My
stores among them, and, after cutting rushes and
boughs for my bed, turned in for the night.
These negroes had been raising Sea-Island
cotton, but the price having declined to five
cents a pound, they could not get twenty-five
cents a day for their labor by cultivating it.
The fierce wind subsided before dawn, but a
heavy fog covered the marshes and the creek.
Cuffy's "settlement" turned out before sunrise
to see me off; and the canoe soon reached the
broad Cooper River, which I ascended in the
misty darkness by following close to the left
bank. Four miles up the Cooper River from
Calibogue Sound there is a passage through the
marshes from the Cooper to New River, which
is called Ram's Horn Creek. On the right of
its entrance a well-wooded hammock rises from
the marsh, and is called Page Island. About
midway between the two rivers and along this
crooked thoroughfare is another piece of upland.
called Pine Island, inhabited by the families of
two boat-builders.
While navigating Cooper River, as the heavy
mists rolled in clouds over the quiet waters, a
sail-boat, rowed by negroes, emerged from the
gloom and as suddenly disappeared. I shouted
after them: "Please tell me the name of the next
creek." A hoarse voice came back to me from
the cloud:
