 CHAPTER VIII. A bright September sun glittered upon the spires of Cincinnati as I reluctantly batted a Jew, and set out in the early morning by the cars to join my traveling companions, meaning to make as long a detour as possible, or, as a down-east lady might say, to make a pretty considerable circumlocation. Fortunately, I had met with some friends, well acquainted with the country, who offered to take me round a much larger circle than I had contemplated, and with a feeling of excitement, such as I had not before experienced, we started for the Mississippi and the Western prairies and route to Detroit. Bishop Milvane, anxious that a very valued friend of his in England should possess something from Ohio, had cut down a small sapling, which, when divested of its branches and otherwise trimmed, made a very formidable-looking bludgeon or cudgel, nearly four feet long. This being too lengthy for my trunks was tied to my umbrella, and on this day in the cars excited no little curiosity, several persons eyeing it, then me, as if wondering in what relation we stood to each other. Finally they took it up, minutely examining it, and tapping it to see whether anything were therein concealed. It caused me much amusement, and from its size some annoyance, till at length, wishing to leave it in my room at a Toronto hotel while I went for a visit of a few days, the waiter brought it down to the door, asking me if I wished to take the cudgel. After this I had it shortened and it travelled in my trunk to New York, where it was given to a carver to be fashioned into a walking-stick, and unless the tradesman played a Yankee trick and substituted another, it is now, after surviving many dangers by sea and land, in the possession of the gentleman for whom it was intended. Some amusing remarks were made upon England by some of the Buckeyes, as the inhabitants of Ohio are called. On trying to persuade a lady to go with me to St. Louis I observed that it was only five hundred miles. Five hundred miles, she replied, why, you'd tumble off your paltry island to the sea before you got so far. Another lady, who got into the cars at some distance from Cincinnati, could not understand the value which we said upon ruins. We should chow them up, she said, make roads or bridges of them, unless Barnum transported them to his museum. We would never keep them on our own hook, as you do. You value them yourselves, I answered, any one would be lynched to remove the stone of Ticonderoga. It was an unfortunate speech, foresee-archly replied, our only ruins are British fortifications, and we go to see them because they remind us that we whipped the nation which whips all the world. The Americans, however, though they may talk so, would give anything if they could appropriate a Kenilworth Castle or a Melrose or a Tenturn Abbey with its covering of Ivy and make it sustain some episode of their history. But though they can make railways, Ivy is beyond them, and the purple heather distains the soil of the new world. A very amusing ticket was given me on the Mad River line. It bore the command, stick this check in your blank. The blank being filled up with a little engraving of a hat. Consequently I saw all the gentlemen with small pink embellishments to the covering of their heads. We passed through a large and very beautiful portion of the State of Ohio, the soil where ever cultivated teeming with crops, and elsewhere with a vegetation no less beautiful than luxuriant, a mixture of small weed prairies and forests of splendid timber. Extensive districts of Ohio are still without inhabitants, yet its energetic people have constructed, within a period of five years, half as many miles of railroad as the whole of Great Britain contains. They are a great people, they do go ahead, these Yankees. The newly cleared soil is too rich for wheat for many years. It grows Indian corn for thirty in secession, without any manure. Its present population is under three millions, and it is estimated that it would support a population of ten millions, almost entirely in agricultural pursuits. We were going ahead, and in a few hours arrived at Forest, the junction of the Clyde, Mad River, and Indiana lines. Away with all English ideas which may be conjured up by the word junction, the labyrinth of iron rails, the smart policemen at the points, the handsome station, and elegant refreshment rooms. Here was a dense forest, with merely a clearing round the rails, a small shanty for the man who cuts wood for the engine, and two sightings for the trains coming in different directions. There was not even a platform for passengers, who, to the number of two or three hundred, were standing on the clearing, resting against the stumps of trees. And yet for a few minutes every day the bustle of life purveys this lonely spot, for here meet travelers from east, west, and south, the care-worn merchant from the Atlantic cities, and the hearty trapper from the western prairies. We here changed cars for those of the Indianapolis line, and nearly at the same time with three other trains, plunged into the depths of the forest. You're from down east, I guess, said a sharp nasal voice behind me. This was a supposition first made in the Portland cars, when I was at a loss to know what distinguishing and palpable peculiarity marked me as a down-easter. Better informed now, I replied, I am. Going west? Yes. Traveling alone? No. Was you raised down east? No, in the old country. In the little old island? Well, you are kind of glad to leave it, I guess. Are you a widow? No. Are you traveling on business? No. What business do you follow? None. Well now, what are you traveling for? Health and pleasure? Well now, I guess you're pretty considerable rich, coming to settle out west, I suppose. No, I'm going back at the end of the fall. Well now, if that's not a pretty tough hickory nut, I guess you Britishers are the queerest critters as ever was raised. I considered myself quite fortunate to have fallen in with such a queerest, for the Americans are usually too much taken up with their own business to trouble themselves about yours, beyond such questions as, are you bound west, stranger, or you're from down east, I guess? Why do you take me for a down-easter, I asked once. Because you speak like one, was the reply. The frequent supposition that I was a New Englander being nearly as bad as being told that I had not the English accent at all. I was glad to be taken for an American, as it gave me a better opportunity of seeing things as they really are. An English person going about staring and questioning with a notebook in his hand is considered fair game, and consequently is crammed on all subjects, stories of petticoated table legs and fabulous horrors of the Bowie knife being among the smallest of the absurdities swallowed. Our party consisted of five persons besides myself, two elderly gentlemen, the niece of one of them, and a young married couple. They knew the Governor of Indiana, and a candidate for the proud position of senator. Also our fellow travelers, and the conversation assumed a political character. In fact they held a long parliament, for I think the discussion lasted for three hours. Every, and to me, unintelligible names were bandied backwards and forwards. I heard of silver grays, but my companions were not discussing a breed of fowls, and of hard shells and soft shells, but the merits of eggs were not the topic. Whigs and Democrats seemed to be analogous to our radicals, and know nothings to be a respectable and constitutional party. Whatever minor differences my companions had, they all seemed agreed in hating the Nebraska men, the advocates of an extension of slavery, who one would have thought, from the epithets applied to them, were a set of thieves and cut-throats. A gentleman whose whole life had been spent in opposition to the principles which they are bringing forward was very violent, and the pretty young lady, Mrs. Wood, equally so. After stopping for two hours at a wayside shed, we set out again at dark for Lafayette, which we reached at nine. These Western cars are crammed to overflowing, and having to cross a wide stream in a ferry boat, the crush was so terrible that I was nearly knocked down. But as American gentlemen freely used their canes where a lady is in the case, I fared better than some of my fellow passengers, who had their coat-tails torn and their toes barbarously crushed in the crowd. The steam ferry boat had