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When they reached the banks of the Alleghany River they found that it was only partly frozen over and that great quantities of broken ice were driving down the channel in the middle. Washington knew that a band of hostile Indians was at his heels, and he had to plan some way of crossing the Alleghany. He decided to build a raft, but had only one poor hatchet with which to construct it.
The whole made a cavalcade of nearly eighty persons. The three principal ranges of the Alleghany, over which they must pass, were designated as Powell's, Walden's, and Cumberland. These mountains forming the barrier between the old settlements and the new country, stretch from the north-east to the south-west. They are of great length and breadth, and not far distant from each other.
In the mean time a well was bored on the bank of the Alleghany, within two miles of the mouth of Oil Creek, in quest of salt water, with a view to the manufacture of salt. This was some forty years ago.
Wales has shewn me all I ever saw, and the region of the Alleghany Alps in no way resembles it. It is a world of mountains rising around you in every direction, and in every form; savage, vast, and wild; yet almost at every step, some lovely spot meets your eye, green, bright and blooming, as the most cherished nook belonging to some noble Flora in our own beautiful land.
Fort Pitt at the confluence of the Alleghany and the Monongahela rivers the site of the present city of Pittsburg was in serious peril for a time, until Colonel Bouquet, a brave and skilful officer, won a signal victory over the Indians, who fled in dismay to their forest fastnesses.
It was found in particular localities along the banks of the Alleghany, issuing with the water from springs, and sometimes bubbling up from the bottom of the river in small globules, that rising to the surface, disperse themselves upon the water, and glide away in silent beauty.
While, in the pursuit of their daring plans of annoyance, the restless enterprise of the French even attempted the distant and difficult gorges of the Alleghany, it may easily be imagined that their proverbial acuteness would not overlook the natural advantages of the district we have just described.
Accordingly two ministers and three ruling elders proceeded to constitute a Presbytery on constitutional ground, declaring in the deed of constitution, adherence to all reformation attainments. This transaction took place in the city of Alleghany, June 24th, 1840.
Having secured his magazines at Raystown, and built a fort there named Fort Bedford, Bouquet made a forward movement of some forty miles, crossed the main Alleghany and Laurel Hill, and, taking post on a stream called Loyalhannon Creek, began another depot of supplies as a base for the final advance on Fort Duquesne, which was scarcely fifty miles distant.
Between the Alleghany mountains and the Mississippi, wherever the natives do not live chiefly on the produce of the chase, the women cultivate maize, beans, and gourds; and the men take no share in the labours of the field. In the torrid zone, hunting tribes are not numerous, and in the Missions, the men work in the fields as well as the women.
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