Page:Historic highways of America (Volume 4).djvu/162

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158
BRADDOCK'S ROAD

and the Men eat, this was a Duty so long disused, that it was a Tour of Fatigue to the Teeth. The Fellows who drove the Waggons, tho' they would have made but a shabby Figure amongst our Hampshire Carters, yet here they looked like Angels, compared with the long, lank, yellow-faced Virginians, who at best are a half-starved, ragged, dirty Set; if by Accident they can clear enough by their Tobacco to buy a Coat, they rather chuse a half-wore gaudy Rag, than a substantial coarse Cloth, or Kersey; they are the very Opposites to the Pensilvanians, who buy Coats of Cloth so strong as to last as long as the Garments of the Israelites in their March through the Desert; a Coat serves a Man for his Life and yet looks fresh, but this comes from their never wearing them at Home; when out of Sight they work half naked. They are a very frugal People, and if they were not so would be as beggarly as their Neighbours the Virginians. The Ground does not bear half the Crops as in England; they have no Market but by Sea, and that very dull, if you consider they are forced to put their Flour in Barrels after grinding and