Page:Memoirs of a Huguenot Family.djvu/440

 432 you, that such numbers of people have lately transplanted themselves hence into the more southerly governments, as must appear almost incredible to any, except such as have had an opportunity of knowing it, either from their own observation, or the credible information of others.

From the waters of Potomac, James River, and Roanoke, on the eastern side of the above-mentioned ridge of mountains, nay, from the side of the Blue Ridge, hundreds of families have, within these few months past, removed, deserted their habitations, and conveyed themselves and their most valuable movables into other governments.

By Bedford Court House, in one week, it is said, and I believe truly said, near three hundred persons, inhabitants of this colony, passed on their way to Carolina. And I have it from good authors, that no later in autumn than October, five thousand more had crossed James River, only at one ferry, that at Goochland Court House, and journeying towards the same place; and doubtless great numbers have passed that way since. And, although all these had not been settled in Virginia, yet a large proportion of them had. From all the upper counties, even those on this side the Blue Hills, great numbers are daily following, and others preparing to follow in the spring. Scarce do I know a neighborhood but has lost some families, and expects quickly to lose more. What aggravates the misfortune, is, that many of these are not the idler and the vagrant, pests of society, whom it is ever salutary to a body politic to purge off, but the honest and industrious, men of worth and property, whom it is an evil at any time to a community to lose, but is most eminently so to our own in the present critical juncture.

Now, sir, as many have thus quitted fertile lands and