complains of want of labourers. A farmer must do all himself. Received of our landlady a lump of Ohio wild sugar, of which some families make from six to ten barrels a-year, sweet and good enough.

Reached Chilicothé, on the Sciota river, to [339] sup and rest at the tavern of Mr. Madera, a sensible young man. Here I met Mr. Randolph, a gentleman of Philadelphia, from Missouri and Illinois, who thinks both sickly, and not to be preferred to the east, or others parts of the west. I saw three or four good houses, in the best street, abandoned, and the windows and doors rotting out for want of occupants.

15th.—I rode all day through a fine interesting country, abounding with every good thing, and full of springs and streams. Near Lancaster,110 I passed a large high ridge of rocks, which nature has clothed in everlasting green, being beautified with the spruce, waving like feathers, on their bleak, barren tops. I reached Lancaster to rest; a handsome county seat, near which land is selling occasionally from sixteen dollars to twenty dollars. A fine farm of 170 acres, 100 being cleared, with all improvements, was sold lately by the sheriff, at sixteen dollars one cent an acre, much less than it cost. Labour is to be had at fifty cents and board, but as the produce is so low, it is thought farming, by hired hands, does not pay. Wheat, fifty cents; corn, 33½ cents; potatoes, 33 cents a bushel; beef, four dollars per cwt.; pork, three dollars; mutton none; sheep being kept only for the wool, and bought in common at 2s. 8d. per head.

Met Judge and General ——, who states that four millions of acres of land will this year [340] be offered to sale, bordering on the lakes. Why then should people go to the Missouri? It is not healthy near the lakes, on account of stagnant waters, made by sand bars, at the mouth of lake rivers. The regular periodical rising and falling of the lakes is not yet accounted for. There is no sensible diminution, or increase of the lake-waters. A grand canal is to be completed in five years, when boats will travel.111

Sunday, 16th.—I left Lancaster at peep of day, travelling through intense cold and icy roads to Somerset, eighteen miles, in five hours, to breakfast.112 Warmed at an old quarter-section man, a Dutch American, from Pennsylvania. He came here eleven years since, cleared seventy acres, has eight children, likes his land, but says, produce is too low to make it worth raising. People comfortably settled in the east, on good farms, should stay, unless their children can come and work on the land. He and his young family do all the work. Has a fine stove below, warming the first, and all other floors, by a pipe passing through them.

I slept at a good tavern, the keeper of which is a farmer. All are farmers, and all the best farmers are tavern-keepers. Farms, therefore, on the road, sell from 50 to 100 per cent more than land lying back, though it is no better in quality, and for mere farming, worth no more. But on the road, a farm and frequented tavern is found to be [341] a very beneficial mode of using land; the produce selling for double and treble what it will bring at market, and also fetching ready money. Labour is not to be commanded, says our landlord.

17th.—Started at peep of day in a snow-storm, which had covered the ground six inches deep. Breakfasted at beautiful Zanesville, a town most delightfully situated amongst the hills. Twelve miles from this town, one Chandler, in boring for salt, hit upon silver; a mine, seven feet thick, 150 feet below the surface. It is very pure ore, and the proprietor has given up two acres of the land to persons who have applied to the legislature to be incorporated. He is to receive one-fifth of the net profits.

18th.—I rode all day through a fine hilly country, full of springs and fountains. The land is more adapted for good pasture than for cultivation. Our landlord, Mr. Gill, states that wheat at fifty cents is too low; but, even at that price, there is no market, nor at any other. In some former years, Orleans was a market, but now it gets supplied from countries more conveniently situated than Ohio, from which it costs one dollar, or one dollar and a quarter per barrel, to send it. Boats carrying from 100 to 500 barrels, sell for only 16 dollars.

From a conversation, with an intelligent High Sheriff of this county, I learn that no common debtor has ever lain in prison longer than five [342] days. None need be longer in giving security for the surrender of all property.

19th.—Reached Wheeling late at night, passing through a romantic, broken, mountainous country, with many fine springs and creeks. Thus I left Ohio, which, thirty years ago, was a frontier state, full of Indians, without a white man's house, between Wheeling, Kaskasky, and St. Louis.

20th.—Reached Washington, Pennsylvania, to sleep, and found our tavern full of thirsty classics, from the seminary in this town.

21st.—Reached Pittsburgh, through a beautiful country of hills, fit only for pasture. I viewed the fine covered bridges over the two rivers Monongahela and Allegany, which cost 10,000 dollars each. The hills around the city shut it in, and make the descent into it frightfully precipitous. It is most eligibly situated amidst rocks, or rather hills, of coal, stone, and iron, the coals lying up to the surface, ready for use. One of these hills, or coal banks, has been long on fire, and resembles a volcano. Bountiful nature has done every thing for this rising Birmingham of America.

We slept at Wheeling, at the good hotel of Major Spriggs, one of General Washington's revolutionary officers, now near 80, a chronicle of years departed.113

22nd.—Bought a fine buffalo robe for five dollars. [343] The buffaloes, when Kentucky was first settled, were shot, by the settlers, merely for their tongues; the carcase and skin being thought worth nothing, were left where the animal fell.

Left Pittsburgh for Greensburgh, travelling through a fine, cultivated, thickly settled country, full of neat, flourishing, and good farms, the occupants of which are said to be rich. Land, on the road, is worth from fifteen to thirty dollars; from it, five to fifteen dollars per acre. The hills and mountains seem full of coal-mines and stone-quarries, or rather banks of coal and stone ever open gratuitously to all. The people about here are economical and intelligent; qualities characteristic of Pennsylvania.

Sunday, 23d.—We agreed to rest here until the morrow; finding one of our best horses sick; and went to Pittsburgh church.

24th.—My fellow traveller finding his horse getting worse, gave him away for our tavern bill of two days, thus paying 175 dollars for two days board. While this fine animal remained ours, no doctor could be found, but as soon as he became our landlord's, one was discovered, who engaged to cure him in a week. Mr. Wheeler took my horse, and left me to come on in the stage, to meet again at