Part 9

There have been many very shocking instances of cruelty in the carrying on of this trade, vulgarly called “The white slave trade.” I shall tell you but of one. While the yellow fever was raging in Philadelphia in the year 1793, at which time few vessels would venture to approach nearer to the city than Fort Mifflin, four miles below it, a captain in the trade arrived in the river, and hearing that such was the fatal nature of the infection, that a sufficient number of nurses could not be procured to attend the sick for any sum whatever, he conceived the philanthropic idea of supplying this deficiency from amongst his passengers; accordingly he boldly sailed up to the city, and advertised his cargo for sale:

“A few healthy servants, generally between seventeen and eighteen years of age, are just arrived in the brig ——, their times will be disposed of by applying on board.” The cargo, as you may suppose, did not remain long unsold. This anecdote was communicated to me by a gentleman who has the original advertisement in his possession.

When I tell you that people are sold in this manner, it is not to be understood that they are sold for ever, but only for a certain number of years; for two, three, four, or five years, according to their respective merits. A good mechanic, that understands a particular kind of trade, for which men are much wanted in America, has to serve a shorter time than a mere labourer, as more money will be given for his time, and the expence of his passage does not exceed that of any other man. During their servitude, these people are liable to be resold at the caprice of their masters; they are as much under dominion as negro slaves, and if they attempt to run away, they may be imprisoned like felons. The laws respecting “redemptioners,” so are the men called that are brought over in this manner, were grounded on those formed for the English convicts before the revolution, and they are very severe.

[Sidenote: GERMAN SETTLERS.]

The Germans are a quiet, sober, and industrious set of people, and are most valuable citizens. They generally settle a good many together in one place, and, as may be supposed, in consequence keep up many of the customs of their native country as well as their own language. In Lancaster and the neighbourhood German is the prevailing language, and numbers of people living there are ignorant of any other. The Germans are some of the best farmers in the United States, and they seldom are to be found but where the land is particularly good; wherever they settle they build churches, and are wonderfully attentive to the duties of religion. In these and many other respects the Germans and their descendants differ widely from the Americans, that is, from the descendants of the English, Scotch, Irish, and other nations, who, from having lived in the country for many generations, and from having mingled together, now form one people, whose manners and habits are very much the same.

The Germans are a plodding race of men, wholly intent upon their own business, and indifferent about that of others: a stranger is never molested as he passes through their settlements with inquisitive and idle questions. On arriving amongst the Americans[17], however, a stranger must tell where he came from, where he is going, what his name is, what his business is; and until he gratifies their curiosity on these points, and many others of equal importance, he is never suffered to remain quiet for a moment. In a tavern he must satisfy every fresh set that comes in, in the same manner, or involve himself in a quarrel, especially if it is found out that he is not a native, which it does not require much sagacity to discover.

Footnote 17:

In speaking of the Americans here, and in the following lines, it is those of the lower and middling classes of the people which I allude to, such as are met with in the country parts of Pennsylvania.

[Sidenote: GERMAN SETTLERS.]

The Germans give themselves but little trouble about politics; they elect their representatives to serve in congress and the state assemblies; and satisfied that deserving men have been chosen by the people at large, they trust that these men do what is best for the public good, and therefore abide patiently by their decisions: they revere the constitution, conscious that they live happily under it, and express no wishes to have it altered. The Americans, however, are for ever cavilling at some of the public measures; something or other is always wrong, and they never appear perfectly satisfied. If any great measure is before congress for discussion, seemingly distrustful of the abilities or the integrity of the men they have elected, they meet together in their towns or districts, canvass the matter themselves, and then send forward instructions to their representatives how to act. They never consider that any important question is more likely to meet with a fair discussion in an assembly where able men are collected together from all parts of the states than in an obscure corner, where a few individuals are assembled, who have no opportunity of getting general information on the subject. Party spirit is for ever creating dissentions amongst them, and one man is continually endeavouring to obtrude his political creed upon another. If it is found out that a stranger is from Great Britain or Ireland, they immediately begin to boast of their own constitution and freedom, and give him to understand, that they think every Englishman a slave, because he submits to be called a subject. Their opinions are for the most part crude and dogmatical, and principally borrowed from newspapers, which are wretchedly compiled from the pamphlets of the day, having read a few of which, they think themselves arrived at the summit of intellectual excellence, and qualified for making the deepest political researches.

[Sidenote: THE SUSQUEHANNAH.]

