Early Western Travels
1748-1846

A Series of Annotated Reprints of some of the best
and rarest contemporary volumes of travel, descriptive
of the Aborigines and Social and
Economic Conditions in the Middle
and Far West, during the Period
of Early American Settlement

Edited with Notes, Introductions, Index, etc., by

Reuben Gold Thwaites, LL.D.

Editor of “The Jesuit Relations and Allied Documents,” “Original
Journals of the Lewis and Clark Expedition,” “Hennepin’s
New Discovery,” etc.

Volume IX

Flint’s Letters from America, 1818-1820

Cleveland, Ohio

The Arthur H. Clark Company

1904

Copyright 1904, by
THE ARTHUR H. CLARK COMPANY
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
The Lakeside Press
R. R. DONNELLEY & SONS COMPANY
CHICAGO

CONTENTS OF VOLUME IX

ILLUSTRATIONS TO VOLUME IX

PREFACE TO VOLUME IX

Had all the travellers from Great Britain who visited America during the early decades of the nineteenth century been of so discriminating a temperament as the Scotchman whose work we republish as volume ix of our series, Americans might have lacked that sensitiveness that arose from unjust and flippant portrayal and criticism of American manners.

James Flint was of a good family, had been carefully educated, and possessed a sound and just judgment, with capacity for philosophic insight. Coming to the United States to observe conditions, he depicts them with candor and good will. While confessing favorable preconceptions, due to a personal liking for democratic institutions, our author does not omit the shadows in his pictures; but he presents them with such dispassionate fairness that the sting of criticism is removed.

Flint was particularly interested in the Middle West. Therefore, after a brief sojourn in New York and Philadelphia, where he commented judiciously on all that made for the higher life of these two young cities, he followed the great Western thoroughfare which crossed Pennsylvania to Pittsburg, then the gateway of trans-Allegheny America. Here he purchased a skiff and floated down the Ohio, occasionally landing to make visits and observations; from Portsmouth he proceeded on a circuit through Ohio and Kentucky, settling at length at the falls of Ohio, in the Indiana town of Jeffersonville.

A resident at this place for several months, his investigation of Western conditions assumed a new phase. No longer the passing traveller, noting the novelties and peculiarities of the people, Flint began a systematic observation of American institutions in general, and particularly the political, social, and economic life of the Middle West. In his succinct but comprehensive study of the national constitution and local state governments, he anticipates De Tocqueville and Bryce. His comments upon the judicial system show an appreciation of the stern necessities of primitive justice, coupled with the law-abiding spirit characteristic of the Anglo-Saxon race. His notes upon the power of public opinion as a restraining force in political life, and upon the universal veneration for the constitution, show that he discovered the fundamental principles underlying American political life. His comprehension of the historical development of the West is remarkable for keen insight and prophetic vision. He realized what the acquisition of Louisiana had meant in dispelling the dangers of a Western secession from the republic; and showed that the true interests of the West allied her with Eastern markets.

Looming large on the horizon, Flint discerned the second factor which was to rend American life. The discussion of the Missouri Compromise had scarce begun, but already he saw that the nation could not always exist half-slave and half-free. He saw also that the long border line forming a kind of moral boundary, was the crucial difficulty, and that the acute stage in the controversy would be reached over the question of fugitive slaves. To the present generation these seem self-evident truths; but few Americans and fewer foreigners had the keenness to perceive this before 1820. Flint, however, unlike many Englishmen of his day, was no radical condemner of slavery; he appreciated its patriarchal features and its real benefits for the negroes. He also saw that the masters suffered more deterioration by the system than the slaves; that the responsibility for the system rested not upon present, but historic conditions; and that wholesale denunciation was not only unjust, but useless.

In addition to his comments on this great social question, Flint throws much light on general conditions in the young West. He studies the spectacular drama of the camp-meeting revival not only from the point of picturesqueness, but of educational and religious development. He realizes the need of the people for education, but appreciates the provisions made therefor in public lands. Throughout the West he finds the saving remnant—people of culture and refinement, who welcome strangers with hospitality, and are laboring to erect a worthy civilization in this newest community. The social equality everywhere evident among whites pleases him, and he remarks not unkindly upon the general dislike for personal service that characterizes the ambitious West. His satire on the excess of the honorary titles of “major,” “colonel,” and “judge,” as well as upon the readiness with which the “land of liberty” is vociferously proclaimed, is gentle and kindly.

But all these features of Flint’s work are secondary to his economic study. Not only did he prove himself a wise and trained observer, but he was a scientific economist, and had come to the United States for research material. At each stage of his travels he sets forth the ratio between prices and wages, explains the industrial aspects, and the prospects for emigrants. Already, he tells us, nearly all the best land of Kentucky and Ohio is taken up. Settlement is flooding Indiana, Illinois, and Missouri, where cheap lands are yet available. He shows the sanitary disadvantages of this newer, more reeking soil, as against the possibilities it offers to the emigrant to secure the profits of his own industry. With keen indignation he condemns the unsound banking system of the West, deprecates the booming of town sites, and the “log-rolling” in state legislatures. But in the face of criticism, and as though eager to forestall unfavorable judgments, he contrasts American conditions with those of Great Britain, with no undue favor for the latter, reminding his English readers that here are no boroughs to monopolize business interests, no clergymen to control education, no nobility to exact special privileges. “I have never heard of any parson who acts as Justice of the Peace, or who intermixes his addresses to the Great Object of Religious Worship, with the eulogy of the Holy Alliance.... The farming interest has no monopoly against manufacturing: nor has the manufacturing any positive prohibition against the farmer.” Free industry is the dominating factor of American life, the keystone of its prosperity.

In short, we have in Flint’s Letters a remarkable study of American life in the beginning of its new era, at the close of the second war with England. Charitable, comprehending, thoughtful, he does not slur over national faults nor unduly praise local virtues. Dangers, both financial and political, are pointed out; but the basic principles of American society are distinctly and clearly laid bare, and the progress and possibilities of the New West revealed.

In the present reprint, the original edition, published in Edinburgh in 1822, has been followed; save that the Addenda given in the latter (pp. 303-330), have been omitted, as being composed of material of small present importance:

1. Two letters from a Jeffersonville (Indiana) lawyer dated Dec. 20, 1820, and Aug. 1, 1821, commenting satirically upon the wildcat currency of that day.

2. Three other letters, by various persons, giving an account of material progress in Indiana.

3. “The American Tariff, with alterations and additions.”

In the preparation of this volume for the press, the Editor has had the assistance of Louise Phelps Kellogg, Ph.D., Edith Kathryn Lyle, Ph.D., and Mr. Archer Butler Hulbert.

R. G. T.

Madison, Wis., October, 1904.

Flint’s Letters from America—1818-1820

Reprint of the original edition: Edinburgh, 1822

LETTERS
FROM
AMERICA,
CONTAINING

OBSERVATIONS ON THE CLIMATE AND AGRICULTURE OF THE WESTERN STATES, THE MANNERS OF THE PEOPLE, THE PROSPECTS OF EMIGRANTS, &c. &c.

BY JAMES FLINT.

“From the disorders that disfigure the annals of the Republics of Greece and Italy, the advocates of despotism have drawn arguments, not only against the forms of republican government, but against the very principles of civil liberty. They have decried all free governments as inconsistent with the order of society, and have indulged themselves in malicious exultation over its friends and partizans. Happily for mankind, stupendous fabrics reared on the basis of liberty, which have flourished for ages, have, in a few glorious instances, refuted their gloomy sophisms. And, I trust, America will be the broad and solid foundation of other edifices not less magnificent, which will be equally permanent monuments of their error.”—General Alexander Hamilton.

EDINBURGH:
PRINTED FOR W. & C. TAIT, PRINCE’S STREET;
AND LONGMAN, HURST, REES, ORME, AND BROWN,
LONDON.
1822.

TO

JAMES STUART, Esquire

YOUNGER OF DUNEARN
THE
FOLLOWING SHEETS
ARE RESPECTFULLY INSCRIBED
BY
THE AUTHOR

CONTENTS

LETTERS FROM AMERICA

LETTER I

Voyage from Greenock to New York—Circumstances of Passengers—Arrival, &c.

New York, July 10, 1818.

As I have already informed you, I sailed from Greenock on the 24th of May last, in the American ship Glenthorn, Stillman Master, bound for this place.

I observed that my fellow emigrants were much affected when about to take a final leave of their native land: some regretting the separation from their native soil, while others, mute and thoughtful, seemed to suffer under feelings of a more tender kind.

To some it may appear inconsistent in people to regret leaving their homes and their friends, while the emigration is voluntarily undertaken; but on this occasion, the paradox will be explained, when their circumstances and views are taken into consideration.

Of our party were three farmers, with their families, whose leases were expired; all of them having declined engaging for a new term of years, {2} under the apprehension of seeing their paternal stock, and the savings of many years’ industry, divided between the landholder and the collector of taxes. A native of Scotland, who had resided several years in America, returned with the intention of resuming business in the town where he was born, but the thick ranks of a necessitous and half employed population, had closed on the place he had left. There was a widow, with two children, on her way to put herself under the protection of a brother in America. With us also were several of the labouring class, whose utmost exertions could only procure the bare support of existence; and ploughmen, who prudently refrained from marrying with fourteen pounds a-year. In short, there was scarcely one of our number whose condition might not perhaps be bettered, or whose prospects could be rendered worse, by the change of country.

In a voyage from Europe to America, most passengers may expect to be sea-sick. Nearly all of them on board the Glenthorn, on this occasion, suffered more or less. For my own part, I never was entirely free from it for more than three-fourths of the passage. This disease is dispiriting while it continues, but as it is believed to produce no permanent injury, but, on the contrary, is thought conducive to future health, the attack is not at all dreaded. People unaccustomed to the seafaring life ought to carry with them those kinds of provisions to which they have been previously accustomed, as the stores of the ship soon become loathsome to the sick. Potatoes will be found acceptable, when the caprice of taste rejects almost every other food; and walking on deck is of service, as the air is better, and the pitching of the ship is considerably less felt, than below.

{3} It is very improper to go to sea in crowded vessels; as epidemic diseases are engendered, and the most dreadful mortality is the consequence. That law of Britain which allows only one passenger for every five tons of burden in American ships (including seamen) is a most beneficial regulation; and while, in American bottoms, the cabin passenger pays L.21, and the steerage passenger L.12, the expense cannot be complained of, while health and comfort are taken into consideration. It is much to be regretted that the government of England does not extend its humane restriction to its own Canadian settlers, and to emigrants who sail for the United States in British ships.

