Read Ebook: Travels in the United States of America Commencing in the Year 1793 and Ending in 1797. With the Author's Journals of his Two Voyages Across the Atlantic. by Priest William

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Yours very sincerely, &c.

DEAR FRIEND,

I slept at an inn, about twenty miles from Annapolis, where we supped in the American fashion on fried squirrels and coffee, the former excellent.

On the evening of the 7th we slept at Wilmington, a pleasantly situate town on the banks of a creek, which joins the Delaware, about thirty miles below Philadelphia. There are about thirty square-rigged vessels, beside sloops, and schooners, belonging to this port, which was originally a danish settlement.

The next morning I walked to Brandywine, to see the grist mills, which are said to be the best in the United States. About five miles from this village was fought the battle of Brandywine. This was Washington's last effort to stop general Howe's progress, and save Philadelphia. The royal army being victorious, they got possession of that city without opposition. General Washington, after rallying his troops, took a very advantageous situation on a chain of hills, a few miles west of the British army.

We dined at Chester. This little town is situated on the Delaware, and is the same to Philadelphia that Gravesend is to London. Ships outward bound here receive their passengers, &c. &c.

At four the same day, arrived in this city, distant from Annapolis one hundred and forty one miles, and from Baltimore one hundred and eleven. Farewell.

Yours, &c.

DEAR SIR,

Farewell, &c.

Dear friend,

Philadelphia, the present seat of government, both of the state of Pensylvania, and of the whole federal union, consisted, in the year 1681, of half a dozen miserable huts, inhabited by a few emigrants from Sweden; when the celebrated William Penn obtained a charter from king Charles the Second, for a certain tract of unsettled country in North America, extending from twelve miles north of Newcastle, along the courses of the Delaware, and a meridian line from its head, to the 43d degree of north latitude, and westward, 5 degrees of longitude from its eastern bounds.

Philadelphia is situate in latitude 39 deg. 56 min. north, and long. 75 deg. 8 min. west from Greenwich, on a narrow neck of land, between the rivers Delaware and Scuylkill, on the Pensylvania banks of the latter, where this river is about one mile wide, and one hundred and twenty from the Atlantic Ocean. This noble river affords a safe navigation for vessels of a thousand tuns burden up to the wharfs of the city. The Scuylkill has nearly the same depth of water.

Philadelphia is the first port in the Union. The total value of it's exports in the year 1793, was 695736 dollars; the total of flower shipped in the year 1792 was 420000 barrels, and in the spring only of 1793 it exceeded 200000 barrels.

The total of inward entries at Philadelphia, in 1793, was 1414 vessels of different sizes, of which 477 were ships or brigs.

During the time the British troops had possession of this city in the last war, they were much distressed for fuel, and obliged to cut down all the wood they could meet with; upwards of a thousand acres of peach and apple orchard were destroyed, belonging to one family. This destruction of the trees has materially hurt the prospects for three or four miles on the Pensylvania side; the opposite Jersey shore is one entire forest.

Philadelphia is at present supplied with water from pumps, placed in different parts of the city; but a company of adventurers are bringing water from above the falls of Scuylkill, in the manner of the New River in London: but mean to improve on sir Hugh Middleton's plan, by making their aqueduct also serve the purposes of inland navigation.

The inhabitants are in general very fond of theatrical representations; their new theatre is an elegant building, from a design the subscribers obtained from London, where the principal scenes were painted by Richardson and Rooker. The receipts of the house have exceeded one thousand six hundred dollars.

Yours, &c.

Since writing this letter, the seat of government of the state has been removed to Lancaster, as being nearer the centre; for the same reason, that of the general government of the United States, will, in the year 1800, be removed to the federal city, now building in the district of Columbia.

DEAR SIR,

It is a general observation with respect to the English, that they eat more animal food than the people of any other nation. The following statement of the manner of living of the Americans will convince you of the falsity of this opinion.

Yours sincerely, &c.

Dear Friend,

The price of labour in this country is very great, owing to the prospect an industrious man has of procuring an independance by cultivating a tract of the waste lands; many millions of acres of which are how on sale by government; to say nothing of those held by individuals. The money arising from the sale of the former is appropriated to the discharge of the national debt.

He gradually clears his land, a few acres every year, and begins to plant wheat, tobacco, &c. These, together with what hogs, and other increase of his stock he can spare, as also the skins of deer, bear, and other animals he shoots in the woods, he exchanges with the nearest storekeeper, for clothing, sugar, coffee, &c.

The following extract from an American work very feelingly describes him under these cruel apprehensions:--

EXTRACT.

But we will suppose our planter to have escaped the scalping knife and tomahawk; and in the course of years situate in a thick, settled neighbourhood of planters like himself, who have struggled through all the foregoing difficulties: he is now a man of some consequence, builds a house by the side of his former hut, which now serves him for a kitchen; and as he is comfortably situate, we will leave him to the enjoyment of the fruits of his industry.

Such a being has often ideas of liberty, and a contempt of vassalage and slavery, which do honour to human nature.

Yours &c.

Dear Friend,

My present intention is to give you some conception of the family of a planter, whose ancestors had in some degree gone through all the difficulties I described in my last.

They enjoy a happy state of mediocrity, between riches and poverty, perhaps the most enviable of all situations. When the boys of this family are numerous, those the father cannot provide for at home, and who prefer a planter's life to a trade, or profession, are, when married, presented with two or three hundred acres of uncultivated land, which their parents purchase for them as near home as possible. The young couple are supplied with stock, and supported till they have a sufficient quantity of land cleared to provide for themselves.

If unsuccessful through want of industry, &c., they often sell off, and emigrate to Kentucky, or some other new country seven or eight hundred miles to the S.W., and begin the world again as back settlers.

I am

Yours sincerely, &c.

"There be also store of frogs, which in the spring time will chirp, and whistle like birds: there be also toads, that will creep to the top of trees, and sit there croaking, to the wonderment of strangers!"

"To a stranger walking for the first time in these woods during the summer, this appears the land of enchantment: he hears a thousand noises, without being able to discern from whence or from what animal they proceed, but which are, in fact, the discordant notes of five different species of frogs!"

DEAR FRIEND,

Previous to my coming to this country, I recollect reading the foregoing passages, the first in a history of New England, published in London, in the year 1671; and the other in a similar production of a later date.

"Call you these peals of thunder, but the yawn or bellowing clouds? by Jove, they seem to me the world's last groans, and those large sheets of flame it's last blaze!"

Farewell.--Believe me

Yours very sincerely, &c.,

DEAR SIR,

Having a few weeks vacation at the theatre, we agreed upon a scheme to give three concerts at Lancaster, a town in Pennsylvania, about seventy miles west of this city. Our band was small, but select; and our singers Darley, and miss Broadhurst. We crossed the Scuylkill about two miles below the Falls.

General Wayne was here completely surprised, but had his revenge at Stoney Point.

The devastation that has taken place among the brave and independent aborigines of this continent, is really shocking to humanity.

I spent the evening at the Pioli, with a surgeon of the american army lately from the scene of action; he gave me a disgusting account of the misunderstanding that subsists between the american citizens on the frontiers, and their neighbours in Upper Canada. It seems the Canadians are accused of assisting the indians in the decisive action against St. Clare.

All the back parts of Pennsylvania were in general cleared, and settled by german, and irish emigrants; but the former are commonly more prosperous than their neighbours, whom they excel in sobriety and economy, and have also a much better understanding amongst themselves.

Yours very sincerely.

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