall into the

ditch, and cannot get out again. I was assured by many persons that

these three sorts of insects followed each other pretty closely; and

that the locusts came in the first year, the caterpillars in the

second, and the grass-worms in the last: I have likewise found by my

own experience that this is partly true.

Moths, or Tineæ, which eat the clothes, are likewise abundant here. I

have seen cloth, worsted gloves, and other woollen stuffs, which had

hung all the summer locked up in a shrine, and had not been taken care

of, quite cut through by these worms, so that whole pieces fell out:

Sometimes they were so spoiled that they could not be mended again.

Furs which had been kept in the garret were frequently so ruined by

worms, that the hair went off by handfuls. I am however not certain

whether these worms were originally in the country, or whether they

were brought over from Europe.

Fleas are likewise to be found in this part of the world. Many

thousands were undoubtedly brought over from other countries; yet

immense numbers of them have certainly been here since time immemorial.

I have seen them on the grey squirrels, and on the hares which have

been killed in such desart parts of this country, where no human

creature ever lived. As I afterwards came further up into the country,

and was obliged to lie at night in the huts and beds of the Indians, I

was so plagued by immense quantities of fleas, that I imagined I was

put to the torture. They drove me from the bed, and I was very glad to

sleep on the benches below the roof of the huts. But it is easy to

conceive that the many dogs which the Indians keep, breed fleas without

end. Dogs and men lie promiscuously in the huts; and a stranger can

hardly lie down and shut his eyes, but he is in danger of being either

squezed to death, or stifled by a dozen or more dogs, which lie round

him, and upon him, in order to have a good resting place. For I imagine

they do not expect that strangers will venture to beat them or throw

them off, as their masters and mistresses commonly do.

The noisy Crickets (Gryllus domesticus) which are sometimes to be met

with in the houses in Sweden, I have not perceived in any part of

Pensylvania or New Jersey, and other people whom I have asked, could

not say that they had ever seen any. In summer there are a kind of

black Crickets [2] in the fields, which make exactly the same chirping

noise as our house crickets. But they keep only to the fields, and were

silent as soon as winter or the cold weather came on. They say it

sometimes happens that these field crickets take refuge in houses, and

chirp continually there, whilst it is warm weather, or whilst the rooms

are warm; but as soon as it grows cold they are silent. In some parts

of the province of New York, and in Canada, every farm-house and most

of the houses in the towns, swarm with so many, that no farm-house in

our country can be better stocked with them. They continue their music

there throughout the whole winter.

Bugs (Cimex lectularius) are very plentiful here. I have been

sufficiently tormented by them, in many places in Canada: But I do not

remember having seen any with the Indians, during my stay at Fort

Frederic. The commander there, Mr. de Lousignan, told me, that none of

the Illinois and other Indians of the western parts of North America

knew any thing of these vermin. And he added, that he could with

certainty say this from his own experience, having been among them for

a great while. Yet I cannot determine whether bugs were first brought

over by the Europeans, or whether they have originally been in the

country. Many people looked upon them as natives of this country, and

as a proof of it said, that under the wings of bats the people had

often found bugs, which had eaten very deep into the flesh. It was

therefore believed that the bats had got them in some hollow tree, and

had afterwards brought them into the houses, as they commonly fix

themselves close to the walls, and creep into the little chinks which

they meet with. But as I have never seen any bugs upon bats, I cannot

say any thing upon that subject. Perhaps a louse or a tick (Acarus) has

been taken for a bug. Or, if a real bug has been found upon a bat’s

wing, it is very easy to conceive that it fixed on the bat, whilst the

latter was sitting in the chinks of a house stocked with European bugs.

As the people here could not bear the inconvenience of these vermin,

any more than we can in Sweden, they endeavoured to expel them by

different means. I have already remarked in the preceding volume, that

the beds to that purpose were made of Sassafras wood, but that they

were only temporary remedies. Some persons assured me that they had

found from their own experience, and by repeated trials, that no remedy

was more effectual towards the expulsion of bugs, than the injecting of

boiling water into all the cracks where they are settled, and washing

all the wood of the beds with it; this being twice or thrice repeated,

the bugs are wholly destroyed. But if there are bugs in neighbouring

houses, they will fasten to one’s clothes, and thus be brought over

into other houses.

I cannot say whether these remedies are good or no, as I have not tried

them; but by repeated trials I have been convinced that sulphur, if it

be properly employed, entirely destroys bugs and their eggs in beds and

walls, though they were ten times more numerous than the ants in an

ant-hill [3].

The Mill-beetles, or Cock-roaches, are likewise a plague of North

America, and are settled in many of its provinces. The learned Dr.

Colden was of opinion that these insects were properly natives of the

West Indies, and that those that were found in North America were

brought over from those islands. To confirm his opinion, he said, that

it was yet daily seen how the ships coming with goods from the West

Indies to North America brought mill-beetles with them in great

numbers. But from the observations which I have made in this country, I

have reason to believe that these insects have been on the continent of

North America since time immemorial. Yet notwithstanding this I do not

deny their being brought over from the West Indies. They are in almost

every house in the city of New York; and those are undoubtedly come

over with ships. But how can that be said of those mill-beetles, which

are found in the midst of the woods and desarts?

The English likewise call the Mill-beetles, Cock-roaches, and the Dutch

give them the name of Kackerlack. The Swedes in this country call them

Brodoetare, or Bread-eaters, on account of the damage they do to the

bread, which I am going to describe. Dr. Linnæus calls them Blatta

Orientalis. Many of the Swedes call them likewise Kackerlack. They are

not only observed in the houses, but in the summer they appear often in

the woods, and run about the trees, which are cut down. On bringing in

all sorts of old rotten blocks of wood for fewel, in February, I

discovered several cock-roaches settled in them; they were at first

quite torpid, or as it were dead; but after lying in the room for a

while, they recovered, became very lively, and began to run about. I

afterwards found very often, that when old rotten wood was brought home

in winter, and cut in pieces for fewel, the cock-roaches were got into

it in numbers, and lay in it in a torpid state. In the same winter, a

fellow cut down a great dry tree, and was about to split it. I then

observed in a crack, some fathoms above the ground, several

cock-roaches together with the common ants. They were, it seems, crept

up a great way, in order to find a secure place of abode against

winter. On travelling in the middle of October 1749, through the

uninhabited country between the English and French colonies, and making

a fire at night near a thick half rotten tree, on the shore of lake

Champlain, numbers of cock-roaches came out of the wood, being wakened

by the smoke and the fire, which had driven them out of their holes.

The Frenchmen, who were then in my company, did not know them, and

could not give them any name. In Canada the French did not remember

seeing any in the houses. In Pensylvania, I am told, they run in

immense numbers about the sheaves of corn, during the harvest. At other

times they live commonly in the houses in the English settlements, and

lie in the crevices, especially in the cracks of those beams which

support the ceiling, and are nearest to the chimney.

They do a deal of damage by eating the soft parts of the bread. If they

have once made a hole into a loaf, they will in a little time eat all

the soft part in it, so that on cutting the loaf, nothing but the crust

is left. I am told they likewise eat other victuals. Sometimes they

bite people’s noses or feet, whilst they are asleep. An old Swede,

called Sven Laock, a grandson of the Rev. Mr. Laockenius, one of the

first Swedish clergymen that came to Pensylvania, told me, that he had

in his younger years been once very much frightened on account of a

cock-roach, which crept into his ear whilst he was asleep. He waked

suddenly, jumped out of bed, and felt that the insect, probably out of

fear, was endeavouring with all its strength to get deeper. These

attempts of the cock-roach were so painful to him, that he imagined his

head was bursting, and he was almost senseless; however he hastened to

the well, and bringing up a bucket full of water, threw some into his

ear. As soon as the cock-roach found itself in danger of being drowned,

it endeavoured to save itself, and pushed backwards out of the ear,

with its hind feet, and thus happily delivered the poor man from his

fears.

The Wood-lice are disagreeable insects, which in a manner are worse

than the preceding; but as I have already described them in a peculiar

memoir, which is printed among the memoirs of the Royal Academy of

Sciences for the year 1754, I refer my readers to that account.