The 4th of July is celebrated by Americans as the anniversary of their independence, declared in 1776. The captain and seamen were disposed to be joyful in commemoration of this great event. The striped flag was displayed, guns and pistols were fired, accompanied with loud cheers. The passengers, no less enthusiastic, joined in the strongest expressions of their devotedness to the democratic form of government. They indulged in such sentiments as, a sincere wish that the United States may long continue exempt from that excessive corruption, as they thought, which has so long and so much degraded a large portion of the human race;—and their avowed satisfaction at the near prospect of becoming people of the Republic.

On the 8th we came in sight of Long Island, and the high lands of New Jersey; a welcome occurrence to people who had been so long at sea. In the afternoon a pilot came on board. He informed us that the city was in great bustle, as the inhabitants were assembled to deposit the bones of General Montgomery, who fell at Quebec, on the 31st of December, 1775.[1] The remains of the patriotic {4} leader were buried by the ministerialists without the fort, and were to-day interred by his grateful countrymen under the portico of St. Paul’s church, New York. We were sorry that it was not in our power to witness the solemnity.

In the evening we were off the point Sandyhook. The smell of the new hay on the adjacent fields regaled us very agreeably. All seemed elated with joy. A bagpipe and two violins played by turns, and our young people danced on deck till a late hour. During this season of mirth, we were entertained by a sight, perhaps unequalled in the phenomena of an European climate. Some dense black clouds which hung over Long Island, were frequently illuminated by flashes of lightning. It is in vain to attempt a description. About midnight we passed through the Narrows, and soon afterwards anchored on the quarantine ground, about seven miles from New York.

On the morning of the 9th of July, the inspecting surgeon visited us, and allowed the anchor to be weighed. In this situation we had a full view of the shores of Staten and Long Islands. The wooden houses are neat, and the orchards and natural woods have a thriving appearance. It would seem that the people here have a partiality to the Lombardy poplar, which grows to a great height, shooting up its branches nearly perpendicularly; assuming something of the appearance of a spire. The straight rows of these trees, so common here, have an insipid regularity and sameness, more like a file of armed soldiery than an ornamental grove.

Some of the frame houses are painted red, those of the finer sort, white; ornamental railings are also painted white. To an European eye, these colours appear too glaring. The lands seen from the bay are sandy and poor.

{5} The first glimpse of the city of New York is by no means a distinct one. The buildings are much obscured by the forest of masts in front of them; and as the site of the town rises but gently inland, the houses in front conceal, in a great measure, those in the rear, so that the shipping and the numerous spires are the objects most distinctly seen.

Before entering the port we were twice boarded by agents from the Newspaper offices. They inquired for British newspapers, and generally for the news of Europe; they noted down the names of several of our passengers, which they intended to publish in the papers of the afternoon. There are no less than seven newspapers printed in New York daily; the competition of these Journalists is keen, and their industry seems to be great.

We have experienced much good treatment from Captain Stillman. Every passenger is so sensible of this, that a committee of their number was requested to make public testimony of their esteem for him.

We landed yesterday about noon, all in good health and spirits. During the voyage, passengers have experienced no kind of sickness, except that peculiarly incident to the sea.

This letter cannot come immediately into the hands of all my friends; most of them, I hope, will hear that I am arrived in this place in good health. Should you adopt any way of making this and any subsequent communications generally known to them, it will be very gratifying to me, and, besides, will relieve me of the labour of writing many letters; a labour, dictated by the strongest ties of gratitude and affection, but one which it is doubtful if I can accomplish to the satisfaction of my own mind.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] General Richard Montgomery (1737-1775) was a native of Ireland, and served with Wolfe at Quebec in 1759. At the outbreak of the Revolutionary War he was appointed commander of the American forces in the Northern Department, being killed in his heroic assault on Quebec, December 31, 1775. Through the courtesy of the British general his body was buried with the honors of war within the unconquered walls of Quebec. Forty-three years later the remains were disinterred, in compliance with a special act of the New York legislature, brought to New York City and deposited with great solemnity beneath a monument in front of St. Paul’s church (July 8, 1818). A full account of the ceremony is contained in the New York Daily Advertiser of that date.—Ed.

{6} LETTER II

Observations on New York—Removal to Long Island—Miscellaneous Remarks—Return to New York—Farther Observations on the City.

New York, August 4, 1818.

On entering New York, I was struck with its appearance. Streets lined with lofty trees, most of them the Lombardy poplar, which affords a very agreeable shade in hot weather; indeed, they are so numerous, that the new comer, when he looks before him, is apt to suppose himself in the midst of a wood. The streets, with a few exceptions, are too narrow, and are deficient in sewers. Many parts of the town prevent me from thinking that it deserves the character of extreme cleanliness bestowed upon it. The greater part of the houses are of brick, neatly built; but, to eyes accustomed to towns of hewn stone, New York has, on the whole, what (for want of a more descriptive word) may be called a gingerbread appearance.

The markets here are amply supplied with fine vegetables, and an immense variety of excellent fish, a great proportion of which are sold alive. Beef and pork are good, but the mutton and veal that I have seen are of inferior quality. Marketing is carried on more after the manner in some English country towns. No servants, but masters, attend and carry home the provisions.

Beggars do not abound here as in some countries of Europe. I am told that every man who is {7} able to work can earn a dollar per day, and that his board costs two or three dollars per week; thus it is in his power to banish every appearance of poverty, and to save some money, provided he is disposed to economy. Mechanics have good encouragement. Joiners one and three-quarters, and masons two dollars a-day. They usually pay three dollars, or upwards, a-week for their board.

Many of the necessaries of life are here purchased at high prices. Woollen cloths and most articles of wearing apparel imported, pay duties, varying, in different cases, from 25 to 33 per cent. In transacting with the merchant and the tailor, farther American enhancements may be calculated upon. Washing and dressing of shirts, neckcloths, &c. costs a dollar and a half per dozen. Every thing that an American does, must be liberally paid for. This tends to render living dear, even where provisions are cheap.

Some imported articles, as silks, wines, foreign spirituous liquors, teas, sugar, and coffee, are much cheaper than in Britain. The difference of custom-house duties is the cause of this.

The condition of animals bespeak the great plenty of food that falls to their share. The horses employed in removing goods to and from the wharfs, and in stage coaches, are fat, and in high spirits. They are not so rough-legged, so broad, or so strong-limbed, as the draught horses of Britain; but they are better adapted for speed. Hogs, running in the streets, are numerous, but they are not starvelings. I have seen several of them that would yield upwards of 300 lbs. of pork without special feeding. Speaking of hogs, I would mention by the way, that they are allowed to run at large for the purpose of cleaning the streets. An economical way of procuring scavengers, {8} but one that leads to a commutation of nuisance rather than a final removal of it.

July 12. Last night the heat was excessive, and not accompanied with a breath of wind. It was in vain that I thrust my head out at an open window to be cooled. The effluvia arising from the streets is, in a great measure, occasioned by a high temperature. I imagine that a copious evolution of phosphorized hydrogen gas goes on in such weather. I could not sleep till three or four o’clock. This morning I heard that some people who had suffered from the heat and stillness of the air, had stretched themselves on carpets, or sat by open room doors, or in passages. Nights so very oppressive are said to occur rarely. In high and inland parts of the country they do not occur at all.

This is not the most proper season of the year for Europeans arriving here. Yesterday and to-day the heat has been excessive, the thermometer in the shade stood at 971/2°. In such a degree of heat it is imprudent to take much exercise. The temperature of the human body being lower than that of the air, the former is deprived of the cooling process usually produced by evaporation. Should the heat of the blood be increased in such a case, fever commences. We had an example of this, in a young man, one of the emigrants on board the Glenthorn, who exerted himself too much in getting baggage ashore. He was this day removed to Brooklyn, a high-lying village on Long Island, about a mile from New York. Transitions from heat to cold are, perhaps, still more dangerous; of late, eleven persons have died in the city by drinking cold water. Several of them were strangers newly landed. Water should not be drunk immediately from the {9} well, but should be allowed previously to stand for a few minutes in the air. It should be taken in small mouthfuls, and these heated in the mouth for two or three seconds before swallowing. Precautions of this kind ought to be strictly attended to, while heated by exercise or the sun’s rays. Spirits are often mixed with water, to prevent the injurious effects of the latter. This corrective, however much extolled, ought to be taken in very small quantities. Here, as in Britain, there are many who resort to spirituous liquors as the sovereign medicine, both in hot and in cold weather.

Strangers lodge in boarding houses, and are charged from three dollars to twenty a-week. I have got lodgings in a good one, where I find interesting company. Previous to our meals a servant rings a small hand-bell, summoning every lodger to the public room, where we all eat together. A polite, well-dressed, hostess presides.

Servants are not here so attentive to their duty as elsewhere; many of them are free blacks, slow in their motions, and often treating the most reasonable commands with neglect. Master is not a word in the vocabulary of hired people. Bos, a Dutch one of similar import, is substituted.[2] The former is used by Negroes, and is by free people considered as synonymous with slave-keeper.

This afternoon much thunder was heard. After twilight the lightning flashed incessantly, so that the illumination was almost permanent. Thunder storms in America are more frequent, more severe, and often accompanied with greater rains than in Europe. A respectable gentleman of Delaware county, in this State, told me, that during a thunder storm there, he laid his watch on the table, and found that an hour and forty-eight minutes elapsed {10} without one cessation of sound. He thinks it probable that the peal lasted about two hours, as a few minutes must have passed before the idea of noting the time suggested itself.

July 13. This evening, after dark, I was surprised to see a large object standing in the centre of one of the principal streets; on approaching it, I discovered that it was a frame-house, with a wheel affixed to each corner. Its length was about twenty-two feet, breadth about sixteen feet, and two stories high. I am just told that much larger buildings than this are often dragged off by horses, with their roofs, floors, plaster, doors, and windows, entire; furniture sometimes included. This sort of removal happens at the expiry of leases of small lots, where the occupier is not bound to leave the buildings.

July 16. For two days past, the skin of my face has been spotted, accompanied with blotches, and with partial swelling. This is called the prickly heat, from the pungent feeling that attends it. A medical gentleman has told me, that this has been occasioned by a sudden cooling, which has put a stop to perspiration. He congratulated me on having escaped a fever, prescribed a hot bath, and subsequent sea-bathing. I am about to set out for Long Island, in obedience to the latter part of the Doctor’s prescription.

Afternoon. Arrived at New Utrecht, a village near the south-western extremity of Long Island.[3] On leaving New York, I crossed the ferry to Brooklyn, by a steam-boat of singular construction: this vessel is composed of two hulls, at a little distance from, and parallel to, one another; they are connected by a deck common to both. The water-wheel, turned by a steam-engine, is placed between {11} the keels of the boats. There is a rudder at each end, so that she can cross and re-cross, without putting about.

