CXXll 
LIFE OF WILSON. 
this market place, in the metropolis of the fertile country of 
Kentucky.* 
* This letter, it should seem, gave offence to some of the inhabitants of 
Lexington; and a gentleman residing in that town, solicitous about its repu- 
tation, undeitook, in a letter to the editor of the Port Foho, to vindicate it 
from strictures which he plainly insinuated were the offspring of ignorance, 
and unsupported by fact. 
After a feeble attempt at sarcasm and irony, the letter-writer thus 
proceeds: “ I have too great a respect for Mi‘. Wilson, as your friend, not to 
beheve he had in mind some other market house than that of Lexington, 
when he speaks of it as ‘unpaved and unfinished!’ But the people of Lex- 
ington woidd be gi-atified to learn what your ornitliologist means by ‘ skinned 
squirrels cut up into quarters,’ which curious anatomical preparations he enu- 
merates among the articles he saw in the Lexington market. Does Mr. Wil- 
son mean to joke upon us? If this is wit we must confess that, however abun- 
dant oxu country may be in good substantial matter-of-fact salt, the attic tart 
is unknown among us. 
“ I hope, however, soon to see this gentleman’s American Ornithology. 
Its elegance of execution, and descriptive propriety, may assuage the httle 
pique we have taken from the author.” 
The. editor of the Port Folio having transmitted this letter to Wilson, pre- 
vious to sending it to press, it was returned with the following note : 
“ TO THE EDITOR OF THE PORT FOLIO. 
Bartram's Gardens, July 16, 1811. 
“ Dear Sfr, 
“ No man can have a more respectful opinion of tlie people of Kentucky, 
particularly tliose of Lexington, tlian myself; because I have traversed near- 
ly the whole extent of their country, and witnessed the effects of theu 
bravery, their active industry, and daring sphit for enterprise. But they 
would be gods, and not men, were they faultless. 
“ I am Sony that truth will not permit me to retract, as mere jofees, the 
few disagi'eeable things alluded to. I certainly had no other market place 
in view, than that of Lexington, in die passage above mentioned. As to the 
circumstance of ‘ skinned squin-els, cut up into quarters,’ which seems to 
have excited so much sensibility, I candidly acknowledge myself to have 
been incoiTect in that statement, and I owe an apology for the same. On 
refening to my notes taken at the time, I find the word ‘ halves,' not quar- 
ters; that is, those ‘ cmious anatomical preparations,’ (skinned squurels) 
were brought to market in the form of a saddle of venison; not in that of a 
leg or shoulder of mutton. 
“ With this correction, I beg leave to assure your very sensible corres- 
