Page:Historic highways of America (Volume 12).djvu/156

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152
PIONEER ROADS

settlement 'for some miles a thinly built village, composed of neat, tidy houses,' in which everything 'indicated prosperity.' This was Franklin. Coming down the Ouleout, the country, he said, 'wore a forbidding aspect, the houses being thinly scattered and many of them denoted great poverty.'

"When Dr. Dwight reached Wattles's Ferry, the more serious trials of his journey began. All the privations of life in a new country which he had met on the road from Catskill at last had overtaxed his patience, and he poured forth his perturbed spirit upon this infant settlement. When he made a second visit a few years later he liked the place much better. His first impressions are chronicled at some length. He says:

"'When we arrived at the Susquehanna we found the only inn-keeper, at the eastern side of the river, unable to furnish us a dinner. To obtain this indispensable article we were obliged therefore to cross the river. The ferry-boat was gone. The inhabitants had been some time employed in building a bridge, but it was un-