A stage coach runs from Brooklyn to New Utrecht. The distance is nine miles; and the fare for one person, half a dollar. This coach, like the other public ones of the country, has no glass windows in the front or the sides of it, these parts are furnished with curtains, which are let down in bad weather. The coach is long, containing four seats that run across; and travellers sit with their faces forward, as in the pews of a church.

I have agreed to stop a few days at New Utrecht. My host is an intelligent man, obliging, but not fawning; he and his wife take the principal drudgery of the house upon themselves, as the slaves are extremely slow in the execution of their work. Sometimes the landlord presides at the head of the table, and at other times he acts as servant. At dinner we were joined by the coach-driver who brought us from Brooklyn; he is very unlike the drivers of some other coaches, is well dressed, active, and attentive to his business, by no means obsequious, answers every question with propriety, and without embarrassment. He does not depend on the gratuities of travellers for his wages. That system, which so universally prevails in Britain, is unknown here.

At the inn there were three boarders, all Scotsmen. One of them, a young gentleman from Edinburgh, who was confined to bed by a broken thigh bone, occasioned by a horse running away with a gig, from which he fell while attempting to disengage himself; he was occasionally attended by a young lady, whose visits were frequent, although she lived at the distance of ten miles. The people of the neighbourhood were also very attentive to this {12} person, often calling for him; and several of the young men sat with him all night by rotation. It was pleasing to see so creditable a display of the benevolent affections.

The good people here are the descendants of the original Dutch settlers. They are placed in comfortable circumstances, their style of living somewhat resembling that of farmers in the more fertile and improved parts of Scotland. If the situations of farmers in the two countries were compared, it would appear that the advantage of the Long Islanders consists in a climate highly conducive to vegetation, their freedom from rent, being owners of the soil, and the total absence of any heavy taxes; and that their comparative disadvantage is, the want of such active domestic and agricultural servants as the farmer of the other country employs.

Mr. Cobbett[4] is now farming about nine miles from this place. His people (it is said) could not bear the opprobrious name servant, and, with the exception of one person, left him.[5]

The fishermen here drag ashore many fishes in their seines. Without other evidence than the vast quantities of smaller ones left on the shore, the abundant supply of the New York market might be inferred. I bathe twice a-day, on the spot where General Howe first effected the landing of his army.[6] A farmer very obligingly gives me the key of his fishing house on the beach, that I may dress and undress in it. The farmers here catch great quantities of fish, with which they manure their land.

There are still a considerable number of slaves in Long Island; they are treated with a degree of {13} humanity that slaves in some other parts of the world never experience; they are well fed, and the whip is very seldom resorted to. Notwithstanding their comparative advantages, they detest the unnatural yoke, and frequently run off. It often happens that the master neither pursues nor inquires after the fugitive. What becomes of the self-emancipated is not here well understood. I have heard that many of them get to Boston, or some other of the northern ports, from whence they are carried to the Southern States, sold, and placed under a harsher treatment.

A great part of the slaves of the State of New York are to be emancipated in the year 1827.[7] It is difficult to predict the consequences of this liberation. It is to be feared that people who have been compelled to work, will, of their own choice, become banditti, rather than adopt industrious habits. Arrangements must necessarily be made before the arrival of this revolution; but many satisfy themselves by saying, that the legislature will devise some plan that will enable them to get over the difficulty. Some suggest that the Negroes shall be returned to Africa. On this measure, the African Association, so much talked of in America, proceeds.[8] The expense of transporting, settling, supporting, and governing a new colony, must be immense. The design is as benevolent as the difficulties to be encountered are great. The support it meets with in slave-keeping states, looks like a pledge of sincerity, and an omen that forebodes success to the undertaking.

{14} The project of removing blacks to the back-woods of America seems to be altogether objectionable. It would be difficult, if not impossible, to prevent their return from exile; their previous habits and disposition render them ill-calculated to the work of subduing the forests. Besides, they would commit depredations on the neighboring settlers, and on the Indian people.

Long Island being composed of alluvial soil, surrounded by a high beach, its surface is necessarily what is called a table land: for the most part the surface is somewhat flat, the soil is dry, and at this season, without streams of water. Near the surface I have observed a substratum that is intermixed with clay. If a part of this was raised above the ground, it would be made to approach to a loam, more productive, and less liable to be injured by drought, than the present sandy coating that covers the surface. A trenching, performed by the spade or by the plough, would no doubt produce the good effect.

A labourer in Long Island receives half a dollar a-day, with his board, and a dollar in harvest.

The weather, which is said to be hotter at present than it has been for several years, begins to scorch the surface of the ground. The stubble from which the hay has recently been removed, retains the appearance of a newly mown field; pasture grass is withering. In some fields a rank crop of weeds continues green; amongst these the cattle are straying nearly two feet deep, but are in reality almost starving; water is drawn from deep wells, and served out to them in rather too small quantities. The cows are small, as may be expected. Good crops of wheat, rye, and Indian corn, are raised. These require manure. Indian corn is considered a good crop, when at the rate {15} of 40 bushels per acre. Oats do not ripen well from the excessive heat, and are used only for the feed of horses. Potatoes are small; their tops grow high and slender, as when shaded by trees in your country; their leaves are small and shrivelled. The greatest luxuriance to be met with in Long Island is in the orchards, the branches of apple and pear trees are bent down, and not unfrequently broken by the weight of the fruit. Peach trees were lately productive, but are now falling into decay. I have met with no one able to assign the cause. The woods are thriving, but few of the trees are large; they are evidently a new growth, and not contemporary with the thick trunks that opposed the first settlers. The owners frequently spare their own timber, and purchase from other parts of the State, or from New Jersey. In consequence of paying for timber and carriage, building in Long Island is rendered more expensive than in more late settlements.

It is not easy to state the price of land in Long Island, as much of it has descended from father to son, from the first settlement; and sales have been rare. A farm within ten miles of New York would perhaps sell at 140 or 150 dollars (from L.31, 10s. to L.33, 15s.) per acre. The practice of renting land is by shares, the occupier paying to the proprietor one half of the actual price of the produce, the former bearing the risk and trouble of collecting the money.

The fences are of wood. The figure is a representation of the railing commonly adopted here.

{16} A fence of this sort, costs about a dollar for every ten yards in length. Where the posts are of cedar, and the rails of chesnut, the erection, it is said, may stand about fifty years. I examined one reported to be thirty years old, and found it to be so strong, that it may be expected still to last for years to come. There are neither hedges nor stone fences to be seen in this neighbourhood.

The crops, as in most parts of America, are cut down by what is called the Cradle-scythe. I went into a field where a Negro was reaping wheat with this sort of implement, and observed that about an English acre was cut down. On making inquiry, it appeared that he had been engaged about six hours in the work. The following dialogue ensued:

“You work very hard?”

“No Sir, I can do much more in the time, but that of no use.”

“You are not free then?”

“No Sir, I a slave, I longs to Jacob Van ——, there,” (pointing to the farm house.)

“But you black people are very well treated here?”

“Oh yes, Sir, master very good to me, give me every thing to eat he eat self, but no Sunday clothes.”

“You may live happier than some poor free people?”

“That may be true, Sir, but put bird in cage, give him plenty to eat, still he fly away.”

I delay giving a description of the cradle-scythe, as I doubt if the one that I have just seen is of the best construction.

After the crop is cut, the swath is collected by the hand, and tied into sheaves; a small quantity of stalks still remain scattered over the surface, {17} these are commonly collected by the hand-rake. To facilitate the latter part of the process, a horse rake has been recently invented; of which the following figure is a representation.

AB is a beam about six inches square, and about twelve feet long. CD is an upright rail that prevents the stalks accumulated by the machine from falling over the beam AB, and so left behind. EF, ef, are two supports to the rail, which also serve as handles for steering, and occasionally upsetting the machine. ABHG is a tire of wooden teeth, one and a half inches diameter, and about six inches distant from one another. These teeth are sharpened at their extremities, and skim along the ground with their points forward; raising up and collecting the stalks. IK are trees to which the horses are yoked. The trees are attached to the beam AB, by the rope BLA.

{18} The field in which I saw the horse rake used is flat and not ridged; consequently the straight beam operated very well. To adapt a beam to ridges, it would only be necessary to construct it with two joints or hinges; one at each side of the handles, and to connect the central part of the beam by a rope with the point of attachment L. Otherwise, the implement may be moved across the ridges.

Four wheeled waggons are the vehicles used in carrying home the crops, carrying manure into the fields, and produce to market. They are drawn by two horses, which trot, whether loaded or not. Small one-horse waggons are also used, they are neat, and are furnished with a seat for conveying families to church, and elsewhere. Many of the farmers who own but small properties, keep one horse gigs. Ladies drive dexterously.

The practice of housing the crops, and the ancient one of treading them out by the feet of horses, shew that the Long Islanders have yet something to learn in the way of dispatching their agricultural business.

The high price of land prevents emigrants from settling here. The near neighbourhood of a market, and the salubrity derived from dry land, together with sea breezes, might, notwithstanding, form sufficient inducements to many, who would pursue their immediate advantage; but those who look forward to the future prospects of a family, commonly prefer some part of the back country.

July 24. Saw the works in progress at Fort Diamond.[9] This is a large battery raised on a shoal in the narrows, about 200 yards off the western point of Long Island; most of the workmen are British.

{19} Crossed the Narrows to Staten Island. The fortifications are extensive and commanding. The garrison consists of one man!

25. Left New Utrecht, where a residence of nine days has completely cured my blotched face. The climate is delightful, and I have entertained a very favourable opinion of the people.

The emigrant who was removed sick to Brooklyn, is dead; thus by far the finest young man of our party, has fallen the first victim to the climate: twenty-two years of age, of a mild and cheerful disposition, and of a manly figure, and who had gained our universal esteem. Of a family consisting of six persons, he was the only one who was able to endure the fatigues of clearing away the forests. The feelings of the survivors are deeply wounded, and the tender attachment that pledged his early return to Scotland is blasted.

I returned to New York, and shall make some more remarks on the city. The population, at the census of 1816, was 100,619, of which 6985 were aliens, 9774 free people of colour, and 617 slaves. It is expected that the enumeration of 1820 will disclose a vast increase.

Literature does not stand on such a broad basis here as in Europe. Printing, particularly of newspapers, is carried on to a considerable extent: but the style of many communications and advertisements which appear in them, shews that the public are not far advanced in taste. Particular pieces are elegant. Many English publications are reprinted, frequently with the addition of some introduction, notes, or an appendix. For the additional matter a patent is procured, which I suppose has generally the practical effect of securing an exclusive privilege for the whole work. Some of Lord Byron’s latest productions, the Memoirs of {20} the Fudge Family,[10] and the Brownie of Bodsbeck,[11] are exhibited in the windows of the principal booksellers. When I left Edinburgh the last mentioned book was not published.

