to be done, offered
us his lodgings if we wished, and as good accommodations as he had,
which were not much. He had nothing to eat but maize bread which was
poor enough, and some small wild beans boiled in water; and little to
lie on, or to cover one, except the bare ground and leaves. We would
not have rejected this fare if the Lord had made it necessary, and we
were afterwards in circumstances where we did not have as good as
this; but now we could do better. The other person, an Irishman, who
lived about three miles from there, did not urge us much, because,
perhaps, he did not wish us to see how easily he would make two
English shillings for which we had agreed with him to take the horses
and boy to the creek, and put them on the path to reach home. We were
to walk to his house, conducted by the Quaker, while he rode round the
creek with the horses. We had to cross it in a canoe, which, when we
were in it, was not the breadth of two fingers above water, and
threatened every moment to upset. We succeeded, however, in crossing
over, and had then to make our way through bushes by an untrodden
path, going from one newly marked tree to another. These marks are
merely a piece cut out of the bark with an axe, about the height of a
man's eyes from the ground; and by means of them the commonest roads
are designated through all New Netherland and Maryland; but in
consequence of the great number of roads so marked, and their running
into and across each other, they are of little assistance, and indeed
often mislead. Pursuing our way we arrived at the house of Maurits, as
the carpenter was called, where he had already arrived with the
horses, and had earned two shillings sooner than we had walked three
miles, and more than he had made by his whole day's work. We went into
the house and found his Irish wife, engaged in cooking, whereby we
made reprisals in another way. After we had thus taken a good supper,
we were directed to a place to sleep which suited us entirely and
where we rested well.

_13th, Wednesday._ As soon as it was day we ate our breakfast and
left, after giving this man his two shillings, who also immediately
rode off with the young man and the horses, to put him on the path to
Sassafras River, while the Quaker who had remained there during the
night, was to take us to the broad cart-road where he had found us.
But neither he nor we could follow the new marked trees so well in the
morning light, and we soon mis