December the 11th. This morning I made a little excursion to Penn’s

Neck, and further over the Delaware to Wilmington. The country round

Penn’s Neck has the same qualities as that about other places in this

part of New Jersey. For the ground consists chiefly of sand, with a

thin stratum of black soil. It is not very hilly, but chiefly flat, and

in most places covered with open woods of such trees as have annual

leaves, especially oak. Now and then you see a single farm, and a

little corn field round it. Between them are here and there little

marshes or swamps, and sometimes a brook with water, which has a very

slow motion.

The woods of these parts consist of all sorts of trees, but chiefly of

oak and hiccory. These woods have certainly never been cut down, and

have always grown without hindrance. It might therefore be expected

that there are trees of an uncommon great age to be found in them; but

it happens otherwise, and there are very few trees three hundred years

old. Most of them are only two hundred years old; and this convinced me

that trees have the same quality as animals, and die after they are

arrived at a certain age. Thus we find great woods here, but when the

trees in them have stood an hundred and fifty or an hundred and eighty

years, they are either rotting within, or losing their crown, or their

wood becomes quite soft, or their roots are no longer able to draw in

sufficient nourishment, or they die from some other cause. Therefore

when storms blow, which sometimes happens here, the trees are broke off

either just above the root, or in the middle, or at the summit. Several

trees are likewise torn out with their roots by the power of the winds.

The storms thus cause great devastations in these forests. Every where

you see trees thrown down by the winds, after they are too much

weakened by one or the other of the above mentioned causes to be able

to resist their fury. Fire likewise breaks out often in the woods, and

burns the trees half way from the root, so that a violent gust of wind

easily throws them down.

On travelling through these woods, I purposely tried to find out, by

the position of the trees which were fallen down, which winds are the

strongest hereabouts. But I could not conclude any thing with

certainty, for the trees fell on all sides, and lay towards all the

points of the compass. I therefore judged, that any wind which blows

from that side where the roots of the tree are weakest and shortest,

and where it can make the least resistance, must root it up and throw

it down. In this manner the old trees die away continually, and are

succeeded by a young generation. Those which are thrown down lay on the

ground and putrify, sooner or later, and by that means encrease the

black soil, into which the leaves are likewise finally changed, which

drop abundantly in autumn, are blown about by the winds for some time,

but are heaped up, and lie on both sides of the trees, which are fallen

down. It requires several years before a tree is intirely reduced to

dust. When the winds tear up a tree with the roots, a quantity of loose

soil commonly comes out with and sticks to them for some time, but at

last it drops off, and forms a little hillock, which is afterwards

augmented by the leaves, which commonly gather about the roots. Thus

several inequalities are formed in the woods, such as little holes land

hills; and by this means the upper soil must likewise be heaped up in

such places.

Some trees are more inclined to putrify than others. The tupelo-tree

(Nyssa), the tulip-tree (Liriodendron), and the sweet gum-tree

(Liquidambar), became rotten in a short time. The hiccory did not take

much time, and the black oak fell sooner to pieces than the white oak;

but this was owing to circumstances. If the bark remained on the wood,

it was for the greatest part rotten, and entirely eaten by worms

within, in the space of six, eight, or ten years, so that nothing was

to be found but a reddish brown dust. But if the bark was taken off,

they would often lie twenty years before they were entirely rotten. The

suddenness of a tree’s growth, the bigness of its pores, and the

frequent changes of heat and wet in summer, cause it to rot sooner. To

this it must be added, that all sorts of insects make holes into the

stems of the fallen trees, and by that means the moisture and the air

get into the tree, which must of course forward putrefaction. Most of

the trees here have deciduous or annual leaves. Many of them begin to

rot whilst they are yet standing and blooming. This forms the hollow

trees, in which many animals make their nests and places of refuge.

The breadth of the Delaware directly opposite Wilmington is reckoned an

English mile and a half; yet to look at it, it did not seem to be so

great. The depth of the river, in the middle, is said to be from four

to six fathoms here.

December the 12th. The Joiners say, that among the trees of this

country they chiefly use the black walnut-trees, the wild cherry-trees,

and the curled maple. Of the black walnut-trees (Juglans nigra) there

is yet a sufficient quantity. However careless people take pains enough

to destroy them, and some peasants even use them as fewel. The wood of

the wild cherry-trees (Prunus Virginiana) is very good, and looks

exceedingly well; it has a yellow colour, and the older the furniture

is, which is made of it, the better it looks. But it is already

difficult to get at it, for they cut it every where, and plant it no

where. The curled maple (Acer rubrum) is a species of the common red

maple, but likewise very difficult to be got. You may cut down many

trees without finding the wood which you want. The wood of the sweet

gum-tree (Liquidambar) is merely employed in joiner’s work, such as

tables, and other furniture. But it must not be brought near the fire,

because it warps. The firs and the white cedars (Cupressus thyoides)

are likewise made use of by the joiners for different sorts of work.

The millers who attended the mill which stood here, said, that the

axle-trees of the wheels of the mill were made of white oak, and that

they continued good three or four years, but that the fir-wood does not

keep so well. The cogs of the mill-wheel, and the pullies, are made of

the wood of the white walnut-tree, because it is the hardest which can

be got here. The wood of mulberry-trees is of all others reckoned the

most excellent for pegs and plugs in ships and boats.

At night I went over the river Delaware, from Willmington, to the

ferrying-place, on the New Jersey side.

December the 13th. In the morning I returned to Raccoon.

On many trees in the woods of this country, either on one of the sides,

or in the middle of a branch, or round a branch, are greater or lesser

knobs or excrescences. Sometimes there is only a single one in a tree.

In the size there is a considerable difference, for some of these knobs

are as big and bigger than a man’s head, others are only small. They

project above the surface of the tree, like a tumor. Sometimes a tree

was quite covered with them. They do not ly on one side only, but often

form a circle round a branch, and even round the stem itself. The trees

which have these knobs are not always great ones, but some not above a

fathom high. The knobs commonly consist of the same parts as the wood

itself, and look within like curled wood. Some of them are hollow. When

a knob on a little tree is cut open, we commonly find a number of

little worms in it, which are sometimes also common in the greater

knobs. This shews the origin of the knobs in general. The tree is stung

by insects, which lay their eggs under the bark, and from the eggs

worms are afterwards hatched. They occasion an extravasation of the

sap, which gradually condenses into a knob. Only the trees with annual

deciduous leaves have these knobs, and among them chiefly the oak, of

which again the black and Spanish oak have the greatest abundance of

knobs. The ash trees, (Fraxinus excelsior) and the red maple (Acer

rubrum) likewise have enough of them. Formerly the Swedes, and more

especially the Finlanders, who are settled here, made dishes, bowls,

&c. of the knobs which were on the ash-trees. These vessels, I am told,

were very pretty, and looked as if they were made of curled wood. The

oak-knobs cannot be employed in this manner, as they are commonly

worm-eaten and rotten within. At present the Swedes no longer make use

of such bowls and dishes, but make use of earthen ware, or vessels made

of other wood. Some knobs are of an uncommon size, and make a tree have

a monstrous appearance. Trees with knobs are very common in the woods

of this country [4].

The roads are good or bad according to the difference of the ground. In

a sandy soil the roads are dry and good; but in a clayey one they are

bad. The people here are likewise very careless in mending them. If a

rivulet be not very great, they do not make a bridge over it; and

travellers may do as well as they can to get over: Therefore many

people are in danger of being drowned in such places, where the water

is risen by a heavy rain. When a tree falls across the road, it is

seldom cut off, to keep the road clear, but the people go round it.

This they can easily do, since the ground is very even, and without

stones; has no underwood or shrubs, and the trees on it stand much

asunder. Hence the roads here have so many bendings.

The farms are most of them single, and you seldom meet with even two

together, except in towns, or places which are intended for towns;

therefore there are but few villages. Each farm has its corn-fields,

its woods, its pastures and meadows. This may perhaps have contributed

something towards the extirpation of wolves, that they every where met

with houses, and people who fired at them. Two or three farm-houses

have generally a pasture or a wood in common, and there are seldom more

together; but most of them have their own grounds divided from the

others.