The Germans, as I have said, are fond of settling near each other: when the young men of a family are grown up, they generally endeavour to get a piece of land in the neighbourhood of their relations, and by their industry soon make it valuable; the American, on the contrary, is of a roving disposition, and wholly regardless of the ties of consanguinity; he takes his wife with him, goes to a distant part of the country, and buries himself in the woods, hundreds of miles distant from the rest of his family, never perhaps to see them again. In the back parts of the country you always meet numbers of men prowling about to try and buy cheap land; having found what they like, they immediately remove; nor having once removed, are these people satisfied; restless and discontented with what they possess, they are for ever changing. It is scarcely possible in any part of the continent to find a man, amongst the middling and lower classes of Americans, who has not changed his farm and his residence many different times. Thus it is, that though there are not more than four millions of people in the United States, yet they are scattered from the confines of Canada to the farthest extremity of Georgia, and from the Atlantic to the banks of the Mississippi. Thousands of acres of waste land are annually taken up in unhealthy and unfruitful parts of the country, notwithstanding that the best settled and healthy parts of the middle states would maintain five times the number of inhabitants that they do at present. The American, however, does not change about from place to place in this manner merely to gratify a wandering disposition; in every change he hopes to make money. By the desire of making money, both the Germans and Americans of every class and description are actuated in all their movements; self-interest is always uppermost in their thoughts; it is the idol which they worship, and at its shrine thousands and thousands would be found, in all parts of the country, ready to make a sacrifice of every noble and generous sentiment that can adorn the human mind.

In coming to this place from Lancaster I crossed the Susquehannah River, which runs nearly midway between the two towns, at the small village of Columbia, as better boats are kept there than at either of the ferries higher up or lower down the river. The Susquehannah is here somewhat more than a quarter of a mile wide, and for a considerable distance, both above and below the ferry, it abounds with islands and large rocks, over which last the water runs with prodigious velocity: the roaring noise that it makes is heard a great way off. The banks rise very boldly on each side, and are thickly wooded; the islands also are covered with small trees, which, interspersed with the rocks, produce a very fine effect. The scenery in every point of view is wild and romantic. In crossing the river it is necessary to row up against the stream under the shore, and then to strike over to the opposite side, under the shelter of some of the largest islands. As these rapids continue for many miles, they totally impede the navigation, excepting when there are floods in the river, at which time large rafts may be conducted down the dream, carrying several hundred barrels of flour. It is said that the river could be rendered navigable in this neighbourhood, but the expence of such an undertaking would be enormous, and there is little likelihood indeed that it will ever be attempted, as the Pennsylvanians are already engaged in cutting a canal below Harrisburgh, which will connect the navigable part of the river with the Schuylkill, and also another canal from the Schuylkill to the Delaware, by means of which a vent will be opened for the produce of the country bordering upon the Susquehannah at Philadelphia. These canals would have been finished by this time if the subscribers had all paid their respective shares, but at present they are almost at a stand for want of money.

[Sidenote: LAWYERS.]

The quantity of wild fowl that is seen on every part of the Susquehannah is immense. Throughout America the wild fowl is excellent and plentiful; but there is one duck in particular found on this river, and also on Patowmac and James rivers, which surpasses all others: it is called the white or canvass-back duck, from the feathers between the wings being somewhat of the colour of canvass. This duck is held in such estimation in America, that it is sent frequently as a present for hundreds of miles—indeed it would be a dainty morsel for the greatest epicure in any country.

York contains about five hundred houses and six churches, and is much such another town as Lancaster. It is inhabited by Germans, by whom the same manufactures are carried on as at Lancaster.

The courts of common pleas, and those of general quarter sessions, were holding when I reached this place; I found it difficult, therefore, at first, to procure accommodation, but at last I got admission in a house principally taken up by lawyers. To behold the strange assemblage of persons that was brought together this morning in the one poor apartment which was allotted to all the lodgers, was really a subject of diversion. Here one lawyer had his clients in a corner of the room; there another had his; a third was shaving; a fourth powdering his own hair; a fifth noting his brief; and the table standing in the middle of the room, between a clamorous set of old men on one side, and three or four women in tears on the other; I and the rest of the company, who were not lawyers, were left to eat our breakfast.

[Sidenote: PENNSYLVANIA COURTS.]

