In January, 1790, the governor and judges arrived at that village for the purpose of organizing the county; which Symmes, whom "the gov ernor complimented with the honor of naming " it, called Hamilton, after the well-known Alexander, then Secretary of the Treasury. At this time, also, the name of Losantiville was abandoned, and Symmes and St. Clair adopted that of Cincinnati, or, as the frontier wrote it, Cincinnata, in honor of the order of the Cincinnati, and to denote the chief place of their residence." The name is a good one, but the place ill suited for the residence of these honorable "knights," whose constitution could not even withstand the semi-aristocratic air of the sea coast.

In the spring of 1799, various stations were formed and garrisoned in the neighborhood of Cincinnati; and General Harmar began to prepare for his campaign against the old Miami village at the junction of the St. Joseph's and St. Mary's, though he was not able to leave till the following September. Of his march, his ill success, amounting to a virtual defeat, and the outburst of savage warfare that followed, we shall not speak, as they may be found in any history of those times. The return of troops, mournful as it was, had its ray of comfort, however, for our adventurer. "It is impossible," he says, "to describe the lands over which the army passed; I am told that they are inviting to a charm."

But in 1791 came new troubles. It was found that it would be very hard, if not impossible, for Symmes and his comrades to pay for the million of acres, extending twenty miles only on the Ohio, as so much of it lay back from that stream that he could not find purchasers. And this brought him into conflict, in some way, with St. Clair, a self-willed and arbitrary man, who had, also, about this time, seen fit to proclaim military law in a "part of the town of Cincinnati; " an act which the judge thought "bordered on tyranny." And when Symmes offered to accompany the governor in the expedition for which he was then preparing, his excellency gave him an answer that led him to think that his presence would be rather disagreeable than otherwise. Next came the fear that Congress might open a land-office, and, by competing with, ruin him; and then the panic that resulted from St. Clair's defeat, on the fourth of November, 1791. When the news of that event reached the settlers, they left their farms with scarce an exception; dismay went through the whole West; and a savage warfare commenced, that for two years and eight months nearly equaled that of 1763. These things were all sources of great discomfort and loss to Symmes, who had, amid them all, but one cause of joy, and that a poor and unchristian one; the general dislike that was brought upon his old foe, St. Clair, whose pride, no doubt, he was very glad to see humbled.

We say nothing of the particulars of that general's defeat, because they are well known. The effect was, as we have said, dreadful. It almost stopped emigration; nor was confidence felt again until the decisive victory of Wayne, in August, 1794, which led to the treaty of Greenville in the same month of the year following.

When the knowledge that peace had been made with the Indians became general, however, "all Kentucky," as Symmes says, "and the back parts of Virginia and Pennsylvania ran mad with the expectation of the

land office opening " in the West; "they laugh me full in the face, when 1 ask them one dollar per acre for first rate land, and tell me they will soon buy as good for thirty cents." Even his North Bend settlers left nim, to push their fortunes in those interior valleys, of which the soldiers of St. Clair and Wayne gave such descriptions. The mere prospect of a treaty diminished the population of this young town one half, and its completion gave his hopes almost a death-blow. So uniformly unfortunate was this founder of the most thriving colony of Ohio, that warfare and peace, prosperity and adversity, seemed equally to injure his interests; and, to complete the picture, he was now at variance with his friend and adviser, Dayton.

But we cannot follow any farther his individual fortunes. No man ever seemed in a surer path to wealth, influence, and honor than Judge Symmes when he first began his western operation. He was a man of good sense and very general information; just, kind, courageous, and persevering; but he had still some faults, which, cooperating with that fatherly but inscrutible Providence which governs all our external fortunes, thwarted his projects, destroyed his most promising plans, and involved him in quarrels and lawsuits, so that at last he died poor and neglected.

But the cloud that is still upon his memory will one day rise. It is clear that, in despite of his failings, he was a true and high-minded man; and the future historian of Ohio will feel, as he examines his character, that it is one upon which he may dwell with pride.

From the conclusion of the treaty of Greenville, the rapid growth of the Miami valleys may be dated; for, after that time, but one great event occurred to embarrass the settlers of that region. This was the failure on the part of Symmes to pay for much of the land which he had sold. But even this difficulty was almost entirely removed by the preemption laws to which we have referred. The country lying about the iunction of Mad river and the Miami, was one of the most valuable portions which were in this situation. Seventeen days after Wayne's treaty, that is, upon the 20th of August, 1795, this tract was purchased of Symmes by St. Clair, James Wilkinson, Jonathan Dayton, and Israel Ludlow, who, during the next month, sent surveyors to lay out their purchase; and, in November, Mr. Ludlow named and surveyed the town of "Dayton," now one of the most flourishing in the state. The settlement of the new town began in the following April.

