and twitched violently. Another female, who had arrived at womanhood, was so much overcome that she was held up to the breeze by two persons who went to her relief. I never before saw such exhaustion. The vertebral column was completely pliant, her body, her neck, and her extended arms, bent in every direction successively. It would be impossible to describe the diversity of cases; they were not now confined within the fence, but were numerous among the people without. Only a small proportion of them could fall within the observation of any one bystander. The scene was to me equally novel and curious.
About dusk I retired several hundred yards into the woods to enjoy the distant effect of the meeting. Female voices were mournfully predominant, and my imagination figured to me a multitude of mothers, widows, and sisters, giving the {235} first vent to their grief, in bewailing the loss of a male population, by war, shipwreck, or some other great catastrophe.
It had been thought proper to place sentinels without the camp. Females were not allowed to pass out into the woods after dark. Spirituous liquors were not permitted to be sold in the neighbourhood.
Large fires of timber were kindled, which cast a new lustre on every object. The white tents gleamed in the glare. Over them the dusky woods formed a most romantic gloom, only the tall trunks of the front rank were distinctly visible, and these seemed so many members of a lofty colonnade. The illuminated camp lay on a declivity, and exposed a scene that suggested to my mind the moonlight gambols of beings known to us only through the fictions of credulous ages. The greatest turmoil prevailed within the fence, where the inmates were leaping and hobbling together with upward looks and extended
