Such has been the progress of the settlement of this country, from dirty Stations or forts, that it has expanded into fertile fields, blushing orchards, pleasant gardens, neat and commodious houses, mining villages and trading towns.
A taste for the decorum of the table was soon cultivated; the pleasures of gardening were considered not only as useful but amusing. These improvements in the comforts of living and manners awakened a sense of ambition to instruct their youth in useful and accomplished arts.
The distance from Philadelphia by land is between seven and eight hundred miles, and upwards of five hundred from Richmond. The roads and accommodations are tolerably good to the borders of the wilderness; through which it is hardly possible for a carriage to pass, great part of the way being over high and steep hills, upon the banks of rivers and along defiles which in some places seem to threaten you at every step with danger.
The wilderness which was formerly two hundred miles through without a single habitation, is reduced from the settlement of Powel's Valley to nearly one half that distance; and it is to be expected that in a few years more the remainder of the distance will afford settlements for the accommodation of people traveling that route.
Upon the arrival of emigrants in the country they generally take a view of that part which it is their object to settle in and according to their circumstances fix upon such a situation as may appear eligible for their business. The greater proportion are husbandmen.
(From A Topographical Description of the Western Territory of America, by Gilbert Imlay, New York, 1793.)