opposite armies, during that unhappy contest, were both in the
neighbourhood. Many of the people, whom we found living here, had served
as soldiers in the army, and told us a number of interesting particulars
relative to several events which happened in this quarter. The landlord
of the tavern where we stopped, for one, related all the circumstances
attending Miss M‘Crea’s death, and pointed out on a hill, not far from
the house, the very spot where she was murdered by the Indians, and the
place of her interment. This beautiful young lady had been engaged to an
officer in General Burgoyne’s army, who, anxious for her safety, as
there were several marauding parties going about in the neighbourhood
where she lived, sent a party of trusty Indians to escort her to the
camp. These Indians had partly executed their commission, and were
approaching with their charge in sight of the British camp, when they
were met by another set of Indians belonging to a different tribe, that
was also attending the British army at this time. In a few minutes it
became a matter of dispute between them which should have the honour of
conducting her to the camp; from words they came to blows, and blood was
on the point of being drawn, when one of their chiefs, to settle the
matter without farther mischief, went up to Miss M‘Crea, and killed her
on the spot with a blow of his tomahawk. The object of contention being
thus removed, the Indians returned quietly to the camp. The enormity of
the crime, however, was too great not to attract public notice, and it
turned the minds of every person against the Indians, who had not before
witnessed their ferocity on occasions equally shocking to humanity. The
impolicy of employing such barbarians was now strongly reprobated, and
in a short time afterwards most of them were dismissed from our army.
[Sidenote: WOODS.]
Fort Edward stands near the river. The town of the same name, is at the
distance of one or two hundred yards from it, and contains about twenty
houses. Thus far we had got on tolerably well; but from hence to Fort
Anne, which was also dismantled prior to the late war, the road is most
wretched, particularly over a long causeway between the two forts,
formed originally for the transporting of cannon, the soil here being
extremely moist and heavy. The causeway consists of large trees laid
side by side transversely, some of which having decayed, great intervals
are left, wherein the wheels of the carriage were sometimes locked so
fast that the horses alone could not possibly extricate them. To have
remained in the carriage over this part of the road would really have
been a severe punishment; for although boasted of as being the very best
in Albany, it had no sort of springs, and was in fact little better than
a common waggon; we therefore alighted, took our guns, and amused
ourselves with shooting as we walked along through the woods. The woods
here had a much more majestic appearance than any that we had before met
with on our way from Philadelphia; this, however, was owing more to the
great height than to the thickness of the trees, for I could not see one
that appeared more than thirty inches in diameter; indeed, in general,
the girt of the trees in the woods of America is but very small in
proportion to their height, and trifling in comparison of that of the
forest trees in Great Britain. The thickest tree I ever saw in the
country was a sycamore, which grew upon the banks of the Shenandoah
River, just at its junction with the Patowmac, in a bed of rich earth,
close to the water; yet this tree was no more than about four feet four
inches in diameter. On the low grounds in Kentucky, and on some of the
bottoms in the western territory, it is said that trees are commonly to
be met with seven and eight feet in diameter. Where this is the case,
the trees must certainly grow much farther apart than they do in the
woods in the middle states, towards the Atlantic, for there they spring
up so very close to each other, that it is absolutely impossible for
them to attain to a great diameter.
The woods here were composed chiefly of oaks[27], hiccory, hemlock, and
beech trees, intermixed with which, appeared great numbers of the smooth
bark or Weymouth pines, as they are called, that seem almost peculiar to
this part of the country. A profusion of wild raspberries were growing
in the woods here, really of a very good flavour: they are commonly
found in the woods to the northward of this; in Canada they abound every
where.
Footnote 27:
There are upwards of twenty different kinds of oaks in America.
[Sidenote: SKENESBOROUGH.]
Beyond Fort Anne, which is situated at the distance of eight miles from
Fort Edward, the roads being better, we once more mounted into our
vehicle; but the miserable horses, quite jaded, now made a dead stop; in
vain the driver bawled, and stamped, and swore; his whip had been
previously worn out some hours, owing to the frequent use he had made of
it, and the animals no longer feeling its heavy lash, seemed as
determined as the mules of the abbess of Andouillets to go no farther.