December the 18th. All persons who intend to be married, must either

have their banns published three times from the pulpit, or get a

licence from the governor. The banns of the poorer sort of people only

are published, and all those who are a little above them get a licence

from the governor. In that licence he declares that he has examined the

affair, and found no obstacles to hinder the marriage, and therefore he

allows it. The licence is signed by the governor; but, before he

delivers it, the bridegroom must come to him in company with two

creditable and well known men, who answer for him, that there really is

no lawful obstacle to his marriage. These men must subscribe a

certificate, in which they make themselves answerable for, and engage

to bear all the damages of, any complaints made by the relations of the

persons who intend to be married, by their guardians, their masters, or

by those to whom they may have been promised before. For all these

circumstances the governor cannot possibly know. They further certify

that nothing hinders the intended marriage, and that nothing is to be

feared on that account. For a licence they pay five and twenty

shillings in Pensylvanian money, at Philadelphia. The governor keeps

twenty shillings, or one pound, and the remaining five shillings belong

to his secretary. The licence is directed only to protestant clergymen.

The quakers have a peculiar licence to their marriages. But as it would

be very troublesome, especially for those who live far from the

governor’s residence to come up to town for every licence, and to bring

the men with them who are to answer for them, the clergymen in the

country commonly take a sufficient number of licences and certificates,

which are ready printed, with blanks left for the names; they give them

occasionally, and get the common money, one pound, five shillings, for

each of them, besides something for their trouble. The money that they

have collected, they deliver to the governor as soon as they come to

town, together with the certificates, which are signed by two men, as

above-mentioned; they then take again as many licences as they think

sufficient: from hence we may conceive that the governors in the

English North American colonies, besides their salaries, have very

considerable revenues [5].

There is a great mixture of people of all sorts in these colonies,

partly of such as are lately come over from Europe, and partly of such

as have not yet any settled place of abode. Hence it frequently happens

that when a clergyman has married such a couple, the bridegroom says he

has no money at present, but would pay the fee at the first

opportunity: however he goes off with his wife, and the clergyman never

gets his due. This proceeding has given occasion to a custom which is

now common in Maryland. When the clergyman marries a very poor couple,

he breaks off in the middle of the Liturgy, and cries out Where is my

fee? The man must then give the money, and the clergyman proceeds; but

if the bridegroom has no money, the clergyman defers the marriage till

another time, when the man is better provided. People of fortune, of

whom the clergyman is sure to get his due, need not fear this

disagreeable question, when they are married.

However, though the parson has got licences to marry a couple, yet if

he be not very careful, he may get into very disagreeable

circumstances; for in many parts of the country there is a law made,

which, notwithstanding the governor’s licence, greatly limits a

clergyman in some cases. He is not allowed to marry a couple who are

not yet of age, unless he be certain of the consent of their parents.

He cannot marry such strangers as have bound themselves to serve a

certain number of years, in order to pay off their passage from Europe,

without the consent of their masters; if he acts without their consent,

or in opposition to it, he must pay a penalty of fifty pounds,

Pensylvania currency, though he has the licence, and the certificate of

the two men who are to answer for any objection. But parents or masters

give themselves no concern about these men, but take hold of the

clergyman, who is at liberty to prosecute those who gave him the

certificate, and to get his damages repaid. With the consent of the

parents and masters he may marry people without danger to himself. No

clergyman is allowed to marry a negro with one of European extraction,

or he must pay a penalty of one hundred pounds, according to the laws

of Pensylvania.

There is a very peculiar diverting custom here, in regard to marrying.

When a man dies, and leaves his widow in great poverty, or so that she

cannot pay all the debts with what little she has left, and that,

notwithstanding all that, there is a person who will marry her, she

must be married in no other habit than her shift. By that means, she

leaves to the creditors of her deceased husband her cloaths, and every

thing which they find in the house. But she is not obliged to pay them

any thing more, because she has left them all she was worth, even her

cloaths, keeping only a shift to cover her, which the laws of the

country cannot refuse her. As soon as she is married, and no longer

belongs to the deceased husband, she puts on the cloaths which the

second has given her. The Swedish clergymen here have often been

obliged to marry a woman in a dress which is so little expensive, and

so light. This appears from the registers kept in the churches, and

from the accounts given by the clergymen themselves. I have likewise

often seen accounts of such marriages in the English gazettes; which

are printed in these colonies; and I particularly remember the

following relation: A woman went, with no other dress than her shift,

out of the house of her deceased husband to that of her bridegroom, who

met her half way with fine new cloaths, and said, before all who were

present, that he lent them his bride; and put them on her with his own

hands. It seems, he said that he lent the cloaths, lest, if he had said

he gave them, the creditors of the first husband should come, and take

them from her; pretending, that she was looked upon as the relict of

her first husband, before she was married to the second.

December the 21st. It seems very probable, from the following

observations, that long before the arrival of the Swedes, there have

been Europeans in this province; and, in the sequel, we shall give more

confirmations of this opinion. The same old Maons Keen, whom I have

already mentioned before, told me repeatedly, that on the arrival of

the Swedes in the last century, and on their making a settlement,

called Helsingburg, on the banks of the Delaware, somewhat below the

place where Salem is now situated; they found, at the depth of twenty

feet, some wells, inclosed with walls. This could not be a work of the

native Americans, or Indians, as bricks were entirely unknown to them

when the Europeans first settled here, at the end of the fifteenth

century; and they still less knew how to make use of them. The wells

were, at that time, on the land; but in such a place, on the banks of

the Delaware, as is sometimes under water, and sometimes dry. But

since, the ground has been so washed away, that the wells are entirely

covered by the river, and the water is seldom low enough to shew the

wells. As the Swedes afterwards made new wells for themselves, at some

distance from the former, they discovered, in the ground, some broken

earthen vessels, and some entire good bricks; and they have often got

them out of the ground by ploughing.

From these marks, it seems, we may conclude, that in times of yore,

either Europeans or other people of the then civilized parts of the

world, have been carried hither by storms, or other accidents, settled

here, on the banks of the river, burnt bricks, and made a colony here;

but that they afterwards mixed with the Indians, or were killed by

them. They may gradually, by conversing with the Indians, have learnt

their manners, and turn of thinking. The Swedes themselves are accused,

that they were already half Indians, when the English arrived in the

year 1682. And we still see, that the French, English, Germans, Dutch,

and other Europeans, who have lived for several years together in

distant provinces, near and among the Indians, grow so like them, in

their behaviour and thoughts, that they can only be distinguished by

the difference of their colour. But history, together with the

tradition among the Indians, assures us, that the above-mentioned wells

and bricks cannot have been made at the time of Columbus’s expedition,

nor soon after; as the traditions of the Indians say, that those wells

were made long before that epocha. This account of the wells, which had

been inclosed with bricks, and of such bricks as have been found in

several places in the ground, I have afterwards heard repeated by many

other old Swedes.

December the 22nd. An old farmer foretold a change of the weather,

because the air was very warm this day at noon, though the morning had

been very cold. This he likewise concluded, from having observed the

clouds gathering about the sun. The meteorological observations annexed

to the end of this volume will prove that his observation was just.

December the 31st. The remedies against the tooth-ach are almost as

numerous as days in a year. There is hardly an old woman but can tell

you three or four score of them, of which she is perfectly certain that

they are as infallible and speedy in giving relief, as a month’s

fasting, by bread and water, is to a burthensome paunch. Yet it happens

often, nay too frequently, that this painful disease eludes all this

formidable army of remedies. However, I cannot forbear observing the

following remedies, which have sometimes, in this country, been found

effectual against the tooth-ach.

When the pains come from the hollowness of the teeth, the following

remedy is said to have had a good effect: A little cotton is put at the

bottom of a tobacco-pipe; the tobacco is put in upon it, and lighted;

and you smoke till it is almost burnt up. By smoking, the oil of the

tobacco gets into the cotton, which is then taken out, and applied to

the tooth as hot as it can be suffered.

The chief remedy of the Iroquois, or Iroquese, against the tooth-ach

occasioned by hollow teeth, I heard of Captain Lindsey’s lady, at

Oswego; and she assured me, that she knew, from her own experience,

that the remedy was effectual. They take the seed capsules of the

Virginian Anemone, as soon as the seed is ripe, and rub them in pieces.

