to sit down, and be very cool and very happy, we invariably
found that that spot lay under the imputation of malaria.

A row upon the Ohio was another of our favourite amusements; but
in this, I believe, we were also very singular, for often, when
enjoying it, we were shouted at, by the young free-borns on the
banks, as if we had been so many monsters.

The only rural amusement in which we ever saw any of the natives
engaged was eating strawberries and cream in a pretty garden
about three miles from the town; here we actually met three or
four carriages; a degree of dissipation that I never witnessed
on any other occasion. The strawberries were tolerable
strawberries, but the cream was the vilest sky-blue, and the
charge half a dollar to each person; which being about the price
of half a fat sheep, I thought "pretty considerable much," if I
may be permitted to use an expressive phrase of the country.

We had repeatedly been told, by those who knew the land, that
the _second summer_ was the great trial to the health of
Europeans settled in America; but we had now reached the middle
of our second August, and with the exception of the fever one of
my sons had suffered from, the summer after our arrival, we had
all enjoyed perfect health; but I was now doomed to feel the
truth of the above prediction, for before the end of August I
fell low before the monster that is for ever stalking through
that land of lakes and rivers, breathing fever and death around.
It was nine weeks before I left my room, and when I did, I
looked more fit to walk into the Potter's Field, (as they call
the English burying ground) than any where else.

Long after my general health was pretty well restored, I suffered
from the effect of the fever in my limbs, and lay in bed reading
several weeks after I had been pronounced convalescent. Several
American novels were brought me. Mr. Flint's Francis Berrian is
excellent; a little wild and romantic, but containing scenes of
first-rate interest and pathos. Hope Leslie, and Redwood, by
Miss Sedgewick, an American lady, have both great merit; and I
now first read the whole of Mr. Cooper's novels. By the time
these American studies were completed, I never closed my eyes
without seeing myriads of bloody scalps floating round me; long
slender figures of Red Indians crept through my dreams with
noiseless tread; panthers flared; forests blazed; and which
ever way I fled, a light foot, a keen eye, and a