In this situation we could not help bantering the fellow upon the
excellence of his cattle, which he had boasted so much of at setting
out, and he was ready to cry with vexation at what we said; but having
accidentally mentioned the sum we had paid for the carriage, his passion
could no longer be restrained, and it broke forth in all its fury. It
appeared that he was the owner of two of the horses, and for the use of
them, and for driving the carriage, was to have had one half of the
hire; but the man whom we had agreed with, and paid at Albany, had given
him only ten dollars as his moiety, assuring him, at the same time, that
it was exactly the half of what we had given, although in reality it
fell short of the sum by seven dollars and a half. Thus cheated by his
companion, and left in the lurch by his horses, he vowed vengeance
against him on his return; but as protestations of this nature would not
bring us any sooner to our journey’s end, and as it was necessary that
something should be immediately done, if we did not wish to remain all
night in the woods, we suggested the idea, in the mean time, of his
conducting the foremost horses as postillion, whilst one of our servants
should drive the pair next to the wheel. This plan was not started with
any degree of seriousness, for we could not have supposed that a tall
meagre fellow, upwards of six feet high, and clad in a pair of thin
nankeen breeches, would very readily bestride the raw boned back of a
horse, covered with the profuse exudations which the intense heat of the
weather, and the labour the animal had gone through, necessarily
excited. As much tired, however, of our pleasantries as we were of his
vehicle, and thinking of nothing, I believe, but how he could best get
rid of us, he eagerly embraced the proposal, and accordingly, having
furnished himself with a switch from the adjoining thicket, he mounted
his harnessed Rosinante. In this style we proceeded; but more than once
did our gigantic postillion turn round to bemoan the sorry choice he had
made; as often did we urge the necessity of getting out of the woods; he
could make no answer; so jogging slowly along, we at last reached the
little town of Skenesborough, much to the amusement of every one who
beheld our equipage, and much to our own satisfaction; for, owing to the
various accidents we had met with, such as traces breaking, bridles
slipping off the heads of the horses, and the noble horses themselves
sometimes slipping down, &c. &c. we had been no less than five hours in
travelling the last twelve miles.
[Sidenote: MUSQUITOES.]
Skenesborough stands just above the junction of Wood Creek with South
River, as it is called in the best maps, but which, by the people in the
neighbourhood, is considered as a part of Lake Champlain. At present
there are only about twelve houses in the place; but if the navigation
of Wood Creek is ever opened, so as to connect Lake Champlain with the
North River, a scheme which has already been seriously thought of, it
will, doubtless, soon become a trading town of considerable importance,
as all the various productions of the shores of the lake will then be
collected there for the New York and Albany markets. Notwithstanding all
the disadvantages of a land carriage of forty miles to the North River,
a small portion of flour and potash, the staple commodities of the state
of New York, is already sent to Skenesborough from different parts of
the lake, to be forwarded to Albany. A considerable trade also is
carried on through this place, and over Lake Champlain, between New York
and Canada. Furs and horses principally are sent from Canada, and in
return they get East Indian goods and various manufactures. Lake
Champlain opens a very ready communication between New York and the
country bordering on the St. Lawrence; it is emphatically called by the
Indians, Caniad—Eri Guarunte, the mouth or door of the country.
[Sidenote: MUSQUITOES.]