no parapet, and the weakest were pushed to the side. The center was filled up with baggage, carts, and horses, and vessels were moored along the river, with the warps crossing each other, to which we had to bow continually to avoid decapitation. When we reached the wharf, quantities of people were waiting to go to the other side, and directly the gangway board was laid, there was a simultaneous rush of two opposing currents, and, the insecure board slipping, they were all precipitated into the water. Fortunately it was not deep, so they merely underwent its cooling influences which they bore with admirable equanimity, only one making a bitter complaint, that he had spoiled his go-to-meatons. The farther west we went, the more dangerous the neighborhood became. At all the American stations there are placards warning people to beware of pickpockets, but from Indiana westward they bore the caution, beware of pickpockets, swindlers, and luggage thieves. At many of the depots there is a general rush for the last car, for the same reason that there is a scramble for the stern cabins in a steamer, vis the explosive qualities of the boilers. We travel the whole of that night, our fellow passengers becoming more extravagant in appearance at every station, and mourning found us on the prairies. Cooper influences our youthful imaginations by telling us of the prairies. Main reed makes us long to cross them, botanists tell us of their flowers, sportsmen of their buffaloes, but without seeing them few people can form a correct idea of what they are really like. The sun rose over a monotonous plain covered with grass, rank, high, and silly looking, blown before the breeze into long, shiny waves. The sky was blue above, and the grass a brownish-green beneath, wild pigeons and turkeys flew over our heads. The horizontal line had not a single inequality. All was hot, unsuggestive, silent, and monotonous. This was the grass prairie. A belt of low timber would bound the expanse, and on the other side of it a green sea would open before us, stretching as far as the eye could reach. Stationary billows of earth covered with short green grass, which, waving beneath the wind, completed the oceanic illusion. This was the rolling prairie. Again a belt of timber and a flat surface covered with flowers, brilliant even at this season of the year, though of the most gorgeous nothing remained but the withered stalks. The ground was enameled with lilies, the helianthus and the ceneraeia flourished, and the deep green leaves and blue blossom of the lupin contrasted with the prickly stem and scarlet flower of the euphorbia. For what purpose was the wilderness made so gay, where for years no eye sees it, but to show forth his goodness who does what he will with his own? This was the weed prairie, more fitly termed the garden of God. These three kinds of prairie were continually alternating with belts of timber and small lakes, but few signs of population were apparent during that long day's journey. We occasionally stopped for water at shanties on the prairies and took in two or three men, but this vast expanse of fertile soil must remain for many years a field for the enterprise of the European races. Towards evening we changed cars again and took in stores of refreshment for our night's journey, as little could be procured along the route. What strange people now crammed the cars, traders, merchants, hunters, diggers, trappers, and adventurers from every land, most of them armed to the teeth, and not without good reason, for within the last few months Indians, enraged at the aggression of the white men, have taken a terrible revenge upon western travelers. Some of their rifles were of most costly workmanship and were nursed with parental care by their possessors. On the seed in front of me were two prairie men, such as are described in the scout-hunters, though of an inferior grade to a decent brain. Fine specimens of men they were, tall, handsome, broad-chested, and athletic, with aqualine noses, piercing gray eyes, and brown curling hair and beards. They wore leather jackets, slashed and embroidered, leather small clothes, large boots with embroidered tops, silver spurs, and caps of scarlet cloth, worked with somewhat tarnished gold thread, doubtless the gifts of some fair ones enamored of the handsome physiotomies and reckless bearing of the hunters. Dullness fled from their presence. They could tell stories, whistle melodies, and sing comic songs without weariness or cessation. Fortunate were those near enough to be enlivened by their droleries during the tedium of a night detention. Each of them wore a leathern belt, with two pistols stuck into it, gold earrings and costly rings. Blythe, cheerful souls they were, telling racy stories of western life, chivalrous in their manners and free as the winds. There were Californians dressed for the diggings, with leather pouches for the gold dust, Mormons on their way to Utah, and restless spirits seeking for that excitement and variety which they had sought for in vain in civilized life. And conveying this motley assortment of human beings, the cars dashed along, none of their inmates heeding each other, or perhaps him who heeds and holds them all in his large love and boundless thought. At eleven we came to an abrupt pause upon the prairie. After waiting quietly for some time without seeing any vestiges of a station, my friends got out to inquire the cause of the detention when we found that a freight train had broken down in front and that we might be detainers for some time, a mark for Indian bullets. Refreshments were produced and clubbed together. The prairie men told stories. The hunters looked to their rifles and polished their already-resplendent chasing. Some Mexicans sang Spanish songs, a New Englander Yankee Doodle, some guessed, others calculated, till at last all grew sleepy. The trappers exhausted their stories, the singers their songs, and a Mormon who had been setting forth the peculiar advantages of his creed, the patience of his auditors, till at length sonorous sounds emitted by numerous nasal organs proving infectious I fell asleep to dream confusedly of Yankee Doodle, pistols, and pickpockets. In due time I awoke. We were stopping still, and there was a light on our right. We're at Rock Island, I suppose, I asked sleepily. A laugh from my friends and the hunters followed the question, after which they informed me in the most polite tones that we were where we had been for the last five hours, namely stationary on the prairie. The intense cold and heavy dew which accompanied an American dawn made me yet more amazed at the characteristic patience with which the Americans submit to an unavoidable necessity, however disagreeable. It is true that there were complaints of cold and heavy size, but no blame was imputed to any one, and the questions of my companions made me quite ashamed of my English impatience. In England we should have had a perfect chorus of complaints, varied by rowing the conductor, abuse of the company, and resolutions to write to the times, or bring up the subject of railway mismanagement in the House of Commons. These people sat quietly, ate, slept, and smoked, and were thankful when the cars at last moved off to their destination. On we flew to the West, the land of wild Indians and buffaloes, on the narrow rims of metal with which this great people is girding the earth. Evening seceded noon and twilight to the blaze of a summer day, the yellow sun sank cloudless behind the waves of the rolling prairie, yet still we hurried on, only stopping our headlong course to take in wood and water at some nameless stations. When the sun set it set behind the prairie waves. I was oblivious of any changes during the night, and at rosy dawn an ocean of long green grass encircled us around. Still on, belts of timber diversify the prospect. We rush into a thick wood, and emerging from it arrive at Rock Island, an unfinished-looking settlement which might bear the name of the Desert City, situated at the confluence of the Rock River and the Mississippi. We stop at a little wharf, where waits a little steamer of uncouth construction. We step in, a steam whistle breaks the silence of that dewy dawn, and at a very rapid rate we run between high wooded bluffs, down a turbid stream, whirling in rapid eddies. We steam for three miles and land at a clearing containing the small settlement of Davenport. We had come down the