low a rate, that no trouble is experienced by the canoeist from
the disturbance caused by their revolving screws. Freedmen, poling
flats loaded with shingles or frame stuff, roared out their merry
songs as they passed. The canal entered the North Landing River
without any lockage; just beyond was North Landing, from which the
river takes its name. A store and evidences of a settlement meet the
eye at a little distance. The river is tortuous, and soon leaves the
swamp behind. The pine forest is succeeded by marshes on both sides of
the slow-flowing current.

Three miles from North Landing a single miniature house is seen; then
for nearly five miles along the river not a trace of the presence of man
is to be met, until Pungo Ferry and Landing loom up out of the low
marshes on the east side of the river. This ferry, with a store
three-quarters of a mile from the landing, and a farm of nearly two
hundred acres, is the property of Mr. Charles N. Dudley, a southern
gentleman, who offers every inducement in his power to northern men to
settle in his vicinity. Many of the property-holders in the uplands are
willing to sell portions of their estates to induce northern men to come
among them.

It was almost dark when I reached the storehouse at Pungo Ferry; and as
Sunday is a sacred day with me, I determined to camp there until Monday.
A deformed negro held a lease of the ferry, and pulled a flat back and
forth across the river by means of a chain and windlass. He was very
civil, and placed his quarters at my disposal until I should be ready to
start southward to Currituck Sound. We lifted the canoe and pushed it
through an open window into the little store-room, where it rested upon
an unoccupied counter. The negro went up to the loft above, and threw
down two large bundles of flags for a bed, upon which I spread my
blankets. An old stove in a corner was soon aglow with burning light
wood. While I was cooking my supper, the little propeller Cygnet, which
runs between Norfolk and Van Slyck's Landing, at Currituck Narrows,
touched at Pungo Ferry, and put off an old woman who had been on a two
years' visit to her relatives. She kindly accosted the dwarfed black
with, "Charles, have you got a match for my pipe?"

"Yes, missus," civilly responded the negro, handing her a light.

"Well, this _is good_!" soliloquized the ancient dame, as she seated
herself on a box and puffed away at the short-stemmed pipe. "Ah, good
indeed to get