It will then be rough, and look like cotton. This cotton-like substance

is dipped into strong brandy, and then put into the hollow tooth, which

commonly ceases to ache soon after. The brandy is biting or sharp, and

the seeds of the anemone, as most seeds of the Polyandria Polygynia

class of plants (or such as have many Stamina, or male flowers, and

many Pistilla, or female flowers) have likewise an acrimony. They

therefore, both together, help to assuage the pain; and this remedy is

much of the same kind with the former. Besides that, we have many seeds

which have the same qualities with the American anemone.

The following remedy was much in vogue against the tooth-ach which is

attended with a swelling: They boil gruel, of flour of maize, and milk;

to this they add, whilst it is yet over the fire, some of the fat of

hogs, or other suet, and stir it well, that every thing may mix

equally. A handkerchief is then spread over the gruel, and applied as

hot as possible to the swelled cheek, where it is kept till it is gone

cool again. I have found, that this remedy has been very efficacious

against a swelling as it lessens the pain, abates the swelling, opens a

gathering, if there be any, and procures a good discharge of the Pus.

I have seen the Iroquese boil the inner bark of the Sambucus

Canadensis, or Canada Elder, and put it on that part of the cheek in

which the pain was most violent. This, I am told, often diminishes the

pain.

Among the Iroquese, or Five Nations, upon the river Mohawk, I saw a

young Indian woman, who, by frequent drinking of tea, had got a violent

tooth-ach. To cure it, she boiled the Myrica asplenii folia, and tied

it, as hot as she could bear it, on the whole cheek. She said, that

remedy had often cured the tooth-ach before.

January the 2nd, 1749. Before the Europeans under the direction of

Columbus, came to the West Indies, the savages or Indians (who lived

there since times immemorial) were entirely unacquainted with iron,

which appears very strange to us, as North America, almost in every

part of it, contains a number of iron mines. They were therefore

obliged to supply this want with sharp stones, shells, claws of birds

and wild beasts, pieces of bones, and other things of that kind,

whenever they intended to make hatchets, knives, and such like

instruments. From hence it appears, that they must have led a very

wretched life. The old Swedes who lived here, and had had an

intercourse with the Indians when they were young, and at a time when

they were yet very numerous in these parts, could tell a great many

things concerning their manner of living. At this time the people find

accidentally, by ploughing and digging in the ground, several of the

instruments which the Indians employed, before the Swedes and other

Europeans had provided them with iron tools. For it is observable that

the Indians at present make use of no other tools, than such as are

made of iron and other metals, and which they always get from the

Europeans: Of this I shall be more particular, in its proper place. But

having had an opportunity of seeing, and partly collecting a great many

of the ancient Indian tools, I shall here describe them.

Their hatchets were made of stone. Their shape is similar to that of

the wedges with which we cleave our wood, about half a foot long, and

broad in proportion; they are made like a wedge, sharp at one end, but

rather blunter than our wedges. As this hatchet must be fixed on a

handle, there was a notch made all round the thick-end. To fasten it,

they split a stick at one end, and put the stone between it, so that

the two halves of the stick come into the notches of the stone; then

they tied the two split ends together with a rope or something like it,

almost in the same way as smiths fasten the instrument with which they

cut off iron, to a split stick. Some of these stone-hatchets were not

notched or furrowed at the upper end, and it seems they only held those

in their hands in order to hew or strike with them, and did not make

handles to them. Most of the hatchets which I have seen, consisted of a

hard rock-stone: but some were made of a fine, hard, black, apyrous

stone. When the Indians intended to fell a thick strong tree, they

could not make use of their hatchets, but for want of proper

instruments employed fire. They set fire to a great quantity of wood at

the roots of the tree, and made it fall by that means. But that the

fire might not reach higher than they would have it, they fastened some

rags to a pole, dipped them into water, and kept continually washing

the tree, a little above the fire. Whenever they intended to hollow out

a thick tree for a canoe, they laid dry branches all along the stem of

the tree, as far as it must be hollowed out. They then put fire to

those dry branches, and as soon as they were burnt, they were replaced

by others. Whilst these branches were burning, the Indians were very

busy with wet rags, and pouring water upon the tree, to prevent the

fire from spreading too far on the sides and at the ends. The tree

being burnt hollow as far as they found it sufficient, or as far as it

could without damaging the canoe, they took the above described

stone-hatchets, or sharp flints, and quartzes, or sharp shells, and

scraped off the burnt part of the wood, and smoothened the boats

within. By this means they likewise gave it what shape they pleased.

Instead of cutting with a hatchet such a piece of wood as was necessary

for making a canoe, they likewise employed fire. A canoe was commonly

between thirty and forty feet long. The chief use of their hatchets

was, according to the unanimous accounts of all the Swedes, to make

good fields for maize-plantations; for if the ground where they

intended to make a maize-field was covered with trees, they cut off the

bark all round the trees with their hatchets, especially at the time

when they lose their sap. By that means the tree became dry, and could

not take any more nourishment, and the leaves could no longer obstruct

the rays of the sun from passing. The smaller trees were then pulled

out by main force, and the ground was a little turned up with crooked

or sharp branches.

Instead of knives they were satisfied with little sharp pieces of flint

or quartz, or else some other hard kind of a stone, or with a sharp

shell, or with a piece of a bone which they had sharpened.

At the end of their arrows they fastened narrow angulated pieces of

stone; they made use of them, having no iron to make them sharp again,

or a wood of sufficient hardness: these points were commonly flints or

quartzes, but sometimes likewise another kind of a stone. Some employed

the bones of animals, or the claws of birds and beasts. Some of these

ancient harpoons are very blunt, and it seems that the Indians might

kill birds and small quadrupeds with them; but whether they could enter

deep into the body of a great beast or of a man, by the velocity which

they get from the bow, I cannot ascertain; yet some have been found

very sharp and well made.

They had stone pestles, about a foot long, and as thick as a man’s arm.

They consist chiefly of a black sort of a stone, and were formerly

employed, by the Indians, for pounding maize, which has, since times

immemorial, been their chief and almost their only corn. They had

neither wind-mills, water-mills, nor hand-mills, to grind it, and did

not so much as know a mill, before the Europeans came into the country.

I have spoken with old Frenchmen, in Canada, who told me, that the

Indians had been astonished beyond expression, when the French set up

the first wind-mill. They came in numbers, even from the most distant

parts, to view this wonder, and were not tired with sitting near it for

several days together, in order to observe it; they were long of

opinion that it was not driven by the wind, but by the spirits who

lived within it. They were partly under the same astonishment when the

first water-mill was built. They formerly pounded all their corn or

maize in hollow trees, with the above-mentioned pestles, made of stone.

Many Indians had only wooden pestles. The blackish stone, of which the

hatchets and pestles are sometimes made, is very good for a grindstone,

and therefore both the English and the Swedes employ the hatchets and

pestles chiefly as grindstones, at present, when they can get them.

The old boilers or kettles of the Indians, were either made of clay, or

of different kinds of pot-stone, (Lapis ollaris). The former consisted

of a dark clay, mixt with grains of white sand or quartz, and burnt in

the fire. Many of these kettles have two holes in the upper margin, on

each side one, through which the Indians put a stick, and held the

kettle over the fire, as long as it was to boil. Most of the kettles

have no feet. It is remarkable that no pots of this kind have been

found glazed, either on the outside or the inside. A few of the oldest

Swedes could yet remember seeing the Indians boil their meat in these

pots. They are very thin, and of different sizes; they are made

sometimes of a greenish, and sometimes of a grey pot-stone, and some

are made of another species of apyrous stone; the bottom and the margin

are frequently above an inch thick. The Indians, notwithstanding their

being unacquainted with iron, steel, and other metals, have learnt to

hollow out very ingeniously these pots or kettles of pot-stone.

