"Let off steam" (1826)

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RECOLLECTIONS OF THE LAST TEN YEARS,
PASSED IN OCCASIONAL RESIDENCES AND JOURNEYINGS
IN THE VALLEY OF THE MISSISSIPPI,
FROM PITTSBURG AND THE MISSOURI TO THE GULF OF MEXICO,
AND FROM FLORIDA TO THE SPANISH FRONTIER;
IN A SERIES OF LETTERS TO
THE REV. JAMES FLINT, OF SALEM, MASSACHUSETTS
by Timothy Flint
Boston: Cummings, Hilliard, and Company
1826
Johnson Reprint Corporation, NY
1968

   Another great book.  I'm not finished with it.  These writings date from 1824.

Pg. 13:  Next in order are the Kentucky flats, or in the vernacular phrase, "broadhorns," a species of ark, very nearly resembling a New England pig-style.
(DARE has 1832--ed.)
Pg. 29:  Grain requires little labour in the cultivation, and the children only need a _pone_ of corn bread, and a bowl of milk.
("Pone" and "Corn-Pone" have widely different OED dates--ed.)
Pg. 35:  ...he had often tried to "get religion," as the phrase is here....
Pg. 63:  ...designate their own state, with the veneration due to age, by the name of "Old Kentucky."
Pg. 78:  Much of his language is figurative and drawn from the power of a steam-boat.  To get ardent and zealous, is to "raise the steam."  To get angry, and give vent and scope to these feelings, is to "let off the steam."  To encounter any disaster, or meet with a great catastrophe, is to "burst the boiler."
(OED has 1831 for "let off steam."  Harold Evans, I was told, is researching steamboats and early technology--ed.)
Pg. 98:  I found, on father inquiry, that the "best" man was understood to be the best fighter, he who had beaten, or, in the Kentucky phrase, had "whipped" all the rest.