When it was found, however, that this purchase would not be included in Symmes' patents, the proprietors refused to accept the benefit of the preemption law, and abandoned their contract; which was taken by Daniel C. Cooper, who realized a fortune from it.

From Cincinnati and Dayton, settlers spread in every direction. And It was not till the country was pretty well filled, that the towns began to grow; the population of Cincinnati increasing but two hundred persons from 1800 to 1805, while the whole region back received about twentyfive thousand emigrants during that time.

The great causes of the rapid advance of the Miami country, were its fertility, ease of access, healthful character, and uncommon amount of water power. The Muskingum and Scioto valleys were not so broad as

those of the Miamies; and the uplands between these last-named streams being upon limestone, while those about the former are based on sandstone, are richer, as well as more level. But the superiority of the Miami country, in respect to water-power, was still more striking Thorn yet but poorly improved in proportion to its capabilities, it a this time moves a very great amount of machinery.

Turning from the fortunes of the two main settlements made in Ohio before the final peace with the Indians, we come to the history of Gallipolis. And here we must confess our extreme deficiency of materials, although many of the original settlers are still residing in their "city of the French." And to this deficiency is added confusion, which we have in vain tried to do entirely away.

In May or June, 1788, Joel Barlow left this country for Europe, "authorized to dispose of a very large body of land" in the West. In 1790, this gentleman distributed proposals in Paris, for the sale of lands, at five shillings per acre, which promised, says Volney, "a climate healthy and delightful; scarcely such a thing as frost in winter; a river called, by way of eminence, 'the Beautiful,' abounding in fish of an enormous size; magnificent forests of a tree from which sugar flows, and a shrub which yields candles; vension in abundance; without foxes, wolves, lions, or tigers; no taxes to pay; no military enrolments; no quarters to find for soldiers. Purchasers became numerous, individuals and whole families disposed of their property; and in the course of 1791, some embarked at Havre, others at Bordeaux, Nantes, or Rochelle," each with his title-deed in his pocket. Five hundred settlers, among whom were not a few carvers and gilders to his majesty, coachmakers, friseurs and peruke-makers, and other artisans and artistes equally well fitted for a backwoods life, arived in the United States in 1791-92; and, acting without concert, traveling without the knowledge of the language, customs or roads, they at last managed to reach the spot designated for their residence, after expending nearly, or quite, the whole proceeds of their sales in France.

They reached the spot designated; but it was only to learn that the persons whose title-deeds they held did not own one foot of land, and that they had parted with all their worldly goods merely to reach a wilderness, which they knew not how to cultivate, in the midst of a people of whose speech and ways they knew nothing, and at the very momeut when the Indians were carrying destruction to every white man's hearth. Without food, without land, with little money, no experience, and with want and danger closing around them, they were in a position that none but Frenchmen could be in without despair.

Who brought them to this pass? Volney says, the Scioto Company, which had bought of the Ohio Company; Mr. Hall says, in his Letters from the West, a company who had obtained a grant from the United States; and, in his Statistics of the West, the Scioto Company, which was formed from or by the Ohio Company, as a subordinate. Barlow, he says, was sent to Europe by the Ohio Company; and by them the lands in question were conveyed to the Scioto Company. Kilbourn says, "the Scioto Land Company, which intended to buy of Congress all the

tract between the western boundary of the Ohio Company's purchase and the Scioto, directed the French settlers to Gallipolis, supposing it to be west of the Ohio Company's purchase, though it proved not to be." The company, he tells us, failed to make their payments, and the whole proposed purchase remained with government.

The last we believe to be the true account. No other connection existed so far as we can learn, between the Ohio and Scioto companies than this, that some persons were stockholders in both; so that the want of good faith, charged by most writers on those of whom the French bought, cannot apply in any degree to the Ohio Company. Nor do we know that there was a want of faith at all; the lands were believed to be what Barlow represented them. A contract with government was to have been regularly made, and funds (as we learn) were collected toward the payment. But the treasurer of the company became bankrupt, and the funds were lost, how we know not. The spot to which the French were directed was supposed to be within the limits of the intended purchase; and, once there, the company, which had failed, could do nothing for them. As we hold it to be good philosophy, as well as true charity, to choose of two sufficient causes that which involves the least moral guilt, we should ascribe that mingling of private and company concerns, which seems to have ruined the latter, to want of care, and not want of honesty.

