We turned up the main street, which is about eighty feet wide, compactly built, well paved, and {161} having a footway, twelve feet wide on each side.—Passing several very handsome brick houses of two and three stories, numerous stores well filled with merchandize of every description, and the market place and court-house, we dismounted at Wilson’s inn, and entered the traveller’s room, which had several strangers in it. Shortly after, the supper bell ringing, we obeyed the summons, and were ushered into a room about forty feet long, where, at the head of a table, laid out with neatness, plenty and variety, sat our well dressed hostess, who did the honours of it with much ease and propriety.
We retired early, and next morning, before breakfast, went to the market, which is held every Wednesday and Saturday. We were surprised at the number of horses belonging to the neighbouring farmers, which were fastened around on the outside, and on entering the market place we were equally astonished at the profusion and variety of most of the necessaries and many of the luxuries of life. There was not however such a display of flesh meat as is seen in Pittsburgh, which might be owing to the warmth of the climate at that season. Prices were nearly similar to those at Pittsburgh: beef four cents per pound, bacon eight, butter twelve and a half; lamb twenty-five cents a quarter, corn meal forty-two cents per bushel, and every thing else in proportion. Vegetables were in great abundance and very cheap, and were sold mostly by negro men and women; indeed that race were the most predominant both as to sellers and buyers.
Our beds had been very good, and our breakfast and dinner to-day, were correspondent to our supper last night—displaying a variety neatly and handsomely served up, with excellent attendance.
I employed the forenoon in running over and viewing the town. It contains three hundred and sixty-six dwelling houses, besides barns, stables and {162} other out offices. The streets cross each other at right angles, and are from fifty to eighty feet wide. A rivulet which turns some mills below the town, runs through the middle of Water street, but it is covered by an arch, and levelled over it the length of the street. It falls into the Elkhorn a few miles to the N. W.
There are societies of Presbyterians, Seceders, Episcopalians, Anabaptists and Roman Catholicks, each of which has a church, no way remarkable, except the Episcopalian, which is very neat and convenient. There is also a society of Methodists, which has not yet any regular house of worship. The court-house now finishing, is a good, plain, brick building, of three stories, with a cupola, rising from the middle of the square roof, containing a bell and a town clock. The cupola is supported by four large brick columns in the centre of the house, rising from the foundation, through the hall of justice, and in my opinion adding nothing to its beauty or convenience. The whole building when finished, will cost about fifteen thousand dollars. The masonick hall, is a neat brick building, as is also the bank, where going for change for a Philadelphia bank note, I received in specie one per cent. advance, which they allow on the notes of the Atlantick cities for the convenience of remitting. There is a publick library and a university, called Transylvania, which is incorporated and is under the government of twenty-one trustees and the direction of a president, the Rev. James Blythe, who is also professor of natural philosophy, mathematicks, geography and English grammar. There are four professors besides: the Rev. Robert H. Bishop, professor of moral philosophy, belles lettres, logick and history; Mr. Ebenezer Sharpe, professor of the languages; Doctor James Fishback, professor of medicine, &c. and Henry Clay, Esq. professor of law. The funds of the university arise from the price of tuition, (which {163} is lower than in any other seminary of learning in the United States) and from eight thousand acres of first rate land, granted to it by the state of Virginia; five thousand of which are in the neighbourhood of Lexington, and three thousand near Louisville at the falls of Ohio. The legislature of Kentucky have also granted to it six thousand acres of valuable land, south of Green river. Its yearly income from the lands, now amounts to about two thousand dollars, which will probably be soon much increased.[126]
There are no fewer than three creditable boarding schools for female education, in which there are at present above a hundred pupils. An extract from Mrs. Beck’s card, will convey some idea of the progress of polite education in this country.
“Boarders instructed in the following branches, at the rate of two hundred dollars per annum, viz. Reading, spelling, writing, arithmetick, grammar, epistolary correspondence, elocution and rhetorick; geography, with the use of maps, globes, and the armillary sphere; astronomy, with the advantage of an orrery; ancient and modern history; chronology, mythology, and natural history; natural and moral philosophy; musick, vocal and instrumental; drawing, painting, and embroidery of all kinds; artificial flowers, and any other fashionable fancy-work; plain sewing, marking, netting, &c.”
The card designates a regular course of education, as it proceeds through the successional branches, all of which cannot be studied by any individual at the same time.
Mrs. Beck is an English lady, and is in high reputation as an instructress. She was now absent, having taken advantage of a vacation, to visit the Olympian Springs, about fifty miles from Lexington, much resorted, on account of their salubrious effects.
There is no regular academy for males, but there are several day schools.