234 AUDUBON, THE NATURALIST 
conditions of life for the merchant-trader at that early 
day were at best far from easy, and an honest success, 
as then understood, required not only plenty of rough 
work but careful planning as well. His goods, pur- 
chased in the East, were laboriously transported across 
the State of Pennsylvania, and if they came from Phil- 
adelphia they must needs traverse the rough wagon 
roads that led through Bedford to Pittsburgh. There 
was an overland trail from Pittsburgh to Kentucky, 
but merchants with heavy loads would naturally take 
the easier river route. In going east to renew his stock 
in trade, it was a common practice to travel on horseback 
from as far west as St. Louis, but on returning the 
merchant would often sell his mount at Baltimore, Phil- 
adelphia or Pittsburgh, where a boat could be taken 
for the remainder of the journey. 
The “ark” or flatboat was considered most convenient 
for the transportation of either passengers or merchan- 
dise down the Ohio, for any well-to-do traveler, while 
floating leisurely with the current, could make himself 
comfortable by fitting up snug sleeping quarters and 
a kitchen on deck, and could go ashore at will, with the 
certainty of satisfying his appetite for wild turkey, veni- 
son and other game in the season. Wilson, who de- 
scended the river in April, 1810, boarded and passed 
many of these “arks,” which he described as built in 
the form of a parallelogram, from twelve to fourteen 
feet wide and from forty to seventy feet long, with a 
canopy to protect them from the weather; they were 
casually helped along by means of two oars in the bow, 
and steered by another and more powerful one in the 
stern. “Several of these floating caravans,” said Wil- 
son, “were loaded with store goods for the supply of 
the settlements through which they passed, having a 