The old tobacco-pipes of the Indians are likewise made of clay, or

pot-stone, or serpentine-stone. The first sort are shaped like our

tobacco-pipes, though much coarser and not so well made. The tube is

thick and short, hardly an inch long, but sometimes as long as a

finger; their colour comes nearest to that of our tobacco-pipes which

have been long used. Their tobacco-pipes of pot-stone are made of the

same stone as their kettles. Some of them are pretty well made, though

they had neither iron nor steel. But besides these kinds of

tobacco-pipes, we find another sort of pipes, which are made with great

ingenuity, of a very fine, red pot-stone, or a kind of serpentine

marble. They are very scarce, and seldom made use of by any other than

the Indian Sachems, or elders. The fine red stone, of which these pipes

are made, is likewise very scarce, and is found only in the country of

those Indians who are called Ingouez, and who, according to father

Charlevoix, live on the other side of the river Missisippi [6]. The

Indians themselves commonly value a pipe of this kind as much as a

piece of silver of the same size, and sometimes they make it still

dearer. Of the same kind of stone commonly consists their pipe of

peace, which the French call calumet de paix, and which they make use

of in their treaties of peace, and alliances. Most authors who have

wrote of these nations mention this instrument, and I intend to speak

of it when an opportunity offers.

The Indians employ hooks made of bone, or bird’s claws, instead of

fishing-hooks. Some of the oldest Swedes here told me, that when they

were young, a great number of Indians had been in this part of the

country, which was then called New Sweden, and had caught fishes in the

river Delaware, with these hooks.

They made fire by rubbing one end of a hard piece of wood continually

against another dry one, till the wood began to smoke, and afterwards

to burn.

Such were the tools of the antient Indians, and the use which they made

of them, before the Europeans invaded this country, and before they

(the Indians) were acquainted with the advantages of iron. North

America abounds in iron-mines, and the Indians lived all about the

country before the arrival of the Europeans, so that several places can

be shewn in this country, where at present there are iron-mines, and

where, not a hundred years ago, stood great towns or villages of the

Indians. It is therefore very remarkable that the Indians did not know

how to make use of a metal or ore which was always under their eyes,

and on which they could not avoid treading every day. They even lived

upon the very spots where iron ores were afterwards found, and yet they

often went many miles in order to get a wretched hatchet, knife, or the

like, as above described. They were forced to employ several days in

order to sharpen their tools, by rubbing them against a rock, or other

stones, though the advantage was far from being equal to the labour.

For they could never cut down a thick tree with their hatchets, and

with difficulty they felled a small one. They could not hollow out a

tree with their hatchets, or do a hundredth part of the work which we

can perform with ease, by the help of our iron hatchets. Thus we see

how disadvantageous the ignorance and inconsiderate contempt of useful

arts is. Happy is the country which knows their full value!

January the 5th. Christmas-day was celebrated this day by the Swedes

and English, for they kept then to the old stile.

January the 6th. There are a great number of hares in this country, but

they differ from our Swedish ones in their size, which is very small,

and but little bigger than that of a rabbit; they keep almost the same

grey colour both in summer and winter, which our Northern hares have in

summer only; the tip of their ears is always grey, and not black; the

tail is likewise grey on the upper side, at all seasons; they breed

several times a year: in spring they lodge their young ones in hollow

trees, and in summer, in the months of June and July, they breed in the

grass. When they are surprised they commonly take refuge in hollow

trees, out of which they are taken by means of a crooked stick, or by

cutting a hole into the tree, opposite to the place where they lie; or

by smoke, which is occasioned by making a fire on the outside of the

tree. On all these occasions the greyhounds must be at hand. These

hares never bite, and can be touched without any danger. In day-time

they usually lie in hollow trees, and hardly ever stir from thence,

unless they be disturbed by men or dogs; but in the night they come

out, and seek their food. In bad weather, or when it snows, they lie

close for a day or two, and do not venture to leave their retreats.

They do a great deal of mischief in the cabbage-fields; but apple-trees

suffer infinitely more from them, for they peel off all the bark next

to the ground. The people here agreed that the hares are fatter in a

cold and severe winter, than in a mild and wet one, of which they could

give me several reasons, from their own conjectures. The skin is

useless, because it is so loose, that it can be drawn off; for when you

would separate it from the flesh, you need only pull at the fur, and

the skin follows: these hares cannot be tamed. They were at all times,

even in the midst of winter, plagued with a number of common fleas [7].

January the 16th. The common mice were in great abundance in the towns

and in the country; they do as much mischief as in the old countries.

Oldmixon in his book, the British Empire in America, vol. i. p. 444,

writes, that North America had neither rats nor mice before European

ships brought them over. How far this is true I know not. It is

undoubted, that in several desart places, where no man ever lived, I

have seen and killed the common mice, in crevices of stones or

mountains; and is it probable that all such mice as are spread in this

manner, throughout the inland parts of the country, derive their origin

from those which were brought over from Europe?

Rats likewise may be ranked among those animals which do great damage

in this country. They live both in the cities and in the country, and

destroy the provisions. Their size is the same with that of our rats,

but their colour differs; for they are grey, or blue-grey. I enquired

of the Swedes, Whether these rats had been here prior to the arrival of

the Europeans, or whether they came over in the ships? But I could not

get an answer which I might depend upon. All agreed, that a number of

these dangerous and mischievous animals were every year brought to

America, by ships from Europe and other countries. But Mr. Bartram

maintained, that before the Europeans settled here, rats had been in

the country; for he saw a great number of them on the high mountains,

which are commonly called the Blue Mountains, where they lived among

stones, and in the subterraneous grottoes which are in those mountains.

They always lie very close in the day-time, and you hardly ever see one

out; but at night they come out, and make a terrible noise. When the

cold was very violent, they seemed quite torpid; for during the

continuance of the cold weather, one could not hear the least noise, or

shrieking, occasioned by them. It is to be observed, that neither the

Swedes nor the English have any dark windows in their houses here.

There is hardly a dormer-window in the garret; but only loose boards.

The walls in the wooden houses are frequently not closed, even with

moss; so that the rooms, though they have fires in them, are no warmer

than the outside apartment, or hall. The rooms where the servants sleep

have never any fire in them, though the winter is pretty severe

sometimes. The rats have, therefore, little or no warmth in winter; but

as soon as a milder season makes its appearance, they come out again.

We observed several times this winter, that the rats were very active,

and made an unusual noise all night, just before a severe cold. It

seems, they had some sensation of cold weather being at hand; and that

they therefore eat sufficiently, or stored up provisions. In mild

weather, they were used to carry away apples, and other provisions:

therefore, we could always conclude, with certainty, when the rats made

an uncommon noise at night, or were extremely greedy, that a severe

cold would ensue. I have already observed in the preceding volume, p.

312, that the grey squirrels in this country have the same quality.

When these, and the common mice, eat maize, they do not consume the

whole grains, but only the loose, sweet and soft kernel, and leave the

rest.

January the 21st. The cold now equalled that of Sweden, though this

country is so much more southerly. The Celsian or Swedish thermometer

was twenty-two degrees below the freezing point, in the morning. As the

rooms are without any shutters here, the cracks in the walls not closed

with moss, and sometimes no fire-place or chimney in the room, the

winters here must be very disagreeable to one who is used to our

Swedish warm winter-rooms. But the greatest comfort here is, that the

cold is of a very short duration. Some days of this month, the room

which I lodged in was such, that I could not write two lines before the

ink would freeze in my pen. When I did not write, I could not leave the

ink-stand on the table; but was forced to put it upon the hearth, or

into my pocket. Yet, notwithstanding it was so cold, as appears from

the meteorological observations at the end of this volume, and though

it snowed sometimes for several days and nights together, and the snow

lay near six inches high upon the ground, yet all the cattle are

obliged to stay, day and night, in the fields, during the whole winter.

For neither the English nor the Swedes had any stables; but the Germans

and Dutch had preserved the custom of their country, and generally kept

their cattle in stables during winter. Almost all the old Swedes say,

that on their first arrival in this country, they made stables for

their cattle, as is usual in Sweden; but as the English came, and

settled among them, and left their cattle in the fields all winter, as

is customary in England, they left off their former custom, and adopted

the English one. They owned, however, that the cattle suffered greatly

in winter, when it was very cold, especially when it froze after a

rain, and that some cattle were killed by it in several places, in the

long winter of the year 1741. About noon, the cattle went out into the

woods, where there were yet some leaves on the young oak; but they did

not eat the leaves, and only bit off the extremities of the branches,

and the tops of the youngest oaks. The horses went into the maize

fields, and ate the dry leaves on the few stalks which remained. The

sheep ran about the woods, and on the corn fields. The chickens perched

on the trees of the gardens, at night; for they had no particular

habitations. The hogs were likewise exposed to the roughness of the

weather, within a small inclosure.

