CHAPTER XVI
Little and Big Hockhocking rivers—Belleville, and Mr. Wild on Mr. Avery’s large farm—Devil’s hole—Shade river—Buffington’s island—Neisanger’s.
Little and Big Hockhocking rivers—Belleville, and Mr. Wild on Mr. Avery’s large farm—Devil’s hole—Shade river—Buffington’s island—Neisanger’s.
We dropped down the stream gently three miles, to the end of Blennerhasset’s island, a little beyond which, on the Ohio shore, we observed a very good looking two story brick house, which as we had been informed, is an excellent tavern owned and kept by Mr. Miles, but we were not tempted to stop, as we had already breakfasted on bread and milk in our skiff. Two miles and a quarter below Miles’s we passed Little Hockhocking river on the right. It is about twenty-five yards wide, and has a wooden bridge across it, and on its right bank is a large square roofed house, handsomely situated.
A mile and a half below Little Hockhocking, we saw on our right a remarkable cavern on the side of a craggy hill, and four miles lower, having passed Newbury and Mustapha’s islands, the latter of which is above a mile in length, and partly cultivated, we came to big Hockhocking river on the right.[90]It is only about thirty yards wide at its mouth, nevertheless it is navigable for keels and other small craft{112} nearly seventy miles, a little above which highest point of navigation, is situated the flourishing town of New Lancaster.
Two miles and a half below Hockhocking a rivulet called Lee’s creek, puts in from the Virginia side, and half a mile further on the same side, is the village of Belleville, or Belle-prè, finely situated on a high bank, commanding a good view of the river both ways. There are here only four or five cabins occupied by hunters and labourers, and a tolerably good wooden house owned by a Mr. Avery from New-London in Connecticut, who purchased a tract here of five miles front on the river, and commenced this settlement about eleven years ago, but going largely into ship building, he was so unfortunate in that business, that in consequence he is now confined for debt in Wood county gaol.
A Mr. Wild, from Durham in Connecticut, who has been five years here, resides in Mr. Avery’s house, and cultivates the farm, which is on a handsome plain running back from the river, on which he has this season seventy acres of corn and fifty of wheat, besides a large proportion of meadow. He was very civil to us, insisting with much hospitality on our taking some refreshment.
Last fall Mr. Avery’s barn with two thousand bushels of grain, several stacks of grain, and a horse, grist and saw mills, were burnt by incendiaries, who, though known, could not be brought to justice for want of positive proof.
From Little Hockhocking the right bank is hilly and broken, and the left an extensive bottom; both sides very thinly inhabited, to ten miles below Belleville, in the last seven we not having observed a single {113} cabin, though the land is level and rich. I cannot account for the right shore not being settled, as it is part of the Ohio Company’s purchase; but the reason on the Virginia side is, that theheirs of general Washington to whom that valuable tract descended on his death, ask for it no less than ten dollars per acre, so that it will probably remain in its savage state as long as land can be purchased cheaper in its neighbourhood, notwithstanding its good situation and its excellent quality.[91]
After leaving Belleville we saw several bald eagles hovering about us. They are about the size of large crows, and when on the wing have their tails spread out in the form of a crescent.[92]
About the middle of this uninhabited tract, we observed on our right a very remarkable large cavern called Devil’s hole: It is in the face of a rock about half way up a steep hill close to the river. About fifty rods further on the same hand we passed Shade river, which is a considerable stream, and apparently very deep. During the war with the Indians, a detachment of the Kentucky militia, ascended this river, landed and destroyed some Indian encampments, but effected nothing of moment.
Five miles below Shade river, we came to Buffington’s island, which is partly cultivated and is about two miles long. Though that on the left is the ship channel, we chose the one on the right, as it presented a long narrow vista, which promised the strongest current: We found it however very shallow, but beautifully picturesque. The river above the island is about a quarter of a mile wide, but below, it is contracted to about two hundred yards, and four miles lower, it is only one hundred and twenty.
Though the river continues narrow, yet probably fromthe depth of its bed the velocity of the current was not increased for a mile and a quarter further to {114} Peter Neisanger’s fine farm, where we stopped at half past seven o’clock.[93]
Fastening our skiff to a tree, we ascended the steep sloping bank to the house, where we were received with cautious taciturnity by Mrs. Neisanger, whose ungracious reception would have induced us to have proceeded further, had not the evening been too far advanced for us to arrive at better quarters before dark; and besides the state of our stomachs rendered us insensible to an uncourteous reception: We determined therefore to make our quarters good, though a few minutes after, friend A——, repented of our resolution, on seeing a figure scarcely meriting the name of human approaching him, where he had gone alone in quest of some of the males of the family. It had the appearance of a man above the middle age, strong and robust, fantastically covered with ragged cloathing, but so dirty that it was impossible to distinguish whether he was naturally a white or an Indian—in either case he equally merited the appellation ofsavage. A——, accosted him as lord of the soil, but he did not deign any reply, on which he returned to me, where I was in the boat adjusting our baggage, to consult with me whether we had not better proceed farther; but first resolving to make one more attempt, we again mounted the bank and found two men with rifles in their hands sitting at the door, neither of whose aspects, nor the circumstance of their being armed, were very inviting: As however we did not see the strange apparition which A——, had described to me, we ventured to accost them.
