down trees and limbs in all directions, so that for immediate preservation I was obliged to steer out into the river which rolled and foamed like a sea, and filled my boat nearly half full of water, and it was with the greatest difficulty I could make the least headway. It continued to snow violently until dusk, when I at length made good my landing at a place on the Kentucky shore, where I had perceived a cabin; and here I spent the evening in learning the art and mystery of bear-treeing, wolf-trapping and wild-cat hunting, from an old professor. But notwithstanding the skill of this great master, the country here is swarming with wolves and wild-cats, black and brown; according to this hunter's own confession he had lost sixty pigs since Christmas last, and all night long the distant howling of the wolves kept the dogs in a perpetual uproar of barking. This man was one of those people called squatters, who neither pay rent nor own land, but keep roving on the frontiers, advancing as the tide of civilized population approaches. They are the immediate successors of the savages, and far below them in good sense and good manners, as well as comfortable accommodations. An engraved representation of one of their cabins would form a striking embellishment to the pages of The Port Folio, as a specimen of the first order of American Architecture.

Nothing adds more to the savage grandeur and picturesque effect of the scenery along the Ohio than these miserable huts of human beings, lurking at the bottom of a gigantic growth of timber that I have not seen equalled in any other part of the United States. And it is truly amusing to observe how dear and how familiar habit has rendered those privations which must have been first the offspring of necessity. Yet none pride themselves more on their possessions. The inhabitants of these forlorn shes will talk to you with pride of the richness of their soil, of the excellence and abundance of their country, of the healthiness of their climate, and the purity of their waters, while the only bread you find among them is of Indian corn coarsely ground in a horse-mill with half the grains unbroken; even their cattle are destitute of stables and hay, and look like moving skeletons; their own houses worse than pig-styes; their clothes an assemblage of rags, their faces yellow, and lank

with disease, and their persons covered with filth, and frequently garnished with the humours of the Scotch fiddle, from which dreadful amusement by the mercy of God I have been most miraculously preserved. All this is the effect of laziness. The corn is thrown into the ground in the spring, and the pigs turned into the woods, where they multiply like rabbits. The labour of the squatter is now over till fall, and he spends the winter in eating pork, cabbage and hoe-cakes. What a contrast to the neat farm and snug cleanly habitation of the industrious settler that opens their green fields, their stately barns, gardens and orchards to the gladdened eye of the delighted stranger!

At a place called Salt Lick I went ashore to see the salt works, and to learn whether the people had found any further remains of an animal of the ox kind, one of whose horns, of a prodigious size, was discovered here some years ago, and is in the possession of Mr. Peale. They make here about one thousand bushels weekly, which sells at one dollar and seventy-five cents per bushel. The wells are from thirty to fifty feet deep, but nothing curious has lately been dug up. I landed at Maysville, or Limestone, where a considerable deal of business is done in importation for the interior of Kentucky. It stands on a high narrow plain between the mountains and the river, which is fast devouring the bank, and encroaching on the town; part of the front street is gone already, and unless some effectual means are soon taken the whole must go by piecemeal. This town contains about one hundred houses, chiefly log and frames. From this place I set out on foot for Washington. On the road at the height of several hundred feet above the present surface of the river, I found prodigious quantities of petrified shells of the small cockle and fan-shaped kind, but whether marine remains or not am uncertain. I have since found these petrified concretions of shells universal all over Kentucky wherever I have been. The rocks look as if one had collected heaps of broken shells and wrought them up among clay, then hardened it into stone. These rocks lie universally in horizontal strata. A farmer in the neighbourhood of Washington assured me, that from seven acres he reaped at once eight thousand weight of excellent hemp, fit for market.

Amidst very tempestuous weather I reached the town of Cincinnati, which does honour to the name of the old Roman, and is

the neatest and handsomest situated place I have seen since I left Philadelphia. You must know that during an unknown series of ages the river Ohio has gradually sunk several hundred feet below its former bed, and has left on both sides occasionally what are called the first or nearest, and the second or next high bank, which is never overflown.

The town of Cincinnati occupies two beautiful plains, one on the first, and the other on the second bank, and contains upwards of five hundred houses, the greater proportion of which are of brick. One block house is all that remains of Fort Washington. The river Licking comes in from the opposite shore, where the town of Newport of forty or fifty houses, and a large arsenal and barracks are lately erected. Here I met with a judge Turner, a man of extraordinary talents, well known to the literati of Philadelphia. He exerted himself in my behalf with all the ardor of an old friend. A large Indian mound in the vicinity of this town has been lately opened by a doctor Drake, who showed me the collection of curiosities which he had found in that and others. In the centre of this mound he also found a large fragment of earthen ware, such as I found at the Big Grave, which is a pretty strong proof that these works have been erected by a people, if not the same, differing little from the present race of Indians, whose fragments of earthen ware dug up about their late towns correspond exactly with these. Twenty miles below this I passed the mouth of the Great Miami, which rushes in from the north, and is a large and stately river, preserving its pure waters uncontaminated for many miles with those of the Ohio, each keeping their respective sides of the channel. I rambled up the banks of this river for four or five miles, and in my return shot a turkey. I also saw five or six deer in a drove, but they were too light heeled for me.

