There was much talk among the latter about the great Erie Canal.
So they fared along through Canandaigua and across the Genesee to the
village of Rochester and on through Lewiston and up the Niagara River to
the Falls, and camped where they could see the great water flood and hear
its muffled thunder. When nearing the latter they overtook a family of
poor Irish emigrants, of the name of Flanagan, who shared their camp site
at the Falls. The Flanagans were on their way to Michigan and had come
from the old country three years before and settled in Broome County, New
York. They, too, were on their way to a land of better promise. Among
them was a rugged, freckled, red-headed lad, well along in his teens, of
the name of Dennis, who wore a tall beaver hat, tilted saucily on one
side of his head, and a ragged blue coat with brass buttons, as he walked
beside the oxen, whip in hand, with trousers tucked in the tops of his
big cowhide boots. There was also a handsome young man in this party of
the name of John McNeil, who wore a ruffled shirt and swallow-tail coat,
now much soiled by the journey.
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