246 HISTORY OF OHIO. 



' payment, or ceased to do business. The farmer was discour- 

 aged from raising much more, than what he really needed for 

 his own immediate use ; the trader feared to take bank paper, 

 that might be of no value, before he could use it; and his old 

 customers could no longer purchase any goods except mere 

 necessaries of life. The people living in the towns, became 

 idle, lazy, and of course, dissipated. Amidst this gloom, the 

 national government brought suits in court on all the bonds 

 due to them, for the internal duties on distilleries, &c., &c., 

 and against the collectors of the revenue. United States 

 Jands had been sold to settlers on a credit, and these were 

 forfeited for non-payment. 



Universal ruin stared all in the face, and it seemed for 

 awhile, as if the people of the west would retrogade into a 

 state of barbarism. 



Congress had chartered a national bank, but although this 

 measure operated for a moment, auspiciously by throwing in- 

 to circulation a sound currency, yet inasmuch as the balance 

 of trade was greatly against the west, we received no lasting 

 benefit from it. 



Three-fourths of the state, all south of the summit which 

 separates the waters of the Mississippi from those of the St. 

 Lawrence, carried their produce to New Orleans for sale. 

 This trade was very little better than no trade, only as it ten- 

 ded to keep men out of absolute idleness. The arks, or as 

 they were called " New Orleans boats," cost about two hun- 

 dred dollars each, where they were built, and as they were of 

 little value at New Orleans, and could not be used by their 

 owners, only for descending the river, the entire cost of the 

 boats was lost. The hands employed in this long, tedious and 

 expensive voyage, provided they escaped death by the yellow 

 fever, or by some robber, were compelled to return home by 

 land through the Indian country. In the interior where these 

 boats were built along the Ohio, and its branches, after build- 

 ing the boats and loading them with flour, pork, lard whisky, 

 cider, apples, fowls, &c., the freshet must come before they 

 could depart on their perilous voyage. And it might hap- 



