LETTER XXXVIII.
Leave Philadelphia.—Arrive at New York.—Visit Long Island.—Dreadful havoc by the Yellow Fever.—Dutch Inhabitants suspicious of Strangers.—Excellent Farmers.—Number of Inhabitants.—Culture of Corn.—Immense Quantities of Grouse and Deer.—Laws to protect them.—Increase of the same.—Decrease of Beavers.—New York agreeable to Strangers.—Conclusion.
MY DEAR SIR, New York, January 1797.
LEAVE PHILADELPHIA.
AFTER having remained a few days at Philadelphia, in order to arrange some matters preparatory to my taking a final leave of that city, I set out once more for New York. The month of December had now arrived; considerable quantities of snow had fallen; and the keen winds from the north-west had already spread a thick crust of ice over the Delaware, whose majestic stream is always the last in this part of the country to feel the chilly touch of the hand of winter. The ice however, was not yet strong enough to sustain the weight of a stage carriage, neither was it very readily to be broken; so that when we reached the falls of the river, where it is usual to cross in going from Philadelphia to New York, we had to remain for upwards of two hours, shivering before the bitter blasts, until a passage was opened for the boat, which was to convey us and our vehicle to the opposite side. The crossing of the Delaware at this place with a wheel carriage, even when the river is frozen over and the ice sufficiently thick to bear, is generally a matter of considerable inconvenience and trouble to travellers, owing to the large irregular masses of ice formed there, when the frost first sets in, by the impetuosity of the current, which breaking away the slender flakes of ice from the edges of the banks, gradually drifts them up in layers over each other; it is only at this rugged part, that a wheel carriage can safely pass down the banks of the river.
When the ground is covered with snow, a sleigh or sledge is by far the most commodious sort of carriage to travel in, as neither it nor the passengers it contains are liable to receive any injury whatsoever from an overturn, and as, added to this, you may proceed much faster and easier in it than in a carriage on wheels; having said then that there was snow on the ground, it will perhaps be a subject of wonder to you, that we had not one of these safe and agreeable carriages to take us to New York; if so, I must inform you, that no experienced traveller in the middle states sets out on a long journey in a sleigh at the commencement of winter, as unexpected thaws at this period now take place very commonly, and so rapid are they, that in the course of one morning the snow sometimes entirely disappears; a serious object of consideration in this country, where, if you happen to be left in the lurch with your sleigh, other carriages are not to be had at a moment’s warning. In the present instance, notwithstanding the intense severity of the cold, and the appearances there were of its long continuance, yet I had not been eight and forty hours at New York when every vestige of frost was gone, and the air became as mild as in the month of September.
LONG ISLAND.
This sudden change in the weather afforded me an opportunity of seeing, to much greater advantage than might have been expected at this season of the year, parts of New York and Long Islands, which the shortness of my stay in this neighbourhood had not permitted me to visit in the summer. After leaving the immediate vicinage of the city, which stands at the southern extremity of the former of these two islands, but little is to be met with that deserves attention; the soil, indeed, is fertile, and the face of the country is not unpleasingly diversified with rising grounds; but there is nothing grand in any of the views which it affords, nor did I observe one of the numerous seats, with which it is overspread, that was distinguished either for its elegant neatness or the delightfulness of its situation; none of them will bear any comparison with the charming little villas which adorn the banks of the Schuylkill near Philadelphia.
On Long Island much more will be found, in a picturesque point of view, to interest the traveller. On the western side, in particular, bordering upon the Narrows, or that contracted channel between the islands, through which vessels pass in sailing to New York from the Atlantic, the country is really romantic. The ground here is very much broken, and numberless large masses of wood still remain standing, through the vistas in which you occasionally catch the most delightful prospects of the distant hills on Staten Island and the New Jersey shore, and of the water, which is constantly enlivened by vessels sailing to and fro.