After spending the day in exploring the Licks, we were hospitably received at the house of a Kentucky proprietor a few miles distant, whose zeal for farming and introducing cattle of the "true Durham breed," had not prevented him from cultivating a beautiful flower garden. We were regaled the next morning at breakfast with an excellent dish of broiled squirrels. There are seasons when the grey squirrel swarms here in such numbers, as to strip the trees of their foliage, and the sportsmen revenge themselves after the manner of the Hottentots, when they eat the locusts which have consumed every green thing in Southern Africa.

We then returned by another route through the splendid forest, and re-crossed the Ohio. The weather was cool, and we saw no fire-flies, although I had seen many a few days before, sparkling as they flitted over the marshy grounds bordering the Ohio, in my excursion up the river to Rockville.

Among the inquiries which can hardly fail to awaken the curiosity of a geologist who explores this region, one of the most natural relates to the relative age of the northern drift, and the deposits containing the remains of the mastodon and elephant, whether at Big Bone Lick, or in the higher terrace (b, fig. 9) at Cincinnati. In my journey, some days afterwards, from the Ohio river to Cleveland on Lake Erie, I had not proceeded twenty-five miles to the northward before I again found myself in a country covered with northern drift, of which I had lost sight for many weeks previously. The first patches which I observed were about five miles N.E. of the town of Lebanon, after which I saw it in great

60

NORTHERN DRIFT.

CHAP. XVII.

abundance at Springfield, with large blocks and boulders of gneiss, reddish syenite, quartzite, and hornblende rock, all of which must have come from the north side of Lake Erie. The Ohio river, therefore, in the north latitude 40° and 41°, seems to mark the southern limit of the drift in this part of North America, although some scattered blocks have gone farther, and reached Kentucky.

I was also told that a boulder of gneiss, twelve feet in diameter, has been found resting on the upper terrace (b, fig. 9), four miles north of Cincinnati, and that fragments of granite, in a similar situation, have been met with at that city itself. These may possibly have been brought into their present position since the period of the deposition of the principal mass of northern drift; for, although I could not obtain sufficient data for forming an accurate opinion as to the relative age of the drift, and the beds containing the bones of mastodon and elephant, whether in the upper terrace above alluded to, or in the licks of Kentucky, I incline to believe the drift, as a whole, to be the older of the two formations. The swamps of the Big Bone Licks have the same intimate relation to the present superficial geography of the district, as have those marshes and alluvial deposits before described in New York, as containing the remains of mastodon and recent shells, which are decidedly more modern than the drift and its erratic blocks. (Vol. I., pp. 18, 20, and 54.)

CHAPTER XVIII

Cincinnati.-Journey across Ohio to Cleveland.-New Clearings.-Rapid Progress of the State since the year 1800.Increase of Population in the United States.-Political Discussions.-German and Irish Settlers.-Stump Oratory.— Presidential Elections.-Relative Value of Labour and Land.

THE pork aristocracy of Cincinnati does not mean those innumerable pigs which walk at large about the streets, as if they owned the town, but a class of rich merchants, who have made their fortunes by killing annually, salting, and exporting, about 200,000 swine. There are, besides these, other wealthy proprietors, who have speculated successfully in land, which often rises rapidly in value as the population increases. The general civilisation and refinement of the citizens is far greater than might have been looked for in a State founded so recently, owing to the great number of families which have come directly from the highly educated part of New England, and have settled here.

As to the free hogs before mentioned, which roam about the handsome streets, they belong to no one in particular, and any citizen is at liberty to take them up, fatten, and kill them. When they increase too fast, the town council interferes, and sells off some of their number. It is a favorite amusement of the boys to ride upon the pigs, and we were shown one sagacious old hog, who was in the habit of lying down as soon as a boy came in sight. 7

VOL. II.

1

62

TOUR THROUGH OHIO.

CHAP. XVIII.

May 29th.-We left Cincinnati for Cleveland on Lake Erie, a distance of 250 miles, and our line of route took us through the centre of the State of Ohio, by Springfield, Columbus, Mount Vernon, and Wooster, at all which places we slept, reaching Cleveland on the fifth day.

In our passage through Ohio, we took advantage of public coaches only when they offered themselves. in the day-time, and always found good private carriages for the rest of the way. If some writers, who have recently travelled in this part of America, found the fatigue of the journey excessive, it must have arisen from their practice of pushing on day and night over roads which are in some places really dangerous in the dark. On our reaching a steep hill north of Mount Vernon, a fellow-passenger pointed out to me a spot where the coach had been lately upset in the night. He said that in the course of the last three years he had been overturned thirteen times between Cincinnati and Cleveland, but being an inside passenger had escaped without serious injury.

In passing from the southern to the northern frontier of Ohio, we left a handsome and populous city and fine roads, and found the towns grow smaller and the high road rougher, as we advanced. When more than half way across the State, and after leaving Mount Vernon, we saw continually new clearings, where the felling, girdling, and burning of trees was going on, and where oats were growing amidst the blackened stumps on land which had never been ploughed, but only broken up with the harrow. The carriage was then jolted for a short space over a

corduroy road, constructed of trunks of trees laid side by side, while the hot air of burning timber made us impatient of the slow pace of our carriage. We then lost sight for many leagues of all human habitations, except here and there some empty wooden building, on which "Mover's House" was inscribed in large letters. Here we were told a family of emigrants might pass the night on payment of a small sum. At last the road again improved, and we came to the termination of the table land of Ohio, at a distance of about sixteen miles from Lake Erie. From this point on the summit of Stony Hill we saw at our feet a broad and level plain covered with wood; and beyond, in the horizon, Lake Erie, extending far and wide like the ocean. We then began our descent, and in about three hours reached Cleveland.

The changes in the condition of the country which we had witnessed are illustrations of the course of events which has marked the progress of civilisation in this State, which first began in the south, and spread from the banks of the Ohio. At a later period, when the great Erie canal was finished, which opened a free commercial intercourse with the river Hudson, New York, and the Atlantic, the northern frontier began to acquire wealth and an increase of inhabitants. Ports were founded on the lake, and grew in a few years with almost unparalleled rapidity. The forest then yielded to the axe in a new direction, and settlers migrated from north to south, leaving still a central wilderness between the Ohio and Lake Erie. This forest might have proved for many generations a serious obstacle to the progress