Page:Diary of ten years.djvu/78

 62 river, the same in the opposite direction down, and the same distance eastward to the interior.

From Guildford to York is, I suppose, 50 miles; from York to Beverley 20 miles; near the latter place is my grant; so that I shall have an opportunity of seeing it, as well as so much of the interior. Expeditions, however, of this kind in perspective arrangement, are often attended with serious difficulties in actual execution. In the present case, thirty persons must be supplied for eleven days with gunpowder, shot, and clothes; and we can only muster three horses for us all. Thunder and rain—a good dramatic conclusion to one day's diary.

29th.—Worked hard in the garden, planting Indian corn transplanting mangel-wurzel, and preparing beds for rock and water melons, cucumbers and pumpkins, and sowing five different kinds of strawberry seeds, and as many sorts of gooseberry, which latter seeds will not, probably, succeed in this climate.

Letty has been preparing striped cotton shirts for my expedition, these being more suited than linen ones to our climate.

30th.—The pigs, confound them! are gone astray again.

This day I have been burning weed for ashes, and planting maize, of which I shall have half an acre, in drills one yard asunder; and the intervals, which will be perfectly cleared, are to be planted with turnips and cabbages.

Flax and asparagus are indigenous plants here. Of the former I have seen very fine stalks, which before the general use of cotton would have been valuable; the asparagus is not good. I have been actively at work this day, and shall be again to-morrow, in getting in the remainder of my maize, previously to my departure. These two days have been very warm, particularly so to James, who has been fruitlessly hunting for the pigs. We shall be roasted to-morrow, if this heat continues, and all the world here is going to the ball.