wife, and as timid as a hare
forbye. When I spoke of fighting the English merchants, he held up his
hands as if I had uttered blasphemy. So, being determined to find out
for myself the truth about this wonderful new land, I left him the
business in the town, bought two good horses, hired a servant, by name
John Faulkner, who had worked out his time as a redemptioner, and set
out on my travels.

This is a history of doings, not of thoughts, or I would have much to
tell of what I saw during those months, when, lean as a bone, and brown
as a hazelnut, I tracked the course of the great rivers. The roads were
rough, where roads there were, but the land smiled under the sun, and
the Virginians, high and low, kept open house for the chance traveller.
One night I would eat pork and hominy with a rough fellow who was
carving a farm out of the forest; and the next I would sit in a fine
panelled hall and listen to gentlefolks' speech, and dine off damask
and silver. I could not tire of the green forests, or the marshes alive
with wild fowl, or the noble orchards and gardens, or even the salty
dunes of the Chesapeake shore. My one complaint was that the land was
desperate flat to a hill-bred soul like mine. But one evening, away
north in Stafford county, I cast my eyes to the west, and saw, blue and
sharp against the sunset, a great line of mountains. It was all I
sought. Somewhere in the west Virginia had her high lands, and one day,
I promised myself, I would ride the road of the sun and find their
secret.

In these months my thoughts were chiefly of trade, and I saw enough to
prove the truth of what the man Frew had told me. This richest land on
earth was held prisoner in the bonds of a foolish tyranny. The rich
were less rich than their estates warranted, and the poor were ground
down by bitter poverty. There was little corn in the land, tobacco
being the sole means of payment, and this meant no trade in the common
meaning of the word. The place was slowly bleeding to death, and I had
a mind to try and stanch its wounds. The firm of Andrew Sempill was
looked on jealously, in spite of all the bowings and protestations of
Mr. Lambie. If we were to increase our trade, it must be at the
Englishman's expense, and that could only be done by offering the
people a better way of business.

When the harvest came and the tobacco fleet arrived, I could see how
the thing worked out. Our two ships, the _Blackcock_ of Ayr and the
_Duncan