_A Pleasant Peregrination through the Prettiest Parts of Pennsylvania.
Performed by Peregrine Prolix. Philadelphia: Grigg and Elliot._
We know nothing farther about _Peregrine Prolix_ than that he is the
very clever author of a book entitled “_Letters descriptive of the
Virginia Springs_,” and that he is a gentleman upon the wrong side of
forty. The first fact we are enabled easily to perceive from the
peculiarity of an exceedingly witty-pedantic style characterizing, in
a manner not to be mistaken, both the Virginia and the Pennsylvania
Letters—the second appears from the first stanza of a rhyming
dedication (much better than eulogistic) to _John Guillemard, Esquire,
Fellow of the Royal Society, London_—
I send my friend a little token
Three thousand miles across the sea,
Of kindness, forty years unbroken
And cherished still for him by me.
However these matters may be, it is very certain that _Peregrine
Prolix_ is a misnomer, that his book is a very excellent thing, and
that the Preface is not the worst part of it.
Our traveller, before setting out on his peregrinations, indulges us,
in Letter I, with a very well executed outline sketch, or scratch, of
Philadelphia, not troubling himself much about either his _keeping_ or
his _fillings in_. We cannot do better than just copy the whole of his
picture.
Philadelphia is a flat, rectangular, clean, (almost too clean
sometimes, for on Saturdays “nunquam cessavit lavari, aut fricari, aut
tergeri, aut ornari, poliri, pingi, fingi,”[1]) uniform, well-built,
brick and mortar, (except one stone house,) well-fed and watered,
well-clad, moral, industrious, manufacturing, rich, sober, quiet,
good-looking city. The Delaware washes its eastern and the Schuylkill
its western front. The distance between the two rivers is one mile and
three quarters, which space on several streets is nearly filled with
houses. Philadelphia looks new, and is new, and like Juno always will
be new; for the inhabitants are constantly pulling down and
new-vamping their houses. The furor delendi with regard to old houses,
is as rife in the bosoms of her citizens, as it was in the breast of
old Cato with regard to Carthage. A respectable-looking old house is
now a rare thing, and except the venerable edifice of Christ Church in
Second above Market Street, we should hardly know where to find one.
[Footnote 1: Plautus, Pænuli, Act i., sc. 2, l. 10.]
The dwelling-houses in the principal streets are all very much alike,
having much the air of brothers, sisters and cousins of the same
family; like the supernumerary figures in one of West's historical
paintings, or like all the faces in all of Stothard's designs. They
are nearly all three stories high, faced with beautiful red unpainted
Philadelphia brick, and have water tables and steps of white marble,
kept so painfully clean as to make one fear to set his foot on them.
The roofs are in general of cedar, cypress or pine shingles; the
continued use of which is probably kept up (for there is plenty of
slate,) to afford the Fire-Companies a little wholesome exercise.
The streets are in general fifty feet wide, having on each side
convenient _trottoirs_ well paved with brick, and a carriage way badly
paved with large round pebbles. They are kept very clean, and the
kennels are frequently washed by floods of pure Schuylkill water,
poured from the iron pipes with which all the streets are underlaid.
{446} This same Schuylkill water is the cause of many comforts in the
shape of drinking, bathing and clean linen, (indusia toraliaque;) and
enters into the composition of those delicious and persuasive liquids
called Pepper's beer and Gray's ale and porter.
This water is so pure, that our brothers of New York complain of its
want of taste; and it is as wholesome and refreshing as the stream of
father Nilus. It is also so copious, that our incendiaries are
scarcely ever able to burn more than the roof or garret of one or two
houses in a month. The fire companies are numerous, voluntary,
well-organized associations, amply furnished with engines, hose, and
all other implements and munitions necessary to make successful war
upon the destroying element; and the members are intelligent, active
and intrepid young men, so skilful from daily practice, that they will
put you out three or four fires in a night, in less time than
Higginbottom, that veteran fireman of London, would have allowed them
to kindle.
The public confidence in these useful, prompt, energetic and faithful
companies is so great, that no citizen is alarmed by the cry of fire;
for he knows that the first tap on the State House bell, arouses
hundreds of these vigilant guardians of the city's safety, who rush to
the scene of danger with one accord; and with engines, axes, ladders,
torches, hooks and hose, dash through summer's heat, or winter's hail
and snows.
