6 TRAVELS IN THE CONFEDERATION 



Kentucky there is no real winter ; and where there is 

 no winter, he argued, people must work year in, year 

 out, and that was not his fancy ; winter, with a warm 

 stove and sluggish days, being indispensable to his. 

 happiness. 



Coventry, another forge 15 miles from Valley-Forge, 

 belongs to a Mr. Pott. On the road thither iron-mould 

 is still to be seen, at times soft, at times hard, and 

 divers other species of rock, scaly sand-stones, quartz, 

 and breccia cemented with sand and iron ; and a 

 gneissic rock especially. The forge at Coventry stands 

 in a narrow valley, running east and west. There are 

 three hearths and three hammers. The hammers lie 

 parallel with the shaft, the trunnions of which catch 

 the helve at a little distance behind the hammer, and 

 thus raise it with less power. 



The bellows are of wood, and consist of two cylindri- 

 cal casks, fitting closely the one into the other, and 

 moving up and down between four wooden posts. 

 The wind goes first through a leathern conduit, into 

 an iron pipe, and so to the hearth. These simple 

 bellows have the advantage that they may be set up 

 without trouble or expense, need few repairs, and 

 should last well. The best bar-iron is at this time sold 

 here at 38 shillings Pensyl. Current the hundredweight, 

 or about 5 pence the pound. Here, as everywhere, the 

 assertion is made that American iron is in no way in- 

 ferior to the best European. Mr. Pott, the owner of 

 the forge, was absent, but we were received by his 

 family with particular courtesy and our wants met with 

 an obliging readiness which is too often not the case, 

 even at a dear reckoning, in the so-called public-houses. 



Five miles farther, over barren, stony, woody, and 