On entering into the courts a stranger is apt to smile at the grotesque appearance of the judges who preside in them, and at their manners on the bench; but this smile must be suppressed when it is recollected, that there is no country, perhaps, in the world, where justice is more impartially administered, or more easily obtained by those who have been injured. The judges in the country parts of Pennsylvania are no more than plain farmers, who from their infancy have been accustomed to little else than following the plough. The laws expressly declare that there must be, at least, three judges resident in every county; now as the salary allowed is but a mere trifle, no lawyer would accept of the office, which of course must be filled from amongst the inhabitants[18], who are all in a happy state of mediocrity, and on a perfect equality with each other. The district judge, however, who presides in the district or circuit, has a larger salary, and is a man of a different cast. The district or circuit consists of at least three, but not more than six counties. The county judges, which I have mentioned, are “judges of the court of common pleas, and by virtue of their offices also justices of oyer and terminer, and general gaol delivery, for the trial of capital and other offenders therein.” Any two judges compose the court of quarter sessions. Under certain regulations, established by law, the accused party has the power of removing the proceedings into the supreme court, which has jurisdiction over every part of the state. This short account of the courts relates only to Pennsylvania: every state in the union has a separate code of laws for itself, and a distinct judicature.

Footnote 18:

This is also the case in Philadelphia, where we find practising physicians and surgeons sitting on the bench as judges in a court of justice.

+LETTER + X.

_Of the Country near York.—Of the Soil of the Country on each Side of the Blue Mountains.—Frederic-town.—Change in the Inhabitants and in the Country as you proceed towards the Sea.—Numbers of Slaves.—Tobacco chiefly cultivated.—Inquisitiveness of the People at the Taverns.—Observations thereon.—Description of the Great Falls of the Patowmac River.—George Town.—Of the Country between that Place and Hoe’s Ferry.—Poisonous Vines.—Port Tobacco.—Wretched Appearance of the Country bordering upon the Ferry.—Slaves neglected.—Passage_ _of the Patowmac very dangerous.—Fresh Water Oysters.—Landed on a deserted Part of the Virginian Shore.—Great Hospitality of the Virginians._

Stratford, March.

IN the neighbourhood of York and Lancaster, the soil consists of a rich, brown, loamy earth; and if you proceed in a south westerly course, parallel to the Blue Mountains, you meet with the same kind of soil as far as Frederic in Maryland. Here it changes gradually to a deep reddish colour, and continues much the same along the eastern side of the mountains, all the way down to North Carolina. On crossing over the mountains, however, directly from Frederic, the same fertile brown soil, which is common in the neighbourhood of York and Lancaster, is again met with, and it is found throughout the Shenandoah Valley, and as far down as the Carolinas, on the west side of the mountains.

[Sidenote: FACE OF THE COUNTRY.]

Between York and Frederic in Maryland there are two or three small towns; viz. Hanover, Petersburgh, and Woodsburg, but there is nothing worthy of mention in any of them. Frederic contains about seven hundred houses and five churches, two of which are for German Lutherans, one for Presbyterians, one for Calvinists, and one for Baptists. It is a flourishing town, and carries on a brisk inland trade. The arsenal of the state of Maryland is placed here, the situation being secure and central.

From Frederic I proceeded in a southerly course through Montgomery county in Maryland. In this direction the soil changes to a yellowish sort of clay mixed with gravel, and continues much the same until you come to the federal city, beyond which, as I have before mentioned, it becomes more and more sandy as you approach the sea coast. The change in the face of the country after leaving Frederic is gradual, but at the end of a day’s journey a striking difference is perceptible. Instead of well cultivated fields, green with wheat, such as are met with along that rich track which runs contiguous to the mountains, large pieces of land, which have been worn out with the culture of tobacco, are here seen lying waste, with scarcely an herb to cover them. Instead of the furrows of the plough, the marks of the hoe appear on the ground; the fields are overspread with little hillocks for the reception of tobacco plants, and the eye is assailed in every direction with the unpleasant sight of gangs of male and female slaves toiling under the harsh commands of the overseer. The difference in the manners of the inhabitants is also great. Instead of being amongst the phlegmatic Germans, a traveller finds himself again in the midst of an inquisitive and prying set of Americans, to gratify whose curiosity it is always necessary to devote a certain portion of time after alighting at a tavern.

[Sidenote: FALLS OF THE PATOWMAC.]

A traveller on arriving in America may possibly imagine, that it is the desire of obtaining useful information which leads the people, wherever he stops, to accost him; and that the particular enquiries respecting the object of his pursuits, the place of his abode, and that of his destination, &c. are made to prepare the way for questions of a more general nature, and for conversation that may be attended with some amusement to him; he therefore readily answers them, hoping in return to gain information about the country through which he passes; but when it is found that these questions are asked merely through an idle and impertinent curiosity, and that by far the greater part of the people who ask them are ignorant, boorish fellows; when it is found that those who can keep up some little conversation immediately begin to talk upon politics, and to abuse every country excepting their own; when, lastly, it is found that the people scarcely ever give satisfactory answers at first to the enquiries which are made by a stranger respecting their country, but always hesitate, as if suspicious that he was asking these questions to procure some local information, in order to enable him to overreach them in a bargain, or to make some speculation in land to their injury; the traveller then loses all patience at this disagreeable and prying disposition, and feels disposed to turn from them with disgust; still, however, if he wishes to go through the country peaceably, and without quarrelling at every place where he stops, it is absolutely necessary to answer some few of their questions.

