236 TRAVELS IN THE CONFEDERATION 



time a hunter in the woods and later Governor and 

 Commandant of the post of St. Vincent on the Wa- 

 bash. It was distressing to hear what these people, 

 (living in the immeasurable forest so far removed from 

 the actual seat and source of all the hostilities), had 

 to tell of the frights and dangers they had passed 

 through ; and yet, returning thither, they were more 

 fortunate than many of their neighbors who had been 

 tomahawked on the spot. They travelled slowly and 

 camped every night in the woods. In the evening we 

 reached the first cabin on the western side of Laurel- 

 hill. This was the residence of Doctor Peter, a Ger- 

 man, who was absent looking for his pigs gone astray 

 in the woods. His wife, a good little old woman, and 

 energetic, gave our horses oats for their refreshment 

 and set before us mountain-tea and maple-sugar, which 

 as well as her bacon, whiskey, and cakes were the 

 products of her own land and industry. 



We had been long coming down the mountain, and 

 from this place there still remained a few miles to go 

 until we reached the foot of the Laurel-hill. Here we 

 saw particularly extensive tracts of forest killed out 

 by fire. Barked and stripped of branches the high, 

 white, trunks stood naked, and among them there was 

 springing up an indescribably thick bush, not to be 

 found among the living, tall trees of the same region. 

 A man met us who was taking to Philadelphia some 

 500 pounds of ginseng-roots (Panax quinque folium L.*) 

 on two horses. He hoped to make a great profit be- 

 cause throughout the war little of this article was 

 gathered, and it was now demanded in quantity by cer- 

 tain Frenchmen. The hunters collect it incidentally in 

 their wanderings ; in these mountains the plant is still 



