Page:Early western travels, 1748-1846 (1907 Volume 8).djvu/192

 The New-York line, west of Buffalo, is about forty miles from this place. The principal creeks within this line, and which are connected with Lake Erie are Eighteen Mile, Catheraugus and Silver Creek. Near to the mouth of the Catheraugus is another settlement of Seneca Indians.

The State of Pennsylvania is bounded by this Lake for the distance of about fifty-miles. The land here is very good. Presque Isle, situated about twenty miles from the New-York line, is a considerable village, and will become a place of importance.[48]

Until about the first of March the weather was uninterruptedly severe; and although the country is generally infested with bears and wolves, and furnishes almost every kind of game, I had not, previous to this period, seen anything, relative to this particular, worthy of remark. All nature, fast bound in the icy arms of winter, was mute. I looked towards the Lake, but it spake not. I asked a reason of the trees, but even their branches did not whisper to me.—The traveller was the only living thing. Upon the bosom of the Lake he could see, that in the very frolic of its waves, a sudden and bitter chill had fixed in disappointment the smile of its delight.—Thus man, in the unsuspecting season of happiness, feels the deadly pressure of unrelenting sorrow.

Leaving the Pennsylvania line, I entered the celebrated Connecticut Reserve, called New Connecticut.

{88} The original charter of Old Connecticut embraced a large section of that part of the North-West Territory, which lies south of Lake Erie. In 1786 this state ceded to the general government all her territory west of Pennsylvania, excepting the tract now constituting New Con-*