Skenesborough is most dreadfully infested with musquitoes; so many of
them attacked us the first night of our sleeping there, that when we
arose in the morning our faces and hands were covered all over with
large pustules, precisely like those of a person in the small pox. This
happened too notwithstanding that the people of the house, before we
went to bed, had taken all the pains possible to clear the room of them,
by fumigating it with the smoke of green wood, and afterwards securing
the windows with gauze blinds; and even on the second night, although we
destroyed many dozens of them on the walls, after a similar fumigation
had been made, yet we suffered nearly as much. These insects were of a
much larger size than any I ever saw elsewhere, and their bite was
uncommonly venomous. General Washington told me, that he never was so
much annoyed by musquitoes in any part of America as in Skenesborough,
for that they used to bite through the thickest boot. The situation of
the place is indeed peculiarly favourable for them, being just on the
margin of a piece of water, almost stagnant, and shaded with thick
woods. The musquito is of the same species with the common gnat in
England, and resembles it very closely both in size and shape. Like the
gnat it lays its eggs on the surface of the water, where they are
hatched in the course of a few days, unless the water is agitated, in
which last case they are all destroyed. From the egg is produced a grub,
which changes to a chrysalis, and afterwards to a musquito; this last
change takes place on the surface of the water, and if at the moment
that the insect first spreads its wings the water is not perfectly still
and the air calm, it will be inevitably destroyed; at those parts of the
lake, therefore, which are most exposed, and where the water is often
agitated, no such thing as a musquito is ever seen; neither are they
ever found along a large and rapid river, where the shores are lofty and
dry; but in the neighbourhood of marshes, low grounds, and stagnant
waters, they always abound. Musquitoes appear to be particularly fond of
the fresh blood of Europeans, who always suffer much more the first year
of their arrival in America than they do afterwards. The people of the
country seem quite to disregard their attacks. Wherever they fix their
sting, a little tumor or pustule usually arises, supposed to be
occasioned by the fermentation, when mixed with the blood, of a small
quantity of liquor which the insect always injects into the wound it
makes with its spicula, as may be seen through a microscope, and which
it probably does to render the blood more fluid. The disagreeable
itching this excites is most effectually allayed by the application of
volatile alkali; or if the part newly stung be scratched and immediately
bathed in cold water, that also affords considerable relief; but after
the venom has been lodged for any time, scratching only increases the
itching, and it may be attended with great danger. Repeated instances
have occurred of people having been laid up for months, and narrowly
escaping the loss of a limb, from imprudently rubbing a part which had
been bitten for a long time. Great ease is also derived from opening the
pustules on the second day with a lancet, and letting out the blood and
watery matter.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
+LETTER + XXI.
_Embark on Lake Champlain.—Difficulty of procuring Provisions at Farms
bordering upon it.—Ticonderoga.—Crown Point.—Great Beauty of the
Scenery.—General Description of Lake Champlain and the adjacent
Country. Captain Thomas and his Indians arrive at Crown
Point.—Character of Thomas.—Reach St. John’s.—Description of that
Place.—Great Difference observable in the Face of the Country,
Inhabitants, &c. in Canada and in the States.—Chambly
Castle.—Calashes.—Bons Dieux.—Town of La Prarie.—Great Rapidity of the
River Saint Lawrence.—Cross it to Montreal.—Astonishment on seeing
large Ships at Montreal.—Great Depth of the River._
Montreal, July.
[Sidenote: LAKE CHAMPLAIN.]
SHORTLY after our arrival in Skenesborough, we hired a small boat of
about ten tons for the purpose of crossing Lake Champlain. It was our
wish to proceed on the voyage immediately; but the owner of the boat
asserting that it was impossible to go out with the wind then blowing,
we were for three days detained in Skenesborough, a delicious feast for
the hungry musquitoes. The wind shifted again and again, still it was
not fair in the opinion of our boatman. At last, being most heartily
tired of our quarters, and suspecting that he did not understand his
business as well as he ought to have done, we resolved not to abide by
his opinion any longer, but to make an attempt at beating out; and we
had great reason to be pleased with having done so, as we arrived in
Canada three days before any of the other boats, that did not venture to
move till the wind was quite aft.
We set off about one o’clock; but from the channel being very narrow, it
was impossible to make much way by tacking. We got no farther than six
miles before sun-set. We then stopped, and having landed, walked up to
some farm houses, which appeared at a distance, on the Vermont shore, to
procure provisions; for the boatman had told us it was quite unnecessary
to take in any at Skenesborough, as there were excellent houses close to
the shore the whole way, where we could get whatever we wished. At the
first we went to, which was a comfortable log-house, neither bread, nor
meat, nor milk, nor eggs, were to be had; the house was crowded with
children of all ages, and the people, I suppose, thought they had but
little enough for themselves. At a second house, we found a venerable
old man at the door, reading a news-paper, who civilly offered it to us
for our perusal, and began to talk upon the politics of the day; we
thanked him for his offer, and gave him to understand, at the same time,
that a loaf would be much more acceptable. Bread there was none; we got
a new Vermont cheese, however. A third house now remained in sight, and
we made a third attempt at procuring something to eat. This one was
nearly half a mile off, but alas! it afforded still less than the last;
the people had nothing to dispose of but a little milk. With the milk
and the cheese, therefore, we returned to our boat, and adding thereto
some biscuits and wine, which we had luckily on board, the whole
afforded us a frugal repast.
