Part 15

The Cohoes Fall is one of the greatest in North America. It is in the river Mohawk, before it unites with the river Hudson. Above and below the fall, the sides and the bottom of the river consist of hard rock. The river is three hundred yards broad here. At the fall there is a rock crossways in the river, running every where equally high, and crossing in a strait line with the side which forms the fall. It represents, as it were, a wall towards the lower side, which is not quite perpendicular, wanting about four yards. The height of this wall, over which the water rolls, appeared to me about twenty or twenty-four yards. I had marked this height in my pocket-book; and afterwards found it agreed pretty well with the account which that ingenious engineer, Mr. Lewis Evans, communicated to me at Philadelphia. He said, that he had geometrically measured the breadth and height of the fall, and found it nine hundred English feet broad, and seventy-five feet high. The representation of this fall, which is here joined, has been made by Mr. Evans. There was very little water in the river at present, and it only ran over the fall in a few places. In such places where the water had rolled down before, it had cut deep holes below into the rock, sometimes to the depth of two or three fathoms. The bed of the river, below the fall, was of rock, and quite dry, there being only a channel in the middle fourteen feet broad, and a fathom or somewhat more deep, through which the water passed which came over the fall. We saw a number of holes in the rock, below the fall, which bore a perfect resemblance to those in Sweden which we call Giants Pots, or Mountain Kettles. They differed in size; there being large deep ones, and small shallow ones. We had clear uninterrupted sun-shine, not a cloud above the horizon, and no wind at all. However, close to this fall, where the water was in such a small quantity, there was a continual drizzling rain, occasioned by the vapours which rose from the water during its fall, and were carried about by the wind. Therefore, in coming within a musket-shot of the fall, against the wind, our cloaths were wetted at once, as from a rain. The whirlpools, which were in the water below the fall, contained several kinds of fish; and they were caught by some people, who amused themselves with angling. The rocks hereabouts consist of the same black stone which forms the hills about Albany. When exposed to the air, it is apt to shiver into horizontal flakes, as slate does.

At noon we continued our journey to Canada in the canoe, which was pretty long, and made out of a white pine. Somewhat beyond the farm where we lay at night, the river became so shallow that the men could reach the ground every where with their oars; it being in some parts not above two feet, and sometimes but one foot deep. The shore and bed of the river consisted of sand and pebbles. The river was very rapid, and against us; so that our rowers found it hard work to get forward against the stream. The hills along the shore consisted merely of soil; and were very high and steep in some parts. The breadth of the river was generally near two musket-shot.

Sturgeons abound in the river Hudson. We saw them for several days together leap high up into the air, especially in the evening; our guides, and the people who lived hereabouts, asserted that they never see any sturgeons in winter time, because these fish go into the sea late in autumn, but come up again in spring and stay in the river all the summer. They are said to prefer the shallowest places in the river, which agreed pretty well with our observations; for we never saw them leap out of the water but in shallows. Their food is said to be several kinds of confervæ, which grow in plenty in some places at the bottom of the river; for these weeds are found in their bellies when they are opened. The Dutch who are settled here, and the Indians, fish for sturgeons, and every night of our voyage upon this river, we observed several boats with people who struck them with harpoons. The torches which they employed were made of that kind of pine, which they call the black pine here. The nights were exceedingly dark, though they were now shortest, and though we were in a country so much to the South of Sweden. The shores of the river lay covered with dead sturgeons, which had been wounded with the harpoon, but escaped, and died afterwards; they occasioned an insupportable stench during the excessive heat of the weather.

As we went further up the river we saw an Indian woman and her boy sitting in a boat of bark, and an Indian wading through the river, with a great cap of bark on his head. Near them was an island on which there were a number of Indians at present, on account of the sturgeon fishery. We went to their huts to try if we could get one of them to accompany us to Fort St. Frederic. On our arrival we found that all the men were gone into the woods a hunting this morning, and we were forced to engage their boys to go and look for them. They demanded bread for payment, and we gave them twenty little round loaves; for as they found that it was of great importance to us to speak with the Indians, they raised difficulties, and would not go till we gave them what they wanted. The island belonged to the Dutch, who had turned it into corn-fields. But at present they had leased it to the Indians, who planted their maize and several kinds of melons on it. They built their huts or wigwams on this island, on a very simple plan. Four posts were put into the ground perpendicularly, over which they had placed poles, and made a roof of bark upon them. They had either no walls at all, or they consisted of branches with leaves, which were fixed to the poles. Their beds consisted of deer-skins which were spread on the ground. Their utensils were a couple of small kettles, and two ladles, and a bucket or two of bark, made so close as to keep water. The sturgeons were cut into long slices, and hung up in the sunshine to dry, and to be ready against winter. The Indian women were sitting at their work on the hill, upon deer-skins. They never make use of chairs, but sit on the ground: however, they do not sit cross-legged, as the Turks do, but between their feet, which, though they be turned backwards, are not crossed, but bent outwards. The women wear no head-dress, and have black hair. They have a short blue petticoat, which reaches to their knees, and the brim of which is bordered with red or other ribbands. They wear their shifts over their petticoats. They have large ear-rings: and their hair is tied behind, and wrapped in ribbands. Their Wampum, or Pearls, and their money, which is made of shells, are tied round the neck, and hang down on the breast. This is their whole dress. They were now making several kinds of work of skins, to which they sowed the quills of the American Porcupines, having dyed them black or red, or left them in their original colour.