Mississippi, mightiest of rivers. Half a mile wide, seventeen hundred miles from its mouth, and were in the far west. Wagons with white tilts, thick-hided oxen with heavy yokes, meddlesome steeds with high-peaked saddles, picketed to stumps of trees, lashing away the flies with their tails, immigrants on blue boxes, wondering if this were the El Dorado of their dreams. Arms, accoutrements, and baggage surrounded the house or shed where we were to breakfast. Most of our companions were bound for Nebraska, Oregon, and Utah, the most distant districts of which they would scarcely reach with their slow-paced animals for four months, exposed in the meantime to the attacks of the Sioux, Comanches, and Blackfeet. There, in a long wooden shed with blackened rafters and an earthen floor, we breakfasted at seven o'clock on Johnny Cake, Squirrels, Buffalo Hump, Dampers, and Buckwheat, tea and corn spirit with a crowd of immigrants, hunters, and adventurers, and soon after re-embarked for Rock Island, our little steamer with difficulty stemming the mighty tide of the father of rivers. The machinery, such as it was, was very visible. The boiler patched in several places, and steam escaping in different directions. I asked the captain if he were not in the habit of sitting upon the safety valve, but he stoutly denied the charge. The vernacular of this neighborhood was rather startling to an English ear. Who's the alligator to hum? Asked a broad-shouldered Kentuckian of his neighbor, pointing to a frame shanty on the shore, which did not look to me like the abode of that amphibious and carnivorous creature. Well, old alligator, what's the time of day? Asked another man, bringing down a brawny paw with a resounding thump upon the herculean shoulders of the first queerest, thereby giving me the information that in the West alligator is a designation of the genus Homo, in fact that it is customary for a man to address his fellow man as old alligator, instead of old fellow. At eight we left Rock Island, and turning my unwilling steps eastward from the land of adventure and romance, we entered the cars for Chicago. They were extremely crowded, and my friends, securing me the only comfortable seat in one of them, were obliged to go into the next, much to their indignation, but protestations were of no use. The engine bell rang, a fearful rush followed, which resulted in the passage down the center being filled with standing men. The conductor shouted, Go ahead, and we were off for Lake Michigan in the Lightning Express, warranted to go sixty-seven miles an hour. I had found it necessary to study physiognomy since leaving England and was horrified by the appearance of my next neighbor. His forehead was low, his deep set and restless eyes significant of cunning, and I at once set him down as a swindler or pickpocket. My convictions of the truth of my inferences were so strong that I removed my purse, in which, however, acting by advice, I never carried more than five dollars, from my pocket, leaving in it only my handkerchief and the checks for my baggage, knowing that I could not possibly keep awake the whole morning. In spite of my endeavours to the contrary, I soon sank into an oblivious state, from which I awoke to the consciousness that my companion was withdrawing his hand from my pocket. My first impulse was to make an exclamation, my second, which I carried into execution, to ascertain my loss, which I found to be the very alarming one of my baggage-checks, my whole property being thereby placed at this vagabond's disposal, for I knew perfectly well that if I claimed my trunks without my checks the acute baggage-master would have set me down as a bold swindler. The keen-eyed conductor was not in the car, and had he been there the necessity for habitual suspicion, incidental to his position, would so far have removed his original sentiments of generosity as to make him turn a deaf ear to my request, and there was not one of my fellow travellers whose phygeogenomy would have warranted me in appealing to him. So recollecting that my checks were marked Chicago, and seeing that the thief's ticket bore the same name, I resolved to wait the chapter of accidents, or the reappearance of my friends. I was scarcely able to decide whether this proof of the reliance to be placed on phygeogenomy was not an adequate compensation for the annoyance I was experiencing, at the probability of my hoarded treasures falling into the hands of an adventurer. During the morning we crossed some prairie country and stopped at several stations, patches of successful cultivation showing that there must be cultivators, though I rarely saw their habitations. The car still continued so full that my friends could not join me, and I began to be seriously anxious about the fate of my luggage. At midday spires and trees, and lofty blocks of buildings, rising from a prairie gas on one side and from the blue waters of Lake Michigan on the other, showed that we were approaching Chicago. Along with beaten tracks through the grass, wagons with white tilts drawn by oxen were proceeding west, sometimes accompanied by armed horsemen. With a hoop like an Indian war-hoop the cars ran into a shed. They stopped, the pickpocket got up, I got up too, the baggage master came to the door. This gentleman has the checks for my baggage, said I, pointing to the thief. Bewildered he took them from his waist-cut pocket, gave them to the baggage master, and went hastily away. I had no inclination to cry, stop thief, and barely had time to congratulate myself on the fortunate impulse which had led me to say what I did, when my friends appeared from the next car. They were too highly amused with my recital to sympathize at all with my feelings of annoyance, and one of them, a gentleman filling a high situation in the east, laughed heartily, saying in a thoroughly American tone, the English ladies must be cute customers if they can out wit Yankee pickpockets. Going to stay all night in Chicago we drove to the two best hotels, but finding them full were induced to take ourselves to an advertising-house, the name of which it is unnecessary to give, though it will never be afaced from my memory. The charge advertised was a dollar a day, and for this every comfort and advantage were promised. The inn was a large brick building at the corner of a street, with nothing very unprepossessing in its external experience. The wooden stairs were dirty enough, and on ascending them to the so-called ladies parlor, I found a large, meanly furnished apartment, garnished with six spittoons, which, however, to my disgust, did not prevent the floor from receiving a large quantity of tobacco juice. There were two rifles, a pistol, and a powder flask on the table. Two Irish immigrant women were seated on the floor, which swarmed with black beetles and ants, undressing a screaming child. A woman evidently in a fever was tossing restlessly on the sofa. Two females, in tarnished bloom or habillement, were looking out of the window, and other extraordinary-looking human beings filled the room. I asked for accommodation for the night, hoping that I should find a room where I could sit quietly. A dirty chambermaid took me to a room or dormitory containing four beds. In one part of it three women were affectionately and assiduously nursing a sick child. In another two were combing tangled black hair, upon which I decided that I must have a room to myself. The chambermaid then took me down a long, darkest passage and showed me a small room without a fireplace, and only lighted by a pane of glass in the door. Consequently it was nearly dark. There was a small bed with dirty buffalo skin upon it. I took it up, and swarms of living creatures fell out of it, and the floor was literally alive with them. The sight of such a room made me feel quite ill, and it was with the greatest reluctance that I deposited my bonnet and shawl in it. Inside the door were some medicine bottles and other suspicious signs of illness, and after making some cautious inquiries we found that there was a case of typhus fever in the house, also one of Asiatic cholera, and three of aug. My friends were extremely shocked with the aspect of affairs. I believed that they were annoyed that I should see such a specimen of an hotel in their country, and they decided that, as I could not possibly remain there for the night, I should go on to Detroit alone, as they were detained at Chicago on business. Though I certainly