The Kaleidoscope of Dr. Brewster is here fabricated in a rude style, and in quantities so great, that it is given as a plaything to children.[12] An artist informed me that a journeyman of his proposes to take a patent for an improvement he had made on it.

The public museum in this city is a recent collection. An Indian mummy from the great saltpetre cave in Kentucky, a bear from Warwick mountains, about sixty miles north of this place, which weighed 700 pounds, and an immensely large turtle, are as yet the most interesting objects.

The town hall is a splendid building. Lightness, and an apparent want of solidity in its parts, deprive it in some measure of the august effect essential to sublime grandeur. The front and columns are made of white marble of a foliated texture. The interior staircase is both large and magnificent. It is circular, and furnished with two elegant flights of steps that wind in contrary directions, so that the one crosses the other alternately. Upon the whole, it displays that elegance which becomes an edifice devoted to the administration of justice.

When I visited the Court of Sessions, the judge on the bench appeared a plain active-looking gentleman, not distinguished by any robes of office. The business on hand was the taking of evidence in the case of a man who had left a vault open during the night. A person passing in the street happened to fall into the chasm, and raised an action of damages, on the ground that he had received bodily hurt. The questions put were numerous {21} and minute, the witnesses, notwithstanding, went on in giving lengthened details, embracing particulars not asked, and foreign to the subject. They seemed in no respect embarrassed by the dignity of the court. The whole of the witnesses were present, and each heard the examinations which preceded his own.

The Washington, a new ship of war, mounting 96 guns, is much visited at present.[13] The seamen are a party of stout healthy looking men, dressed in striped cottons, very suitable to the present hot weather, and cleanly in the extreme. The decoration, cleanliness of the ship, and the order that prevailed aboard, can scarcely be surpassed. Diffident, however, as I am in forming an opinion on any naval affair, I cannot avoid the impression that a vessel of such strength, and with such a crew of freemen, must be an overmatch for any other vessel constructed and manned as European ships of war were wont to be.

The steam-frigate is a novelty in naval architecture. The vessel is bomb-proof, impelled by a powerful steam-engine; is said to be furnished with apparatus for heating ball, for throwing hot water, for moving a sort of arms to prevent boarding, and to carry submarine guns of one hundred pounds shot.[14]

The steam-boat, Chancellor Livingstone, is the largest and finest vessel of the kind perhaps ever built; she is 526 tons burden, length 165 feet, and breadth 50 feet. The power of the engine is estimated as being equal to that of eighty horses. The boiler is of copper, and weighs twenty tons. The cabin unites something like the horizontal dimensions of a church, and a degree of elegance not exceeded by any floating apartment. The Chancellor sails between New York and Albany.[15]

{22} August 3. The theatre has some degree of resemblance in its plan to that at Edinburgh, and is attended by a genteelly-dressed audience. To-night the celebrated Mr. Incledon completed his engagement.[16] He was highly applauded. The song, “Scots wha hae wi’ Wallace bled,” was alike cheered by Scots and Americans.

During this season of the year, most people wear light cotton clothes; the jacket is in many cases striped, and the pantaloons of Indian nankin. A broad-brimmed straw-hat is commonly used, to prevent the face from being scorched by the rays of the sun. Draymen, and other labouring people, wear a sort of frock or hunting shirt of tow-cloth, that hangs down to the knees. A tall, thin, swarthy-countenanced man, with a frock, surmounted by a broad straw hat, is a figure somewhat new to the Briton.

One of the greatest inconsistencies among a people professing liberty and equality, is the degradation imposed on people of colour. In the church of the most popular preacher of New York, I looked in vain for a black face. There is a congregation of blacks in town, who have a preacher of the same colour, where (it is said) a white man would be equally singular. Blacks are not admitted into the public baths; and, at some places of amusement the hand-bills have a note of this kind, N.B. “A place is provided for people of colour.” I do not recollect of having seen or heard of a black person who is in any degree eminent in society, or who has acquired reputation in any mechanical or mercantile business. This depression appears to be produced partly by the aversion with which the white face looks on the black one, and partly by bad education and habits. Something more than mere emancipation is required, a moral change, {23} affecting both the black and the white, must take place, before the condition of the negro can be completely ameliorated.

The churches of New York are fifty-three in number, and are occupied by seventeen religious sectaries. None of these are peculiarly privileged by law, and none denied the common protection of citizens.

August 4. Now when about to leave New York, I feel a pleasure in stating my conviction of the civilization and moral honesty of the people. In the former respect, they may exult in any comparison with the mass of many European cities. And in regard to the latter, I have heard of no recent instance of housebreaking or riot. In hot weather, people leave their windows open during the night, and street doors are seldom closed during the whole of the evening; the inhabitants not thinking their hats and umbrellas in much danger. Such traits are perfectly unequivocal.

FOOTNOTES:

[2] From the Dutch Baas, meaning master.—Ed.

[3] New Utrecht was in Kings County, New York, seven miles from New York City.—Ed.

[4] William Cobbett, a publicist known both in America and England, was born on a farm in Surrey, March, 1762. After serving for several years in the English army, he resigned and (1792) came to Philadelphia. Here, under the name of “Peter Porcupine,” he advocated the cause of the Federalists. Returning to London in 1800, he founded the Weekly Political Register. His influence with the workingmen was so great that the English government became alarmed, and he found it prudent to spend two more years in America (1817-19). He published his experiences as a Long Island farmer (1818), under the title A Year’s Residence in the United States of America. Vigorously opposing the plans of Morris Birkbeck and others to bring over colonies of British emigrants to the United States, his attacks and the replies that followed brought on a journalistic controversy which lasted until about 1825. (See volumes x, xi, and xii of our series.) Upon his return to England, he was elected to parliament as a Liberal in 1832, and served until his death (1835).—Ed.

[5] This person was English.—Flint.

[6] Admiral Lord Richard Howe, British general in the Revolutionary War, left Halifax with his fleet June 11, 1776, to effect a union with General Clinton at New York. He arrived at Sandy Hook June 29, and July 2 took possession of Staten Island.—Ed.

[7] By act of legislation, 31st March, 1817, “Every Negro, Mulatto, or Mustee, within this State, born before the 4th day of July, 1799, shall, from and after the 4th day of July, 1827, be free.”—Flint.

[8] The American Society for the Colonization of the Free People of Color of the United States, was organized at Washington, December, 1816. It rapidly gained favor, both North and South, and by February, 1820, sufficient money had been subscribed to send the first colony to Liberia. But the free negroes disliked it; the colonists suffered great hardships in Liberia; and the abolitionists soon opposed the project. William Lloyd Garrison began to denounce the Society in 1829, and thereafter it declined steadily in importance.—Ed.

[9] Fort Diamond, later renamed Fort Lafayette, was the largest of the forts planned in 1812 for the defense of New York harbor. It became famous as a political state prison during the War of Secession, and was then protected by seventy-five heavy mounted guns.—Ed.

[10] A series of metrical epistles purporting to be written in Paris by Thomas Moore.—Ed.

[11] “The Brownie of Blednoch,” a folk-lore ballad, is the best known of William Nicholson’s poems. He was a Galloway peddler (1782-1849), who composed verses as he travelled from town to town.—Ed.

[12] Sir David Brewster (1781-1868), experimental philosopher and editor of the Edinburgh Encyclopedia, invented the kaleidoscope about 1816. Throughout these letters, Flint portrays large acquaintance with the writings of the more noted of his fellow-countrymen.—Ed.

[13] The “Washington” was built at Portsmouth, New Hampshire, in 1814, being the second ship of seventy-four guns (not ninety-six, as Flint states) launched for the United States navy. She was the flagship of Commodore Chauncey in the Mediterranean, from 1816 to 1818. In 1843 she was broken up in New York harbor.—Ed.

[14] This was the “Fulton,” the first steamship in the American navy. Robert Fulton directed her construction, and she made her trial trip June 1, 1815, a few months after his death. Her naval service was unimportant. While employed as a receiving-ship at the Brooklyn docks she blew up, June, 1829.—Ed.

[15] The “Chancellor Livingstone,” built under Fulton’s direction, and named in honor of his friend and patron, was completed in 1816. She was one hundred and twenty-five tons larger than any boat then on the Hudson. Her average speed was eight and a half miles an hour. In 1832 she was put on the route between Boston and Portland, being broken up at Portland two years later.—Ed.

[16] Benjamin Charles Incledon (1764-1826), a famous English vocalist.—Ed.

LETTER III

Journey from New York to Philadelphia—Remarks on the country passed through—Notices of companions—Their conversation by the way—Observations on Philadelphia—Institutions—Manufactures—People.

Philadelphia, December 19, 1818.

This letter will give you the details of my journey from New York to Philadelphia, and some particulars with regard to the latter city.[17]

{24} August 5. Got aboard of the Olive-Branch steam-boat for New Brunswick. This is a large vessel, wrought by an engine of forty-five horses’ power. She may at once be pronounced elegant and commodious. The passengers dine on board.

In a company so large, the traveller has it in his power to select the person with whom he would enter into conversation. The individual I fell in with, on this occasion, was a mercantile gentleman from England. He seemed to me a man of a good disposition, and one who possessed considerable knowledge of the principal towns, and of the different ways of transacting business in the United States. The American character, according to his report, is by no means a good one. He expressed himself as completely tired of the country, and proposed returning to England. He told me that he had met with considerable losses by villanous insolvencies. His account, instead of convincing me that the Americans were sinners above all others, just shewed me that he was a good-natured, credulous man, and that he had fallen into the hands of several artful rogues; a class, it would seem, not wanting in America.

The land on both sides of the strait, between Staten Island and the main land, is light and sandy, in some spots almost sterile. People in boats are busy with long wooden tongs, resembling forceps, taking up clams from the bottom, in six or seven feet of water.

The land on both margins of the Raritan is very low and flat, covered with a rank growth of reeds. These are cut for the cattle, and form a coarse but a very bulky crop. The swamps, being liable to inundation, are not made to yield any other herbage than their spontaneous produce.

{25} About four miles below New Brunswick, the red sandstone is met with. It is the first rock toward the coast, the interval being high alluvial land, containing vegetables and the bones of marine animals of tribes still existing; facts that establish without a doubt that the ocean has receded.