Towards evening, we went from hence to a farm close to the river, where we found only one man, looking after the maize and the fields; the inhabitants being not yet returned since the end of the war.

The little brooks here contain Crawfish, which are exactly the same with ours [78], with this difference only, that they are somewhat less; however, the Dutch inhabitants will not eat them.

June the 23d. We waited a good while for the Indians, who had promised to come home, in order to shew us the way to Fort St. Ann, and to assist us in making a boat of bark, to continue our voyage. About eight o’clock three of the men arrived. Their hair was black, and cut short; they wore rough pieces of woollen cloth, of a bright green colour, on their shoulders, a shirt which covers their thighs, and pieces of cloth, or skins, which they wrap round the legs and part of the thighs. They had neither hats, caps, nor breeches. Two of them had painted the upper part of their foreheads, and their cheeks, with vermilion. Round their neck was a ribband, from which hung a bag down to the breast, containing their knives. They promised to accompany us for thirty shillings; but soon after changed their minds, and went with an Englishman, who gave them more. Thus we were obliged to make this journey quite alone. The Indians, however, were honest enough to return us fifteen shillings, which we had paid them before-hand.

Our last night’s lodging was about ten English miles from Albany. During the last war, which was just now ended, the inhabitants had all retreated from thence to Albany, because the French Indians had taken or killed all the people they met with, set the houses on fire, and cut down the trees. Therefore, when the inhabitants returned, they found no houses, and were forced to ly under a few boards which were huddled together.

The river was almost a musket-shot broad, and the ground on both sides cultivated. The hills near the river were steep, and the earth of a pale colour.

The American Elder (Sambucus occidentalis [79]) grows in incredible quantities along those hills, which appear quite white, from the abundance of flowers on the Elder.

All this day along, we had one current after another, full of stones, which were great obstacles to our getting forward. The water in the river was very clear, and generally shallow, being only from two to four feet deep, running very violently against us in most places. The shore was covered with pebbles, and a grey sand. The hills consisted of earth, were high, and stood perpendicular towards the river, which was near two musket-shot broad. Sometimes the land was cultivated, and sometimes it was covered with woods.

The hills near the river abound with red and white clover. We found both these kinds plentiful in the woods. It is therefore difficult to determine whether they were brought over by the Europeans, as some people think; or whether they were originally in America, which the Indians deny.

We found Purslane (Portulaca oleracea) growing plentifully in a sandy soil. In gardens it was one of the worst weeds.

We found people returning every where to their habitations, which they had been forced to leave during the war.

The farms were commonly built close to the river, on the hills. Each house has a little kitchen-garden, and a still lesser orchard. Some farms, however, had large gardens. The kitchen-gardens afford several kinds of gourds, water-melons, and kidney-beans. The orchards are full of apple-trees. This year the trees had few or no apples, on account of the frosty nights which had happened in May, and the drought which had continued throughout this summer.

The houses hereabouts are generally built of beams of wood, and of unburnt bricks dried by the sun and the air. The beams are first erected, and upon them a gable with two walls, and the spars. The wall on the gable is made of boards. The roof is covered with shingles of fir. They make the walls of unburnt bricks, between the beams, to keep the rooms warmer; and that they might not easily be destroyed by rain and air, they are covered with boards on the outside. The cellar is below the house.

The farms are either built close to the river-side, or on the high grounds; and around them are large fields with maize.

We saw great numbers of Musk-Rats (Castor Zibethicus Linn.) on the shores of the river, where they had many holes, some on a level with the surface of the water. These holes were large enough to admit a kitten. Before and in the entrance to the holes, lay a quantity of empty shells, the animals of which had been eaten by the Musk-Rats [80]. They are caught in traps placed along the water-side, and baited with some maize or apples.

The Sassafras-trees abound here, but never grow to any considerable height.

Chestnut-trees appear now and then.