felt rather out of my element in this place, I was not at all sorry for the opportunity, thus accidentally given me, of seeing something of American society in its lowest grade. We went down to dinner, and only the fact of not having tasted food for many hours could have made me touch it in such a room. We were in a long apartment, with one table down the middle, with plates laid for one hundred people. Every seat was occupied, these seats being benches of somewhat uncouth workmanship. The floor had recently been washed and emitted a damp, fetid odor. At one side was a large fireplace, where, in spite of the heat of the day, sundry manipulations were going on, coming unto the general name of Cookery. At the end of the room was a long, lead trough or sink, where three greasy scullery boys without shoes were perpetually engaged in washing plates, which they wiped upon their aprons. The plates, however, were not washed, only superficially rinsed. There were four brigand-looking waders with prodigious beards and mustaceos. There was no great variety at table. There were eight boiled legs of mutton, nearly raw, six antiquated fowls, whose legs were of the consistency of guitar strings, baked pork with onion fixings, the meat swimming in grease, and for vegetables, yams, corn cobs, and squash. A cup of stewed tea, sweetened with molasses, stood by each plate, and no fermented liquor of any description was consumed by the company. There were no carving knives, so each person hacked the joints with his own, and some of those present carved them dexterously with bowie knives taken out of their belts. Neither were their salt spoons, so everybody dipped his greasy knife into the little pewter pot containing salt. Dinner began, and after satisfying my own hunger with the least objectionable dish, namely pork with onion fixings, I had leisure to look round me. Every quarter of the globe had contributed to swell that motley array, even China. Motives of interest or adventure had drawn them all together to this extraordinary outpost of civilization, and soon would disperse them among lands where civilization is unknown. As far as I could judge, we were the only representatives of England. There were Scots, for Scots are always to be found where there is any hope of honest gain. There were Irish immigrants speaking with a rich brogue, French traders from St. Louis, Mexicans from Santa Fe, Californians fitting out, and Californians coming home with fortunes made, keen-eyed speculators from New England, Pac-men from Canada, prairie men, trappers, hunters, and adventurers of all descriptions. Many of these were bowie knives or pistols in their belts. The costumes were very varied and picturesque. Two bloomers in very poor green habillements sat opposite to me, and did not appear to attack any attention, though bloomerism is happily defunct in the States. There had been three duels at Chicago in the morning, and one of the dualists, a swarthy, dark-browed villain, sat next but one to me. The quarrel originated in a gambling-house, and this Mexicans' opponent was mortally wounded, and there he sat, with the guilt of human blood upon his hands, describing to his vis-a-vis the way in which he had taken aim at his adversary, and no one seemed to think anything about it. From what I heard, I fear dueling must have become very common in the West, and no wonder from the number of lawless spirits who congregate where they can be comparatively unfettered. The second course consisted exclusively of pumpkin pies, but when the waiters changed the plates, their way of cleaning the knives and forks was so peculiarly disgusting that I did not attempt to eat anything. But I must remark that in this motley assemblage there was nothing of coarseness, not a word of bad language, indeed nothing which could offend the most fastidious ears. I must, in this respect, bear very favorable testimony to the Americans, for in the course of my somewhat extensive travels in the United States, and mixing as I did very frequently with the lower classes, I never heard any of that language which so frequently offends the ear in England. I must not be misunderstood here. Profane language is only too notoriously common in the States, but custom, which in America is frequently stronger than law, totally prohibits its use before ladies. I suppose that there is no country in the world where the presence of a lady is such a restraint upon manners and conversation. A female, whatever her age or rank may be, is invariably treated with deferential respect, and if this deference may occasionally trespass upon the limits of absurdity, or if the extinct chivalry of the past ages of Europe meets with a partial revival upon the shores of America, this extreme is vastly preferable to the briskery, if not incivility, which ladies, as I have heard, too often meet with in England. The apparent temperate habits in the United States form another very pleasing feature to dwell upon. It is to be feared that there is a considerable amount of drunkenness among the English, Irish, and Germans who form a large portion of the American population, but the temperate tea-drinking, water-drinking habits of the Native Americans are most remarkable. In fact, I only saw one intoxicated person in the States, and he was a scotch fiddler. At the hotels, even when sitting down to dinner in a room with four hundred persons, I never on occasion saw more than two bottles of wine on the table, and I know from experience that in many private dwelling-houses there is no fermented liquor at all. In the West, more especially at the rude hotels where I stopped, I never saw wine, beer, or spirits upon the table, and the spectacle gratified me exceedingly of seeing fierce-looking, armed, and bearded men drinking frequently in the day of that cup which cheers but not inebriates. Water is a beverage which I never enjoyed in purity and perfection before I visited America. It is provided in abundance in the cars, the hotels, the writing-rooms, the steamers, and even the stores, in crystal jugs or stone filters, and it is always iced. This may be either the result or the cause of the temperance of the people. Ancient history tells us of a people who used to intoxicate their slaves, and while they were in that condition, display them to their sons to discuss them early with the degrading vice of drunkenness. The immigrants who have left our shores, more particularly the Irish, have voluntarily enacted the part formerly assigned to the slaves of the Spartans. Certainly it is that their intemperance, with the evils of which the Americans are only too well acquainted, has produced a beneficial result, causing a strong reaction in favour of temperance principles. The national oath of the English, which has earned for them a horrible sobriquet, and the excretions which belong to the French, Italian, and Spanish nations, are unfortunately but too well known, because they are too often heard. Indeed, I have scarcely ever travelled in England by coach or railway. I have seldom driven through a crowded street, or ridden on horseback through a quiet agricultural village, without hearing language and direct defiance of the Third Commandment. Profanity and drunkenness are among the crying sins of the English lower orders. Much has been said upon the subject of swearing in the United States. I can only say that, travelling in them as I have travelled in England, and mixing with people of a much lower class than I ever was thrown among in England, mixing with these people, too, on terms of perfect equality, I never heard an oath till after I crossed the Canadian frontier. With regard to both these things, of course, I only speak of what fell under my own observation. After dinner, being only too glad to escape from a house where pestilence was rife, we went out into Chicago. It is a wonderful place, and tells more forcibly of the astonishing energy and progress of the Americans than anything I saw. Forty years ago the whole ground on which the town stands could have been bought for six hundred dollars. Now a person would give ten thousand for the sight of a single store. It is built on a level prairie, only slightly elevated above the lake's surface. It lies on both sides of the Chicago River, about a mile above its entrance into Lake Michigan. By the construction of piers, a large artificial harbor has been made at the mouth of this river. The city has sprung up rapidly and is