ABSTRACT
May f 18th V Breakfasted with Mr Can, & rode into the Country to the Governors Garden, in order to dine with him there. The Cavalcade was numerous, Mrs Graham* was carried up in a Chair. The Road goes on the Sides of what the Inhabitants call Ladder Hill. This Road is of an easy ascent, 9 Foot wide, has on one Side the Natural Steep Rocks, & on the other a parapet-wall 3 feet high, made of such common stones, as the hill affords. It goes zigzag & brings you in less than a Miles distance to the brow of the hill, where the precipice ends. This road has been built by the present Governor & executed by Cap1 Tippet. It is really very fine, & may be used even for 2 wheeled Carriages, if they be not too wide. It were to be wished the parapet wall were every where of equal goodness, for where the Road wanted a good Foundation, there only it is made with Good Mortar, & in all the remaining parts, with a gritty, gravelly, crumbling Clay, for which reason the few Carts which are used dayly pull down some parts of this wall. The old road is shorter, has more zigzags, is steeper & connects with the new & is used by the Slaves 8t other people walking on
1 Frederick Stuart (1751-1802), son of the John Stuart, Earl of Bute, and a passenger
in the Dutton. 2 They were all impressed wieh the interior. George (11, pp. 561-4) gives a good
description of the prospects and the general geology, calling, for the latter, Raspe to his aid when discussing volcanoes and sharply criticising Hawkesworth's 'unfortunate., remarks on Nature, as well as. . . his philosophical digressions \ when he, it seems, had often misunderstood Buflfon and other authorities like the Dutch ethnographer Cornelius de Pauw (1739-99), from whom he had also copied without due acknowledgment.