The old State House, in whose eastern room the Declaration of
Independence was signed, has on the top of it, a sort of stumpy
steeple, which looks as if somewhat pushed in, like a spy glass, half
shut. In this steeple is a large clock, which, twice as bad as Janus,
presents four faces, which at dusk are lighted up like the full moon;
and as there is a man in the moon, so there is a man in the clock, to
see that it does not lag behind, nor run away from father time; whose
whereabout, ever and anon, the people wish to know. This close
observer of the time is also a distant observer of the fires, and
possesses an ingenious method of communicating their existence and
position to his fellow citizens below. One tap on the great bell means
north; two indicate south; three represent east, and four point out
west; and by composition these simple elements are made to represent
also the intermediate points. If the fire be in the north, the man
strikes successive blows with solemn and equal intervals, thus;
tap——tap——tap——tap; if it be in the south, thus; tap tap——tap tap; if
it be in the north east, thus; tap——tap tap tap———tap——tap tap tap; so
that when the thrifty and well-fed citizen is roused by the cry of
fire at midnight, from a pleasant dream of heaps of gold and smoking
terrapins and whisky punch, he uncovers one ear and listens calmly for
the State House bell, and if its iron tongue tell of no scathe to him,
he turns him on his side and sleeps again. What a convenient
invention, which tells the firemen when and where to go, and the
terrapin men when to lie snug in their comfortable nests! This clever
plan is supposed to have been invented by an M. A. P. S.; this
however, we think doubtful, for the Magellanic Premium has never, to
our knowledge, been claimed for the discovery. This reminds us that
the American Philosophical Society is _located_[2] in Philadelphia,
where it possesses a spacious hall, a good library, and an interesting
collection of American antiquities, gigantic fossil bones, and other
curiosities, all of which are open to the inspection of intelligent
and inquisitive travellers.
[Footnote 2: A new and somewhat barbarous, but exceedingly convenient
yankeeism, which will probably work its way into good society in
England, as its predecessor ‘_lengthy_,’ has already done.]
The Society was founded by the Philosophical Franklin, and its
presidential chair is now occupied by the learned and venerable
Duponceau.
There exists here a club of twenty-four philosophers, who give every
Saturday evening very agreeable male parties;[3] consisting of the
club, twenty invited citizens and any strangers who may happen to be
in town. These parties are not confined to any particular circle; but
all men who are distinguished in the arts, whether fine or mechanical;
or in the sciences, whether natural or artificial, are liable to be
invited. The members of the club are all M. A. P. S., and the parties
are supposed to look with a steady eye towards the cultivation of
science; the other eye however regards with equal complacency the
useful and ornamental arts of eating and drinking. The only defect in
the latter department that we have discovered, is the banishment of
ice cream and roman punch.
[Footnote 3: Called Wistar parties, in honor of the late illustrious
Caspar Wistar, M.D., Professor of Anatomy in the University of
Pennsylvania.]
The markets are well supplied with good things. The principal one is
held under long colonnades running along the middle of Market street,
and extending from Front to Eighth street, a distance of more than one
thousand yards. The columns are of brick and the roofs of shingles,
arched and ceiled underneath. If I were to say all they deserve of its
beef, mutton and veal, there would be no end to the praises that
_flesh_ is heir to; but the butter and cream-cheese in the spring and
summer, are such dainties as are found in no other place under the
welkin. They are produced on dairy farms and by families near the
city, whose energies have for several generations been directed to
this one useful end, and who now work with an art made perfect by the
experience of a century.
Here is the seat of the University of Pennsylvania, which comprehends
a College of the Arts and several preparatory schools; and a college
of Medicine the most celebrated of the United States, in the list of
whose professors are many names advantageously known in all civilized
nations.
The Hospital for the insane, sick and wounded is a well conducted
institution, and worth a stranger's visit. Go and see also the Museum,
the Water-Works, the Navy-Yard, and the public squares, and lots of
other things too tedious to write down.
The site of the city promises very little for the scenery of the
environs; but unlike the witches in Macbeth, what is promised is more
than kept. Take an open carriage and cross the Schuylkill by the
Market street bridge, and ride up the west bank of the river for five
or six miles, and your labor will be fully rewarded by a succession of
lovely landscapes, comprehending water, hill and dale; wood, lawn and
meadow; villas, farmhouses and cottages, mingled in a charming
variety.