supplied with all the accessories of a high state of civilization. Chicago, in everything that contributes to real use and comfort, will compare favorably with any city in the world. In 1830 it was a mere trading post situated in the theater of the Black Hawk War. In 1850 its population was only twenty-eight thousand people. It has now not less than sixty thousand. It had not a mile of railway in 1850, now fourteen lines radiate from it, bringing to it the trade of an area of country equaling one hundred and fifty thousand square miles. One hundred heavy trains arrive and depart from it daily. It has a commerce commensurate with its magnitude. It employs about seventy thousand tons of shipping, nearly one half being steamers and propellers. The lumber trade, which is chiefly carried on with buffalo, is becoming very profitable. The exports of Chicago to the east of breadstuffs for the past year exceeded thirteen million bushels, and the city which, in 1840, numbered only four thousand inhabitants, is now one of the largest exporting grain markets in the world. Chicago is connected with the western rivers by a sloop canal, one of the most magnificent works ever undertaken. It is also connected with the Mississippi at several points by railroad. It is regularly laid out with wide, airy streets, much more cleanly than those of Cincinnati. The wooden houses are fast giving place to lofty, substantial structures of brick, or a stone similar in appearance to a white marble, and are often six stories high. These houses, as in all business streets in the American cities, are disfigured up to the third story by large, glaring sign-boards containing the names and occupations of their residents. The sidewalks are of wood, and wherever they are made of this insubstantial material, one frequently finds oneself stepping into a hole, or upon the end of a board which tilts up under one's feet. The houses are always lead and flat, so that there are generally three stores, one above another. These stores are very handsome, those of the outfitters particularly so, though the quantity of goods displayed in the streets gives them rather a barbaric appearance. The sidewalks are literally encumbered with bales of scarlet flannel, and every other article of an immigrant's outfit. At the outfitters' stores you can buy anything, from a cart nail to a revolver, from a suit of oil skin to a paper of needles. The streets present an extraordinary spectacle, everything reminds that one is standing on the very verge of Western civilization. The roads are crowded to an inconvenient extent with carriages of curious construction, wagons, carts, and men on horseback, and the sidewalks with eager foot passengers. By the side of a carriage drawn by two or three handsome horses a creaking wagon with a white tilt, drawn by four heavy oxen, may be seen. Mexicans and hunters dash down the crowded streets at full gallop on meddlesome steeds, with bits so powerful as to throw their horses on their haunches when they meet with any obstacle. They ride animals that look too proud to touch the earth, on high-peaked saddles with pistols in the holsters, short stirrups, and long, cruel-looking Spanish spurs. They wear scarlet cabs or palmetto hats, and high jackboots. Knives are stuck into their belts, and light rifles are slung behind them. These picturesque beings, the bullock wagons setting out for the far west, the medley of different nations and costumes in the streets, make the city a spectacle of great interest. The deep hollow roar of the locomotive and the shrill scream from the steamboat are heard all day. A continuous stream of life ever bustles through the city, and standing as it does on the very verge of Western civilization, Chicago is a vast emporium of the trade of the districts east and west of the Mississippi. At an office in one of the streets, Mr. C. took my ticket for Toronto by railway, steamer, railway, and steamer, only paying eight dollars and a half, or about thirty-four shillings, for a journey of seven hundred miles. We returned to tea at the hotel, and found our Veyons and companions just the same as at dinner. It is impossible to give an idea of the Western men to anyone who has not seen one, at least, as a specimen. They are the men before whom the Indians melt away as grass before the scythe. They shoot them down on the smallest provocation and speak of head of Indian as we do in England of head of game. Their bearing is bold, reckless, and independent in the extreme. They are as ready to fight a foe as to wait upon women and children with tender assiduity. Their very appearance says to you, Stranger, I belong to the greatest, most enlightened, and most progressive nation on earth. I may be the president or millionaire next year. I don't care a straw for you or anyone else. Illinois is a state which has sprung up, as if by magic, to be one of the most fruitful in the West. It was settled by men from the New England States, men who carried with them those characteristics which have made the New Englander's career one of active enterprise and successful progress wherever he has been. Not many years ago the name of Illinois was nearly unknown, and on her soil the hearty settler battled with the forest trees for space in which to sow his first crops. Her roads were merely rude and often impassable tracks through forest or prairie. Now she has an operation, and course of construction, two thousand and seventy miles of those iron sinews of commercial progress, railroads running like a network over the state. At seven o'clock, with a feeling of great relief mingled with thankfulness at having escaped untouched by the terrible pestilence which had rivaled Chicago, I left the hotel, more appropriately termed a caravan sarai, and my friends placed me in the lightning express warranted to go sixty-seven miles an hour. As it may be St. Louis, I fancy that Chicago is more worth a visit than any other of the western cities. Even one day at it was worth a voyage across the Atlantic, and a land journey of eighteen hundred miles. CHAPTER IX. The night-cars are always crowded, both in Canada and the States, because people in business are anxious to save a day if they have any expedition to make, and as many of the cars are fitted up with seats of a most comfortable kind for night traveling, a person accustomed to them can sleep in them as well as on a sofa. After leaving Chicago, they seemed about to rush with a hoop into the moonlit waters of Lake Michigan, and in reality it was not much better. For four miles we ran along a plank-road supported only on piles. There was a single track and carriages projecting over the hull, there was no bridge to be seen, and we really seemed to be going along on the water. These insecure railways are not uncommon in the States. The dangers of the one on the Hudson River have been experienced by many travelers to their cost. We ran three hundred miles through Central Michigan in ten hours, including stoppages. We dashed through woods, across parries, and over bridges without parapets, at a uniform rate of progress. A boy making continual peregrinations with iced water alleviated the thirst of the passengers, for the night was intensely hot, and I managed to sleep very comfortably till awoke by the intense cold of dawn. During the evening an incident most vexatious to me occurred. The cars were very full, and were not able to seat all the passengers. Consequently, according to the usages of American etiquette, the gentleman vacated the seats in favor of the ladies, who took possession of them in a very engracious manner, as I thought. The gentleman stood in the passage down the center. At last all but one had given up their seats, and while stopping at a station another lady entered. A seat for a lady, said the conductor, when he saw the crowded state of the car. The one gentleman did not stir. A seat for a lady, repeated the man in a more imperious tone. Still, no movement on the part of the gentleman appealed to. A seat for a lady. Don't you see there's a lady wanting one? Now vociferated several voices at once. But without producing any effect. Get up for the lady, said one bolder than the rest, giving the stranger a sharp admonition on the shoulder. He pulled his traveling cap over his eyes, and doggedly refused to stir. There was now a regular hubbub in the car. American blood was up, and several gentlemen tried to induce the offender to move. I'm an Englishman, and