{14} We stopped here awhile, to let our horses rest, and to bask in the pleasant sunshine. Having been chilled with the air on the summit of the mountain, we were pleased with inhaling the warm breeze of the valley.
The contrast, between the verdant meads and fertile arable ground of this secluded spot, and the rugged mountains and frowning precipices by which it is environed, gives the prospect we have contemplated a mixture of romantic wildness and cultivated beauty which is really delightful.
Hence we crossed the second mountain, four miles over, and stopped to dine at Fannetsburg, a little village on a graceful eminence swelling from the bosom of the vale. The houses are all built of wood, mostly of hewn logs, except our Inn, which is a handsome edifice of lime-stone.
In the afternoon we crossed the third ridge, which is three miles and an half over; in some places steep and difficult of ascent; and, passing part of the valley below, reached a place called Burnt Cabins to lodge. The settlement in this place is named from the destruction of the first buildings erected here, at the time of the defeat of Col. {15} Washington, at the Little Meadows in 1753.[1]." An Indian war was thus averted. The locality has retained its name of Burnt Cabins to the present day.—Ed.]
- ↑ Harris is mistaken in his derivation of the term "Burnt Cabins." Little Meadows is nearly a hundred miles west of this place. Burnt Cabins took its name from the dispossession of the settlers by the Pennsylvania authorities in 1750. About ten years previous, groups of Scotch-Irish had begun to push over the Susquehanna into the attractive basin of the Juniata, which was still unpurchased Indian territory. The aborigines were so incensed that a deputation went to Philadelphia to protest, and an Indian war appeared imminent. The government sent out a commission headed by Secretary Peters, and including George Croghan and Conrad Weiser as members, to drive off the intruders and burn their cabins. The official report is found in Pennsylvania Colonial Records, v, pp. 440-449. The settlers themselves aided in the work, and Peters remarked, "It may be proper to add, that the Cabbins or Log Houses which were burnt were of no considerable Value, being such as the Country People erect in a Day or two, and cost only the Charge of an Entertainment [i.e., a log-rolling