On the west bank of the Schuylkill opposite to the city, we regret to
say, is an enormous palace, which cost many hundred thousand dollars,
called an Almshouse, (unhappy misnomer,) which is big enough to hold
all the paupers that _would be_ in the world, if there were no poor
laws to _make them_. But you had better go and see it, and take the
length and breadth and height of our unreason, in this age of light,
when we ought to know better.
The people of Philadelphia are in general well-informed, well-bred,
kind, hospitable and of good manners, very slightly tinged with quaker
reserve; and the tone of society is good, except in a small circle of
exclusive _imagines subitæ_, who imitate very awkwardly the
exaggerations of European fashion. The tone of the Satanic school,
which has somewhat infected the highest circles of fashion in England,
has not yet crossed the Atlantic.
There are many good Hotels, and extensive boarding houses; and the
table of the Mansion House is said to be faultless.
Taking every thing into consideration, this is certainly the very spot
for annuitants, who have reached the rational age of fifty, to nestle
in during the long remnant of their comfortable days. We say long
remnant, because as a class, annuitants are the longest livers; and
there is an excellent company here, that not only grants annuities,
but also insures lives.
The climate of Philadelphia is variable, and exhibits (in the shade,)
all the degrees of temperature that are contained between the tenth
below, and the ninetieth {447} above zero, on the scale of Fahrenheit.
In general, winter does not begin seriously until after Christmas, but
he sometimes lingers too long in “_the lap of spring_,” and leaves a
bridge of ice on the noble river Delaware until the tenth of March.
There are generally three or four weeks of severe cold, during which
the thermometer sometimes at night sinks below zero, and sometimes in
the day does not rise to the point of thaw. This period is generally
enlivened by two or three snow storms, which set in motion the rapid
sleighs, the jingle of whose lively bells is heard through day and
night. The Delaware is not frozen over every winter, but there is
always made an ample supply of fine crystalline ice to last the
citizens until the next winter. The annual average duration of
interrupted navigation may be four or five weeks. In March there is
sometimes a little Scotch weather in which Sawney would rub his hands
and tell you, here is a fine cauld blawey snawey rainy day. There is
however not much such weather, though the March winds have been known
to blow (as Paddy would say,) even in the first week of April; after
which spring begins with tears and smiles to coax the tardy vegetation
into life.
Spring is short and vegetation rapid. Summer sprinkles a day here and
there in May, and sets in seriously to toast people in June; during
which month there are generally six or eight days whose average
temperature reaches the altissimum of summer heat. In July the days
are hot, but there is some relief at night; whilst in August the fiery
day is but a prelude to a baking night; and the whole city has the air
of an enormous oven.[4] The extremely hot weather does not continue
more than six weeks, and so far from being a misfortune, it is a great
advantage to the inhabitants; for it makes every body that can spare
twenty dollars, take a pleasant journey every year, whereby their
minds are expanded, their manners improved, and they return with a
double zest to the enjoyments of Philadelphia, having learned, quantum
est in rebus inane, that is, in the rebuses of other places.
[Footnote 4: The season of the Dog Days. A witty Philadelphia lady
being once asked, how many Dog Days there are, answered that there
must be a great many, for every dog has his day. At that time the city
abounded in dogs, but the corporation has since made fierce war upon
them, with a view perhaps of lessening the number of Dog Days, and
improving the climate, by _curtailing_ those innocent beasts.]
The autumn, or as the Philadelphians call it, the Fall, is the most
delightful part of the year, and is sometimes eked out by the Indian
Summer as far as Christmas. The Fall begins in the first half of
September and generally lasts until the middle of November, when it is
succeeded by the Indian Summer; a pleasant period of two or three
weeks, in which the mornings, evenings and nights are frosty, and the
days comfortably warm and a little hazy. The Indians are supposed to
have employed this period in hunting and laying in game for winter
use, before the long-knives made game of _them_.
The population of Philadelphia and its suburbs exceeds 180,000 souls.
