Letter XVEEE.

Richmond, Virginia, 20th June, 1820.

I CONCLUDED my letter this morning, because I did not wish to inflict more than two sheets upon you at once; but it did not bring me so far on my route as I intended. In speaking of East Tennessee, a delightful country, of which I have the most agreeable impressions, I forgot to say that the inhabitants are anticipating considerable advantages from improvements in the land communication between the Tennessee and the Black Warrior. They have also some prospect of the completion of two canals, which have long been projected, and appear in the maps of the United States, and which would connect the waters of the Tennessee with those of the Tombigbee and the Alabama, and afford a passage for the produce of East Tennessee to Mobile and the Gulf of Mexico. This would supply a great stimulus to industry; as Mobile at present obtains a large proportion of her flour from New Orleans, by way of Lake

Borgne and Port Chartrain,-a channel of communication rendered so expensive by a heavy tonnage duty, that flour was selling at Mobile, when I was there, extravagantly higher than at New Orleans.

On the 12th, we set off early from the house of our German host, Straw, and rode part of the time, in heavy rain, to a good inn, where we breakfasted. We had for some days been almost insensibly ascending the Alleghany mountains; but until the 12th, we saw nothing which indicated any extraordinary elevation. On that afternoon, however, we had a very extensive, though not a particularly interesting view; and the air was so cool, that I was glad to ride in my great coat. Our mountain ride gave us an appetite before the end of our day's journey; and we stopped to take coffee at a small house on the ridge, where we were detained till it was nearly dark. The universal custom of making and baking fresh bread for you, is a sad detention to travellers, who ought never to order breakfast or tea, unless they can afford to stay two hours. About nine o'clock we arrived at the bottom of one of the little vallies, very common among the Alleghany mountains, and took up our abode for the night

at the ferry-house on the Kanawa, a large river, which falls into the Ohio. We crossed it in a ferry-boat, at half-past four o'clock the next morning, (the 13th,) and breakfasted at Major -'s, a fine friendly old gentleman, whom I found sitting in his neat white porch, and whose respectable appearance rendered me almost ashamed to ask if he entertained travellers: although I am now pretty well accustomed to consider neither the imposing aspect of a house, nor the sounding title of its inhabitant, whether Dr., Colonel -, Judge or Preacher as any indication that they do not "keep private "entertainment." The old gentleman was much interested in hearing about England, the native land of his grandfather. His wife, who made breakfast for me, was a sensible well-read gentlewoman, who would appear highly respectable in any society, incredible as this may seem, of one living in the wilds of America, within 12 miles from the summit of the Alleghany. One of the daughters, a pleasing modest girl, corresponds with Mr. Kingsbury, my Missionary friend, who had called here on his way to Brainerd, and left the "Life of Harriet Newell," which had greatly interested all the family. Soon after breakfast, we reached the top of the

Alleghany mountains, where, to our surprise, we found a turnpike-gate, the first we had seen for many months. The view was extensive, though disappointing, as a whole; the loss of one magnificent prospect, however, was far more than compensated by the succession of beautiful and interesting vallies, through which we continued to pass for several days, surrounded by ranges of lofty mountains at different distances. Soon after we began to descend, we stopped for some cold water at an attractive inn, where we found the people assiduously and cordially civil, like our honest and best kind of innkeepers at home. They offered to fetch us some icedwater if we would wait a few minutes. The long steep descent from the top of the Alleghany rendered us very sensible of the truth of an observation I had frequently heard in this country, that the land on the eastern side of the range is lower than that on the western. In the course of the day, we several times crossed the winding Roanoke, which we viewed with a sort of affection, as a distant link connecting us, in some degree, with our native home, it being the first river, discharging its waters into the Atlantic, which we had seen since we left the Oakmulgee, on our Alabama route in March. In the evening, we passed through Salem to the house of

a well-meaning awkward German, (the German houses are always recognised by their flowergardens,) intending to sleep there; but my intentions were frustrated by little assailants, who had no mercy on a tired traveller, but drove me at midnight into the porch, where I dozed a little before day-break. I was glad to feel myself on horseback again before sunrise, (14th,) though more tired than on my arrival the preceding night. At Lock's, where we staid and breakfasted, ten miles distant, I lay down for an hour, as the country was far too beautiful to be wasted on a sleepy traveller. We were now fairly in the valley between the North mountain and the Blue ridge; the whole of which is often indiscriminately called the Valley of the Shenandoah, although the inhabitants confine the name to that part of it which is watered by the river Shenandoah, and which commences a little above Staunton. With the richness of this luxuriant valley I know, you are already acquainted; and of the sublimity of its mountain scenery, it would be in vain to attempt a description. Our host and his habitation were truly English; and it required no great stretch of imagination to fancy myself near Windermere. We left Fincastle a little to our right, and proceeded to Judge

-'s,