From New Brunswick to Trenton, travellers are conveyed by four-horse coaches. Six of these wait the arrival of the steam-boat. In one of these I took my seat, and found that only two gentlemen were to be along with me; one of them an American who had travelled in Britain, and the other an Englishman, who had just been out on an extensive tour in the United States. Both appear men of talent and education; the one a Virginian lawyer, and the other a person well acquainted with the state of science and manufacture in his own country; they are equally devoted to the representative form of government. Their only difference of opinion arose from drawing a comparison between the national characters of the two countries. The American claimed the superiority, in toto, while the Englishman asserted the higher excellence of the literary, the scientific, and the mechanical attainments of Britain; but, at the same time admitted, with apparent candour, the superior dexterity of Americans in traffic, and that, taken in a body, they are without some of the ruder qualities of John Bull. Thus, in one day, I have heard two intelligent Englishmen discuss the character of the American people, and each draw opposite conclusions: a fact, which proves how cautious we ought to be in forming an estimate of a community; as we are in continual danger of judging of the great stock from the small, and it may happen that an unfair sample may come within the narrow limits of a single person’s observation.

{26} The land between New Brunswick and Princeton is chiefly of a poor sand. The road is composed of the same material, with plank bridges over ravines, where most of the streams are now dried up. The woods, to a Briton, seem more remarkable for their height, than for the diameter of the trees. The stems, even by the road side, where many are felled, stand closely together, and their tops form a continued canopy, that sheds a gloom over the surface of the ground. When proximity to the two greatest cities in the Union is considered, it seems surprising that the arm of man has effected so little. The farms by the road side are neither numerous, nor are the cleared patches large. The passenger has no way of knowing how the country is peopled or improved beyond the first clearing; and where no opening occurs, he cannot see the light more than about 200 yards into the woods. Rail fences, however, and cattle amongst the trees, indicate that the whole is appropriated.

The cows are small, and of little value; and the few sheep which I have seen, are long-legged and thin, perhaps the worst breed in existence.

Princeton College is a large brick house, situated in a grass field. The edifice has a retired, if not a gloomy appearance. It was here that Dr. Witherspoon,[18] the author of the “Characteristics of Scottish Clergy,” found an asylum, and the means of prosecuting useful labours. By the way side stands a row of very large weeping willows, that are highly ornamental to this small town. Their long slender twigs hang down almost perpendicularly, and wave with every wind, displaying, as it were, a sort of vegetable drapery.

From Princeton onward, the land is much better than that observed to the north, and the {27} surface is finely diversified, but dusk prevented me from seeing a part of the country next to Trenton.

The arrival of six four-horse coaches produced considerable stir in the Inn at Trenton. No sooner had the passengers entered, than a pile of trunks and portmanteaus was reared in the bar-room, that would make a good figure in the warehouse of a wholesale merchant. The party at supper was very large. There being three lines of conveyance between New York and Philadelphia, the aggregate of the intercourse must be great. Betwixt New Brunswick and this place, a distance of twenty-five miles, we have not seen a single pedestrian. The heat of the weather may in some measure account for this.

Trenton is beautifully situated at the head of the tide water of the river Delaware. The orchards are luxuriant, and the pasture grounds richer than any that I have hitherto seen in the country.

August 6. Trenton is celebrated by one of the most dexterous feats of generalship on record. I shall take the liberty of stating some particulars of the affair. On the 1st of January, 1777, the term of enlistment amongst the American troops expired, and that day brought on a dissolution of the best part of the army. General Howe, aware of the occurrence, pressed forward on the 2d, with an army vastly superior. The head of their column arrived at Trenton about four o’clock, and attempted to cross Sanpink creek, which runs through the town, but finding the fords guarded, halted and kindled their fires. The American army was drawn up on the other side of the creek. In this situation the latter remained till dark, cannonading the enemy, and receiving the fire of their field pieces.

{28} Washington having discovered that the enemy designed to surround his little army, ordered the baggage to be removed after dark. At twelve o’clock, having renewed his fires, he decamped with his army, unperceived by the enemy, and marched against Princeton by a circuitous route, where he arrived by the rising of the sun, defeated the troops there, and captured their stores.[19]

The Delaware is a delightful river, with many magnificent windings. The convex shore of one extensive curve, is so imposing, that it is called Point-no-Point, an apparent cape being always in sight, but which recedes as the observer advances. The grounds adjacent to the river are flat, and covered with a rich verdure; but the beach is of a height sufficient to prevent a person from seeing far inland from the river. Many large farm houses are to be seen, with extensive orchards, and beautiful weeping willows adjoining. The last form large spreading masses without any erect or principal top, the main or leading branches rear themselves upwards, after acquiring a considerable degree of strength; and the shoots immediately younger, are elegantly bent, as if in the act of getting erect; while the youngest of all are completely pendulous. The whole is singularly picturesque.

On approaching Philadelphia, I felt disappointed in seeing the shipping so very inferior to that at New York; and the houses fronting the river are old and irregularly placed, so that the idea of a port declining in trade immediately occurred.

Philadelphia is situated between the rivers Delaware {29} and Schuylkill. The streets are laid off agreeably to the cardinal points, and cross one another at right angles, the principal ones running in the east and west direction, crossing the neck of land between the two rivers.

The streets, as at New York, are lined with trees; they are cleaner kept, and are wider, and more regular, so that gaseous exhalations are much less felt in them than in the other city. Most of the houses are of brick, and many of them have the doors and windows surrounded by white marble. Several public edifices are built of that material.

August 7. The general aspect of the city is more pleasant, and a freer circulation of air is felt than in New York; of course the natural inference is that Philadelphia must be the more salubrious of the two. Dr. Mease, of the American Philosophical Society, has deduced the same conclusion from the bills of mortality.[20] The daily average of deaths being 52/3 in this place, and 61/3 at New York. At the time this computation was made, the population of Philadelphia was the greater of the two, consequently something more is to be allowed in favour of the relative healthfulness of Philadelphia.

The doctor has also compared the mortalities of Philadelphia and Liverpool, and it appears that the deaths in the former city are, to those in the latter, as 33 to 50. The comparison was made between the number of deaths in 1810 for Philadelphia, and on another year for Liverpool. This must have been occasioned from a want of data applying to the same year in both places. My very short acquaintance with the doctor gives me the utmost confidence in his candour, and in the accuracy of his calculations.

{30} It is not to be kept out of view, that the mortality in Philadelphia is considerably greater in summer than in winter, the deaths in August, for example, may be fairly stated at twice the number in December. This fact, not to mention the epidemical diseases with which Philadelphia is sometimes visited, must give a decided preference to Liverpool.

The religious sects of Philadelphia are eighteen in number; they have thirty-four places of worship. The whole may be exhibited thus: Swedish, three churches; Quakers, three; Free Quakers, one; Episcopal, three; Baptist, one; Presbyterian, two; Catholic, four; German Lutheran, two; German Calvinist, two; Associate Reformed Church, one; Moravians, one; Associate Church, (Antiburghers,) one; Presbyterian Covenanters, one; Methodists, four, (two for whites and two for blacks;) Universalists, one; Unitarians, one; Independents, one; Jewish Synagogues, two.

There are four state law courts in the city; four Banks, and eleven Insurance offices.

The other institutions would be too tedious to enumerate separately, probably the following includes most of them. Thirteen charitable institutions, eight free school societies, three patriotic societies, about twenty mutual benefit societies, five associations for the relief of foreigners and their descendants, seven literary institutions, three libraries, the American Philosophical Society,[21] the Society of Artists, the Pennsylvanian Academy of Fine Arts, and a museum of natural history.[22]

The American Philosophical Society meets frequently, and is well attended. When I visited the institution, three of the foreign ministers were {31} present. Professor Cooper[23] read very interesting papers on the bilious fever, on a new mordant to be used in dyeing, and on a new test for detecting arsenic where administered as a poison. There is still zeal and talent in the association once distinguished by a Franklin and a Rittenhouse.[24]

The Franklean library contains about 24,000 volumes; almost every scientific work of merit may be seen. Strangers are allowed to read and even to write in the great hall. On leaving a small deposit they may carry books out of the library. The building belongs to the institution, and has a herculean bust of the founder over the entrance; and the following lines, by Alexander Wilson[25] the ornithologist, hang in a frame in the great room.

“Ye who delight through learning’s paths to roam,

Who deign to enter this devoted dome;

By silent awe and contemplation led,

Survey these wonders of the illustrious dead!

The lights of every age—of every clime,

The fruits of science, and the spoils of time,

Stand here arranged, obedient to your nod;

Here feast with sages, and give thanks to God.

Next thanks to him; that venerable sage,

His country’s boast,—the glory of the age!

Immortal Franklin, whose unwearied mind,

Still sought out every good for all mankind;

Search’d every science, studious still to know,

To make men virtuous, and to keep them so—

Living, he reared with generous friends this scene;

And dead, still stands without to welcome in.”

The Atheneum is another excellent institution.[26] Here a great number of American and foreign newspapers are read, and there is also a collection of the reviews, periodical publications, and scientific journals, of Britain and America. Strangers are introduced by the subscribers.

The United British Emigrant Society meets frequently, and its business in conducted with zeal{32} and ability. A book is kept open, in which are inserted notices of labourers, &c. &c. wanted, with the names and residences of the persons to whom they are to apply. On looking over this record, I observed that many of the situations offered were in the western country. Although the members of this society merit the utmost credit for their benevolent exertions, the most cautious strangers will always hesitate to undertake long journies, incurring a great expense, the risk of meeting only with a trifling employment, and that of cheapening their labour by the sacrifices which they make. Artifices of this kind are not to be imputed to the society.

The museum contains a considerable collection of objects; and among the rest a skeleton of an entire mammoth. Around the upper part of the wall are arranged the portraits of several hundreds of the personages who have distinguished themselves in the revolution, or in the legislature of America. The design is praiseworthy, but the execution of the pictures is bad.

The state prison does honour to the jurisprudence of the country. The culprit is not made a burden on the community, but is put to work, and the first of his earnings applied to his support, a part of the remainder is given to him at his dismissal; by this means he is not under the necessity of resorting immediately to robbery or theft. Habits of industry are acquired, and trades learned, by persons who previously were pests to society. The strict order, and even silence, that is maintained in the establishment, is conceived to be the peculiarity that has produced the effects that distinguish it above every institution of the kind. The provisions given to the inmates are said to be plentiful and good, though furnished at the low rate of {33} fourteen cents, or about seven-pence-half-penny English, per day.

