evening, in company with Mr. Y., of Bellefonte, Center county, Pa.
On Monday the 12th, and Tuesday 13th, Mr. Y. and I promenaded the
principal streets and visited places of interest.

At 6 p.m., Wednesday, September 14, I left Norfolk in the C. W. Thomas,
which steamed to Fortress Monroe, where she arrived at 7-1/2 p.m., when
I got aboard the John Farran, and steamed by the way of the Atlantic
Ocean to Cape Hatteras, through the Swash, and through Pamlico sound to
Neuse river, and thence up to Newbern, where we arrived at 7 p.m. of
the 15th. Having expended all the money that I took with me but a few
cents, I felt perplexed as to how I should reach the Valley City, which
I supposed was at the mouth of the Roanoke river, where I had left her;
but on going ashore at Newbern, I soon learned that she was anchored
off that place, having steamed there during my absence. I quickly
arrived aboard her, feeling delighted that I was once more among my old
naval companions. The next thing of interest I learned was, that
Newbern was being visited by an endemic of yellow fever.

Having already passed twice through the Dismal Swamp Canal, and would
have steamed through it the third time had I not been too late for the
boat that was destroyed, but I was destined to pass through it still
again on my passage home. Lossing, in his history of the American
Revolution, in volume I, page 311, gives a very complete description of
the Dismal Swamp, through which this canal passes. He says:

"Schemes for internal improvements, for facilitating the
development of the resources of the country, often occupied
Washington's most serious attention. At the time we are
considering, he was engaged, with some other enterprising
gentlemen, in a project to drain the Dismal Swamp, an immense
morass lying partly in Virginia and partly in North Carolina, and
extending thirty miles from north to south, and ten miles from east
to west. Within its dark bosom, and nowhere appearing above its
surface, are the sources of five navigable rivers and several
creeks; and in its centre is a body of water known as Drummond's
lake, so named from its alleged discoverer. A great portion of the
morass is covered with tall cypresses, cedars, hemlocks, and
junipers, draped with long mosses, and covered with creeping vines.
In many places it is made impassable by fallen trees, thick brakes,
and a dense growth of shrub