LIFE OF WILSON. 
cxxv 
of Kentucky. It stands on a high narrow plain between the moun- 
tains and the river, which is fast devouring the bank, and encroach- 
ing on the town ; part of the front street is gone already, and xin- 
less some effectual means are soon taken the whole must go by 
piecemeal. This town contains about one hundred houses, chiefly 
log and frames. From this place I set out on foot for Washington. 
On the road, at the height of several hundred feet above the pre- 
sent surface of the river, I found prodigious quantities of petrified 
shells of the small cockle and fan-shaped kind, but whether ma- 
rine remains or not am uncertain. I have since found these petri- 
fied concretions of shells universal all over Kentucky wherever I 
have been. The rocks look as if one had collected heaps of broken 
shells and wrought them up among clay, then hardened it into 
stone. These rocks lie universally in horizontal strata. A farmer 
in the neighbourhood of Washington assured me, that from seven 
acres he reaped at once eight thousand weight of excellent hemp, 
fit for market. 
Amidst very tempestuous weather I reached the town of Cin- 
cinnati, which does honour to the name of the old Roman, and is 
the neatest and handsomest situated place I have seen since I left 
Philadelphia. You must know that during an unknown series of 
ages the river Ohio has gradually sunk several hundred feet below 
its former bed, and has left on both sides, occasionally, what are 
called the first or nearest, and the second or next, high bank, 
the latter of which is never overflowed. 
The town of Cincinnati occupies two beautiful plains, one on 
the first, and the other on the second bank, and contains upwards 
of five hundred houses, the greater proportion of which are of brick. 
One block house is all that remains of Fort Washington. The 
river Licking comes in from the opposite shore, where the town of 
Newport, of forty or fifty houses, and a large arsenal and barracks, 
are lately erected. Here I met with judge Turner, a man of extra- 
ordinary talents, well known to the literati of Philadelphia. He 
2 I 
VOL. IX. 
