"Mayn't I now?" find it in his heart to deny her.

CHAPTER VI.

THE PRECEPTOR.

It seems fitting that we should now, for a few moments, turn our attention upon him who colored with his own spirit, and shaped with his own hand, the destinies of the one who, in this brief drama, holds so conspicuous a place.

Of a temperament sanguine, and a mind inquiring when once excited with respect to any particular subject, the young Mary had high anticipations of the new world she was about to enter and she was impatient to behold again its dawning light. Thoughts, such as had never before been hers, now thronged her mind; and warm dreams, and vague images of things new and beautiful, Cunningham was a man of strong mind, mingled with doubts and fears, and the correct views, and fixed principles; but he bright hopes that impelled her on. Not was an enthusiast in religion, and greatly more confident was "the world-seeking Ge- over-estimated the moral influence of human noese,” that in addition to the continents he teaching. He had been a student, close and had yet beheld, were others fairer and intense; and the knowledge which books greater than they, than was the aroused impart, was his. In his Study, he had soul of this unlettered girl, that beyond the walked with the Stagyrite, and imbibed his world of mind she had yet known, and whose extent she could now compass at a glance, lay one of magnitude extreme, and grandeur indescribable: and not more impatiently did the great voyager long for the time when he should be allowed to dare tempest and death, in search of those unknown continents, than did this young being for the arrival of the day that was to usher her into a new and higher creation.

Mary's feelings had been wrought to a high pitch of excitement; and when she won from her parent his consent to her desire, she threw herself upon her bed, in a state of bodily as well as mental exhaustion.

Her buoyant spirits, however, and elastic frame, soon regained their tone. Still, she slept but little during the night; and the next morning for the first time in her life, she arose with a pale cheek, and a shade of pensive melancholy resting upon her beautiful face.

Mary's present state of mind, however, as will readily be conceived, had not been produced by the circumstance which she mentioned to her father, alone. At the party already mentioned, she had excited, by her beauty and vivacity, the attention and interest of one who was surprised to find a being so capable and so deserving, without even the rudiments of a common education, and with only a few dim and vague ideas of her origin and final destiny. That one, was Cunningham; and he scrupled not to interest her mind in the subject of education, and to awaken her curiosity with respect to an over-ruling Providence, and an eternal hereafter.

lessons of wisdom; he had admired the firmness of the Stoic, and smiled at his philosophy; he had lingered in the gardens of the Epicurean, and heard the eloquence of the Portico; he had laved his spirit in the streams of olden Poesy, and quenched his thirst at "the well of English undefiled;" he had heard the Grecian orator denounce, and the Roman persuade; he had bent entranced over the glowing pages of Holy Writ, ascended the Mount of Olives with the Son of Man, and accompanied the Apostles on their missions of grace and duty; he had beheld the Game of Life from the Beginning-and he saw how weak and corrupt was the human heart, but thought how strong and beautiful it might be made.

This had he done-and thus had he dreamed; the while forming his moral character upon a high model, and disciplining his intellect severely and thoroughly. But his sphere of actual observation upon human. nature, had been bounded, first by the walls of his college, and subsequently by those of his Study. And thus secluded from contact with the world which surrounded him, he had heard of its wickedness and folly. and magnified them fifty-fold. He cared not to jeopard his salvation, by mingling with it at all. But his mind was too well disciplined, and his moral nature too well toned, to allow of his becoming a confirmed misanthrope; and it was a favorite amusement with him, in hours of relaxation, to form plans for the regeneration of the human kind. He saw that the efforts of the pulpit, effectual as they were, were yet weak indeed, when considered with reference to the magnitude of the work they had to per

form; and various were the auxiliar schemes smiled at the extravagance of some—adthat he originated and abandoned.-But, mired the beauty and purity of others-and upon revolving in his mind the whole mat- sighed, when still others came thronging ter of human error and regeneration, his on, the loved and the long-cherished, whose good sense taught him, that to meet with realization he had once fondly believed in anything like success in applying a remedy, and longed for, but now knew to be imposit is first necessary to see and study the dis-sible. But there was one-and a gleam of ease and its nature. He therefore determin- joy lighted his features as it came dearer ed to go at once into the world. This he than all, and above all: and this, might not did; and he soon found, to his joy, that hu- it yet be fulfilled? His heart answered that man nature was not exactly what he had it might; and instantly his thoughts were of conceived it to be. Goodness, it is true, that beautiful, but wild and neglected being, he did not find everywhere; nor did he per- who had so interested his feelings, at their ceive it abounding anywhere: but he saw casual meeting. But more of pride and folly in the heart of man, than of wickedness and corruption. Experience soon modified his preconceived opinions; and now, qualifying his original idea, he dreamed of a state of human perfectibility. And he thought mankind, in the aggregate, susceptible of that regeneration which was necessary to this.