A small kind of birds, which the Swedes call Snow-bird, and the English

Chuck-bird, came into the houses about this time. At other times, they

sought their food along the roads. They are seldom seen, but when it

snows. Catesby, in his Natural History of Carolina, calls it Passer

nivalis; and Dr. Linnæus, in his Systema Naturæ, calls it Emberiza

hyemalis.

The river Delaware was now covered with ice opposite Philadelphia, and

even somewhat lower, and the people could walk over it; but nobody

ventured to ride over on horseback.

January the 22d. There are partridges in this country; but they are not

of the same kind with ours. The Swedes called them sometimes rapphons

(partridges), and sometimes aekkerhoens (quails). Some of the English

likewise called them partridges, others quails. Their shape is almost

the same with that of the European partridges, and their nature and

qualities the same: I mean, they run and hide themselves, when pursued.

But they are smaller, and entirely different in colour. In this work I

cannot insert, at large, the descriptions which I have made of birds,

insects, quadrupeds, and plants; because it would swell my volume too

much. I only observe, that the feet are naked, and not hairy; the back

is spotted with brown, black, and white; the breast is dark yellow; and

the belly whitish, with black edges on the tips of the feathers. The

size is nearly that of a hazel-hen, or tetrao bonasia. Above each eye

is a narrow stroke of whitish yellow. These birds are numerous in New

Sweden, i. e. this part of the country. On going but a little way, you

meet with great coveys of them. However, they keep at a great distance

from towns; being either extirpated, or frightened there by the

frequent shooting. They are always in lesser or greater coveys, do not

fly very much, but run in the fields, and keep under the bushes and

near the inclosures, where they seek their food. They are reckoned very

delicious food; and the people here prepare them in different ways. For

that purpose they are caught, and shot in great numbers. They are

caught by putting up a sieve, or a square open box, made of boards, in

the places they frequent. The people strew some oats under the sieve,

and lift it up on one side by a little stick; and as soon as the

partridges are got under the sieve, in order to pick up the oats, it

falls, and they are caught alive. Sometimes they get several partridges

at once. When they run in the bushes, you can come very near them,

without starting them. When they sleep at night, they come together in

an heap. They scratch in the bushes and upon the field, like common

chickens. In spring they make their nests, either under a bush or in

the maize fields, or on the hills in the open air: they scratch some

hay together, into which they lay about thirteen white eggs. They eat

several sorts of corn, and seeds of grass. They have likewise been seen

eating the berries of sumach, or rhus glabra. Some people have taken

them young, and kept them in a cage till they were tame: then they let

them go; and they followed the chickens, and never left the

court-yards.

The inclosures made use of in Pensylvania and New Jersey, but

especially in New York, are those, which on account of their serpentine

form resembling worms, are called worm-fences in English. The poles

which compose this fence are taken from different trees; but they are

not all of equal duration: the red cedar is reckoned the most durable

of any, for it holds out above thirty years; but it is very scarce, and

grows only in a single place hereabouts, so that no fences can be made

of it. It is true, the fences about Philadelphia (which however are

different from the worm-fences) are all made of red cedar; but it has

been brought by water from Egg-harbour, where it grows in abundance.

The supports on which the poles lie are made of the white cedar, or

Cupressus thyoides, and the poles which are laid between them of the

red cedar or Juniperus Virginiana. Next to the cedar-wood, oak and

chesnut are reckoned best. Chesnut is commonly preferred, but it is not

every where so plentiful as to be made into fences; in its stead they

make use of several sorts of oak. In order to make inclosures, the

people do not cut down the young trees, as is common with us, but they

fell here and there thick trees, cut them in several places, leaving

the pieces as long as it is necessary, and split them into poles of the

usual thickness; a single tree affords a multitude of poles. Several

old men in this country told me, that the Swedes on their arrival here,

made such inclosures as are usual in Sweden, but they were forced to

leave off in a few years time, because they could not get posts enough;

for they had found by experience that a post being put into the ground

would not last above four or six years before the part under ground was

entirely rotten; but the chief thing was, that they could not get any

switches for to tie them together; they made some of hiccory, which is

one of the toughest trees in this country, and of the white oak; but in

the space of a year or two the switches were rotten, and the fence fell

in pieces of itself, therefore they were forced to give over making

such inclosures. Several of the new comers again attempted, but with

the same bad success, to make fences with posts and switches. The

Swedish way of inclosing therefore will not succeed here. Thus the

worm-fences are one of the most useful sorts of inclosures, especially

as they cannot get any post, made of the woods of this country, to stay

above six or eight years in the ground without rotting. The poles in

this country are very heavy, and the posts cannot bear them well,

especially when it blows a storm; but the worm-fences are easily put up

again, when they are thrown down. Experience has shewn that an

inclosure made of chesnut or white oak seldom holds out above ten or

twelve years, before the poles and posts are thoroughly rotten: when

the poles are made of other wood, the fences hardly stand six or eight

years. Considering how much more wood the worm-fences require, (since

they run in bendings) than other inclosures which go in strait lines,

and that they are so soon useless, one may imagine how the forests will

be consumed, and what sort of an appearance the country will have forty

or fifty years hence, in case no alteration is made; especially as wood

is really squandered away in immense quantities, day and night all the

winter, or nearly one half of the year, for fewel.

February the 8th. The Musk-rats, so called by the English in this

country, on account of their scent, are pretty common in North America;

they always live near the water, especially on the banks of lakes,

rivers, and brooks. On travelling to places where they are, you see the

holes which they have dug in the ground just at the water’s edge, or a

little above its surface. In these holes they have their nests, and

there they continue whenever they are not in the water in pursuit of

food. The Swedes call them Désmans Rattor [8], and the French, Rats

musqués. Linnæus calls this animal Castor Zibethicus. Their food is

chiefly the muscles which ly at the bottom of lakes and rivers; you see

a number of such shells near the entrance of their holes. I am told

they likewise eat several kinds of roots and plants. They differ from

the European Musk-rat, or Linnæus’s Castor Moschatus. The teeth are the

same in both; the tail of the American is compressed on the sides so,

that one sharp edge goes upwards and the other downwards: the hind feet

are not palmated, or joined by a moveable skin, but are peculiar for

having on both sides of the feet, long, white, close, pectinated,

off-standing hair, besides the short hair with which the feet are quite

covered. Such hairs are on both sides of the toes, and do the same

service in swimming as a web. Their size is that of a little cat, or to

be more accurate, the length of the body is about ten inches, and the

tail of the same length: the colour of the head, neck, back, sides, and

of the outside of the thighs, is blackish brown; the hairs are soft and

shining; under the neck, on the breasts, and on the inside of the

thighs, they are grey. They make their nests in the dykes that are

erected along the banks of rivers to keep off the water from the

adjoining meadows; but they often do a great deal of damage, by

spoiling the dykes with digging, and opening passages for the water to

come into the meadows; whereas Beavers stop up all the holes in a dyke

or bank. They make their nests of twigs and such like things

externally, and carry soft stuff into them for their young ones to ly

upon. The Swedes asserted that they could never observe a diminution in

their number, but believed that they were as numerous at present as

formerly. As they damage the banks so considerably, the people are

endeavouring to extirpate them, when they can find out their nests; the

skin is paid for, and this is an encouragement towards catching the

animal. A skin of a Musk-rat formerly cost but three-pence, but at

present they gave from six-pence to nine-pence. The skins are chiefly

employed by hatters, who make hats of the hair, which are said to be

nearly as good as Beaver hats. The Musk-rats are commonly caught in

traps, with apples as baits. In the country of the Iroquese, I saw

those Indians following the holes of the Musk-rats by digging till they

came to their nests, where they killed them all. Nobody here eats their

flesh; I do not know whether the Indians eat it, for they are commonly

not over nice in the choice of meat. The musk-bag is put between the

cloaths in order to preserve them against worms. It is very difficult

to extirpate these Rats when they are once settled in a bank. A Swede,

however, told me, that he had freed his bank, or piece of dyke along

the river, from them in the following manner: He sought for all their

holes, stopped them all up with earth, excepting one, on that side from

whence the wind came. He put a quantity of sulphur into the open

entrance, set fire to it, and then closed the hole, leaving but a small

one for the wind to pass through. The smoke of the sulphur then entered

their most remote nests, and stifled all the animals. As soon as the

sulphur was burnt, he was obliged to dig up part of the ground in the

bank, where they had their nests; and he found them lie dead by heaps.

