hstanding his
Northern birth and occasional rollicking habits, he is generally
popular.

I then called on Mr Robertson, a merchant, for whom I had brought a
letter of introduction from England. This old gentleman took me for a
drive in his buggy at 6 P.M. It appears that at this time of year the
country outside the city is quite pestilential, for when we reached the
open, Mr Robertson pointed to a detached house and said, "Now, I am as
fond of money as any Jew, yet I wouldn't sleep in that house for one
night if you gave it to me for doing so."

I had intended to have visited Mr Blake, an English gentleman for whom I
had a letter, on his Combahee plantation, but Mr Robertson implored me
to abandon this idea. Mr Robertson was full of the disasters which had
resulted from a recent Yankee raid of the Combahee river. It appears
that a vast amount of property had been destroyed and slaves carried
off. This morning I saw a poor old planter in Mr Robertson's office, who
had been suddenly and totally ruined by this raid. The raiders consisted
principally of Northern armed negroes, and as they met with no Southern
whites to resist them, they were able to effect their depredations with
total impunity. It seems that a good deal of the land about Charleston
belongs either to Blakes or Heywards. Mr Blake lost thirty negroes in
the last raid, but he has lost since the beginning of the war about 150.

Mr Robertson afterwards took me to see Mrs ----, who is Mr Walter
Blake's daughter. To me, who had roughed it for ten weeks to such an
extent, Charleston appeared most comfortable and luxurious. But its
inhabitants must, to say the least, be suffering great inconvenience.
The lighting and paving of the city had gone to the bad completely. Most
of the shops were shut up. Those that were open contained but very few
goods, and those were at famine prices. I tried to buy a black scarf,
but I couldn't find such an article in all Charleston.

An immense amount of speculation in blockade-running was going on, and
a great deal of business is evidently done in buying and selling
negroes, for the papers are full of advertisements of slave auctions.
That portion of the city destroyed by the great fire presents the
appearance of a vast wilderness in the very centre of the town, no
attempt having been made towards rebuilding it; this desert space looks
like the Pompeian ruins, and extends, Mr Robertson says, for a mile in
length by half a mile in