Such was the state of mind, in which Cunningham left his native New-England, and sought the regions of the Great West. Arriving at the Dutch Village, a pilgrim in search of a resting place for life, various considerations induced him there to plant his staff. The town was a growing one, and delightfully situated; he saw the hand of Industry in every direction, and knew that prosperity must crown well-directed effort; he likewise beheld around him, in great part, an uneducated and unsophisticated race of men; and, as has been already said, to cast his lot among such beings, would be to realize one of his most cherished dreams. That he did so, has been already seen, and in what capacity.

Thump! thump! thump!-on the doorsill-and the world of Revery was at an end.

"Pes you te new mashter?" asked an aged individual, of rather odd appearance, as Cunningham hastily quitted his desk and approached the door.

"I am the new teacher-yes, sir." "Vell-tat's all I wanted to know. I've got a gall at home, vat's got te teufil in her head, unt she wants to come to you, to learn all te tam nonsense vat's pound up in pooks. Vere she got her notion, put from te Old One, I knows not; for I never read any ting in my life-unt her good moter tied pefore she knew a pook from a cappitch. Put she's peen so much mit te town galls, for tish year gone-unt her head's full of one tam stuff another-unt so she musht come." "I shall be happy”—

66

"Yaw-yaw-no toubt-I paysh anytime you choose;" and away to his dearborn, which stood over the street, waddled the Patriarch of Rock-Hollow.

Cunningham was pleased, puzzled, and disgusted. He took a few turns across the Cunningham entered upon the discharge room, and began to suspect that he was himof the duties of Teacher, with all the enthu-self the devil that was at the bottom of the siasm which his peculiar character, and his old man's apparent discontent. But could present novel situation, were calculated to this be the father of the pretty and highinspire. In general, he was pleased with souled girl he had met at the recent party? his pupils, and at once won their confidence and could she so soon have considered his and esteem. This rendered his labors much words, and taken such a step? He doubted. lighter than they would otherwise have But in a very few moments his doubts were been-and made his duties a pleasure, rath-resolved; for stepping to a window, and er than the drudgery which is so often the looking out, he saw one of his pupils comlot of him who takes upon himself the office of teacher in a public school. He was leaning upon his desk one morning, in a musing attitude, a half-hour or more before schooltime. None of his pupils had yet made their appearance, and the young Preceptor was abandoning himself to revery. One by one the dreams of his boyhood stole up; he

ing slowly towards the house, accompanied by the very object of his solicitude.

Lucy Winters, a bright-eyed brunette from the Old Dominion,-had been one of the young playmates of Mary Vantyle. Her father had formerly had extensive business transactions with Yohonnes, and he it was who had years before observed in the little

orphan Mary evidences of a character much "How truly beautiful! What womanly grace! above the ordinary stamp, and originally and yet what childlike simplicity!" And a prevailed upon her prejudiced father to send feeling, deeper and more overpowering than her to the village school. He regretted it any he had ever before experienced, took much when she was taken away, but knew possession of his breast. He thought of the that any efforts to have her remain would be wild romp of the party-and then of the seunavailing with her parent. But no sooner date girl that had just quitted his presence; had he at this time heard of her present de- only a few days had passed-and yet there termination to become a pupil of Cunning- was certainly a visible change in her charham, than he dispatched Lucy to the Hol-acter. And he trembled! for might not the

low to bring her young friend over to the high spirit which inhabited that mortal frame, village, that he might bestow upon her some thus suddenly called to a knowledge of its of that advice which he knew she so much nature and capacity, by its incessant workneeded but could not receive from her natural guardian.

ings do violence to its fragile tenement? The clock struck the hour of school, and awoke him to a sense of his immediate duties.

The months rolled round. The Christ

When he had chatted awhile with Mary and his daughter, Mr. Winters thought it best that they should all go up to the Academy together, and talk the matter over mas holidays were come; and there were with the teacher. The two young friends departed for that purpose-Lucy rejoiced exceedingly, and Mary half trembling, half confident, but determined to pursue the object she had in view. Mr. Winters soon followed them; and they had hardly seated themselves in the school-room, ere he entered. A consultation took place, during the continuance of which Mary was often much confused and sometimes sorely mortified. Various plans were suggested, considered, and abandoned. Finally it was determined, that Mary should spend a few months at home, in preparing herself to enter the school in a manner becoming her age and character, before taking that step; and when it was announced to her by Mr. Winters, that Lucy was for a time to make the Hollow-House her home, and become her teacher, the est upon young friends mingled exclamations and tears of joy.