The Cockspur Hawthorn (Cratægus Crus Galli Linn.) grows in the poorest soil, and has very long spines; which shews, that it may be very advantageously planted in hedges, especially in a poor soil.

This night we lodged with a farmer, who had returned to his farm after the war was over. All his buildings, except the great barn, were burnt.

June the 24th. The farm where we passed the night was the last in the province of New York, towards Canada, which had been left standing, and which was now inhabited. Further on, we met still with inhabitants: but they had no houses, and lived in huts of boards; the houses being burnt during the war.

As we continued our journey, we observed the country on both sides of the river to be generally flat, but sometimes hilly; and large trails of it are covered with woods of fir-trees. Now and then we found some parts turned into corn-fields and meadows; however, the greater part was covered with woods. Ever since we left Albany, almost half-way to Saratoga, the river runs very rapid; and it cost us a deal of pains to get upwards. But afterwards it becomes very deep, for the space of several miles; and the water moves very slowly. The shores are very steep, though they are not very high. The river is two musket-shot broad. In the afternoon it changed its direction; for hitherto its direction was from North to South, but now it came from N. N. E. to S. S. W. and sometimes from N. E. to S. W.

Anthills are very scarce in America; and I do not remember seeing a single one before I came to the Cohoes Fall. We observed a few in the woods to-day. The Ants were the same with our common red ones (Formica rufa Linn.) The Ant-hills consist chiefly of the slate-like mouldered stone which abounds here, there being nothing else for them.

Chestnut-trees grew scattered in the woods. We were told, that Mulberry-trees (Morus rubra Linn.) likewise grow wild here, but rather scarce; and this is the most northerly place where they grow in America; at least, they have not been observed further to the north. We met with wild parsneps every day; but commonly in such places where the land was or had been cultivated. Hemp grows spontaneously, and in great abundance, near old plantations.

The woods abound with Woodlice, which were extremely troublesome to us.

The Thuya occidentalis Linn. appeared along the shores of the river. I had not seen it there before.

The trees which grow along the shores, and on the adjacent hills, within our sight to-day, are elms, birches, white firs, alders, dog-trees, lime-trees, red willows, and chestnut-trees. The American Elder, (Sambucus Canadensis Linn.) and the wild vines, only appear in places where the ground has been somewhat cultivated, as if they were desirous of being the companions of men. The lime-trees and white walnut-trees are the most numerous. The horn-beams, with inflated cones, (Carpinus Ostrya Linn.) appeared now and then; but the water-beech and water-poplar never came within sight any more.

We frequently saw ground-squirrels and black squirrels in the woods.

At a little distance from Saratoga, we met two Indians in their boats of bark, which could scarce contain more than one person.

Near Saratoga the river becomes shallow and rapid again. The ground is here turned into corn-fields and meadows, but on account of the war, it was not made use of.

Saratoga has been a fort built of wood by the English, to stop the attacks of the French Indians upon the English inhabitants in these parts, and to serve as a rampart to Albany. It is situated on a hill, on the east-side of the river Hudson, and is built of thick posts driven in to the ground, close to each other, in the manner of palisades, forming a square, the length of whose sides was within the reach of a musket-shot. At each corner are the houses of the officers, and within the palisades are the barracks, all of timber. This fort has been kept in order and was garrisoned till the last war, when the English themselves in 1747 set fire to it, not being able to defend themselves in it against the attacks of the French and their Indians; for as soon as a party of them went out of the fort, some of these enemies lay concealed, and either took them all prisoners, or shot them.

I shall only mention one, out of many artful tricks which were played here, and which both the English and French who were present here at that time, told me repeatedly. A party of French, with their Indians, concealed themselves one night in a thicket near the fort. In the morning some of their Indians, as they had previously resolved, went to have a nearer view of the fort. The English fired upon them, as soon as they saw them at a distance; the Indians pretended to be wounded, fell down, got up again, ran a little way, and dropped again. Above half the garrison rushed out to take them prisoners; but as soon as they were come up with them, the French and the remaining Indians came out of the bushes, betwixt the fortress and the English, surrounded them, and took them prisoners. Those who remained in the fort had hardly time to shut the gates, nor could they fire upon the enemy, because they equally exposed their countrymen to danger, and they were vexed to see their enemies take and carry them off in their fight and under their cannon. Such French artifices as these made the English weary of their ill-planned fort. We saw some of the palisades still in the ground. There was an island in the river, near Saratoga, much better situated for a fortification. The country is flat on both sides of the river near Saratoga, and its soil good. The wood round about was generally cut down. The shores of the river are high, steep, and consist of earth. We saw some hills in the north, beyond the distant forests. The inhabitants are Dutch, and bear an inveterate hatred to all Englishmen.