Having taken passage for himself and a friend in the Pioneer line, at
8 A. M., for Hallidaysburg, Mr. Prolix dates his second letter from
Lancaster. This epistle is full of fun, bustle, and all good
things—gives a lively picture of the horrors of early rising and
half-eaten breakfasts—of a cruise in an omnibus, about the city of
Brotherly Love, in search of the due quota of passengers—of the depot
in Broad Street—of an unilocular car with its baggage and
passengers—of an old woman in a red cloak and an old gentleman in a
red nose—of a tall, good looking Englishman, who was at the trouble of
falling asleep—and of an infantile little American gentleman, who had
no trouble whatever about fulfilling all his little occasions. Some
account, too, is given of the ride to the foot of the inclined plane
on the western bank of the Schuylkill, of the viaduct by which the
plane is approached, the view from the viaduct, of the country between
Philadelphia and Lancaster, of the Columbia rail road, of Lancaster
city, and of Mrs. Hubley's very respectable hotel.
_Letter III_ is dated from Duncan's Island. Mr. Prolix left Lancaster
at 5 A. M. in a rail road car, drawn by two horses tandem, arrived at
Columbia in an hour and a half, and stopped at Mr. Donley's Red Lion
Hotel, where he “breakfasted and dined, and found the house very
comfortable and well kept.”
“Columbia,” says Mr. P. “is twelve miles from Lancaster, and is
situated on the eastern bank of the noble river Susquehanna. It is a
thriving and pretty town, and is rapidly increasing in business,
population and wealth. There is an immense bridge here over the
Susquehanna, the superstructure of which, composed of massy timber,
rests upon stone piers. This bridge is new, having been built within
three years. The waters of the Susquehanna, resembling the citizens of
Philadelphia, in their dislike to old buildings, took the liberty
three years ago, to destroy the old bridge by means of an ice freshet,
though it was but twenty years of age, and still in excellent
preservation. The views from the bridge, up and down the river, are
very interesting. Here is the western termination of the rail road,
and goods from the sea-board intended for the great west, are here
transhipped into canal boats. Columbia contains about twenty-five
hundred souls.”
Our author does not think that the state affords the public as good a
commodity of travelling as the public ought to have for the money
paid. Each passenger car, he says, pays for locomotive power two cents
per mile, for each passenger—for toll two cents a mile for itself, and
one cent per mile for each passenger—burthen cars paying half these
rates. There is some mistake here or—we are mistaken. The estimated
cost of working an engine, including interest and repairs, is sixteen
dollars per day—and the daily sum earned is twenty eight dollars—the
state clearing twelve dollars per day on each locomotive. Empty cars
pay the same toll and power-hire as full ones, which, as Mr. Prolix
observes, is unreasonable.
At 4 P. M. our peregrinator went on board a boat to ascend the canal
which follows the eastern bank of the Susquehanna. His description of
the genus “canal boat,” species “Pioneer Line,” is effective, and will
interest our readers.
A canal packet boat is a microcosm that contains almost as many
specimens of natural history as the Ark of Noah. It is nearly eighty
feet long and eleven wide; and has a house built in it that extends to
within six or seven feet of stem and stern. Thirty-six feet in length
of said house are used as a cabin by day, and a dormitory by night;
the forward twelve feet being nocturnally partitioned off by an opaque
curtain, when there are more than four ladies on board, for their
accommodation. In front of said twelve feet, there is an apartment of
six feet containing four permanent berths and separated from the cabin
by a wooden partition, with a door in it; this is called the ladies'
dressing room, and is sacred to their uses.
At 9 P. M. the steward and his satellites begin the work of arranging
the sleeping apparatus. This consists of a wooden frame six feet long
and twenty inches wide, with canvass nailed over it, a thin mattress
and sheets, &c. to match. The frame has two metallic points on one
side which are inserted into corresponding holes in the side of the
cabin, and its horizontality is preserved {448} by little ropes
descending from the ceiling fastened to its other side. There are
three tiers of these conveniences on each side, making twenty-four for
gentlemen, and twelve for ladies, besides the four permanent berths in
the ladies' dressing room. The number of berths, however, does not
limit the number of passengers; for a packet is like Milton's
Pandemonium, and when it is brim full of imps, the inhabitants seem to
grow smaller so as to afford room for more poor devils to come in and
be stewed; and tables and settees are put into a sleeping fix in the
twinkling of a bedpost.