smiling faces and merry hearts at the Hollow-House. A party at the Hollow, between Christmas and New-year's Day, had become a common thing-a matter of course-and on such occasions the old Patriarch's hospitality was exhibited in no niggard shape. The present year, the party was larger and gayer than usual; but among all who thronged the well-supplied dining-hall, "from noon till noon of night," there was not a lighter step than Mary Vantyle's, nor a gayer laugh, nor a rosier cheek. She seemed indeed the heart of the "goodlie companie;" gliding everywhere-laughing at everything-and romping with every body. Cunningham was one of the very few present at the festivities, who were rather spectators than partakers: and he gazed with a deep inter

"The gleesome elfin, coy and wild,
Neither a woman nor a child,"

Mr. Winters took the pains to seek out Yohonnes, and explain to him the agency who was so soon to become his pupil. He he had assumed and the arrangements that had watched, with a solicitude almost painhad been made. The nature of these brought ful, the whole course of her three or four to the patriarch's bosom some relief; for he months' preparation; and he was now fully thought he might yet prevail upon his daugh-conscious of the priceless value of the gem ter, before the period of her home preparation should expire, to abandon her design.

CHAPTER VII.

PRECEPTOR AND PUPIL.

How beautiful!" thought Cunningham, as he again leaned his head upon his desk, after the departure of the young friends.

that was about to be confided to his care.

The holidays were over; and Mary Vantyle began the new year, by entering the school. She had made astonishing progress in her studies; and, elate with hope, had regained and preserved her full buoyancy of spirit. "I fear," she said, as she entered the room the first morning, in company with Lucy Winters, "that we 'll make romps of your whole school. Father says I'm the wildest rustic in the county; and I'm sure

if Lucy hadn't gone home once in a while, was surrounded. Yet his frank countenance, her folks wouldn't have known her-she's amiable manners, and evident worthiness, become such a romp, too. But I hope I procured him many friends; and he posses haven't changed her more than she and her sed the esteem of the villagers and farmers good father have changed me." Mary said generally. Mary's was a rich mind; and this in a serious tone, and continued: "And Cunningham's unceasing labors to give now I have come to put myself under your beauty and vitality to the germs, which had direction. I'm sure I am very eager to been implanted in it by the hand of Nature, learn; and I wish you to get me along as of a good moral and intellectual character, fast as you can; and don't mind my feel- were fully appreciated by her, and amply ings." rewarded. Her beauty, and vivacity, and Cunningham received the trust, confided natural superiority, at once made an impresto him so beautifully and with so much sim- sion upon his susceptible heart; and, at plicity, with deep delight; he well knew first without exactly intending it, though by how precious it was; and he at once deter- no means unconsciously, he soon fell into mined to take the unfashioned block, and the habit of doling out to her a grain of love shape it into forms of moral and intellectual with every one of learning. He managed beauty, and social goodness. The interest so admirably to maintain the balance of powthe young Preceptor felt in this experiment er between the two interests, that with each from the beginning, may be easily imagined he made about equal progress. And she so when we look back at the warm dreams of his boyhood. But when, as months rolled on, a new feeling awoke in his bosom, and he saw that its fervor had touched the spirit of his young pupil, and created in her heart an answering sentiment, what was his delight! This was the last dream of his boyhood, and the first of his manhood: to form | and fashion, himself, the one being who was to share his earthly pilgrimage. And here was to be the fulfilment-the Reality of the Ideal!

well attended to one of the objects of his solicitude, and so perfectly understood the other, that before half a year had rolled away she could actually, though in secret, conjugate the verb "to love!"

Thus sped the period of our hiatus; and who shall say, that it was not one of ecstatic bliss. The course of true love," with Cunningham and Mary, had as yet found but one ripple: this was, that he could never make himself so welcome a guest at the Hollow-House, as would have been proper He found in his young charge, as he had and pleasant. Yohonnes found no satisfacexpected, an apt and attentive pupil; and tion, in seeing his daughter forever with a with feelings of pride and joy did he wit- book or pen in her hand; he had been opponess, day by day and hour by hour, the gra-sed to her going to the school, from the bedual unfolding of her mind, and the up-grow-ginning; and having nobody else to find ing of a lofty and superior character. She fault with for it, he laid the blame upon the was the moon to his spirit-receiving, and Teacher, and had settled down in the belief reflecting with almost its original strength that he had enticed her, in connection with and fervor, the light and warmth of his high the Evil One. and peculiar nature and to her, he was the genial, and cheering, and worshipful sunscattering his beams with a liberal hand upon the fruitful virgin soil, and calling forth the beautiful and fragrant flowers of intellect, and maturing the rich and varied fruits of moral humanity.

