The Monroe journal. [volume] (Monroe, N.C.) 189?-1965, 1916-11-28
SCiPEGOAT AGAIN.
keziah Tells Us Some More About
the Sandy Country.
Correspondence Of The Journal.

4
Whiteyille. Nov. 20.-As l am al
ways TOO lazy to go TO bed before
get sleepy and am not feeling much
disposed towards sleep at the present
moment | believe that l will write
The Journal and tell everybody
around home about a little patch of
timber that We have up. or down. in
this part of the world. The tract IS
called white Marsh. but dunno
how it ever got the first part OF its
name for il is about the blacklist and
most gloomy place | ever ran across.
Ii is situated one mile northeast
of whiteville and is 40 miles long and
varies from one TO two miles in
width: through, about the center.
runs black and ugly looking stream
which empties into Lake Waccamaw,
about IL miles fro mhere. To de-
gress fro mthe main subject a mo-
ment. Lake Waccamaw is AZ miles
long and II miles wide. ii is one OF
the best summer resorts in the State.
The fishing is ideal and game such as
bear. deer. coon. wild turkey etc.
abound along its banks. but set out
to try and tell you something OF
White Marsh and had better revert
10 my subject and leave the lake
alone for some future date.
Yesteray evening Sunday was
bright and warm so Mister" Jack
Wooten. with whose family l have
the honor to dwell. harnessed his
pony TO a neat little runabout and
suggested a trip 10 the country.
whereat we both babe farewell to a
number OF high school girls who were
DESTROYS that we hang around anu
crack pecans for them. To digress
again, We may say in all honesty that
we would not have left them but for
the fact that we had been. nightly.
sitting up till near the wee small
hours talking of the wonders OF the
swamp and the alligators that
abound therein. Jack being almost
as great a liar as myself and had my
curiosity stretched TO the straining
point. so we had no regrets for the
girls we left behind us. We logged
along at about the speed at which
John Gilpin rode. with nothing to in
terrupt our dreams of aligators, etc,
except for an occasional gas buggy
which insisted on hogging the road.
| was mentally admiring cornfeld
that was fenced in and had large
number of cows and hogs in the en-
closure gathering the crop, when we
dropped over the top of small hill
and there was the object OF our
journey, three hundred yards away.
But who At that distance would have
thought of calling it marsh or
swamp, il appeared. simply to be a
vast forest and so il was: there grow
ing with a splendor that one would
only expect to find in tropical coun-
tries, was almost every kind of hard
wood from the humble black gum TO
the lordly crypress, and hanging from
their limbs were great wavy ten
drills of beautiful fawn colored moss
much of it extending downward five
feet or more from the supporting
limbs.
The road runs right through the
swamp for no other reason than II
couldn't go round II. II is claimed
that Lord CORVALLIS constructed the
original road during the Revolution
airy war when he was hemmed in and
had no alternative but to 90 forward.
Since those days the road bed has
been elevated about four feet and
the main stream near the center OF
the swamp is spanned by bridge
while at various intervals are about
twenty or thirty spillways, also
brdged. In dry season the water in
the main stream. there is several,
runs nearly level with the banks. A
very slight freshet has the effect OF
flooding thousands of acres of forest,
but with very little effect upon the
animal life resident therein. All
about in the swamp are little knobs
where the waters never reach and
even If it did ii would do little
damage to the creatures that make
of these islands haven. There is
almost no tide and anything could
easily swim or wade to safety for
il takes tremendous amount of wa
ter to inudate the whole area to any
considerable depth.
The chain gang has been at work
in the swamp for the past several
weeks endeavoring to clear one side
of the road of the timber so as to
permit the entrance of the sun, gen.
orally, the road has been pretty bad
for no sunlight has ever reached it
and it was impossible for it to dry
quickly after rains. The work they
are now doing will change all that,
they have cut a sweep OF timber near
ly two hundred feet wide bordering
on one side 1T would astonish some
of you to look across that area of fell
ed timber. They are Just cutting
trees right and left and leaving them