But, whatever doubt there may be as to the causes of the suffering, there can be none as to the sufferers. The poor gilders, and carvers, and peruke-makers, who had followed a jack-o'-lantern into a literally howling wilderness, found that their lives depended on their labor. They must clear the ground, build their houses, and till their fields. Now the spot apon which they had been located by the Scioto Company was covered, in part, with those immense buttonwood or sycamore trees, which are so frequent along the rivers of the West, and to remove which is no small undertaking even for the American woodman. The coachmakers were wholly at a loss; but at last, hoping to conquer by a coup-de-main, they tied ropes to the branches, and while one dozen pulled at them with might and main, another dozen went at the trunk with axes, hatchets, and every variety of edge-tool, and by dint of perseverance and cheerfulness overcame the monster; though not without some hair-breadth escapes; for, when a mighty tree, that had been hacked on all sides, fell, it required a Frenchman's heels to avoid the sweep of the wide-spread branches. But when they had felled the vast vegetable, they were little better off than before; for they could not move or burn it. And at last ▲ good idea came to their aid; and while some chopped off the limbs, others dug, by the side of the trunk, a great grave, into which, with many a heave, they rolled their fallen enemy.

a

Their houses they did not build in the usual straggling American style, but made two rows or blocks of log cabins, each cabin being about sixteen feet square; while at one end was a larger room, which was used as council-chamber and ball-room.

In the way of cultivation they did little. The land was not theirs, and they had no motive to improve it; and, moreover, their coming was

In the midst of the Indian war. Here and there a little vegetable garden was formed; but their main supply of food they were forced to buy from boats on the river, by which means their remaining funds were sadly broken in upon. Five of their number were taken by the Indians; food became scarce; in the fall, a marsh behind the town sent up miasmata that produced fevers; then winter came, and despite Mr. Barlow's promise, brought frost in plenty; and by-and-by, they heard from beyond seas of the carnage that was desolating the firesides they had left. Never were men in a more mournful situation; but still, twice in the week, the whole colony came together, and to the sound of the violin danced off hunger and care. The savage scout that had been lurking all day in the thicket, listened to the strange music, and, hastening to his fellows, told them that the whites would be upon them, for he had seen them at their war-dance; and the careful Connecticut man, as he guided his broad-horn in the shadow of the Virginia shore, wondered what mischief "the red-varmints" were at next; or, if he knew the sound of the fiddle, shook his head, as he thought of the whisky that must have been used to produce all that merriment.

But French vivacity, though it could work wonders, could not pay for land. Some of the Gallipolis settlers went to Detroit, others to Kaskaskia; a few bought their lands of the Ohio Company, who treated them with great liberality; and, in 1795, Congress, being informed of the cirtumstances, granted to the sufferers twenty-four thousand acres of land opposite Little Sandy river, to which, in 1798, twelve hundred acres more were added; which tract has since been known as French Grant. The influence of this settlement upon the state was unimportant; but it forms a curious little episode in the Ohio history, and affords a strange example of national character.

But that portion of Ohio, which at this time is most flourishing, all things considered, is the Western Reserve, or Connecticut Reserve. This district was retained by Connecticut when she made her transfer to the United States, in 1786, though against the judgment of many of our wisest statesmen. In 1800, however, the right of jurisdiction was relinquished by the State to the Union, and patents were issued by the United States to the governor of Connecticut, for the use of those persons who had previously bought from her; by which means all difficulties were quieted. The Reserve included all the land north of the forty-first degree of north latitude, and extended west from Pennsylvania one hundred and twenty miles. It is a level and fertile country; and, though much of it was so wet, when covered with forests, that it was thought by many to be of little value, it has become dry as it has been opened to the sun, and presents at this time as fine an extent of arable and meadow land as can be seen anywhere; diversified, in the southern counties, by little lakes of crystal clearness; and, in point of cultivation, fences, and buildings, no district in the West surpasses, if there be any that equals the Reserve. This is in part owing to the habits of the original settlers, who were principally from Connecticut and Massachusetts; and in part to the fact that the ground has to be well cleared, ditched, and cultiva ted, in order that it may be productive. A soil that demands labor that