Abaft the cabin is a small apartment four feet square, in which the
steward keeps for sale all sorts of potables, and some sorts of
eatables. Abaft that is the kitchen, in which there is generally an
emancipated or escaped slave from Maryland or Virginia, of some shade
between white and black, who performs the important part of cook with
great effect. The breakfasts, dinners and suppers are good, of which
the extremes cost twenty-five cents each, and the mean thirty-seven
and a half.
The passengers can recreate by walking about on the roof of the cabin,
at the risque of being decapitated by the bridges which are passed
under at short intervals of time. But this accident does not often
happen, for the man at the helm is constantly on the watch to prevent
such an unpleasant abridgment of the passengers, and gives notice of
the approaching danger by crying out ‘bridge.’
This machine, with all that it inherits, is dragged through the water
at the rate of three miles and a half per hour by three horses, driven
tandem by a dipod with a long whip, who rides the hindmost horse. The
rope, which is about one hundred yards in length, is fastened to the
side of the roof, at the distance of twenty feet from the bow, in such
fashion that it can be loosed from the boat in a moment by touching a
spring. The horses are changed once in about three hours and seem very
much jaded by their work.
At an hour past midnight Mr. Prolix arrived at Harrisburg, where the
boat stops for half an hour to let out and take in passengers. It was
pitch dark, however, and nothing was visible from the boat. We miss,
therefore, a description of the town, which is cavalierly snubbed by
the tourist for containing no more than forty-five hundred
inhabitants. He goes to sleep, and awaking at 5 in the morning, finds
himself opposite to Duncan's Island. He lands, and takes up his
quarters at the hotel of Mrs. Duncan. Unlike the hotels previously
described, which were all “elegant, respectable and neat,” this one is
merely “neat, elegant and respectable.”
_Letter IV_ is dated from Hallidaysburg. Leaving Duncan's Island at 6,
the traveller embarked in the canal packet Delaware, Captain Williams,
following the bank of Duncan's Island in a north-western course for
about a mile, and then crossing the Juniata over “a substantial
aqueduct built of timber and roofed in.” In the course of the day he
passed Millerstown, Mexico and Mifflin, arriving at Lewistown before
sunset, a distance of about forty miles. Lewistown contains about
sixteen hundred inhabitants, some of whom, says Mr. Prolix, make
excellent beer. Waynesburg and Hamiltonville were past during the
night, and Huntingdon at 7 in the morning. In the course of the day
Petersburg, Alexandria and Williamsburg made their appearance, and at
3 P. M. a shower of rain. At half past 6, “the packet glided into the
basin at Hallidaysburg.” Here terminates that portion of the
Pennsylvania canal which lies east of the Alleghany mountains. Goods
destined for the west are taken from the boats and placed in burthen
cars, to make their passage over the mountains by means of the
Alleghany portage rail road. Mr. Prolix here put up at Moore's hotel,
which was not only very “neat, elegant,” &c. but contained at least
one vacant room, six feet wide by fourteen long, with a double bed,
two chairs, and a wash-stand, “whose cleanliness was as great as its
littleness.”
_Letter V_ is headed _Bedford Springs, August 7, 1835_. At half past 8
on the 6th, “after a good and abundant breakfast,” Mr. P. left
Hallidaysburg in a coach and four for these Springs. The distance is
thirty-four miles—direction nearly south. In six hours he arrived at
Buckstown, a little village consisting of two taverns, a blacksmith's
shop, and two or three dwellings. Here our traveller put up at a
tavern whose sign displayed the name of P. Amich—probably, quoth Mr.
P., a corruption of Peregrini Amicus. Leaving this establishment at 3
P. M. he proceeded eleven miles to the village of Bedford—thence two
miles farther to the Springs, of which we have a very pretty
description. “The benches,” says Mr. Prolix, “and wooden columns of
the pavilion have suffered much from the ruthless ambition of that
numerous class of aspirants after immortality who endeavor to cut
their way to the temple of fame with their penknives, and inflict the
ambitious initials of their illustrious names on every piece of stuff
they meet. As a goose delights in its gosling, so does one of these
wits in his whittling.”
_Letters VI and VII_ are a continuation of the description of the
Springs. From letter VII we extract, for the benefit of our invalid
readers, an analysis by Doctor William Church of Pittsburgh, of a
quart of the water from the particular springs ycleped Anderson's.
