it of enterprise, which characterized the men of his time, when
the manners of chivalry were united to zeal for commerce, and made
subservient to the acquisition of wealth. But Captain Smith is
most remarkable for uniting to the virtues which characterized his
contemporaries several qualities to which they were generally strangers;
his style is simple and concise, his narratives bear the stamp of truth,
and his descriptions are free from false ornament. This author throws
most valuable light upon the state and condition of the Indians at the
time when North America was first discovered.

The second historian to consult is Beverley, who commences his narrative
with the year 1585, and ends it with 1700. The first part of his book
contains historical documents, properly so called, relative to the
infancy of the colony. The second affords a most curious picture of the
state of the Indians at this remote period. The third conveys very clear
ideas concerning the manners, social conditions, laws, and political
customs of the Virginians in the author's lifetime. Beverley was a
native of Virginia, which occasions him to say at the beginning of
his book, that he entreats his readers not to exercise their critical
severity upon it, since, having been born in the Indies, he does not
aspire to purity of language. Notwithstanding this colonial modesty, the
author shows throughout his book the impatience with which he endures
the supremacy of the mother-country. In this work of Beverley are also
found numerous traces of that spirit of civil liberty which animated the
English colonies of America at the time when he wrote. He also shows the
dissensions which existed among them, and retarded their independence.
Beverley detests his Catholic neighbors of Maryland even more than
he hates the English government: his style is simple, his narrative
interesting, and apparently trustworthy.

I saw in America another work which ought to be consulted, entitled "The
History of Virginia," by William Stith. This book affords some curious
details, but I thought it long and diffuse. The most ancient as well as
the best document to be consulted on the history of Carolina, is a work
in small quarto, entitled "The History of Carolina," by John Lawson,
printed at London in 1718. This work contains, in the first part, a
journey of discovery in the west of Carolina; the account of which,
given in the form of a journal, is in general confused and superficial