[Sidenote: LAKE CHAMPLAIN.]
The people at the American farm houses will cheerfully lie three in a
bed, rather than suffer a stranger to go away who comes to seek for a
lodging. As all these houses, however, which we had visited, were
crowded with inhabitants, we felt no great inclination to ask for
accommodation at any of them, but determined to sleep on board our
little vessel. We accordingly moored her at a convenient part of the
shore, and each of us having wrapped himself up in a blanket, which we
had been warned to provide on leaving New York, we laid ourselves down
to sleep. The boat was decked two thirds of her length forward, and had
a commodious hold; we gave the preference, however, because more airy,
to the cabin or after part, fitted up with benches, and covered with a
wooden awning, under which a man could just sit upright, provided he was
not very tall. The benches, which went lengthwise, accommodated two of
us; and the third was obliged to put up with the cabin floor; but a
blanket and a bare board, out of the way of musquitoes, were luxuries
after our accommodations at Skenesborough; our ears were not assailed by
the noise even of a single one the whole night, and we enjoyed sounder
repose than we had done for many nights preceding.
The wind remained nearly in the same point the next morning, but the
lake being wider, we were enabled to proceed faster. We stopped at one
house to breakfast, and at another to dine. At neither of these,
although they bore the name of taverns, were we able to procure much
more than at the houses where we had stopped the preceding evening. At
the first we got a little milk, and about two pounds of bread,
absolutely the whole of what was in the house; and at the second, a few
eggs, and some cold salted fat pork; but not a morsel of bread was to be
had. The wretched appearance also of this last habitation was very
striking; it consisted of a wooden frame, merely with a few boards
nailed against it, the crevices between which were the only apertures
for the admission of light, except the door; and the roof was so leaky,
that we were sprinkled with the rain even as we sat at the fire side.
That people can live in such a manner, who have the necessaries and
conveniencies of life within their reach, as much as any others in the
world, is really most astonishing! It is, however, to be accounted for,
by that desire of making money, which is the predominant feature in the
character of the Americans in general, and leads the petty farmer in
particular to suffer numberless inconveniencies, when he can gain by so
doing. If he can sell the produce of his land to advantage, he keeps as
small a part of it as possible for himself, and lives the whole year
round upon salt provisions, bad bread, and the fish he can catch in the
rivers or lakes in the neighbourhood; if he has built a comfortable
house for himself, he readily quits it, as soon as finished, for money,
and goes to live in a mere hovel in the woods till he gets time to build
another. Money is his idol, and to procure it he gladly foregoes every
self-gratification.
[Sidenote: TICONDEROGA.]
From this miserable habitation, just mentioned, we departed as soon as
the rain was over, and the wind coming round in our favour, we got as
far as Ticonderoga that night. The only dwelling here is the tavern,
which is a large house built of stone. On entering it we were shewn into
a spacious apartment, crowded with boatmen and people that had just
arrived from St. John’s, in Canada. Seeing such a number of guests in
the house, we expected nothing less than to be kept an hour or two till
sufficient supper was prepared for the whole company, so that all might
sit down at once together, which, as I have before said, is the custom
in the country parts of the United States. Our surprise therefore was
great at perceiving a neat table and a comfortable little supper
speedily laid out for us, and no attempts made at serving the rest of
the company till we had quite finished. This was departing from the
system of equality in a manner which we had never witnessed before, and
we were at a loss for some time to account for it; but we presently
heard that the woman of the house had kept a tavern for the greater part
of her life at Quebec, which resolved the knotty point. The wife is
generally the active person in managing a country tavern, and the
husband attends to his farm, or has some independent occupation. The man
of this house was a judge, a sullen demure old gentleman, who sat by the
fire[28], with tattered clothes and dishevelled locks, reading a book,
totally regardless of every person in the room.
Footnote 28:
Though this was the 14th day of July, the weather was so cold that we
found a fire extremely agreeable.