He sold the skins, and they paid his trouble, not to mention the

advantage he got by clearing his bank of the Musk-rats.

Beavers were formerly abundant in New Sweden, as all the old Swedes

here told me. At that time they saw one bank after another raised in

the rivers by beavers. But after the Europeans came over in great

number, and cultivated the country better, the beavers have been partly

killed, and partly extirpated, and partly are removed higher into the

country, where the people are not so numerous. Therefore there is but a

single place in Pensylvania where beavers are to be met with; their

chief food is the bark of the beaver-tree, or Magnolia glauca, which

they prefer to any other. The Swedes therefore put branches of this

tree near the beaver-dykes, into traps, which they laid for the

beavers, whilst they were yet plentiful; and they could almost be

certain of good success. Some persons in Philadelphia have tamed

beavers, so that they go a fishing with them, and they always come back

to their masters. Major Roderfert, in New York, related that he had a

tame beaver above half a year in his house, where he went about quite

loose, like a dog. The major gave him bread, and sometimes fish, which

he was very greedy of. He got as much water in a bowl as he wanted. All

the rags and soft things he could meet with he dragged into a corner,

where he was used to sleep, and made a bed of them. The cat in the

house, having kittens, took possession of his bed, and he did not

hinder her. When the cat went out, the beaver often took the kitten

between his fore paws and held it to his breast to warm it, and doated

upon it; as soon as the cat returned he gave her the kitten again.

Sometimes he grumbled, but never did any hurt, or attempted to bite.

The English and the Swedes gave the name of Mink to an animal of this

country, which likewise lives either in the water, or very near it. I

have never had an opportunity to see any more than the skin of this

animal. But the shape of the skin, and the unanimous accounts I have

heard of it, make me conclude with much certainty, that it belonged to

the genus of weasels or mustelæ. The greatest skin I ever saw, was one

foot, eight inches long, a lesser one was about ten inches long, and

about three inches, one third broad, before it was cut; the colour was

dark brown, and sometimes almost black; the tail was bushy, as that of

a marten; the hair was very close; and the ears short, with short hair.

The length of the feet belonging to the lesser skin was about two

inches long. I am told this animal is so similar to the American

polecat, or Viverra putorius, that they are hardly distinguishable [9].

I have had the following accounts given me of its way of living; it

seldom appears in day-time, but at night it comes out of the hollow

trees, on the banks of rivers. Sometimes it lives in the docks and

bridges, at Philadelphia, where it is a cruel enemy to the rats.

Sometimes it gets into the court-yards at night, and creeps into the

chicken-house, through a small hole, where it kills all the poultry,

and sucks their blood, but seldom eats one. If it meets with geese,

fowls, ducks, or other birds on the road, it kills and devours them. It

lives upon fish and birds. When a brook is near the houses, it is not

easy to keep ducks and geese, for the mink, which lives near rivers,

kills the young ones. It first kills as many as it can come at, and

then it carries them off, and feasts upon them. In banks and dykes near

the water, it likewise does mischief, with digging. To catch it the

people put up traps, into which they put heads of birds, fishes, or

other meat. The skin is sold in the towns, and at Philadelphia; they

give twenty-pence and even two shillings a-piece for them, according to

their size. Some of the ladies get muffs made of these skins; but for

the greatest part they are sent over to England, from whence they are

distributed to other countries. The old Swedes told me that the Indians

formerly used to eat all kinds of flesh, except that of the mink.

I have already mentioned something of the Raccoon; I shall here add

more of the nature of this animal, in a place which is properly its

native country [10]. The English call it every where by the name of

Raccoon, which name they have undoubtedly taken from one of the Indian

nations; the Dutch call it Hespan, the Swedes, Espan, and the Iroquese,

Attigbro. It commonly lodges in hollow trees, lies close in the

day-time, never going out but on a dark, cloudy day; but at night it

rambles and seeks its food. I have been told by several people, that in

bad weather, especially when it snows and blows a storm, the Raccoon

lies in its hole for a week together without coming out once; during

that time it lives by sucking and licking its paws. Its food are

several sorts of fruit, such as maize, whilst the ears are soft. In

gardens it often does a great deal of damage among the apples,

chesnuts, plumbs, and wild grapes, which are what it likes best; among

the poultry it is very cruel. When it finds the hens on their eggs, it

first kills them, and then eats the eggs. It is caught by dogs, which

trace it back to its nest, in hollow trees, or by snares and traps, in

which a chicken, some other bird, or a fish, is put as a bait. Some

people eat its flesh. It leaps with all its feet at once; on account of

this and of several other qualities, many people here reckoned it to

the genus of bears. The skin sold for eighteen-pence, at Philadelphia.

I was told that the Raccoons were not near so numerous as they were

formerly; yet in the more inland parts they were abundant. I have

mentioned the use which the hatters make of their furs; as likewise

that they are easily tamed, that they are very greedy of sweet-meats,

&c. in the preceding volume. Of all the North American wild quadrupeds

none can be tamed to such a degree as this.

February the 10th. In the morning I went to Philadelphia, where I

arrived towards night. On my arrival at the ferry upon the river

Delaware, I found the river quite covered with drifts of ice, which at

first prevented our crossing the water. After waiting about an hour,

and making an opening near the ferry, I, together with many more

passengers, got over, before any more shoals came on. As it began to

freeze very hard soon after the twelfth of January (or New Year,

according to the old style) the river Delaware was covered with ice,

which by the intenseness of the frost grew so strong, that the people

crossed the river with horses at Philadelphia. The ice continued till

the eighth of February, when it began to get loose, and the violent

hurricane, which happened that night, broke it, and it was driven down

so fast, that on the twelfth of February not a single shoal came down,

excepting a piece or two near the shore.

Crows flew in great numbers together to-day, and settled on the tops of

trees. During the whole winter we hardly observed one, though they are

said to winter there. During all this spring they commonly used to sit

at the tops of trees in the morning; yet not all together, but in

several trees. They belong to the noxious birds in this part of the

world, for they chiefly live upon corn. After the maize is planted or

sown, they scratch the grains out of the ground and eat them. When the

maize begins to ripen, they peck a hole into the involucrum which

surrounds the ear, by which means the maize is spoiled, as the rain

passes through the hole which they have made, and occasions the

putrefaction of the corn. Besides eating corn, they likewise steal

chickens. They are very fond of dead carcasses. Some years ago the

government of Pensylvania had given three-pence, and that of New Jersey

four-pence premium for every head of a Crow, but this law has now been

repealed, as the expences are too great. I have seen the young Crows of

this kind in several places playing with tame ones whose wings were

cut. The latter hopped about the fields, near the farm-houses where

they belonged to, but always returned again, without endeavouring to

escape on any occasion. These American Crows are only a variety of the

Royston Crow, or Linnæus’s Corvus Cornix.

February the 12th. In the afternoon I returned to Raccoon from

Philadelphia.

On my journey to Raccoon, I attentively observed the trees which had

yet any leaves left. The leaves were pale and dried up, but not all

dropt from the following trees:

The Beach-tree, (Fagus sylvatica) whether great or small; it always

kept a considerable part of its leaves during the whole winter even

till spring. The greater trees kept the lowermost leaves.

The white oak (Quercus alba). Most of the young trees which were not

above a quarter of a yard in diameter, had the greatest part of their

leaves still on them, but the old trees had lost most of theirs, except

in some places where they have got new shoots. The colour of the dry

leaves was much paler in the white oak than in the black one.

The black oak (as it is commonly called here). Dr. Linnæus calls it the

red oak, Quercus rubra. Most of the young trees still preserved their

dried leaves. Their colour was reddish brown, and darker than that of

the white oak.

