Resumed my journey; called at L—r’s tavern, eleven miles from Greensburg. The hostess, after promising to give me breakfast, shewed me into a front room. After waiting about twenty-five minutes, two ladies on horseback, apparently turned of forty, alighted before the window; the hostess ran forward, embraced and kissed them. Her salute was the loudest articulation of the kind that I have heard. She came into the room, and told {57} me, she had got so much engaged, that she could not be troubled with my breakfast, and that there is a tavern only half a mile forward where I would be attended to. The good lady will be freed from every imputation of unkindness, since I have related how cordially she welcomed her female friends who engrossed all her attention.
Met with a man who asked me if I knew of “any traveller who would rest himself and thrash for a few days?” To-day I begin to find the estimate formed of foot travellers in this country of equality. It is an undoubted truth that the rider is two steps higher than the footman.
Saw a drove of large cattle on their way from the State of Ohio for Philadelphia. Their condition is good, the length of the journey taken into consideration. In size and even fat, they are much superior to the Pennsylvanian stock by the sides of the road. Indeed, it is somewhat surprising to see such bad cattle on the rich lands of this State. The causes merit the strictest inquiry.
Every where the wheat stubble is so much overgrown with annual weeds, that the verdure at a distance is apt to be mistaken for pasture. This growth is occasioned by the long course of hot weather, which succeeds an early harvest. It would be advantageous if clover, or some other useful herbage, were sown amongst the crops, that the farmer might not only avail himself of the propensity to vegetation, but check the dissemination of weeds so hurtful to adjoining fields, and to the succeeding pasture.
The potato crops are better than those I have seen on the coast, the plants are more vigorous, and the tubers much larger.
Land partly cleared, and with some rude buildings {58} thereon, sells at from twenty to forty dollars an acre.
The new road from Philadelphia to Pittsburg is now in an advanced stage of progress.[36] Much of it is finished, and corresponding parts of the old track abandoned. Probably, by two years hence, the traveller will have a turnpike from the one city to the other. The improvement is important, but it is not one that deserves unqualified praise. In multitudes of cases, it passes through hollows, and over eminences, without regard to that minimum of declivity, which in a great measure constitutes the value of a road. In some cases, the vertical curve, formed by passing over rising grounds, is so long, that, applied laterally, the eminence surmounted, would have been altogether avoided. The road from Baltimore to Wheeling, now constructing at the expense of the government, is understood to be more judiciously laid off. Its competition must, ere long, give the proprietors of the Philadelphia line, an instructive lesson on the economical application of labour.
Produce, in the higher parts of Pennsylvania, may be stated at the rates of from twenty to twenty-five bushels of wheat, and from twenty-five to thirty bushels of Indian corn, per acre. These quantities are raised under slovenly management, and without much labour. A farmer expressed his contentment under existing circumstances; a dollar a bushel for wheat (he said) is a fair price, where the farmer pays neither rent nor taxes to the government. His farm, for example, pays four or five dollars a-year, for the support of the state and county officers.
Labourers receive a dollar per day, and can find board for two dollars a-week. Mechanics, in {59} most cases, earn more. Where health is enjoyed, in this place, poverty bespeaks indolence, or want of economy.
Arrived at Pittsburg, after a pleasant journey, with almost uninterrupted good weather. Some observations on this place will be the subject of my next letter.