KENTUCKY. 4Si 



flax, hemp, and vegetables of all kinds common in this climate yield 

 abundantly. Cotton is with difficulty brought to perfection, but the 

 sod appears to be peculiarly suitable to tobacco. 



Animals. ...Here are bears, deer, elks, and many other animals 

 common to the United States. The rivers abound in the finest fish : 

 salmon, roach, perch, eel, and all kinds of hook fish. The paroquet 

 is common here ; as is the ivory-bill woodpecker. 



Natural curiosities. ...The banks, or rather precipices, of the 

 rivers Kentucky and Dick, may be reckoned among the natural curi- 

 osities of this country. Here the astonished eye beholds 300 or 400 

 feet of solid perpendicular rock, in some parts of the lime stone kind, 

 and in others of fine white marble, curiously chequered with strata 

 of astonishing regularity. Caves are found amazingly large, in some 

 of which you may travel several miles under a fine lime stone rock, 

 supported by curious arches and pillars. In most of them run streams 

 of water. There is a cave in Rockcastle county, so large, that a 

 yoke of oxen and cart can drive in at one side of a large hill, and 

 come out at the other, at the distance of about half a mile. There 

 is another in Warren county, which is said to have been explored 

 about seven miles, and the extent of it not yet ascertained. Most of 

 these caves furnish earth, from which large quantities of salt petre 

 are made. There are three springs or ponds of bitumen near Green 

 river, which discharge themselves into a common reservoir, and, 

 when used in lamps, answer all the purposes of the finest oil.* At a 

 salt spring near the Ohio river, very large bones have been found, far 

 surpassing the size of any species of animals now in America : the 

 head appears to have been considerably above three feet long. Dr. 

 Hunter said it could not be the elephant, and that, from the form of 

 the teeth, it must have been carnivorous, and belonging to a race of 

 animals now extinct. Specimens have been sent to France and Eng- 

 land, but the most complete is now preserved in Peale's Museum at 

 Philadelphia. What animal this is, and by what means its remains 

 are found in these regions (where none such now exist) are very diffi- 

 cult questions, and variously resolved. 



Population*. ...The number of inhabitants in this country has in- 

 creased, by emigration from the other states, with surprising rapidi- 

 ty. Before the year 1782, they did not exceed 3000. In 1790 they 

 amounted to 73,677, of whom 12,430 were slaves. At the general 

 census in 1800, they were found to be 220,960, including 40,343 

 slaves; and, according to that of 1810, they amounted to 406,5 1 1, in- 

 cluding 80,561 slaves. 



Chief towns. ...Kentucky as yet contains no very large towns; 

 the principal are Lexington, Louisville, Washington, Danville, and 

 Frankfort. Lexington is the largest town in the state, and, with the 

 exception of Pittsburg, in Pennsylvania, the most considerable inland 

 town westward of the Allegheny mountains. It contains about 800 

 houses, and 45< inhabitants, and is progressing with almost unex- 

 ampled rapidity in wealth and population. 



The Kentucky river at Lexington forms a semicircle, and almost 

 surrounds the town and its vicinity ;• making a distance thence to 

 Boonsborough of 18 miles, and to Frankfort of 22 miles, in a journey 

 by land ; while a circuit by water between these places is upwards of 

 ? 80 miles. 



* Morse's American Geography, p. 407. 