A quart of water, evaporated to dryness, gave _thirty-one_ grains of a
residuum. The same quantity of water, treated agreeably to the rule
laid down by Westrumb, contained eighteen and a half inches of
carbonic acid gas. The residuum, treated according to the rules given
by Dr. Henry, in his system of Chemistry, gave the following result.
Sulphate of Magnesia or Epsom Salts, 20 grains.
Sulphate of Lime, . . . . . . . . . 3¾ "
Muriate of Soda, . . . . . . . . . . 2½ "
Muriate of Lime, . . . . . . . . . . ¾ "
Carbonate of Iron, . . . . . . . . . 1¼ "
Carbonate of Lime, . . . . . . . . . 2 "
Loss, . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ¾ "
———
31 grains.
To which must be added 18½ cubic inches of carbonic acid gas.
“These waters,” says our author, “have acquired so great a reputation
that immense quantities are sent away daily in barrels to perform long
and expensive journeys by land to go and cure those who cannot come to
them. The price of a barrel filled, and ready booted and spurred for
its journey, is three dollars—and that is enough to last a regular and
prudent toper four months.”
_Letter VIII_ is dated “_Somerset, August 14_.” At 10 in the morning
of this day, our traveller left the Springs in a hack, to join the
mail coach at Bedford on its way to Somerset. “In an hour,” says Mr.
P. “we were snugly ensconced in one of Mr. Reeside's well-appointed
coaches, and rumbling over the stone turnpike on our way to the great
west.” The road for eleven miles is, we are told, not very hilly.
Afterwards the country rises gradually from plateau to plateau, for a
{449} distance of fourteen miles, when you reach the summit of the
Alleghany. Here is a large stone tavern, where the coach takes fresh
horses. The country is now nearly level—but for the next six miles
descends by alternate declivities and levels into “the broad valley
which lies between the summits of the Alleghany Mountain and Laurel
Hill,” the distance between which is about twenty miles. In this
valley stands Somerset, which Mr. P. reached at half past 7 P. M.
“having been eight hours and a half in travelling thirty-eight miles
from Bedford.”
_Letter IX_ is dated “_Pittsburg, August 16_.” At half past 3 A. M. on
the 15th, the tourist took the coach from the east bound to the City
of Furnaces—at 7 passed the summit of Laurel Hill—at 8 arrived at
_Jones' Mills_, about one-third down the western declivity of the
mountain, and breakfasted—at one reached Mount Pleasant, having passed
through two mountain villages, Donegal and Madison—thence twenty miles
to Stewartsville—thence thirteen farther to
_Pittsburgium, longæ finis chartæque viæque,_
in spite of the manifold temptations offered to keen appetites by the
luxuries of _Chalfant's_, at Turtle Creek, which, quoth Mr. Prolix,
“is a very good house.” His opinions of Pittsburgh, as of every thing
else, are entitled to much weight, and in the present instance we give
them entire.
The sensation on entering Pittsburgh is one of disappointment; the
country through which you have come is so beautiful, and the town
itself so ugly. The government of the town seems to have been more
intent on filling the purses, than providing for the gratification of
the taste, or for the comfort of its inhabitants. As for the
Pittsburghers themselves, they are worthy of every good thing, being
enlightened, hospitable, and urbane.
Pittsburgh has produced many eminent men in law, politics and
divinity, and is now the residence of the erudite, acute and witty
author of the Memoir of Sebastian Cabot, which should be read by every
native American. Its manufacturing powers and propensities have been
so often described and lauded that we shall say nothing about them,
except that they fill the people's pockets with cash, and their
toiling town with noise, and dust, and smoke.
Pittsburgh is full of good things in the eating and drinking way, but
it requires much ingenuity to get them down your throat
unsophisticated with smoke and coal-dust. If a sheet of white paper
lie upon your desk for half an hour, you may write on it with your
finger's end, through the thin stratum of coal-dust that has settled
upon it during that interval.
The Pittsburghers have committed an error in not rescuing from the
service of Mammon, a triangle of thirty or forty acres at the junction
of the Alleghany and Monongahela, and devoting it to the purposes of
recreation. It is an unparalleled position for a park in which to ride
or walk or sit. Bounded on the right by the clear and rapid Alleghany
rushing from New York, and on the left by the deep and slow
Monongahela flowing majestically from Virginia, having in front the
beginning of the great Ohio, bearing on its broad bosom the traffic of
an empire, it is a spot worthy of being rescued from the ceaseless din
of the steam engine, and the lurid flames and dingy smoke of the coal
furnace. But alas! the sacra fames auri is rapidly covering this area
with private edifices; and in a few short years it is probable, that
the antiquary will be unable to discover a vestige of those celebrated
military works, with which French and British ambition, in by-gone
ages, had crowned this important and interesting point.
