During my stay at New York, I took a botanical excursion into New Jersey, by the river side, towards the north. This part of New Jersey is very uneven; the soil is hard and flinty, to judge of it by the grass which I saw in places pulled up. Large rocks, of a chalky nature, as if decayed, appeared even with the ground upon almost all the hills. Notwithstanding, we observed different species of trees; among others, a variety of the red oak, the acorn of which is nearly round; the white oak, quercus alba; and, among the different species or varieties of nut trees, the juglans tomentosa, or mocker-nut, and the juglans minima, or pig-nut. In the low and marshy places, where it is overflowed almost all the year, we found the juglans-hickery, or shell-barked hickery; the quercus prinus aquatica, which belongs to the series of prunus, and is not mentioned in the “History of Oaks.”[4] The valleys are planted with ash trees, palms, cornus florida’s poplars, and quercus tinctoria’s, known in the country by the name of the black oak.

The quercus tinctoria is very common in all the {17} northern states; it is likewise found to the west of the Alleghany mountains, but is not so abundant in the low part of Georgia and the two Carolinas. The leaves of the lower branches assume a different form from those of the higher branches; the latter are more sharp and pointed. The plate given in the History of Oaks only represents the leaves of the lower branches, and the shape of them when quite young. Amid these numerous species and varieties of oaks, the leaves of which vary, as to form, according to their age, which generally confounds them with each other; notwithstanding, there are certain characteristic signs by which the quercus tinctoria may be always known. In all the other species the stalk, fibres, and leaves themselves are of a lightish green, and towards the autumn their colour grows darker, and changes to a reddish hue; on the contrary, the stalk, fibres and leaves of the black oak are of a yellowish cast, and apparently very dry; again, the yellow grows deeper towards the approach of winter. This remark is sufficient not to mistake them; notwithstanding, there is another still more positive, by which this species may be recognised in winter, when even it has lost its leaves; that is, by the bitter taste of its bark, and the yellow colour {18} which the spittle assumes when chewed. The bark of the quercus cinerea has nearly the same property; and, finding this, I made an observation of it to Dr. Bancroft, who was at Charleston in the winter of 1802. Upon the whole, it is impossible to be mistaken concerning these two kinds of oaks; for the latter grows only in the dryest parts of the southern states. It is very rarely more than four inches in diameter, and eighteen feet in height; its leaves are lanceolated: on the other hand, the quercus tinctoria grows upwards of eighty feet in height, and its leaves are in several lobes, and very long.

Among the species of acorns that I sent over from the northern states of America to France, and those which I brought with me in the spring of 1803, were some of the black oak, which have come up very abundantly in the nursery at Trianon. Mr. Cels has upwards of a hundred young plants of them in his garden.

The species and variety of nut trees natural to the United States are also extremely numerous, and might be the subject of a useful and interesting monography; but that work would never be precisely accurate provided the different qualities of those trees are not studied in the country itself. I have {19} seen some of those nut trees which, by the leaves and blossom, appeared of the same species, when the shells and nuts seemed to class them differently. I have, on the contrary, seen others where the leaves and blossoms were absolutely different, and the fruit perfectly analogous. It is true there are some, where the fruit and blossom are systematically regular at the same time, but very few. This numerous species of nut trees is not confined to the United States; it is remarked in every part of North America from the northern extremity of the United States as far as Mississipi; that is to say, an extent of more than eight hundred leagues from north to south, and five hundred from east to west. I brought over with me some new nuts of six different species, which have come up exceedingly well, and which appear not to have been yet described.

I left New York the 8th of June 1802, to go to Philadelphia; the distance is about a hundred miles. The stages make this journey some in a day, others in a day and a half; the fare is five piastres each person. At the taverns where the stages stop they pay one piaster for dinner, half one for supper or breakfast, and the same for a bed. The space of ground that separates the two cities is completely {20} cleared, and the farms are contiguous to each other. About nine miles from New York is a place called Newark, a pretty little town situated in New Jersey. The fields that encompass it are planted with apple trees; the cyder that is made there is accounted the best in the United States; however, I conceived it by far inferior to that of Saint Lo, Coutance, or Bayeux. Among the other small towns by the road side, Trenton seemed worthy of attention. Its situation upon the Delaware, the beautiful tract of country that surrounds it, must render it a most delightful place of abode.

Philadelphia is situated upon the Delaware, a hundred miles distant from the sea; at this period the most extensive, the handsomest, and most populous city of the United States. In my opinion, there is not one upon the old continent built upon so regular a plan. The streets cut each other at right angles, and are from forty to fifty feet in breadth, except the middle one, which is twice as broad. The market is built in this street, and is remarkable for its extent and extreme cleanliness; it is in the centre of the town, and occupies nearly one-third of its length. The streets are paved commodiously before the houses with brick; pumps erected on both sides, about {21} fifty yards distant from each other, afford an abundant supply of water; upon the top of each is a brilliant lamp. Several streets are planted with Italian poplars of a most beautiful growth, which makes the houses appear elegantly rural.

The population of Philadelphia is always on the increase; in 1749, there were eleven thousand inhabitants; in 1785, forty thousand; and now the number is computed to be about seventy thousand. The few Negroes that are there are free, the greatest part of whom go out to service. Provisions are not quite so dear at Philadelphia as New York; on which account the boarding houses do not charge more than from six to ten piastres per week. You never meet any poor at Philadelphia, not a creature wearing the aspect of misery in his face; that distressing spectacle, so common in European cities, is unknown in America; love, industry, the want of sufficient hands, the scarcity of workmanship, an active commerce, property, are the direct causes that contend against the introduction of beggary, whether in town or country.

During my stay at Philadelphia, I had an opportunity of seeing the Rev. Dr. Collin, minister of the Swedish church, and president of the Philosophical {22} Society; Mr. John Vaughan, the secretary; Messrs. Piles, John and William Bartram.[5] These different gentlemen had formerly been particularly acquainted with my father, and I received from them every mark of attention and respect. Mr. Piles has a beautiful cabinet of natural history. The legislature of Pensylvania have presented him with a place to arrange it in; that is the only encouragement he has received. He is continually employed in enriching it by increasing the number of his correspondents in Europe, as well as in the remote parts of the United States; still, except a bison, I saw nothing in his collection but what may be found in the Museum at Paris.

The absence of Mr. W. Hamilton deprived me of the pleasure of seeing him; notwithstanding, I went into his magnificent garden, situated upon the borders of the Schuylkill, about four miles from Philadelphia. His collection of exotics is immense, and remarkable for plants from New Holland; all the trees and shrubs of the United States, at least those that could stand the winter at Philadelphia, after being once removed from their native soil; in short, it would be almost impossible to find a more agreeable situation than the residence of Mr. W. Hamilton.[6]