It would not interest the general reader to give a description of the few cities and many small villages that were passed during the descent of the Ohio.  Few of these places possess even a local interest, and the eye soon wearies of the air of monotony found in them all.  Even the guide-books dispose of these villages with a little dry detail, and rarely recommend the tourist to visit one of them.

One feature may be, however, remarked in descending the Ohio, and that is the ambition displayed by the pioneers of civilization in the west in naming hamlets and towns—­which, with few exceptions, are still of little importance—­after the great cities of the older parts of the United States, and also of foreign lands.  These names, which occupy such important positions on the maps, excite the imagination of the traveller, and when the reality comes into view, and he enters their narrow limits, the commonplace architecture and generally unattractive surroundings have a most depressing effect, and he sighs, “What’s in a name?” We find upon the map the name and appearance of a city, but it proves to be the most uninteresting of villages, though known as Amsterdam.  We also find many towns of the Hudson duplicated in name on the Ohio, and pass Troy, Albany, Newburg, and New York.  The cities of Great Britain are in many instances perpetuated by the names of Aberdeen, Manchester, Dover, Portsmouth, Liverpool, and London; while other nations are represented by Rome, Carthage, Ghent, Warsaw, Moscow, Gallipolis, Bethlehem, and Cairo.  Strangely sandwiched with these old names we find the southern states represented, as in Augusta, Charleston, &c.; while the Indian names Miami, Guyandot, Paducah, Wabash, and Kanawha are thrown in for variety.

In the evening I sought the shelter of an island on the left side of the river, about three miles above Sisterville, which proved to be a restful camping-place during the dark night that settled down upon the surrounding country.

Tuesday being a rainy day, I was forced by the inclemency of the weather to seek for better quarters in a retired creek about three miles above the thriving town of Marietta, so named in honor of Maria Antoinette of Austria.

The country was now becoming more pleasing in character, and many of the islands, as I floated past them on the current, gave evidence of great fertility where cultivation had been bestowed upon them.  Some of these islands were connected to one shore of the river by low dams, carelessly constructed of stones, their purpose being to deepen the channel upon the opposite side by diverting a considerable volume of water into it.  When the water is very low, the tops of these dams can be seen, and must, of course, be avoided by boatmen; but when the Ohio increases its depth of water, these artificial aids to navigation are submerged, and even steamboats float securely over them.