There is a large bridge of timber across the Alleghany and another
over the Monongahela; the former of which leads to the town of
Alleghany, a rapidly increasing village, situated on a beautiful plain
on the western side of the river. About half a mile above the bridge
the Alleghany is crossed by an aqueduct bringing over the canal, which
(strange to say) comes down from the confluence of the Kiskeminetas
with the Alleghany on the _western_ side of the latter river. The
aqueduct is an enormous wooden trough with a roof, hanging from seven
arches of timber, supported by six stone piers and two abutments. The
canal then passes through the town and under Grant's hill through a
tunnel, and communicates by a lock with the Monongahela.
The field of battle on which the conceited Braddock paid with his life
the penalty of obstinate rashness, is not far from Pittsburgh, and is
interesting to Americans as the scene on which the youthful Washington
displayed the germs of those exalted qualities which afterwards
ripened into the hero, and made him the founder and father of a
nation.
Pittsburgh is destined to be the centre of an immense commerce, both
in its own products and those of distant countries. Its annual exports
at present probably exceed 25,000 and its imports 20,000 tons. Its
trade in timber amounts to more than six millions of feet. The
inexhaustible supply of coal and the facility of obtaining iron,
insure the permanent success of its manufactories. Pittsburgh makes
steam engines and other machinery, and her extensive glassworks have
long been in profitable operation. There are also extensive paper
mills moved by steam, and a manufactory of crackers (not explosive but
edible) wrought by the same power. These crackers are made of good
flour and pure water, and are fair and enticing to the eye of hunger,
but we do not find the flavor so agreeable to the palate as that of
Wattson's water crackers. Perhaps they are _kneaded_ by the iron hands
of a steam engine, whereas hands of flesh are _needed_ to make good
crackers.
New Yorkers and people from down east, who wish to visit the Virginia
Springs, cannot take an easier and more delightful route, than that
through Pennsylvania to Pittsburg, and thence down the Ohio to
Guyandotte; whence to the White Sulphur the distance is one hundred
and sixty miles over a good road, through a romantic country, and by a
line of good stage coaches.
_Letter X_ is dated “_Johnstown, August 20_.” Mr. P. left Pittsburgh
on the 18th, at nine in the evening, in the canal packet Cincinnati,
Captain Fitzgerald. In a few minutes after moving, the packet entered
the aqueduct which carries the canal over to the western bank of the
Alleghany, “along which it runs in a north eastern direction for
thirty miles.” At five o'clock on the morning of the 19th, our tourist
passed the village of Freeport, which stands on the western bank of
the Alleghany, below the mouth of the Kiskeminitas. A few minutes
afterwards he crossed the Alleghany through an aqueduct, which
“carries the canal over that river to the northern bank of the
Kiskeminitas, the course of which the canal now pursues in a south
eastern direction.”
At eight A. M. Mr. P. passed Leechburg, at twelve Saltsburgh—and at
two P. M. an aqueduct leading the canal into a tunnel eight hundred
feet long, going through the mountain and cutting off a circuit of
four miles. At 3 A. M. on the 20th, Johnstown is reached, “the eastern
end of the trans-Alleghanian canal, and the western beginning of the
Portage rail road.”
_Letter XI_ gives a vivid picture of the Portage rail road. This also
we will be pardoned for copying.
_Packet Juniata, near Lewistown, August 21, 1835._
Yesterday, at Johnstown, we soon despatched the ceremony of a good
breakfast, and at 6 A. M. were in {450} motion on the first level, as
it is called, of four miles in length, leading to the foot of the
first inclined plane. The _level_ has an ascent of one hundred and one
feet, and we passed over it in horse-drawn cars with the speed of six
miles an hour. This is a very interesting part of the route, not only
on account of the wildness and beauty of the scenery, but also of the
excitement mingled with vague apprehension, which takes possession of
every body in approaching the great wonder of the internal
improvements of Pennsylvania. In six hours the cars and passengers
were to be raised eleven hundred and seventy-two feet of perpendicular
height, and to be lowered fourteen hundred feet of perpendicular
descent, by complicated, powerful, and _frangible_ machinery, and were
to pass a mountain, to overcome which, with a similar weight, three
years ago, would have required the space of three days. The idea of
raising so rapidly in the world, particularly by steam or _a rope_, is
very agitating to the simple minds of those who have always walked in
humble paths.