We lay over night in a little hut of boards erected by the people who were come to live here.

June the 25th. Several saw-mills were built here before the war, which were very profitable to the inhabitants, on account of the abundance of wood which grows here.

The boards were easily brought to Albany, and from thence to New York, in rafts every spring with the high water; but all the mills were burnt at present.

This morning we proceeded up the river, but after we had advanced about an English mile, we fell in with a water-fall, which cost us a deal of pains before we could get our canoe over it. The water was very deep just below the fall, owing to its hollowing the rock out by the fall. In every place where we met with rocks in the river, we found the water very deep, from two to four fathoms and upwards; because by finding a resistance it had worked a deeper channel into the ground. Above the fall, the river is very deep again, the water glides along silently, and increases suddenly near the shores. On both sides till you come to Fort Nicholson, the shore is covered with tall trees. After rowing several miles, we passed another water-fall, which is longer and more dangerous than the preceding one.

Giants-pots [81], which I have described in the memoirs of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, are abundant near the fall of the rock which extends across the river. The rock was almost dry at present, the river containing very little water at this season of the year. Some of the giants-pots were round, but in general they were oblong. At the bottom of most of them lay either stones or grit, in abundance. Some were fifteen inches in diameter, but some were less. Their depth was likewise different, and some that I observed were above two foot deep. It is plain that they owed their origin to the whirling of the water round a pebble, which by that means was put in motion, together with the sand.

We intended to have gone quite up to Fort Nicholson in the canoe, which would have been a great convenience to us; but we found it impossible to get over the upper fall, the canoe being heavy, and scarce any water in the river, except in one place where it flowed over the rock, and where it was impossible to get up, on account of the steepness, and the violence of the fall. We were accordingly obliged to leave our canoe here, and to carry our baggage through unfrequented woods to Fort Anne, on the river Woodcreek which is a space from forty-three to fifty English miles, during which we were quite spent, through the excess of heat. Sometimes we had no other way of crossing deep rivers, than by cutting down tall trees, which stood on their banks, and throwing them across the water. All the land we passed over this afternoon was almost level, without hills and stones, and entirely covered with a tall and thick forest, in which we continually met with trees which were fallen down, because no one made the least use of the woods. We passed the next night in the midst of the forest, plagued with muskitoes, gnats, and wood-lice, and in fear of all kinds of snakes,

June the 26th. Early this morning we continued our journey through the wood, along the river Hudson. There was an old path leading to Fort Nicholson, but it was so overgrown with grass, that we discovered it with great difficulty. In some places we found plenty of raspberries, some of which were already ripe.

Fort Nicholson is the place on the eastern shore of the river Hudson, where a wooden fortification formerly stood. We arrived here some time before noon, and rested a while. Colonel Lydius resided here till the beginning of the last war, chiefly with a view of carrying on a greater trade with the French Indians; but during the war, they burnt his house, and took his son prisoner. The fort was situated on a plain, but at present the place is all overgrown with a thicket. It was built in the year 1709, during the war which Queen Anne carried on against the French, and it was named after the brave English general Nicholson. It was not so much a fort, as a magazine to Fort Anne. In the year 1711, when the English naval attempt upon Canada miscarried, the English themselves set fire to this place. The soil hereabouts seems to be pretty fertile. The river Hudson passed close by here.

Some time in the afternoon, we continued our journey. We had hitherto followed the eastern shore of the river Hudson, and gone almost due North; but now we left it, and went E. N. E. or N. E. across the woods, in order to come to the upper end of the river Woodcreek, which flows to Fort St. Frederic, where we might go in a boat from the former place. The ground we passed over this afternoon was generally flat, and somewhat low. Now and then we met with rivulets, which were generally dried up during this season. Sometimes we saw a little hill, but neither mountains nor stones, and the country was every where covered with tall and thick forests. The trees stood close, and afforded a fine shade; but the pleasure which we enjoyed from it was lessened by the incredible quantity of gnats which fill the woods. We found several plants here, but they were far from each other, (as in our woods where the cattle have destroyed them,) though no cattle ever came here. The ground was every where thick covered with leaves of the last autumn. In some places we found the ground over-grown with great quantities of moss. The soil was generally very good, consisting of a deep mould, in which the plants thrive very well. Therefore it seems that it would answer very well if it were cultivated: however, flowing waters were very scarce hereabouts; and if the woods were cleared, how great would be the effects of the parching heat of the sun, which might then act with its full force!

We lodged this night near a brook, in order to be sufficiently supplied with water, which was not every where at hand during this season. The muskitoes, punchins or gnats, and the woodlice, were very troublesome. Our fear of snakes, and of the Indians rendered this night’s rest very precarious and unsecure.