Page:Early western travels, 1748-1846 (1907 Volume 3).djvu/246

 in the open field, and proceed from kernels without being either pruned or grafted. They shoot so vigorously, that at the age of four years they begin to bear. The major part of the inhabitants plant them round their houses, and others have great orchards of them planted crosswise. They turn the hogs there for two months before the fruit gets ripe. These animals search with avidity for the peaches that fall in great numbers, and crack the stones of them for the kernels.

The immense quantity of peaches which they gather are converted in brandy, of which there is a great consumption in the country, and the rest is exported. A few only of the inhabitants have stills; the others carry their peaches to them, and bring back a quantity of brandy proportionate to the number of peaches they carried, except a part that is left for the expense of distilling. Peach brandy sells {186} for a dollar a gallon, which is equal to four English quarts.

In Kentucky the taxes are assessed in the following manner: they pay a sum equivalent to one shilling and eight-pence for every white servant, six-pence halfpenny for every negro, three-pence for a horse, two shillings per hundred acres of land of the first class, cultivated or not, seventeen-pence per hundred of the second class, and sixpence halfpenny per hundred of the third class. Although these taxes are, as we must suppose, very moderate, and though nobody complains of them, still a great number of those taxable are much in arrears. This is what I perceived by the numerous advertisements of the collectors that I have seen pasted up in different parts of the town of Lexinton. Again, these delays are not peculiar to the state of Kentucky, as I have made the same remark in those of the east.