I tell you I won't be browbeat by you beastly Yankees. I've paid for my seat, and I mean to keep it, savagely shouted the offender, thus verifying my worst suspicions. I thought so. I knew it. A regular John Bull trick, just like them, were some of the observations made, and very mild they were, considering the aggravated circumstances. Two men took the culprit by his shoulders, and the others, pressing behind, impelled him to the door, amid a chorus of groans and hisses, disposing of him finally by placing him in the immigrant car, installing the lady in the vacated seat. I could almost fancy that the shade of the departed judge Lynch stood by with an approving smile. I was so thoroughly ashamed of my countrymen, and so afraid of my nationality being discovered, that if anyone spoke to me, I adopted every Americanism which I could think of in reply. The country within fifty miles of Detroit is a pretty alternation of prairie, wood, and corn fields, peach and apple orchards. The maze is the staple of the country. You see it in the fields. You have corn cobs for breakfast, corn cobs, mush, and hominy for dinner, Johnny cake for tea, and the very bread contains a third part of Indian meal. I thought the little I saw of Michigan very fertile and pretty. It is another of the newly constituted states, and was known until recently under the name of the Michigan Territory. This state is a peninsula between the Huron and Michigan Lakes, and borders in one part closely on Canada. It has a salubrious climate and a fertile soil, and is rapidly becoming a very productive state. Of late years the influx of immigrants of a better class has been very great. The state has had great capabilities for saw-and-flower mills. The grand rapids alone have a fall of fifteen feet a mile, and afford immense water-power. In Michigan human beings have ceased to be alligators. They are hausses. Thus one man says to another, how do you do, old hauss? Or what's the time of day, old hauss? When I reached Detroit I was amused when a conductor said to me, one of them ere hausses will take your trunks, pointing as he spoke to a group of porters. On arriving at Detroit I met for the first time with tokens of British enterprise and energy, and of the growing importance of Canada West. Several persons in the cars were going to New York, and they took the ferry at Detroit, and went down to Niagara Bridge by the Canada Great Western Railway as the most expeditious route. I drove through the very pleasant streets of Detroit to the National Hotel, where I was to join the Walrances. Having indulged the hope of rejoining my formal travelling companions here, I was greatly disappointed at finding a note from them containing the intelligence that they had been summoned by telegraph to Toronto to a sick relative. They requested me to join them there, and hoped I should find no difficulty on the journey. It was the time of the State Fair, and every room in the inn was occupied, but Mr. Benjamin, the very popular host of the National, on hearing my circumstances, would on no account suffer me to seek another abode, and requested a gentleman to give up his room to me, which with true American politeness he instantly did. I cannot speak too highly of the National Hotel or of its deservedly popular landlord. I found that I could not leave Detroit before the next night, and at most hotels a lady alone would have been very uncomfortably placed. This was over, but as soon as I retired to my room the waiter appeared with an abundant repast, for which no additional charge was made. I sat in my room the whole day, and Mr. Benjamin came twice to my door to know if I wanted anything. He introduced me to a widow-lady, whose room I afterwards shared, and when I went down at night to the steamer he sent one of his clerks with me to save me any trouble about my luggage. He also gave me a note to an hotelkeeper at Buffalo, requesting him to pay me every attention in case I should be detained for a night on the road. The hotel was the perfect pattern of cleanliness, elegance, and comfort, and the waiters, about fifty of whom were Dutch, attended scrupulously to every wish, actual or supposed of the guests. If these pages should ever meet Mr. Benjamin's eye it may be a slight gratification to him to know that his kindness to a stranger has been both remembered and appreciated. I had some letters of introduction to residents at Detroit, and here, as in all other places which I visited, I had but to sew them to reap a rich harvest of kindness and hospitality. I spent two days most agreeably at Detroit in a very refined and intellectual circle, perfectly free from those mannerisms which I had expected to find in a place so distant from the coast. The concurrent testimony of many impartial persons goes to prove that in every American town highly polished an intellectual society is to be met with. My bedroom window at the national hotel looked into one of the widest and most bustling streets of Detroit. It was the day of the State Fair. Consequently, I saw the town under a very favorable aspect. The contents of several special trains and hundreds of wagons crowded the streets, the wagons frequently drawn by very handsome horses. The private carriages were of a superior class to any I had previously seen in the States. The harness was handsome and richly plated, and elegantly dressed ladies filled the interiors. But in amusing contrast, the coachmen all looked like wild Irishmen enlisted for the occasion and drove in a standing posture. Young farmers, many of them dressed in the extreme of the fashion of young America, were dashing about in their light wagons, driving tandem or span, heavily laden drays were proceeding at a slower speed, and all this traffic was carried on under the shade of fine trees. Very bands playing the star-spangled banner and hail Columbia were constantly passing and repassing, and the whole population seemed on the qui-viv. Squadrons of cavalry continually passed my window, the men in gorgeous uniforms, with high, waving plumes. Their horses were very handsome, but were not at all willing to display themselves by walking slowly or in rank, and the riders would seem to have been selected for their corpulence, probably under the supposition that the weight of both men and horse would tell in a charge. The air, hail Columbia, is a very fine one, and doubtless thrills American hearts, as ours are thrilled by the national anthem. Two regiments afoot followed the cavalry, one with peaceful looking green and white plumes, the other with horsetails dyed scarlet. The privates had a more independent air than our own regulars, and were principally the sons of respectable citizens. They appeared to have been well-drilled, and were superior in appearance to our militia, but it must be remembered that the militia of America constitutes the real military force of the country, and is paid and cared for accordingly, the regular army only amounting to ten thousand men. A gun of the artillery followed, and the spectacle made me laugh immoderately, though I had no one with whom to share my amusement. It was a new-looking gun of shining brass, perfectly innocent of the taste of gunpowder, and mounted on a carriage spuriously like a timber-truck, which had once been painted. Six very respectable-looking artillerymen were clustered upon this vehicle, but they had to hold hard, for it jolted unmercifully. It was drawn by four horses of different colors and sizes, and they appeared animated by the principle of mutual repulsion. One of these was ridden by a soldier seated on a saddle placed so far upon the horse's neck that it gave him the appearance of clinging to the mane. The harness was shabby and travel-soiled, and the traces were of rope, which seemed to require continual fixing, to judge from the frequency with which the rider jumped off to adjust them. The artillerymen were also continually stopping the vehicle to rearrange the limber of the gun. While I was instituting an invidious comparison between this gun and our well-appointed, well-horsed, well-manned artillery at Woolwich, the thought suddenly flashed across my mind that the militia forces of America beat us at Lexington, Saratoga, and Ticonderoga. A change came over the spirit of my dream, from the ridiculous to the sublime, was but a step, and the grotesque gun carriage was instantly invested with sublimity. Various attractions were presented at the fair. There