In the afternoon of the 15th I entered Big Bone Creek, which being passable only about a quarter of a mile, I secured my boat and left my baggage under the care of a decent family near, and set out on foot five miles through the woods for the Big Bone Lick, that great antediluvian rendezvous of the American elephants. This place which lies "far in the windings of a sheltered vale," afforded me a fund of amusement in shooting ducks and peroquets (of which last I skinned twelve, and brought off

two slightly wounded) and in examining the ancient buffalo roads to this great licking place. Mr. Colquhoun, the proprietor, was not at home, but his agent and manager entertained me as well as he was able, and was much amused with my enthusiasm. This place is a low valley everywhere surrounded by high hills; in the centre, by the side of the creek is a quagmire of near an acre, from which and another smaller one below, the chief part of these large bones have been taken; at the latter places I found numerous fragments of large bones lying scattered about. In pursuing a wounded duck across this quagmire, I had nearly deposited my carcass among the grand congregation of mammoths below, having sunk up to the middle and had hard struggling to get out. As the proprietor intends to dig in various places this season for brine, and is a gentleman of education and intelligence, I have strong hopes that a more complete skeleton of that animal called the mammoth, than has yet been found will be procured. I laid the strongest injunctions on the manager to be on the look out, and to preserve every thing; I also left a letter for Mr. Colquhoun to the same purport, and am persuaded that these will not be neglected. In this eighbourhood I found, the Columbo plant in great abundance, and collected some of the seeds. Many of the old stalks were more than five feet high. I have since found it in various other parts of this country. In the afternoon of the next day I returned to my boat, replaced my baggage, and rowed twenty miles to the Swiss settlement, where I spent the night. These hardy and industrious people have now twelve acres closely and cleanly planted with vines from the Cape of Good Hope. They last year made seven hundred gallons of wine, and expect to make three times as much the ensuing season. Their houses are neat and comfortable, they have orchards of peach and apple trees, besides a great number of figs, cherries, and other fruit trees, of which they ar very curious. They are of opinion that this part of the Indiana Territory is as well suited as any part of France for the cultivation of the vine, but the vines they say require different management here from what they were accustomed to in Switzerland: I purchased a bottle of their last vintage, and

drank to all your healths as long as it lasted in going down the river. Seven miles below this I passed the mouth of Kentucky river, which has a formidable appearance. I observed twenty or thirty scattered houses on its upper side and a few below, many of the former seemingly in a state of decay. It rained on me almost the whole of this day, and I was obliged to row hard and drink healths to keep myself comfortable. My birds' skins were wrapt up in my great coat, and my own had to sustain a complete drenching, which, however, had no bad effects. This evening I lodged at the most wretched hovel I had yet seen. The owner, a meagre diminutive wretch, soon began to let me know of how much consequence he had formerly been; that he had gone through all the war with general Washington-had become one of his life-guards, and had sent many a British soldier to his long home. As I answered him with indifference, to interest me the more he began to detail anecdotes of his wonderful exploits; "One grenadier," said he, "had the impudence to get up on the works and to wave his cap in defiance; my commander [general Washington I suppose] says to me, "Dick, cant you pepper that there fellow for me?” "Please your honour, says I, I'll try at it; so I took a fair, cool and steady aim, and touched my trigger. Up went his heels like a turkey! down he tumbled! one buckshot had entered here and another here [laying a finger on each breast] and the bullet found the way to his brains right through his forehead. By he was a noble looking fellow!" Though I believed every word of this to be a lie, yet I could not but look with disgust on the being who uttered it. This same miscreant pronounced a long prayer before supper, and immediately after called out in a splutter of oaths for the pine splinters to be held to let the gentleman see. Such a farrago of lies, oaths, prayers, and politeness, put me in a good humour in spite of myself. The whole herd of this filthy kennel were in perpetual motion with the itch, so having procured a large fire to be made, under pretence of habit I sought for the softest plank, placed my trunk and great coat at my head, and stretched myself there till morning. I set out early and passed several arks. A number of turkies which I observed from time