Philadelphia does not abound in manufacturing establishments. The predominance of British goods has shut up many workshops that were employed during the late war. Paper is manufactured in great quantities in Pennsylvania. Founderies for coarse cast iron articles are numerous. In town there are two manufactories of lead shot. Printing is carried on to a considerable extent, and executed in a superb style. It is said that one of the late Edinburgh novels was here set up in types in one day. The quarto edition of Joel Barlow’s Columbiad is an unrivalled specimen of printing. The types were cast by Messrs. Binnie and Ronaldsons, who, by their skill and individual exertions, have saved the United States from importing these essential literary implements. Mr. Melish’s[27] geographical establishment, is another prominent concern. He is continually embodying the most recent government surveys of the interior, into the general maps of the country. At Lehigh Falls, on the Schuylkill, there is a mill for cutting brads, which produces no less than two hundred in a minute. Philadelphia is in various respects well adapted to manufacture; if the facilities which it presents for its advancement are neglected, the city must decline, as the trade of New York and Baltimore is making rapid progress. The new road from the latter city to the Ohio,[28] and the extension of carriage, by steam boats, through the Mississippi and the Ohio, are all circumstances which tend to supersede Philadelphia as a market and as a thoroughfare.

At present, vast quantities of English goods are selling by auction in the ports of the United States. New York is the chief mart in this way. Merchants from the country, attend sometimes these {34} sales for many days, and even for weeks together. Public sales, and the present low prices, are very injurious to the merchants and manufacturers of England.

Probably the market of Philadelphia displays the greatest quantity of fruits and vegetables in the world. Boat loads are brought by the Delaware, and numerous waggons come loaded from the interior. Peaches, apples, pears, melons, cucumbers, pine apples, sweet potatoes, onions, &c. are plentiful beyond example.

The cleanliness and the civil address of persons who vend provisions in the market, are truly gratifying: if a speck is to be seen on the white apron of the butcher, it may be inferred that it came there on the same morning. Girls arrive on horseback, or driving light waggons, to sell vegetables, or the produce of the dairy. Many of these females, I am told, are the daughters of farmers who are in good circumstances. Here are none of the lazzaroni hucksters of fruit and sweet-meats, that form such a deplorable spectacle in the finest cities of Britain; nor of the miserables who rise earlier than the sun, to pick from amongst the ashes, the charred offal of their neighbour’s fire.

September 3. To-day I have seen a man sprawling on the ground in a state of intoxication; he is a native of Ireland. This is the first instance of the kind which I have seen in America. From this incident, I do not mean to represent that the people here do not drink spirituous liquors. The truth is, that many drink of them almost the moment after they get out of bed, and also at frequent intervals during the day; but though this fact has been noticed, the first conclusion is nevertheless true, that excessive drinking is rare.

{37} The saw for cross-cutting timber for fuel, is a tool which, for superior expedition, recommends itself to joiners and others. The following figure is a representation of it.

AB is the blade, about thirty inches long, and about two inches broad. It is very thin, and its teeth are very slightly bent to the right and left, so that it makes a narrow cut, through which the slender blade moves with little friction,—hence its facilities. The crooked stick ECA is the handle, FDB is another crooked stick, into which the blade is fixed at B. The wooden bar CD serves for fulcra, over which the blade is stretched by twisting the small rope EF, by means of the peg GH.

The sawing of firewood, and many other sorts of hard labour, are chiefly performed by black people. Happily, very few of these are now slaves in Pennsylvania. Free blacks, it is understood, have no difficulty in earning the means of subsistence, but the circumstance of their being despised and degraded, has had bad effects on their character. Even the Quakers, who have so honourably promoted negro emancipation, allot a separate part of the church to people of colour. In the state prison, too, they are separated from whites. These odious distinctions should be abolished in a free country.

Negroes are stigmatized as an inferior race; indolent, dishonest, and vindictive in the extreme. {38} There can be no doubt that, in many instances, these characteristics are too just, but it cannot be otherwise, while moral culture is, in a great measure, withheld from them, while they are excluded from the society of the wise and the good, and while the hope of applause gives no stimulus to the coloured man. Moral or immoral, he is a negro. This, of itself, is enough to keep him down. If Africans were placed on a similar footing, and with the same opportunities, as their white neighbours, and if they still kept behind, we might then begin to suspect a radical defect in their nature. But, as they are, it cannot be pretended that the experiment has been made.

For some time past, the democratic party have been nominating candidates for their general support in the ensuing election. No doubt is entertained of a democratic preponderance in the next session of Congress. The Federalist cabal is now disconcerted in this part of the Union. The mercenary avarice that would barter the independence of America for English goods, was never less formidable than now.

Here, as at New York, boarding houses are to be found, varying from the simplest accommodations, to elegance and luxury. The person who lives in a house where a high price is paid for board, is separated from the poorer class, and his acquaintances and associates are people in affluent circumstances and polished education; he is as free in the choice of his society as he possibly can be. Without doors, however, persons of lesser note are not treated with hauteur, and in transacting business the utmost affability prevails.

The dress worn in temperate weather is the same as in Britain, with this difference only, that pantaloons {39} are almost universal: the shorter small-clothes are used only by Quakers. On Sundays it would be difficult to discriminate betwixt the hired girl and the daughter in a genteel family, were drapery the sole criterion. Attentive observation of the people on the streets, would convince any one of the general diffusion of comfort and competence.

The symptoms of republican equality are visible in all the members of the community. I have seen several curious instances of this, which would surprise those accustomed only to the manners of the old world. For example, the Mayor is a respectable-looking, plainly dressed gentleman, and apparently a penetrating and efficient police magistrate. On a late occasion the court was crowded, and the weather hot; he desired a person in attendance to bring cold water. It was brought in a brown jug, not accompanied with a glass. A person within the railing (probably a lawyer or clerk, more thirsty than his honour) intercepted the vessel, drank, and then handed it to the Judge.

On the Sabbath, we do not witness all the stillness and solemnity that usually characterize a presbyterian town. On the morning of that day, I have seen loaded waggons start in the market street, for the westward. A grocer, opposite to the house where I board, has two shops, one of them he keeps open for the sale of liquor, segars, &c. In a late newspaper, a complaint appeared against bringing cattle into the street for sale on Sunday afternoon. If this complaint was founded on truth, it is at least evident that it was addressed to citizens who, it was believed, would suppress the evil. I am inclined to think that a very great proportion of the people spend the day in the duties of {40} religion; but some here, as in other places, employ it purely as a day of rest; some as a day of amusement; and others in visiting friends, or other convivial meetings. On a Sunday afternoon I have heard many reports of guns, in the neighbouring woods or swamps. You will consider all this as a foul blot on the fair character of the City of Brethren; but I trust that your liberality will not impute to the jurisprudence of America, pre-existing customs, that, at every stage of the settlement, must have been imported from England; even from a country which pays tithes, for the support of a priesthood.

Every day numbers of European emigrants are to be seen in the streets. The ingress is greater than at any former time. I have never heard of another feeling than good wishes to them. For my own part, I have met with several receptions kinder than I ever could have anticipated; and have become acquainted with a number of excellent citizens, whose approbation will always be sufficient to convey a high gratification to my mind.

FOOTNOTES:

[17] The author’s route from New York to Philadelphia was by boat to New Brunswick, thence by stage to Trenton on the Delaware, where boat was taken for Philadelphia. Stages, by this time, had practically ceased running between New York and Philadelphia.—Ed.

[18] James Witherspoon, born in Haddingtonshore, Scotland, in 1722, was a descendant of John Knox. Graduating from Edinburgh University, and receiving ordination as a Presbyterian minister, in 1768 he accepted an invitation to become president of Princeton College, and brought with him a considerable addition to the college library. From the first he took an active part in the Revolutionary War; as member of the provincial assembly, he assisted in overthrowing the royal governor; as member of the continental congress he signed the Declaration of Independence, and aided in initiating several important legislative measures. After the close of the war, he retired to his farm near Princeton, dying there in September, 1794.—Ed.

[19] Washington’s Letters, vol. ii, page 4, Lond. 1795.—Flint.

[20] John Mease, a wealthy and philanthropic Philadelphian, was born in 1771. Although a graduate of the Medical College of the University of Pennsylvania, he did not practice regularly, but devoted himself to literary and scientific pursuits. In association with David Rittenhouse and other members of the Philosophical Society, he was engaged in numerous undertakings for the betterment of the city. His Picture of Philadelphia, published in 1811, was for many years the best travellers’ guide thereof.—Ed.

[21] The American Philosophical Society, the oldest scientific association in America, was organized by Franklin in 1743. In 1769 it was combined with the American Society for Promoting Useful Knowledge, and from that date (except for a few years during the Revolutionary War) has never failed to meet regularly. Among its presidents may be noted Franklin, Jefferson, Rittenhouse, and Caspar Wistar.

The Society of Artists, formed in 1810, to establish a school of drawing and hold an annual exhibition of foreign and American paintings, was dissolved soon after Flint’s visit to Philadelphia.

The Academy of Fine Arts was organized in 1805, largely through the efforts of Charles Wilson Peale. The following year a building was occupied, and the first exhibition opened in 1811, in conjunction with the Society of Artists. The Academy has ceased to hold exhibitions, but maintains a good permanent collection.

The Museum, opened by Peale at his residence in 1784, contained for the most part portraits of Revolutionary heroes painted by himself. When transferred to Independence Hall (1802), it included a large collection of birds, insects, and the implements of primitive men. The Philadelphia Museum Company acquired it in 1821; but later the collection was sold and dispersed.—Ed.

[22] Dr. Mease’s Picture of Philadelphia.—Flint.

[23] Thomas Cooper, born in London in 1759, was eminent both as a lawyer and a scientist. Educated at Oxford, he practiced law, first in England, and after 1795 in Northumberland, Pennsylvania. Upon a visit to France (about 1792), he studied chemistry, and continued his researches in that science after coming to America. Upon being removed, for arbitrary conduct, from a judgeship (1811), he was appointed professor of chemistry at Dickinson College, later at the University of Pennsylvania, and in 1820 became president of the college of South Carolina. At the time of his death (1840) he was engaged in revising the statutes of the latter state, and in writing pamphlets in favor of state rights.—Ed.

[24] For a brief biography of David Rittenhouse, see A. Michaux’s Travels, volume iii of our series, note 75.—Ed.

[25] Alexander Wilson was for many years a weaver and poet in Paisley, Scotland. Trouble breaking out between the weavers and masters, he emigrated to Philadelphia in 1794, becoming in turn weaver, school-teacher, and peddler. In 1802 the scientist John Bartram became interested in Wilson’s talents, and gave systematic direction to his natural taste for ornithology, to which he devoted the remainder of his life. He published his first volume of American Ornithology in 1808, and had nearly completed nine volumes before his death, in 1813.—Ed.