The old fort and barracks of Ticonderoga are on the top of a rising
ground, just behind the tavern; they are quite in ruins, and it is not
likely that they will ever be rebuilt, for the situation is very
insecure, being commanded by a lofty hill called Mount Defiance. The
British got possession of the place the last war by dragging cannon and
mortars up the hill, and firing down upon the fort.
Early the next morning we left Ticonderoga, and pursued our voyage to
Crown Point, where we landed to look at the old fort. Nothing is to be
seen there, however, but a heap of ruins; for shortly before it was
given up by the British, the powder magazine blew up, by which accident
a great part of the works was destroyed; since the evacuation of it
also, the people in the neighbourhood have been continually digging in
different parts, in hopes of procuring lead and iron shot; a
considerable quantity was in one instance got out of the stores that had
been buried by the explosion. The vaults, which were bomb proof, have
been demolished for the sake of the bricks for building chimneys. At the
south side alone the ditches remain perfect; they are wide and deep, and
cut through immense rocks of limestone; and from being overgrown towards
the top with different kinds of shrubs, have a grand and picturesque
appearance. The view from this spot of the fort, and the old buildings
in it overgrown with ivy, of the lake, and of the distant mountains
beyond it, is indeed altogether very fine. The fort, and seven hundred
acres of good cleared land adjoining to it, are the property of the
state of New York, and are leased out at the rate of one hundred and
fifty dollars, equal to £. 33. 10 _s._ sterling per annum, which is
appropriated for the use of a college. The farmer who rented it told us,
he principally made use of the land for grazing cattle; these, in the
winter season, when the lake was frozen, he drove over the ice to
Albany, and there disposed of.
[Sidenote: CROWN POINT.]
Crown Point is the most advantageous spot on the shores of Lake
Champlain for a military post, not being commanded by any rising grounds
in the neighbourhood, as Ticonderoga is, and as the lake is so narrow
here, owing to another point running out on the opposite side, that it
would be absolutely impossible for a vessel to pass, without being
exposed to the fire of the fort. The Indians call this place
Tek-ya-dough-nigarigee, that is, the two points immediately opposite to
each other: the one opposite to Crown Point is called Chimney Point;
upon it are a few houses, one of which is a tavern. While we staid there
we were very agreeably surprised, for the first time, with the sight of
a large birch canoe upon the lake, navigated by two or three Indians in
the dresses of their nation. They made for the shore and soon landed;
and shortly after another party, amounting to six or seven, arrived,
that had come by land.
On board our little vessel we had a poor Canadian, whom we took in at
Skenesborough. Tempted by the accounts he had heard of the United
States, he quitted his own home in Canada, where he lived under one of
the seigniors, and had gone as far as Albany, in the neighbourhood of
which place he had worked for some time with a farmer; but finding, that
although he got higher wages, he had to pay much more for his provisions
than in Canada, and that he was also most egregiously cheated by the
people, and particularly by his employer, from whom he could not get
even the money he had earned; finding likewise that he was unable to
procure any redress, from being ignorant of the English language, the
poor fellow determined to return to Canada, and on his way thither we
met him, without a shilling in his pocket.
Having asked this little fellow, as we sailed along, some questions
about the Indians, he immediately gave us a long account of a Captain
Thomas, a chief of the Cachenonaga nation, in the neighbourhood of whose
village he said he lived. Thomas, he told us, was a very rich man, and
had a most excellent house, in which he said he lived as well as a
seignior, and he was sure we should be well received if we went to see
him; he told us also that he had built a church, and was a christian;
that he was very charitable, and that if he were acquainted with his
present distress he would certainly make him a present of four or five
dollars. “Oh je vous assure, messieurs, que c’est un bon sauvage.” It
was impossible not to smile at the little Canadian, who, half naked
himself, and nearly as dark as a mulatto, concluded his panegyric upon
Thomas, by assuring us, “he was a good savage;” at the same time we felt
a strong desire to behold this chief, of whom we had heard so much. It
was not long before we were gratified, for the party of Indians that
arrived whilst we were at Chimney Point were from the Cachenonaga
village, and at their head was Captain Thomas.
[Sidenote: CAPTAIN THOMAS.]