were horse races and trotting-matches, a trotting bull warranted to beat the fastest horse in Michigan and bands of music. Phineas Taylor Barnum presented the spectacle of his very superior menagerie. In one place a wizard offered to show the smallness of the difference between Mem and Tim. The Siamese twins, in another, displayed their monstrous and inseparable union, and vocalists were awaiting the commands of the lovers of song. There was a large piece of ground devoted to an agricultural exhibition, and here, as at home, coach in China fowls were the observed of all the observers and realized fabulous prices. In a long range of booths, devoted to the products of manufacturing industry, some of the costliest productions of the looms of Europe were exhibited for sale. There were peep-shows and swings and merry-go-rounds and hobby-horses, and with so many inducements offered, it will not be supposed that holiday people were wanting. Suddenly, while the diversions were at their height and in the midst of the intense heat, a deluge burst over Detroit, like the breaking of a waterspout, in a few minutes turning the streets into rivers deep enough in many places to cover the fetlocks of the horses. It rained as it only rains in a hot climate, and the storm was accompanied by thunder and lightning. Wagons and carriages hurried furiously along, stages intended to carry twelve persons at six cents were conveying twenty through the flood at a dollar each, and ladies drenched to the skin, with white dresses and silk stockings the color of mud, were hurried along over the slippery sidewalks. An infantry regiment of militia took to their heels and ran off at full pelt, and a large body of heavy cavalry dashed by in a perfect hurricane of mustaches, draggled plumes, cross-bands, gigantic white gloves, and clattering sabers, clearing the streets effectually. A hundred years ago Detroit was a little French village of wooden houses, a mere post for carrying the fur trade with the Indians. Some of these houses still remain, dingy, many windowed, many gable buildings, of antique construction. Canoes laden with peltry were perhaps the only craft which disturbed the waters of the Detroit River. The old times are changed, and a thriving commercial town of forty thousand inhabitants stands on the site of the French trading post. Handsome quays and extensive wharves now line the shores of the Detroit River, and to look at the throng of magnificent steamers and small sailing vessels lying among them, sometimes two or three deep, one would suppose oneself at an English seaport. The streets, which contain very handsome stores, are planted with trees, and are alive with business, and hotels, banks, and offices appear in every direction. All together Detroit is a very pleasing place, and from its position bids fair to be a very important one. I had to leave the friends whose acquaintance and kindness rendered Detroit so agreeable to me in the middle of a very interesting conversation. Before ten at night I found myself on apparently interminable wharf, creeping between cartwheels and over bales of wool to the Mayflower steamer, which was just leaving for Buffalo. Passing through the hall of the Mayflower, which was rather a confused and dimly lighted scene, I went up to the saloon by a very handsome staircase with elaborate bronze balustrades. My bewildered eyes surveyed a fairy scene, an eastern palace, a vision of the Arabian Nights. I could not have believed that such magnificent existed in a ship. It impressed me much more than anything I have seen in the palaces of England. The Mayflower was a steamship of twenty-two hundred's berthin, her length three hundred thirty-six feet, and her extreme breadth sixty. She was of one thousand horsepower, with eighty-one inch cylinders, and a stroke of twelve feet. I speak of her in the past tense, because she has since been totally cast away in a storm on Lake Erie. This lake bears a very bad character, and persons are warned not to venture upon it at so stormy a season of the year of September, but, had the weather been very rough, I should not have regretted my voyage in so splendid a steamer. The saloon was three hundred feet long. It had an arched roof and gothic cornice, with molding below of gilded grapes and vine-leaves. It was ten feet high, and the projections of the ceiling, the moldings, and the panels of the doors of the state-rooms were all richly gilded. About the middle there was an enclosure for the engine, closely obstructing the view. This enclosure was gothic, to match the roof, and at each end had a window of plate glass six feet square through which the mechanism of the engine could be seen. The engine itself, being a high-pressure one, and consequently without the encumbrances of condenser and air pump, occupied much less room than one of ours in a ship of the same tonnage. Every stationary part of the machinery was of polished steel, or bronze, with elaborate castings, a crank indicator and a clock faced each other, and the hole was lighted by two large colored lamps. These windows were a favorite lounge of the curious and scientific. The carpet was of rich velvet pile, in groups of brilliant flowers, and dotted over with chairs, sofas, and terratettes of carved walnut wood, cushioned with the richest green velvet. The tables were of marble with gilded pedestals. There was a very handsome piano, and both it and the table supported massive vases of beautiful savers, or dresden china, filled with exotic flowers. On one table was a richly chaste silver tray, with a silver oar of iced water upon it. The saloon was brilliantly lighted by eight chandeliers with dependent glass lusters, and at each end two mirrors, the height of the room, prolonged interminably the magnificent scene. In such an apartment one would naturally expect to see elegantly dressed gentlemen and ladies, but no, western men in palmetto hats and great boots lounged upon the superb sofas, and negroes and negresses chattered and promenaded. Porcelain's patoons and considerable number garnished the floor, and their office was by no means a sinecure one, even in the saloon exclusively devoted to ladies. I saw only one person whom I liked to speak to among my three hundred fellow voyagers. This was a tall, pale, and a very ladylike person in deep mourning with a perfectly uninterested look, and such deep lines of sorrow on her face that I saw at a glance that the world had no power to interest or please her. She sat on the same sofa with me, and was helplessly puzzling over the route from Buffalo to Albany with a gruff, uncouth son, who seemed by no means disposed to aid her in her difficulties. As I was able to give her the information she wanted, we entered into conversation for two hours. She soon told me her history, merely an ordinary one, of love, bereavement, and sorrow. She had been a widow for a year, and she said that her desolation was so great that her soul-wish was to die. Her sons were taking her on a tour, in the hope of raising her spirits, but she said she was just moved about and dressed like a doll, and that she had not one ray of comfort, and that all shrunk from her hopeless and repining grief. She asked me to tell her if any widow of my acquaintance had been able to bear her loss with resignation, and when I told her of some instances among my own relations, she burst into tears, and said, I am ever arraigning the wisdom of God, and how can I hope for his consolations? The task of a comforter is ever a hard one, and in her instance it was particularly so, to point to the balm of Gillette, as revealed in sacred scripture, for a stranger to show her in all kindness that comfort could never be experienced while, as she herself owned, she was living in the neglect of every duty, both to God and man. She seemed roused for the moment, and thanked me for the sympathy which I most sincerely felt, hoping at the same time to renew the conversation in the morning. We had a stormy night, from which she suffered so much as to be unable to leave her birth the next day, and I saw nothing further of her beyond a brief glimpse which I caught of her at Buffalo, as she was carried ashore, looking more despairing even than the night before. Below this is the lady's cabin, also very handsome, but disfigured by numerous spittoons, and beneath this again is a small cabin with berths, too deep round the sides, and in this abode, as the ship was full, I took a berth