[26] A public reading-room called the Atheneum was established by private subscription in 1814. Ten years later it contained 3,300 volumes, including prominent foreign and American reviews. Rooms were rented from the American Philosophical Society until 1847, when the Atheneum building was erected.—Ed.

[27] For a sketch of John Melish, see Bradbury’s Travels, volume v of our series, note 129.—Ed.

[28] For a brief description of the National Road, see Harris’s Journal, volume iii of our series, note 45.—Ed.

{41} LETTER IV[29]

Journey from Philadelphia to Pittsburg—Lancaster—Elizabeth Town—The River Susquehana—Harrisburg—Carlisle—Chambersburg—Cove Mountain—Macconnel’s Town—Sidelong-hill—The river Juniata—Bedford—The Allegany Ridge—Stoystown—Laurel-hill—Lauchlinstown—Chesnut Ridge—Greensburg—Adamsburg—Pittsburg—Interspersed remarks on the Country, Taverns, &c.—Notices of Emigrants, and occurrences by the way.

Pittsburg, 28th September.

The contents of this will be composed of notes taken on my journey from Philadelphia to Pittsburg.[30]

On the morning of the 20th of September, I went to the Coach-Office in Philadelphia to take my seat. Such is the number of travellers that I found it necessary to take out a ticket two days previously.

The mail-coach is a large clumsy vehicle, carrying twelve passengers. It is greatly encumbered by large bags, which are enormously swollen by the bulk of newspapers. As a substitute for glass windows, a large roll of leather is let down on each side in bad weather.

During the greater part of the day our route was through a part of the country of a clayey soil, moderately fertile, and of a flat insipid surface. Late in the afternoon, we passed some land of a finer mould, and more elegant structure, with fruit trees bending under their load. The Indian {42} corn is nearly ripe, and is a great crop this year. The stalks are generally about eight feet high. The people have been picking the leaves off this sort of crop, and setting them up between the rows in conical bunches, to be preserved as winter food for the cattle.

We passed several family waggons moving westward. The young and the strong walking, the aged and infants riding. Waggons for removing families, and those for carrying goods to Pittsburg, have a canvass cover, stretched over hoops that pass from one side of the waggon to the other, in the form of an arch. The front is left open, to give the passengers within the vehicle the benefit of a free circulation of cool air.

Lancaster is a large town, well known for the manufacture of rifle-guns. We were too late in the evening for having a distinct sight of the place, or of the country towards Elizabeth Town, which is much commended.

September 21. The coach stopped at Elizabeth Town, last night, for three hours, and started again before three o’clock. We were near Middletown (eight miles on our way) before the light disclosed to our eyes a pleasant and fertile country.

It was near Middletown that we got the first peep of the river Susquehana, which is here about a mile in breadth. The trees on the east bank, confining the view to the right and left, produced an illusory effect, almost imposing on the mind a lake instead of the river. The highly transparent state of the air, and the placid surface of the water, united in producing a most distinct reflexion of the bold banks on the opposite side. Cliffs, partially concealed by a luxuriant growth of trees, sprung from the detritus below, and by smaller {43} ones rooted in the rifted rocks. Over these a rising back ground is laid out in cultivated fields. The eye is not soon tired of looking on a scene so richly furnished, and so gay.

Harrisburg, the seat of legislature of Pennsylvania, is a small town which stands on a low bottom by the river; a pleasant, but apparently an unhealthy situation. Opposite to the town is a small island in the river, connected with the eastern and western shores by very long wooden bridges. The waters of the Susquehana are limpid, but shallow at this place, and ill adapted to navigation, except in times of flood.

The country immediately west of the Susquehana is truly delightful. The soil, whether occupied by the natural woods, orchards, or crops, is covered with a profuse vegetation; and the superficial aspect altogether agreeable. The best sort of houses are of limestone; they shew nothing of fine taste or neat workmanship, but are far superior in durability and appearance to the wooden erections so common here. Barns are much larger, and frequently neater than the adjoining dwellings.

Towards Carlisle, the road passes through lands inferior to the lower country, seen in the forenoon. The surface of limestone rocks, and large detached blocks of the same mineral, interrupt the plough in the field, and the wheeled carriage on the road.

Carlisle, though in a newly settled country, has an appearance somewhat antiquated. With so much grass growing in the streets, a suspicion arises that there is not much traffic here.

Shippensburg is a place more recently founded than the last, but has, notwithstanding, contracted something like the rust of time. Wooden {44} erections soon acquire a weather-beaten appearance. The subsidence of log houses discloses chinks, shewing that they are well ventilated in summer, but not the most comfortable lodgments for the winter.

At Chambersburg the coach halted during the night. The rough roads already surmounted, and the report of worse still before us, determined two of the passengers, besides myself, to walk, as an easier mode of travelling over the mountains. Chambersburg is 143 miles from Philadelphia, and 155 from Pittsburg; and lies in the intersection of the roads from York, Baltimore, and Philadelphia. Several branches of what has been very properly called the current of emigration, being here united, strangers from the eastern country, and from Europe, are passing in an unceasing train. An intelligent gentleman, at this place, informed me, that this stream of emigration has flowed more copiously this year, than at any former period; and that the people now moving westward, are ten times more numerous than they were, ten years ago. His computation is founded on the comparative amount of the stage-coach business, and on careful observation. This astonishing statement is, in some degree, countenanced by a late notice in a New York newspaper, that stated the number of emigrants which arrived in that port during the week, ending the 31st of August last, to be 2050. The gentleman alluded to, says, that shades of character, sensibly different from one another, are forming in the western States. He represents the Kentuckians to be a high-toned people, who frequently announce their country, as if afraid of being mistaken for inhabitants of Ohio State; and the Ohians, as having less pride of country, being less assuming in their {45} demeanour, but not less agreeable in conversation, nor less punctual in business transactions. Were it not for the intelligence of my penetrating informant, and for his great intercourse with travellers, I would certainly not have remarked the supposed distinction of these provincial characters. If the difference really exists, it will be difficult to assign any moral cause that is adequate; unless it be the keeping slaves in Kentucky, a species of stock not permitted by the constitution of Ohio.

September 22. We found a waggoner who agreed to carry our travelling necessaries to Pittsburg. For my portmanteau, weighing about fourteen pounds, he charged three dollars, alleging the trouble that attends putting small articles within doors every night. This is an instance of one man measuring his demand by the urgent situation of another. The jolting that waggons undergo in this rugged country, render it indispensable that baggage be packed with the utmost care.

The two young gentlemen with whom I started, are Americans, good walkers, and cheerful companions.

One mile to the north of Chambersburg the road ascends a steep hill of slate clay, the first stratified substance that I have seen overlaying the limestone. The soil on the summit is so excessively poor, that I am surprised to see such ground cultivated in this country.

Several taverns by the road are log-houses constructed by laying squared trees horizontally, in a quadrangular position, in a way similar to that in which house-joiners pile up boards to be dried. As the erection advances, the last laid or uppermost log is notched on the upper side, near both ends, for the reception of the next cross pieces. {46} The interstices are filled up with lime or clay, and the roofs are of shingles, or thin boards. Frame houses consist of erect posts, set in sills or horizontal foundation beams. Over the tops of the posts other horizontal pieces are laid, forming the summit of the wall. The outside of the posts are covered over with thin boards, ranged horizontally, the upper one uniformly overlaying the edge of that immediately under it. The inside is most commonly lined with lathing and plaster, but the last piece of finery is frequently dispensed with.

Near Baker’s tavern, six miles from Chambersburg, the waggon wheels have uncovered a fine slate clay, fit to be used as slate pencils. The same kind of substance is to be seen in the adjoining stream.

Around Campbell’s Town, seven miles from Chambersburg, the land is bleak, and apparently poor; to the north-west an extended high ridge exposes to view a large tract of romantic wood scenery.

At thirteen miles from Chambersburg is Loudon, a few houses only, two of them taverns, situated at the foot of the ridge just mentioned, which is called the Cove Mountain. A new road is formed over it. The ascent is winding and gradual, so that seven miles are occupied in surmounting the formidable barrier. The darkness of the night, and the great quantity of timber on both sides, rendered this part of our journey very gloomy. Not a sound was to be heard but that of the Catadid, a large green insect, whose note resembles its name, as nearly as it can any articulate sound. Near the top of the hill stands a miserable log tavern filled with movers, a name for settlers removing to the western country. At the summit, we were accosted in the Irish accent. The individual {47} told us that he was so much exhausted, that he could not proceed farther, and that he had laid himself down among the trees.[31]

At Macconnel’s Town, we knocked at the door of a tavern, heard a noise within, which convinced us that the people were astir, but not willing to hear us. On making louder applications, the landlord saluted us, “Who’s there?” With some reluctance he let us in, grumbling at the lateness of our arrival, it being ten minutes past ten o’clock. He affected to be unwilling to let us have supper; but while he was refusing, a female commenced cooking for us.

September 23. From beds which we last night saw on the floor of the bar-room, a numerous group of Swiss emigrants had arisen. One of them, an old man with a long beard, has a truly patriarchal appearance. The females wear hats, and are of a hardy and masculine form.

About a mile from Macconnel’s Town, is the foot of another steep ridge; a new road over it is nearly finished. Here we met with a foot traveller, who told us that he had settled in Illinois, by the Wabash, about fifty miles above Vincennes. The ground, he said, “is as good as ever man set foot on.”[32] He had not heard of Mr. Birkbeck’s settlement: this, together with his appearance, convinced us that he is a hunter of the woods. He was on his way to remove his family from New York state, a journey of 1400 miles.

Called at Noble’s tavern for breakfast. The hostess could not accommodate us with it. She was in great bustle, having thirty highway labourers {48} at board, had no bread baked, and politely expressed her regret at being so circumstanced, but assured us, that, by going half a mile forward to the next tavern, we would be attended to. Mr. Noble is a member of the Pennsylvania Senate; the frank and obliging disposition of his wife demands my acknowledgment.

At the next tavern the prediction of a breakfast was verified: it was largely furnished, but not with the greatest dispatch.

The forenoon was hot, something like the greatest heat I have felt in Scotland. The mornings and evenings were agreeably cool, the air usually still, and the sky highly serene.

Sidelong-hill is a steep ascent. The waggon path is worn into a deep rut or ravine, so that carriages cannot pass one another in some parts of it. The first waggoner that gets into the track, blows a horn, to warn others against meeting him in the narrow pass. The waggoners are understood to be as friendly toward one another as seamen are, and that cases are not wanting, where one has waited several days, assisting another to refit his carriage.

