Page:Early western travels, 1748-1846 (1907 Volume 3).djvu/213

 was on the point of setting out to the banks of the Ohio, there to form a settlement. These particulars are sufficient to give, on the pretended flourishing state of the vines in Kentucky, an idea very different to that which might be formed from the pompous account of them which appeared some months since in our public papers.

I profited by my stay with Mr. Dufour, to ask him in what part of Kentucky the numerous emigration of his countrymen had settled, which had been so much spoken of in our newspapers in 1793 and 1794. His reply was, that a great number of the Swiss had actually formed an intention to settle there; but {136} just as they were setting out, the major part had changed their mind, and that the colony was then reduced to his family and a few friends, forming, in the whole, eleven persons.

I did not set out from the vineyard till the second day after my arrival. Mr. Dufour offered, in order to shorten my journey, to conduct me through the wood where they cross the Kentucky river. I accepted his proposal, and although the distance was only four miles we took two hours to accomplish it, as we were obliged to alight either to climb up or descend the mountains, or to leap our horses over the trunks of old trees piled one upon another. The soil, as fertile as in the environs of Lexinton, will be difficult to cultivate, on account of the great inequality of the ground. Beech, nut, and oak trees, form chiefly the mass of the forests. We crossed, in the mean time, the shallows of the river, covered exclusively with beautiful palms. A great number of people in the country dread the proximity of these palms; they conceive that the down which grows on the reverse of the leaves, in spring, and which falls off in the course of the