When the inhabitants of Pensylvania sow pease procured from abroad, they are not commonly attacked by these insects for the first year; but in the next they take possession of the pea. It is greatly to be wished that none of the ships which annually depart from New York or Pensylvania, may bring them into the European countries. From hence the power of a single despicable insect will plainly appear; as also, that the study of the œconomy and of the qualities of insects, is not to be looked upon as a mere pastime and useless employment.[31]
The Rhus radicans is a shrub or tree which grows abundantly in this country, and has in common with the ivy, called Hedera arborea, the quality of not growing without the support either of a tree, a wall, or a hedge. I have seen it climbing to the very top of high trees in the [[178]]woods, and its branches shoot out every where little roots, which fasten upon the tree and as it were enter into it. When the stem is cut, it emits a pale brown sap of a disagreeable scent. This sap is so sharp that the letters and characters made upon linnen with it, cannot be got out again, but grow blacker the more the cloath is washed. Boys commonly marked their names on their linnen with this juice. If you write with it on paper, the letters never go out, but grow blacker from time to time.
This species of Sumach has the same noxious qualities as the poisonous sumach, or Poison-tree, which I have above described, being poisonous to some people, though not to every one. Therefore all that has been said of the poison tree is likewise applicable to this; excepting that the former has the stronger poison. However I have seen people who have been as much swelled from the noxious exhalations of the latter, as they could have been from those of the former. I likewise know that of two sisters, the one could manage the tree without being affected by its venom, though the other immediately felt it as soon as the exhalations of the tree came near her, or when ever she came a yard too near the [[179]]tree, and even when she stood in the way of the wind, which blew directly from this shrub. But upon me this species of sumach has never exherted its power, though I made above a hundred experiments upon myself with the greatest stems, and the juice once squirted into my eye, without doing me any harm. On another person’s hand which I had covered very thick with it, the skin a few hours after became as hard as a piece of tanned leather, and peeled off in the following days, as if little scales fell from it.
October the 10th. In the morning I accompanied Mr. Cock to his country seat, which is about nine miles from Philadelphia to the north.
Though the woods of Pensylvania afford many oaks, and more species of them than are found further north, yet they do not build so many ships in this province as they do in the northern ones, and especially in New England. But experience has taught the people that the same kind of trees is more durable the further it grows to the north, and that this advantage decreases the more it grows in warm climates. It is likewise plain that the trees in the south grow more every year, and form thicker ringlets than those in the north. The former [[180]]have likewise much greater tubes for the circulation of the sap than the latter. And for this reason they do not build so many ships in Pensylvania, as they do in New England, though more than in Virginia and Maryland; but Carolina builds very few, and its merchants get all their ships from New England. Those which are here made of the best oak, hardly are serviceable above ten, or at most twelve years; for then they are so rotten, that no body ventures to go to sea in them, Many captains of ships come over from England to North-America, in order to get ships built. But most of them choose New England, that being the most northerly province; and if they even come over in ships which are bound for Philadelphia, they frequently on their arrival set out from Pensylvania for New England. The Spaniards in the West Indies are said to build their ships of a peculiar sort of cedar, which holds out against putrefaction and wet; but it is not to be met with on the continent in the English provinces. Here are above nine different sorts of oak, but not one of them is comparable to the single species we have in Sweden, with regard to its goodness. And therefore a ship of European oak costs a great deal more than one made of American oak. [[181]]
Many people who chiefly employed themselves in gardening, had found in a succession of years, that the red Beet, which grew out of the seed which was got from New York, became very sweet and had a very fine taste; but that it every year lost part of its goodness, if it was cultivated from seeds which were got here. The people were therefore obliged to get as many seeds of red beet every year from New York, as were wanted in their gardens. It has likewise been generally observed, that the plants which are produced from English seeds are always much better and more agreeable, than those which come from seeds of this country.
In the garden of Mr. Cock was a raddish which was in the loose soil, grown so big as to be seven inches in diameter. Every body that saw it, owned it was uncommon to see them of such a size.
That species of Convolvulus which is commonly called Batatas, has here the name of Bermudian potatoes. The common people, and the gentry without distinction planted them in their gardens. This is done in the same manner as with the common potatoes. Some people made little hillocks, into which they put these potatoes; but others only planted them in flat beds. [[182]]The soil must be a mixture of sand and earth, and neither too rich, nor too poor. When they are going to plant them, they cut them, as the common potatoes, taking care however that a bud or two be left upon each piece which is intended to be planted. Their colour is commonly red without, and yellow within. They are bigger than the common sort, and have a sweet and very agreeable taste, which I cannot find in the other potatoes, in artichokes or in any other root, and they almost melt in the mouth. It is not long since they have been planted here. They are dressed in the same manner as common potatoes, and eaten either along with them, or by themselves. They grow very fast and very well here; but the greatest difficulty consists in keeping them over winter, for they will bear neither cold, nor a great heat, nor wet. They must therefore be kept during winter in a box with sand in a warm room. In Pensylvania where they have no valves in their chimnies, they are put in such a box with sand, at some distance from the fire, and there they are secured both against frost and against over great heat. It will not answer the purpose to put them into dry sand in a cellar, as is commonly done with the common sort of potatoes. For the [[183]]moisture which is always in cellars, penetrates the sand, and makes them putrefy. It would probably be very easy to keep them in Sweden in warm rooms, during the cold season. But the difficulty lies wholly in bringing them over to Sweden. I carried a considerable number of them with me on leaving America, and took all possible care in preserving them. But we had a very violent storm at sea, by which the ship was so greatly damaged, that the water got in every where, and wetted our cloaths, beds and other moveables so much, that we could wring the water out of them. It is therefore no wonder that my Bermuda potatoes were rotten; but as they are now cultivated in Portugal and Spain, nay even in England, it will be easy to bring them into Sweden. The drink which the Spaniards prepare from these potatoes in their American possessions is not usual in Pensylvania.[32]
Mr. Cock had a paper mill, on a little brook, and all the coarser sorts of paper are manufactured in it. It is now annually rented for fifty pounds Pensylvania currency. [[184]]
October the 11th. I have already mentioned, that every countryman has a greater or lesser number of apple trees planted round his farm-house, from whence he gets great quantities of fruit, part of which he sells, part he makes cyder of, and part he uses in his own family for pyes, tarts, and the like. However he cannot expect an equal quantity of fruit every year. And I was told, that this year had not by far afforded such a great quantity of apples as the preceding; the cause of which they told me, was the continual and great drought in the month of May, which had hurt all the blossoms of the apple trees, and made them wither. The heat had been so great as to dry up all the plants, and the grass in the fields.