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Letter from Wilkesbarre - July 23, 1849
On Friday and Saturday last we received a few favors, in the way of showers, accompanied with thunder and lighting, the first of the season, so that now humanity, as well as herb and flower, vegetates again with freedom and comfort.

Business of all kinds is so dreadfully dull at this season, that we have nothing more profitable to do than seek for cool spots and keep off the flies, to the end that we may wag along comfortable and happy. It is perhaps best, after all, to have nothing to do a part of the time, that we may keep free of excitement in this warm weather, especially as the cholera is within a day's ride of us...

We up here in the woods, put off for "The Rocks," a fashionable watering place, or rather wetting place on the Susquehanna, about a short half mile from here.

There, may be seen, almost any time, any number of bathers, enjoying themselves hugely in the clear water, quite as happy as the sea-bathers, for they have every here to make it pleasant - barrin' the salt in the water, but then we don't mind that. And then we don't stop to put on bathing-dresses, as some folks do, which we consider a bore, in the abstract, though necessary and proper at times.

As a fashionable notion of wetting one's self with the spray of Niagara, we take a trip to the Mill creek aqueduct, a mile farther up, and enjoy a shower-bath, as voluminous and refreshing as the Waverly Novels, under the overflow. The water and the noise are extremely like Niagara - all but the vastness.

Our hotels are filled with strangers from the cities. Last year a notice got abroad that the small-pox was in the borough, which kept almost everybody away. This year it is again a place of considerable resort, and a pleasant one it is, too. Strangers can spend a few weeks here very delightfully. We have everything any one can wish for, except the salt water; but then we have more than enough pretty girls to make up for the want of that. (Public Ledger News Article - July 26, 1849)