The elder of the two was Neisanger.—Though he did not say us “nay” to our request of supper, his “yea” was in the very extreme ofbluntness, and without either the manner or expression which sometimes merits its having joined to it the adjectivehonest.
{115} They laid aside their rifles, and supper being announced by the mistress of the cabin, we made a hearty meal on her brown bread and milk, while she attended her self-important lord with all due humility, as Sarah did Abraham; which patriarchal record in the scriptures, is perhaps the original cause of a custom which I have observed to be very common in the remote parts of the United States, of the wife not sitting down to table until the husband and the strangers have finished their meal.
During supper, Mr. Neisanger gradually relaxed from his blunt and cautious brevity of speech, and we gathered from him that he had been a great hunter and woodsman, in which occupation, he said that one man may in one season kill two hundred deer and eighty bears.
He had changed his pursuit of the wild inhabitants of the forest about nine years ago, for an agricultural life. Since that time he had cleared a large tract of land, had planted three thousand fruit trees on his farm, and had carried on a distillery of whiskey and peach brandy, for the first of which he gets seventy-five cents per gallon, and for the last a dollar.
After supper we took leave of this Nimrod of the west without much regret, as our seats while under his roof had not been the most easy to us, and we returned to our boat with more pleasure than we had done heretofore.
We betook ourselves to rest on our platform, lulled to repose by the mournful hooting of the owl, whose ill omened note was amply compensated for by the delightful melodyof the red bird, who awoke us at early dawn with his grateful welcome to the returning day.[94]
From hence to Clarksburgh in Virginia is only seventy-five miles.
FOOTNOTES:[90]For the Hockhocking River, see Croghan’sJournals, vol. i of this series, p. 131, note 99.—Ed.[91]Washington admonished his executors in his will, not to dispose of these lands too cheaply, and suggested a sale price of ten dollars per acre. This particular tract became the property of six of his grand-nieces, two of whom (named Fitzhugh) later settled in the vicinity.—Ed.[92]The bald or white-headed eagle (haliaëtus leucocephalus), the American national symbol.—Ed.[93]Peter Neisanger (or Niswonger) joined the Marietta colony in 1790. He was employed thereby as a ranger, and the succeeding year gave timely warning to the people assembled at a church service of a threatened Indian raid.—Ed.[94]The red-bird was either the scarlet tanager (piranga rubra), or the cardinal grosbeak (cardinalis virginianus), both of which frequent the Ohio shores.—Ed.
[90]For the Hockhocking River, see Croghan’sJournals, vol. i of this series, p. 131, note 99.—Ed.
[90]For the Hockhocking River, see Croghan’sJournals, vol. i of this series, p. 131, note 99.—Ed.
[91]Washington admonished his executors in his will, not to dispose of these lands too cheaply, and suggested a sale price of ten dollars per acre. This particular tract became the property of six of his grand-nieces, two of whom (named Fitzhugh) later settled in the vicinity.—Ed.
[91]Washington admonished his executors in his will, not to dispose of these lands too cheaply, and suggested a sale price of ten dollars per acre. This particular tract became the property of six of his grand-nieces, two of whom (named Fitzhugh) later settled in the vicinity.—Ed.
[92]The bald or white-headed eagle (haliaëtus leucocephalus), the American national symbol.—Ed.
[92]The bald or white-headed eagle (haliaëtus leucocephalus), the American national symbol.—Ed.
[93]Peter Neisanger (or Niswonger) joined the Marietta colony in 1790. He was employed thereby as a ranger, and the succeeding year gave timely warning to the people assembled at a church service of a threatened Indian raid.—Ed.
[93]Peter Neisanger (or Niswonger) joined the Marietta colony in 1790. He was employed thereby as a ranger, and the succeeding year gave timely warning to the people assembled at a church service of a threatened Indian raid.—Ed.
[94]The red-bird was either the scarlet tanager (piranga rubra), or the cardinal grosbeak (cardinalis virginianus), both of which frequent the Ohio shores.—Ed.
[94]The red-bird was either the scarlet tanager (piranga rubra), or the cardinal grosbeak (cardinalis virginianus), both of which frequent the Ohio shores.—Ed.