The Englishwoman In America By Isabella Lucy Bird
























































































































 -  They are generally so dirty that
they travel by themselves in a partially lighted van, called the
Emigrants' car, for - Page 32
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They Are Generally So Dirty That They Travel By Themselves In A Partially Lighted Van, Called The Emigrants' Car, For A Most Trifling Payment.

I once got into one by mistake, and was almost sickened by the smell of tobacco, spirits, dirty fustian, and old leather, which assailed my olfactory organs.

Leaving Erie, beyond which the lake of the same name stretched to the distant horizon, blue and calm like a tideless sea, we entered the huge forests on the south shore, through which we passed, I suppose, for more than 100 miles.

My next neighbour was a stalwart, bronzed Kentucky farmer, in a palm-leaf hat, who, strange to say, never made any demonstrations with his bowie- knife, and, having been a lumberer in these forests, pointed out all the objects of interest.

The monotonous sublimity of these primeval woods far exceeded my preconceived ideas. We were locked in among gigantic trees of all descriptions, their huge stems frequently rising without a branch for a hundred feet; then breaking into a crown of the most luxuriant foliage. There were walnut, hickory, elm, maple, beech, oak, pine, and hemlock trees, with many others which I did not know, and the only undergrowth, a tropical-looking plant, with huge leaves, and berries like bunches of purple grapes. Though it was the noon of an unclouded sun, all was dark, and still, and lonely; no birds twittered from the branches; no animals enlivened the gloomy shades; no trace of man or of his works was there, except the two iron rails on which we flew along, unfenced from the forest, and those trembling electric wires, which will only cease to speak with the extinction of man himself.

Very occasionally we would come upon a log shanty, that most picturesque of human habitations; the walls formed of large logs, with the interstices filled up with clay, and the roof of rudely sawn boards, projecting one or two feet, and kept in their places by logs placed upon them. Windows and doors there were none, but, where a door was not, I generally saw four or five shoeless, ragged urchins, whose light tangled hair and general aspect were sufficient to denote their nationality. Sometimes these cabins would be surrounded by a little patch of cleared land, prolific in Indian corn and pumpkins; the brilliant orange of the latter contrasting with the charred stumps among which they grew; but more frequently the lumberer supported himself solely by his axe. These dwellings are suggestive, for they are erected by the pioneers of civilization; and if the future progress of America be equal in rapidity to its past, in another fifty years the forests will have been converted into lumber and firewood - rich and populous cities will have replaced the cabins and shanties - and the children of the urchins who gazed vacantly upon the cars will have asserted their claims to a voice in the councils of the nation.

The rays of the sun never penetrate the forest, and evening was deepening the gloom of the artificial twilight, when gradually we became enveloped in a glare, redder, fiercer, than that of moonlight; and looking a head I saw the forest on fire, and that we were rushing into the flames. "Close the windows, there's a fire a-head," said the conductor; and after obeying this commonplace direction, many of the passengers returned to the slumbers which had been so unseasonably disturbed. On, on we rushed - the flames encircled us round - we were enveloped in clouds of stifling smoke - crack, crash went the trees - a blazing stem fell across the line - the fender of the engine pushed it aside - the flames hissed like tongues of fire, and then, leaping like serpents, would rush up to the top of the largest tree, and it would blaze like a pine-knot, There seemed no egress; but in a few minutes the raging, roaring conflagration was left behind. A forest on fire from a distance looks very much like 'Punch's' picture of a naval review; a near view is the height of sublimity.

The dangers of the cars, to my inexperience, seemed by no means over with the escape from being roasted alive. A few miles from Cleveland they rushed down a steep incline, apparently into Lake Erie; but in reality upon a platform supported on piles, so narrow that the edges of the cars hung over it, so that I saw nothing but water. A gale was blowing, and drove the surf upon the platform, and the spray against the windows, giving such a feeling of insecurity, that for a moment I wished myself in one of our "'coon sentry-boxes." The cars were very full after leaving Cleveland, but I contrived to sleep soundly till awakened by the intense cold which attends dawn.

It was a glorious morning. The rosy light streamed over hills covered with gigantic trees, and park-like glades watered by the fair Ohio. There were bowers of myrtle, and vineyards ready for the vintage, and the rich aromatic scent wafted from groves of blossoming magnolias told me that we were in a different clime, and had reached the sunny south. And before us, placed within a perfect amphitheatre of swelling hills, reposed a huge city, whose countless spires reflected the beams of the morning sun - the creation of yesterday - Cincinnati, the "Queen City of the West." I drove straight to Burnet House, almost the finest edifice in the town, and after travelling a thousand miles in forty-two hours, without either water or a hair-brush, it was the greatest possible luxury to be able to remove the accumulations of soot, dust, and cinders of two days and nights. I spent three days at Clifton, a romantic village three miles from Cincinnati, at the hospitable house of Dr. Millvaine, the Bishop of Ohio; but it would be an ill return for the kindness which I there experienced to give details of my visit, or gratify curiosity by describing family life in one of the "homes of the New World."

CHAPTER VII.

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