After numerous and long-continued attempts to overcome the prejudices of the worthy Dutchman, Cunningham was convinced that any efforts of the kind would prove ineffectual, and abandoned them altogether. But after Mary, at the urgent solicitations of her aged and now failing parent, We must here make an hiatus in our nar had left the school, the lovers continued to rative. We pass over a period of some two have secret meetings; and as "stolen inyears and a half, during all which time terviews" are reputed the sweetest, perhaps Cunningham retained the preceptorship of they enjoyed themselves quite as much the school, and through most of which Mary in their moonlight and starlight rambles continued his pupil. The character of the along the pleasant creek, as they would former, during the period, underwent some have done even in the neat parlor or the modifications, though he still shrank from a delightful piazza of the Hollow-House itgeneral intimacy with those by whom he self.

A BRIEF HISTORY

which now do, or shortly will, intersect the country between the lakes and the Ohio

OF THE SETTLEMENT AT BELVILLE, IN WEST- river, have converted the course of trade from

ERN VIRGINIA:

WITH AN ACCOUNT OF EVENTS THERE, AND ALONG THE
BORDERS OF THE OHIO RIVER IN THAT REGION OF

COUNTRY, FROM THE YEAR 1785 To 1795:
INCLUDING BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES OF SOME OF THE
WESTERN PIONEERS.

CHAPTER I.

the Mississippi to the Atlantic cities, and by opening new markets to the products of the soil, have more than doubled their value to the producer. Thus adding not only to the wealth of individuals, but twenty-fold to the value of the real estate of a whole community.

Many individuals are yet living, who have seen the rich lands on the alluvions of the

Introduction—The past and the present-Settlement of Ohio selling for from two to four dollars an

Belville-Its founder-Land Warrants-A frontier village Character of the country.

CONNECTED with the first settlement of the Valley of the Ohio, there is hardly a circumstance however small, or the name of an individual however humble, that can be devoid of interest at the present day. Transactions which then seemed of little moment to the actors, were pregnant with vast results, and no eye but that of an inspired prophet could have foreseen the vast changes which were destined to take place in the aspect of this great valley in the short space of fifty years. In no other region on the face of the earth, has such an amount of civilization, population and improvement been accomplished in centuries. In the brief period of the life of a single man, the whole valley bordering on that prince of rivers, the calm and majestic Ohio, from Pittsburgh to Louisville, has been changed from a dark and shady forest to a cultivated and productive country.

acre, that now will command from fifty to one hundred. Indian corn, which could only be converted into whisky, or fed to the hogs, if raised beyond the wants of the family, sold for ten or fifteen cents per bushel; fat pork for one dollar and a half or two dollars per hundred; beef for two dollars and a half or three dollars; fine wheat for thirty-one to forty-four cents per bushel; flour at one dollar and seventy-five cents per barrel; butter eight cents per pound; and whisky, the habitual beverage of the West, at twenty cents per gallon. The prices of all these articles are now three-fold, and raised in ten-fold quantities. The increase in value is no doubt in part owing to the increase in population; but the principal cause will be found in the ease and facility with which we reach the Eastern or Atlantic markets, and compete with the agriculturists East of the mountains, where our present prices were familiar more than twenty years ago. Our schools, roads and manufactures, have kept a tolerably even pace with the rest of the improvements.

Where but a short time since, the Indian built his rude wigwam, and chased the bison and the deer, we now see farms, orchards, A retrospect to the days when many of gardens, villages and turreted cities. Where our fathers had no roads but bridle-paths the wolf and bear once roamed the uncon- from one remote settlement to another trolled tenants of the forest, are now seen when all the intercourse between the staherds of domestic cattle, and thousands of tions on the rivers was carried on by water, harmless sheep. On rivers, where the sur- in small canoes, or perogues made from the face, since the creation, was unruffled by trunk of a single tree, and all their breadany larger craft than the light canoe of the stuffs pounded in a hominy-mortar, or savage, now float boats of all dimensions, ground, with great labor, on hand-mills, crowned with that wonder of the age, the cannot but be interesting to their descendalmost self-moving steam-boat. This event ants. When to those toils and vexations of itself, the discovery of the immortal Ful-naturally incident to all new settlements ton, has brought the shores of the distant remote from the parent State, we add the Mississippi within ten days of our own dangers they constantly incurred for more doors, and changed the manners of the coun- than thirty years from their natural but retry, and the commercial policy of its inhab- lentless foe, the red man of the West, we itants, in the course of twenty years, as cannot but admire the courage and constancy much as had formerly been accomplished in that bore them up under so many trials and the course of ages. Canals and rail-roads privations. The better we become acquaint