Having followed the high way as far as Montgomery court-house, which is about thirty miles from Frederic, I turned off along a bye road running through the woods, in order to see the great falls of Patowmac River. The view of them from the Maryland shore is very pleasing, but not so much so as that from the opposite side. Having reached the river therefore close to the falls, I rode along through the woods, with which its banks are covered, for some distance higher up, to a place where there was a ferry, and where I crossed into Virginia. From the place where I landed to the Falls, which is a distance of about three miles, there is a wild romantic path running along the margin of the river, and winding at the same time round the base of a high hill covered with lofty trees and rocks. Near to the shore, almost the whole way, there are clusters of small islands covered with trees, which suddenly opposing the rapid course of the stream, form very dangerous eddies, in which boats are frequently lost when navigated by men who are not active and careful. On the shore prodigious heaps of white sand are washed up by the waves, and in many places the path is rendered almost impassable by piles of large trees, which have been brought down from the upper country by floods, and drifted together.

[Sidenote: PORT TOBACCO.]

The river, at the ferry which I mentioned, is about one mile and a quarter wide, and it continues much the same breadth as far as the falls, where it is considerably contracted and confined in its channel by immense rocks on either side. There also its course is very suddenly altered, so much so indeed, that below the falls for a short distance it runs in an opposite direction from what it did above, but soon after it resumes its former course. The water does not descend perpendicularly, excepting in one part close to the Virginian shore, where the height is about thirty feet, but comes rushing down with tremendous impetuosity over a ledge of rocks in several different falls. The best view of the cataract is from the top of a pile of rocks about sixty feet above the level of the water, and which, owing to the bend in the river, is situated nearly opposite to the falls. The river comes from the right, then gradually turning, precipitates itself down the falls, and winds along at the foot of the rocks on which you stand with, great velocity. The rocks are of a slate colour, and lie in strata; the surface of them in many places is glossy and sparkling.

From hence I followed the course of the river downwards as far as George Town, where I again crossed it; and after passing through the federal city, proceeded along the Maryland shore of the river to Piscatoway, and afterwards to Port Tobacco, two small towns situated on creeks of their own name, which run into the Patowmac. In the neighbourhood of Piscatoway there are several very fine views of the Virginian shore; Mount Vernon in particular appears to great advantage.

I observed here great numbers of the poisonous vines which grow about the large trees, and are extremely like the common grape vines. If handled in the morning, when the branches are moist with the dew, they infallibly raise blisters on the hands, which it is sometimes difficult to get rid of.

Port Tobacco contains about eighty houses, most of which are of wood, and very poor. There is a large English episcopalian church on the border of the town, built of stone, which formerly was an ornament to the place, but it is now entirely out of repair; the windows are all broken, and the road is carried through the church-yard over the graves, the paling that surrounded it having been torn down. Near the town is Mount Misery, towards the top of which is a medicinal spring, remarkable in summer for the coldness of the water.

[Sidenote: HOE’S FERRY.]

From Port Tobacco to Hoe’s Ferry, on the Patowmac River, the country is flat and sandy, and wears a most dreary aspect. Nothing is to be seen here for miles together but extensive plains, that have been worn out by the culture of tobacco, overgrown with yellow sedge,[19] and interspersed with groves of pine and cedar trees, the dark green colour of which forms a curious contrast with the yellow of the sedge. In the midst of these plains are the remains of several good houses, which shew that the country was once very different to what it is now. These were the houses, most probably, of people who originally settled in Maryland with Lord Baltimore, to go to decay, as the land around them is worn out, and the people find it more to their interest to remove to another part of the country, and clear a piece of rich land, than to attempt to reclaim these exhausted plains. In consequence of this, the country in many of the lower parts of Maryland appears as if it had been deserted by one half of its inhabitants, but which have now been suffered

Footnote 19:

This sedge, as it is called, is a sort of coarse grass, so hard that cattle will not eat it, which springs up spontaneously, in this part of the country, on the ground that has been left waste; it commonly grows about two feet high; towards winter it turns yellow, and remains standing until the ensuing summer, when a new growth displaces that of the former year. At its first springing up it is of a bright green colour.