Post for week of 1/22-1/26

For this post, I would like to explore the obvious discrepancies between William Byrd's original history of the dividing line and his secret history, which will hopefully illuminate what I feel to be an overwhelming lack of coherence that runs throughout the work. In the beginning of the narrative of Byrd's travels, a history of the Virginia and North Carolina colonies provides the reader with an overall sense of purpose for the work. Accordingly, Byrd's first secret history is of those who will be joining him on the trip to distinguish the border, which makes sense because to understand the progression of the adventure, one should understand whom exactly is making that adventure. Therefore, these two histories alongside one another are largely effective because they play off one another in a way that helps the reader to understand the situation more easily.
However, the next "set" of histories are slightly less coherent when paired with one another. Byrd starts his second real history by discussing where the line for the border should begin, but then he moves into an account of a Marooner he passes which he feels to be the perfect example of a heathen. This didactic account may not seem out of the ordinary, but when paired with the next excerpt of secret history, I feel Byrd's narrative loses all sense of purpose whatsoever. Having said this, his next secret history is about two girls who came to see them and who prompted quite a bit of fantasy on the part of the men it seems, but who remained virtuous only because an old woman guarded them. As if this strange tangent weren't enough to confuse me as to the purpose of the text, then Byrd goes into a strange (yet somewhat entertaining) account of the North Carolinian's continuous diet of hog, which prompts his rather horrifying descriptions of diseases caused by eating too much pork.
Then Byrd goes into another secret history detailing how two more women attempt to wile the men with their "hidden charms." This type of fluctuation between events that actually have something to do with Byrd's mission (to find the best border for the states of Virginia and N.C.) and events that have nothing to do with that mission (entertaining women, bears being the source of female reproductive powers,etc.) is what I find to be the most troublesome about this text. Though it may be good for entertainment value, there are parts of the regular histories and the secret histories that just threw me for a loop. To atone for this lack of coherence I would suggest that Byrd perhaps write a third history, which would include all of the actual events that pertained to finding a border between the states. Then perhaps the reader would not be deceived into thinking they were going to read a history of borders when they are really reading a history of loose women and lazy men. I understand that this sort of writing is effective in engaging the reader, but how far must one go (and how many inane stories must one tell) in order to do so?