248 INDIANA HISTORICAL COLLECTIONS 



Frankfort, the capitol of this capital state, is upon the 

 east side of the Kentucky river, 50 miles from the Ohio, 

 surrounded by wild, high, rocky, and romantic hills, and 

 is a very different spot from what modern taste would 

 select for a city. Here the beginning was induced by a 

 favorable location upon one of the hills for defence 

 against the Indians, and upon the "great Buffalo tract" 

 that ranged through "from Limestone to Beargrass," 

 now the flourishing cities of Maysville and Louisville. It 

 may be interesting to some, that I should mention, that 

 in the first settlement of Kentucky, the whole surface 

 was covered with a thick cane brake, and the only method 

 of passing through the country with any ease or rapidity, 

 was to follow the Buffalo trails, or along the beds of 

 creeks. Now that dense vegetable mass has entirely dis- 

 appeared from the face of the country, except now and 

 then a farmer has had the good taste to preserve a little 

 patch as a memento of olden time. Olden time! did I 

 say? Why some of the first settlers of Kentucky, yet live 

 upon the land they won through a long struggle with the 

 aboriginee, who fought manfully to retain his favorite 

 hunting ground. 



When I arrived in Frankfort, I ordered the stage to 

 set me down at the door of Thomas B. Stevenson, the 

 energetic editor of the Kentucy Farmer. Much to my 

 own, and more to his regret, his wife had left home 

 that morning on a distant visit, and when I arrived, I 

 found him also absent; but I found "the way prepared;" 

 my name was familiar to the servants, and I went into 

 possession of comfortable quarters with a feeling of free- 

 dom and pleasure that I always feel when I know I am 

 welcome, and which I was sure of here, even before I 

 saw the index of it upon the fine open manly countenance 

 of my friend when he came in shortly after my arrival. 



I spent a couple of days at Frankfort very agreeably; 

 saw some fine stock and farms in the neighborhood, took 

 note of the noble improvements of the Kentucky river, 

 by which the state is making a slack water navigation 



