CXXIV 
LIFE OF WILSON. 
human beings, lurking at the bottom of a gigantic growth of tim- 
ber that I have not seen equalled in any other part of the United 
States. And it is truly amusing to observe how dear and how fa- 
miliar habit has rendered those privations which must have been 
first the offspring of necessity. Yet none pride themselves more 
on their possessions. The inhabitants of these forlorn sheds will 
talk to you with pride of the richness of their soil, of the excellence 
and abundance of their country, of the healthiness of their climate, 
and the purity of their waters, while the only bread you find among 
them is of Indian corn coarsely ground in a horse-mill, with half of 
'the grains unbroken , even their cattle are destitute of stables and 
hay, and look like moving skeletons ; their own houses worse than 
pig-sties ; their clothes an assemblage of rags, their faces yellow, 
and lank with disease, and their persons covered with filth, and 
frequently garnished with the humours of the Scotch fiddle, from 
Avhich dreadful disease by the mercy of God I have been most mi- 
raculously preserved. All this is the effect of laziness. The corn 
is thrown into the ground in the Spring, and the pigs turned into 
the woods, where they multiply like rabbits. The labour of the 
squatter is now over till Autumn, and he spends the Winter in eat- 
ing pork, cabbage and hoe-cakes. What a contrast to the neat 
farm, and snug cleanly habitation, of the industrious settler that 
opens his green fields, his stately barns, gardens and orchards, to 
the gladdened eye of the delighted stranger ! 
At a place called Salt Lick I went ashore to see the salt works, 
and to learn whether the people had found any further remains of 
an animal of the ox kind, one of whose horns, of a prodigious size, 
was discovered here some years ago, and is in the possession of 
Mr. Peale. They make here about one thousand bushels weekly, 
which sells at one dollar and seventy-five cents per bushel. The 
wells are from thirty to fifty feet deep, but nothing curious has 
lately been dug up. I landed at Maysville, or Limestone, where a 
considerable deal of business is done in importation for the interior 