On Sidelong-hill we came up with a singular party of travellers,—a man with his wife and ten children. The eldest of the progeny had the youngest tied on his back; and the father pushed a wheelbarrow, containing the moveables of the family. They were removing from New Jersey to the State of Ohio, a land journey of 340 miles to Pittsburg. Abrupt edges of rocks, higher than the wheel, occasionally interrupt the passage. Their humble carriage must be lifted over these. A little farther onward we passed a young woman, carrying a sucking child in her arms, and leading a very little one by the hand. It is impossible to take particular notice {49} of all the travellers on the way. We could scarcely look before or behind, without seeing some of them. The Canterbury pilgrims were not so diversified nor so interesting as these.

Crossed the river Juniata by a wooden bridge, supported by two strong chains, hung in the manner of a slack rope, over the tops of posts, (one at each end,) about twenty feet higher than the road. The curve formed by the chain passes low enough to come under, and support several of the cross beams under the middle of the bridge. Other parts of the bridge are supported by perpendicular ties, that pass, from the roadway upward, to the chains. The Juniata runs here in a deep chasm, between cliffs of slate clay; the bridge has consequently a magical effect. The river is shallow, but at other seasons of the year is navigable. The land is poor and parched, and is formed of steep, irregular knolls.

Passed Bloody Run, a town of a very few houses, but with two taverns. A romantic site in a low valley of the Juniata. The declining light of the evening had softened the outline of the timber on the hills beyond the river, so that the scene brought to my recollection the heaths of a well known land.

Stopped for the night in a tolerably good tavern, two miles from Bloody Run. The bar-room is nearly filled with people. On our being shewn to a more retired apartment, I could see one person make a wry face, and then smile to his acquaintance. It would seem that our being separated from the large party, was not attended by the most pleasant sensations.

September 24. Last night we slept in a large room containing five beds. It was proposed that one of these should hold two of us. My companions went together, and I congratulated myself on {50} monopolizing one of the beds,—but here I reckoned without mine host. About midnight a man entered the room, groped all the beds, and finding that I was alone, tumbled in beside me. Such is a common occurrence, I am told, in this country, but it is the first time that I have met with it. In the morning I discovered that my neighbour was a person of good address, and respectable appearance.

After resuming our journey, we came up to a family rising from their beds by the embers of a fire in the wood. The father fired off a rifle, which it would seem he had kept in readiness for defence. There can be no great objection to sleeping in the woods, in such fine weather. From several heaps of ashes that we have seen by the sides of the road, it is evident that the practice is common, even where taverns are numerous. Emigrants carry their moveables in one horse carts, or two or four horse waggons, as the quantity of goods may require. They carry much of their provisions from Philadelphia, and other towns, and many of them sleep in their own bed clothes, on the floors of bar-rooms in the taverns. For this kind of lodging they usually pay twenty-five cents a family.

The dollar is the integer of money in the United States, as universal as the pound is in Britain. In the former country, cents or hundredth parts of a dollar are the lowest fractional parts in use. Rating the dollar at four shillings and sixpence sterling, the cent of America is eight per cent, more than the halfpenny of Britain. The fractional divisions of the dollar, are 1/2, 1/4, 1/8, 1/16, or 50 cents, 25 cents, 121/2 cents, and 61/4 cents. Silver coins representing all these quantities are in circulation. The peculiarity in the convenience of quantities {51} derived from continual bisection, is known to all who are acquainted with the theory of numbers.

It is impossible to say whether it is cheaper to travel with a family, by purchasing a waggon and horses at Philadelphia, or by hiring one of the waggons that pass regularly to Pittsburg. This depends on the price paid for carriage at the particular time, and also on that to be paid for waggon and horses at Philadelphia. In the one case, the waggoner is paid for the weight of the goods, and for that of the persons who ride; and in the other case, the waggon and horses may be expected to sell at, or under, half the price paid for them at the sea-port. The great number of family waggons now on the road, amounts to a presumption that this mode of travelling is now thought to be the cheaper.

Crossed the Juniata once more. The bridge is a new stone erection of bad workmanship. We are told that it fell down repeatedly. To insure its standing, a step is left on the head of each abutment, on these the wooden centres rest. They are not withdrawn, so that the beams must give way, before it can be ascertained whether the effective arch is of wood or of stone!!! The parapets have been coped with boards, but the wind has uncovered one of the sides!!!

The steep banks are covered with trees. Oak, ash, hickory, chesnut, and walnut, are the most prevalent species.

Bedford, the head town of the county of that name, is a considerable place, with some neat brick and stone houses.

In our progress this forenoon we have seen much poor scorched land. Indian corn is short and shrivelled; pasture bad, and the woods without the strength they attain in a richer soil. Orchards {52} bear well; the traveller may knock down the apples that overhang the road, and may probably pass without complaint. Pear trees are scarce, if at all to be seen. Probably they are subject to canker on this light dry soil. Peaches are small. A farmer by the road side, offered us a few of the latter sort of fruit, unasked. Ironstone is abundant, in one place the new road is formed of it. In another, we saw prismatic pieces of nine or ten inches square, and about four feet long. The prevailing strata are of clay schist; the surface is hilly and broken.

In the afternoon, we found ourselves climbing a steep, without being aware that it was the side of the Allegany ridge, not having previously seen any eminence through the woods. The mountain is itself so much enveloped in foliage, that we can only with the utmost difficulty have a single peep of the lower country behind. The lower country, where seen, has nearly all the sameness of the surface of the ocean. The farthest visible ridge appears blue, and its outline looks as smooth as if it were not covered by timber. We could not recognise a trace of our way hither.

Met several waggons descending; they are obliged to move along in a narrow track, on the very brink of a precipice. The road winds round a point of the hill, and slants along the side of a tremendous ravine, that, as it were, cleaves the eastern side of the ridge in two parts. The trees render it almost impossible to see across the chasm. The scenery is naturally romantic, but not yet exposed to the eye of the admiring traveller.

The large timber on the summit indicates a degree of fertility not usual on hill tops; and far surpassing that of the country near the south east foot of the mountain. The cleared ground by a {53} tavern on the height is good. The top of this range of mountains is a table land, swelled with irregularities, and in some parts strewed with large detached blocks of sandstone; the same kind of mineral of which the horizontal strata of the mountain is composed. Were it not for the recollection of the steep ascended, we should never have surmised that we were here on the “spine of the United States.”

Met with two young men going eastward. One of my companions saluted them, “You are going the wrong way.” “No,” replied one of the others, “You are going the wrong way. I have been at Pittsburg and in the State of Ohio, and I declare it is the most detestable country in the world.”

Stotler’s tavern was full of people; we had no sooner entered the door than we were in a crowd. We could not remain for the night.

We set out for the next tavern, and at dusk came into a track so wet and miry, that it would be considered impassable in some parts of the world. We groped our way along the side of it, over logs, and occasionally through the wood, to avoid the horrid bog. Two young men of the neighbourhood came forward, told us that we had just entered upon the worst part of the road, and, as they were going in the same direction, offered to conduct us.

The next tavern was one where whisky is sold, but the occupiers of it could not be troubled with lodging travellers. They told us that there is another tavern a mile forward. The road still bad; but as our conductors were going farther, we accompanied them.

The other tavern was so completely thronged with movers, that a multitude of them had taken up their lodgings in a barn. We were permitted {54} to stop, on condition of all three sleeping in one bed, which was said to be a large and a good one. Two-thirds of the bar-room floor was covered by the beds of weary travellers, lying closely side by side, and the remaining part occupied by people engaged in drinking, and noisy conversation. The room in which supper was taken, was too small to admit any large proportion of the company at once, of consequence we had to wait the alternation of a supper party and a cooking, before we got to the table.

This accumulation of travellers is chiefly occasioned by people in the eastern States having reaped and disposed of their crops at this season, and on that account finding it a convenient time for removing to the western country.

September 25. At half past five all were in bustle, preparing for the road: Some settling bill with the hostess, others waiting to settle: Some round a long wooden trough at the pump, washing, or drying themselves with their pocket-handkerchiefs: Some Americans drinking their morning’s bitters, (spirits with rue, wormwood, or other vegetable infusion:) Some women catching children who had escaped naked from bed, others packing up bed clothes, or putting them into waggons: Waggoners harnessing their horses, &c.

The little piece of ground cleared here is very rich, the best pasture I have seen in America; but the winter in this high region must be severe.

Two miles onward there are fine fields and orchards. The interval land is meadow. No Indian corn is to be seen. By the road side, what miners call the vise of a bed of coal is perceptible.

Stoystown is delightfully situated on the north bank of a deep vale.[33] The neighbouring grounds are but recently cleared. If we may judge from {55} the appearance of the houses, tavern-keepers are the principal men of the place; one of these is dubbed Major.

The land on this side of the Allegany ridge is much better than immediately on the eastern side of it. At present travellers and horses consume a great part of the produce, but as cultivation proceeds, the distance from market must become more sensibly felt.

The ridge, Laurel Hill, is about seven miles broad from one side of the base to the other. We observed a rattlesnake that had been recently killed on the road; it was about three and a half feet long, and about an inch and a half in diameter. The people say, that only two species of serpents are poisonous here; but there are probably more, as no less than thirty species have been enumerated in the United States.

Laurel Hill being broad, and considerably steep, must be of prominent height. Of its elevation relatively to the Allegany ridge, I could not even venture an opinion. To be continually enveloped in woods, without seeing to any great distance, must be a condition disagreeable to the inquisitive traveller, and to the geologist.

We lodged at Lauchlin’s Town;[34] near this place is a small furnace. Malleable iron is sold at ten cents a-pound.

September 26. On this day there was a heavy shower of rain, the first since our leaving Philadelphia. Passed Chesnut ridge, near Somerset.[35] At a tavern here, some men were drinking and swearing most hideously. It is much to be regretted that this vice is so prevalent in a country where so many other things are to be commended.

Greensburg, the county town of Westmoreland, is a considerable place, built on rising ground. {56} Here, and westward of this place, the land is fine, but hilly. Stopped at Adamsburg, six miles from Greensburg.

September 28. Yesterday my companions set out for Pittsburg. These young gentlemen have conducted themselves in the style which distinguishes the well-bred from the uncultivated and obtrusive man. They put no such questions as, “Where are you going?—What are you to do there?” &c. so common in this land of liberty. Of my companions I only knew their names, the States they came from, and that they are going to the western country.

Yesterday morning the hoar-frost was faintly visible on the newly mown grass, the first that has been observed this season. No danger is now to be apprehended from the cold, as Indian corn, (the latest of the crops,) is ripe. The woods and orchards have their young shoots well matured, and will soon be coloured with their autumnal tinge.

A majority of the people in the neighbourhood of Adamsburg are Germans, or their descendants. Although most of them can speak in English, their conversation with one another is in German, and a clergyman in the neighbourhood preaches in that language.