The Spanish oak, which is a mere variety of the black oak. The young

trees of this kind likewise keep their leaves.

A scarce species of oak which is known by its leaves having a

triangular apex or top, whose angles terminate in a short bristle; the

leaves are smooth below, but woolly above [11]. The young oaks of this

species had still their leaves.

When I came into any wood where the above kinds of oaks were only

twenty years, and even not so old, I always found the leaves on them.

It seems that Providence has, besides other views, aimed to protect

several sorts of birds, it being very cold and stormy about this time,

by preserving even the dry leaves on these trees. I have this winter at

several times seen birds hiding in the trees covered with old leaves

during a severe cold or storm.

February the 13th. As I began to dig a hole to-day, I found several

insects which were crept deep into the ground in order to pass the

winter. As soon as they came to the air, they moved their limbs a

little, but had not strength sufficient for creeping, except the black

ants, which crept a little, though slowly.

Formica nigra, or the black ant, were pretty numerous, and somewhat

lively. They lay about ten inches below the surface.

Carabus latus. Some of these lay at the same depth with the ants. This

is a very common insect in all North America.

Scarabæus; chesnut-coloured, with a hairy thorax; the elytræ shorter

than the abdomen, with several longitudinal lines, beset with hair. It

is something similar to the cock-chaffer, but differs in many respects.

I found it very abundant in the ground.

Gryllus campestris, or the field-cricket: They lay ten inches deep;

they were quite torpid, but as soon as they came into a warm place they

revived and were quite lively. In summer I have found these crickets in

great plenty in all parts of North America where I have been. They

leaped about on the fields, and made a noise like that of our common

house-crickets, so that it would be difficult to distinguish them by

their chirping. They sometimes make so great a noise, that it causes

pain in the ears, and even two people cannot understand each other. In

such places where the rattle-snakes live, the field-crickets are very

disagreeable, and in a manner dangerous, for their violent chirping

prevents the warning, which that horrid snake gives with its rattle,

from reaching the ear, and thus deprives one of the means of avoiding

it. I have already mentioned that they likewise winter sometimes in

chimnies [12]. Here they ly all winter in the ground, but at the

beginning of March, as the air was grown warm, they came out of their

holes, and began their music, though at first it was but very faint and

rarely heard. When we were forced on our travels to sleep in

uninhabited places, the crickets had got into the folds of our clothes,

so that we were obliged to stop an hour every morning in examining our

clothes, before we could get rid of them.

The red ants (Formica rufa) which in Sweden make the great ant-hills, I

likewise found to-day and the following day; they were not in the

ground, for when my servant Yungstroem cut down old dry trees, he met

with a number of them in the cracks of the tree. These cracks were at

the height of many yards in the tree, and the ants were crept so high,

in order to find their winter habitation: As soon as they came into a

warm place, they began to stir about very briskly.

February the 14th. The Swedes and the English gave the name of blue

bird to a very pretty little bird, which was of a fine blue colour.

Linnæus calls it Motacilla Sialis. Catesby has drawn it in his Natural

history of Carolina, vol. I. pl. 47, and described it by the name of

Rubecula Americana cærulea; and Edwards has represented it in his

Natural history of birds, plate and page 24. In my own journal I called

it Motacilla cærulea nitida, pectore rufo, ventre albo. In Catesby’s

plate I must observe, that the colour of the breast ought to be dirty

red or ferruginous; the tibiæ and feet black as jet; the bill too

should be quite black; the blue colour in general ought to be much

deeper, more lively and shining; no bird in Sweden has so shining and

deep a blue colour as this: The jay has perhaps a plumage like it. The

food of the blue bird is not merely insects, he likewise feeds upon

plants; therefore in winter, when no insects are to be met with, they

come to the farm-houses in order to subsist on the seeds of hay, and

other small grains.

Red-bird is another species of small bird. Catesby has likewise figured

it [13]. Dr. Linnæus calls it, Loxia Cardinalis. It belongs to that

class of birds which are enemies to bees, lying in wait for them and

eating them. I fed a cock for five months together in a cage; it eat

both maize and buck-wheat, for I gave it nothing else. By its song it

attracted others of its species to the court-yard, and after we had put

some maize on the ground under the window where I had it, the others

came there every day to get their food; it was then easy to catch them

by means of traps. Some of them, especially old ones, both cocks and

hens, would die with grief on being put into cages. Those on the other

hand which were grown tame, began to sing exceedingly sweet. Their note

very nearly resembles that of our European nightingale, and on account

of their agreeable song, they are sent abundantly to London, in cages.

They have such strength in their bill that when you hold your hand to

them they pinch it so hard as to cause the blood to issue forth. In

spring they sit warbling on the tops of the highest trees in the woods,

in the morning. But in cages they sit quite still for an hour; the next

hour they hop up and down, singing; and so they go on alternately all

day.

February the 17th. Cranes (Ardea Canadensis) were sometimes seen flying

in the day-time, to the northward. They commonly stop here early in

spring, for a short time, but they do not make their nests here, for

they proceed on more to the north. Certain old Swedes told me, that in

their younger years, as the country was not yet much cultivated, an

incredible number of cranes were here every spring; but at present they

are not so numerous. Several people who have settled here, eat their

flesh, when they can shoot them. They are said to do no harm to corn,

or the like.

February the 23d. This morning I went down to Penn’s Neck, and returned

in the evening.

Snow lay yet in several parts of the woods, especially where the trees

stood very thick, and the sun could not make its way: however it was

not above four inches deep. All along the roads was ice, especially in

the woods, and therefore it was very difficult to ride horses, which

were not sharp shoed. The people who are settled here know little of

sledges, but ride on horseback to church in winter, though the snow is

sometimes near a foot deep. It lays seldom above a week before it

melts, and then some fresh snow falls.

A species of birds, called by the Swedes, maize-thieves, do the

greatest mischief in this country. They have given them that name,

because they eat maize, both publicly and secretly, just after it is

sown and covered with the ground, and when it is ripe. The English call

them blackbirds. There are two species of them, both described and

drawn by Catesby [14]. Though they are very different in species, yet

there is so great a friendship between them, that they frequently

accompany each other in mixed flocks. However, in Pensylvania, the

first sort are more obvious, and often fly together, without any of the

red-winged stares. The first sort, or the purple daws, bear, in many

points, so great a likeness to the daw, the stare, and the thrush, that

it is difficult to determine to which genus they are to be reckoned,

but seem to come nearest to the stare; for the bill is exactly the same

with that of the thrush, but the tongue, the flight, their sitting on

the trees, their song and shape, make it entirely a stare; at a

distance they look almost black, but close by they have a very blue or

purple cast, but not so much as Catesby’s print: their size is that of

a stare; the bill is conic, almost subulated, strait, convex, naked at

the base, black, with almost equal mandibles, the upper being only a

very little longer than the lower; the nostrils are oblong, yet a

little angulated, so as to form almost squares; they are placed

obliquely at the base of the bill, and have no hair; there is a little

horny knob, or a small prominence on the upper side of them; the tongue

is sharp and bifid at the point; the iris of the eyes is pale; the

forehead, the crown, the nucha, the upper part and the sides of the

neck are of an obscure blue and green shining colour; the sides of the

head under the eyes are obscurely blue; all the back and coverts of the

wings are purple; the upper coverts of the tail are not of so

conspicuous a purple colour, but as it were blackened with soot; the

nine primary quill-feathers are black; the other secundary ones are

likewise black, but their outward margin is purple; the twelve tail

feathers have a blackish purple colour, and their tips are round; those

on the outside are the shortest, and the middle extremely long. When

the tail is spread, it looks round towards the extremity. The throat is

blueish green, and shining; the breast is likewise black or shining

green, according as you turn it to the light; the belly is blackish,

and the vent feathers are obscurely purple-coloured; the parts of the

breast and belly which are covered by the wings, are purple-coloured;

the wings are black below, or rather sooty; and the thighs have

blackish feathers; the legs (tibiæ), and the toes are of a shining

black. It has four toes, as most birds have. The claws are black, and

that on the back toe is longer than the rest. Dr. Linnæus calls this

bird Gracula Quiscula.