As soon as we arrived at the foot of plane No. 1, the horses were
unhitched and the cars were fastened to the rope, which passes up the
middle of one track and down the middle of the other. The stationary
steam engine at the head of the plane was started, and the cars moved
majestically up the steep and long acclivity in the space of four
minutes; the length of the plane being sixteen hundred and eight feet,
its perpendicular height, one hundred and fifty, and its angle of
inclination 5° 42′ 38″.
The cars were now attached to horses and drawn through a magnificent
tunnel nine hundred feet long, having two tracks through it, and being
cut through solid rock nearly the whole distance. Now the train of
cars were attached to a steam tug to pass a level of fourteen miles in
length. This _lengthy_ level is one of the most interesting portions
of the Portage Rail Road, from the beauty of its location and the
ingenuity of its construction. It ascends almost imperceptibly through
its whole course, overcoming a perpendicular height of one hundred and
ninety feet, and passes through some of the wildest scenery in the
state; the axe, the chisel and the spade having cut its way through
forest, rock and mountain. The valley of the little Conemaugh river is
passed on a viaduct of the most beautiful construction. It is of one
arch, a perfect semi-circle with a diameter of _eighty feet_, built of
cut stone, and its entire height from the foundation is seventy-eight
feet six inches. When viewed from the bottom of the valley, it seems
to span the heavens, and you might suppose a rainbow had been turned
to stone.
The fourteen miles of this second level are passed in one hour, and
the train arrives at the foot of the second plane, which has seventeen
hundred and sixty feet of length, and one hundred and thirty-two feet
of perpendicular height. The third level has a length of a mile and
five-eighths, a rise of fourteen feet six inches, and is passed by
means of horses. The third plane has a length of fourteen hundred and
eighty feet, and a perpendicular height of one hundred and thirty. The
fourth level is two miles long, rises nineteen feet and is passed by
means of horses. The fourth plane has a length of two thousand one
hundred and ninety-six feet, and a perpendicular height of one hundred
and eighty-eight. The fifth level is three miles long, rises
twenty-six feet and is passed by means of horses. The fifth plane has
a length of two thousand six hundred and twenty-nine feet, and a
perpendicular height of two hundred and two, and brings you to the top
of the mountain, two thousand three hundred and ninety-seven feet
above the level of the ocean, thirteen hundred and ninety-nine feet
above Hallidaysburg, and eleven hundred and seventy-two feet above
Johnstown. At this elevation in the midst of summer, you breathe an
air like that of spring, clear and cool. Three short hours have
brought you from the torrid plain, to a refreshing and invigorating
climate. The ascending apprehension has left you, but it is succeeded
by the fear of the steep descent which lies before you; and as the car
rolls along on this giddy height, the thought trembles in your mind,
that it may slip over the head of the first descending plane, rush
down the frightful steep, and be dashed into a thousand pieces at its
foot.
The length of the road on the summit of the mountain is one mile and
five-eighths, and about the middle of it stands a spacious and
handsome stone tavern. The eastern quarter of a mile, which is the
highest part, is a dead level; in the other part, there is an ascent
of nineteen feet. The descent on the eastern side of the mountain is
much more fearful than the ascent on the western, for the planes are
much longer and steeper, of which you are made aware by the increased
thickness of the ropes; and you look _down_ instead of _up_.
There are also five planes on the eastern side of the mountain, and
five slightly descending levels, the last of which is nearly four
miles long and leads to the basin at Hallidaysburg; this is travelled
by the cars without steam or horse, merely by the force of gravity. In
descending the mountain you meet several fine prospects and arrive at
Hallidaysburg between twelve and one o'clock.
_Letter XII_ is dated from Lancaster and is occupied with the return
home of the adventurous Mr. Prolix, whose book we heartily recommend
to all lovers of the _utile et dulce_.