ty of this place, began
to improve, but the roads were proportionally deteriorated. Wild even to
savageness, mountain heights branched thickly across the country, with
no seeming order or direction. The only level ground was in the narrow
valleys, along the course of the streams.

The woods in the vicinity of the Genesee abound in large black
squirrels, some of which are as big as a small cat. They are destructive
to grain, and are, therefore, keenly pursued by sportsmen, who
frequently make parties to kill them, and who destroy several thousands
at one chase: their flesh is considered a great delicacy. These animals
migrate, at different seasons; and have the credit of ingeniously
ferrying themselves over rivers, by using a piece of bark for a raft,
and their tails for sails.

_Bath_ is embosomed in wild mountains. The principal houses are
constructed round the three sides of a square, or green; and, as most of
them were at this time new, white, and tastefully finished, they had a
lively appearance, and were agreeably contrasted with the dark adjacent
mountain scenery.

The road from Bath to _Painted Post_, though stony, is tolerably level.
The adjacent mountains have a slaty appearance, with horizontal strata.
Mr. Hall was disappointed at Painted Post, to find the post gone,
broken down or rotted, within the last few years. It had been an Indian
memorial, either of triumph or death, or of both.

When he was at Ancaster, this gentleman had been shown the grave of an
Indian, among the woods, near the head of the stream: it was covered
with boards, and a pole was erected at each end, on which a kind of
dance was rudely painted with vermilion. The relatives of the deceased
brought offerings to it daily, during their stay in the neighbourhood.

After passing through some other villages, Mr. Hall reached the banks of
the _Susquehanna_: these have no great variety of scenery, though they
frequently present grand features. The space betwixt the mountains and
the river is often so narrow, that it barely suffices for one carriage
to pass; and, in many places, the road, for a mile or two, seems to have
been hewn from the rock. Near the creeks there is tolerable land, and
two or three pleasant villages. The face of the landscape is no where
naked: mountain and vale are alike clothed with pine and dwarf
oak-trees; the swamp lands are covered with hemlock-trees, and the
bottoms of the woods with rhododendrons.

_Wilksbarre_