for the night with a southern lady, her two female slaves, four negresses, and a mulatto woman, who had just purchased their freedom in Tennessee. These blacks were really ladylike and intelligent, and so agreeable and naive that although they chattered to me until two in the morning, I was not the least tired of them. They wanted me to bring them all home to England, to which they had been taught to look as a land of liberty and happiness, and it was with much difficulty that I made them understand that I should not be able to find employment for them. I asked one of them, a very fine-looking mulatto, how long she had been married and her age. She replied that she was thirty-four and had been married twenty-one years. Their black faces and woolly hair contrasted most ludicrously with the white pillow case. After sleeping for a time I was awoke by a dissonance of hands, groaning, straining, creaking, and the crash of waves and roar of wind. I dressed with difficulty and crawling to the window beheld a cloudless sky, a thin blue stormy-looking mist, and waves higher than I had ever seen those on the ocean. Indeed, Lake Erie was one sheet of raging, furious billows, which dashed about our leviathan but top-heavy steamer as if she had been a plaything. I saw two schooners scutting with only their forceful set, and shortly after a vessel making signals of distress, having lost her masks, bulwarks, and boats in the gale, we were unable to render her very seasonable assistance. I was not now surprised at the caution given by the stewardess the previous night, namely, that the less I undressed the better in case of an accident. While the gale lasted, being too much inured, too rough weather to feel alarmed, I amused myself with watching the different effects produced by it on the feelings of different persons. The southern lady was frantic with terror. First she requested me, in no very gentle tones, to call the stewardess. I went to the abode of that functionary, and found her lying on the floor seasick. Her beautiful auburn hair tangled and disheveled. Oh, madam, how could you sleep? She said. We've had such an awful night. I've never been so ill before. I returned from my useless errand, and the lady then commanded me to go instantly to the captain and ask him to come. He's attending to the ship, I urged. Go then, if you've any pity, and ask him if we shall be lost. There's no danger, as far as I can judge. The engines work regularly, and the ship obeys her helm. The Mayflower gave a heavier role than usual. Oh, my God, oh, heaven, shrieked the unhappy lady. Forgive me. Mercy, mercy! A lull followed in which she called to one of her slaves for a glass of water, but the poor creature was too ill to move, and seeing that her mistress was about to grow angry, I went up to the saloon for it. On my way to the table I nearly tumbled over a prostrate man whom I had noticed the night before as conspicuous for his audacious and hearty bearing. I guess we're going to Davy Jones, he said. I've been saying my prayers all night. Little good, I guess. I've been a sinner too long. I've seen many a grown followed. I looked at the reckless speaker. He was lying on the floor with his hat and shoes off and his rifle beside him. His face was ghastly, but I verily believe more from the effects of sea sickness than fear. He begged me, in feeble tones, to get him some brandy, but I could not find anybody to give it to him, and went down with the water. The two slaves were as frightened as people almost stupefied by sickness could be, but when I asked one of the freed negresses if she were alarmed she said, Me no fear, if me die me go to Jesus Christ, if me live me serve him here, better to die. It has been said that poverty, sickness, all the ills of life are paradise to what we fear of death. That it is not that life is sweet, but that death is bitter. Here the poet and the philosopher might have learned a lesson. This poor, untutored negress probably knew nothing more than her Bible true. But she had that knowledge of a future state which reason, unassisted, by the light of revelation, could never have learned. She knew God as revealed in Christ, and in that knowledge, under its highest and truest name of faith, she feared not the summons which would call her into the presence of the Judge of all. The infidel may hug his heartless creed, which by ignoring a light futurity and the divine government makes an aimless chaos of the past, and a gloomy obscurity of the future. But in the hour of death and in the day of judgment the boldest atheist in existence would thankfully exchange his failing theories for the poor African's simple creed. Providence has given the negro an amount of heart and enthusiasm to which we are strangers. He is warm and ardent in his attachments, fierce in his restfulness, terrible in his revenge. The black troops of our West Indian colonies, when let loose, fight with more fury and bloodthirstiness than those of any white race. This temperament is carried into religion, and nowhere on earth does our Lord find a more loving and zealous disciple than in the converted and Christianized negro. It is indeed true that in America only more than three million free-born Africans wear the chains of servitude. But it is no less true that in many instances the Gospel has penetrated the shades of their Egyptian darkness, giving them a clear escape from tyrannizing lust, a full immunity from penal woe. Many persons who have crossed the Atlantic without annoyance are discomposed by the short chopping surges of these inland seas, and the poor negresses suffered dreadfully from seasickness. As the stewardess was upstairs, and too ill herself to attend upon any one, I did what I could for them, getting them pillows, camphor, etc., only too happy that I was in a condition to be useful. One of them, a young married woman with a baby of three months old, was alarmingly ill, and as the poor infant was in danger of being seriously injured by the rolling of the ship, I took it on my lap for an hour till the gale moderated, thereby gaining the lasting kindly remembrance of its poor mother. I am sure that a white infant would have screamed in a most appalling way, for, as I had never taken a baby in my arms before, I held it in a very awkward manner. But the poor little black thing, wearied with its struggles on the floor, lay very passively, every now and then turning its little monkey face up to mine, with a look of understanding and confidence which quite conciliated my good will. It was so awfully ugly, so much like a black ape, and so little like the young of the human species, that I was obliged while I held it to avert my eyes from it, lest in a sudden fit of foolish prejudice and disgust I should let it fall. Meanwhile, the southern lady was very ill, but not too ill, I am sorry to say, to box the ears of her slaves. The gale moderated about nine in the morning, leaving a very rough, foamy sea, which reflected in a peculiarly dazzling and disagreeable way the cloudless and piercing blue of the sky. The saloon looked as magnificent as by candlelight, with the sunshine streaming through a running window of stained glass. Dinner on a plentiful scale was served at one, but out of three hundred passengers only about thirty were able to avail themselves of it. Large glass-tubs of vanilla ice-cream were served. The voyage was peculiarly uninteresting, as we were out of sight of land nearly the whole day. My friend the widow did not appear, and when I attempted to write the ink-stand rolled off the table. It was just sunset when we reached Buffalo, and moored at a wharf crowded with large steamers receiving and discharging cargo. Owing to the gale, we were two hours too late for the Niagara cars, and I slept at the Western Hotel, where I received every attention. Buffalo is one of the best samples of American progress. It is a regularly laid out and substantially built city of sixty-five thousand inhabitants. It is still in the vigor of youth, for the present town only dates from eighteen thirteen. It stands at the foot of Lake Erie, at the opening of the Hudson Canal, where the commerce of the great chain of inland lakes is condensed. It is very going ahead. Its inhabitants are ever changing. Its population is composed of all nations, with a very large proportion of Germans, French, and Irish. But their national characteristics, though not lost, are seen through a medium of pure Americanism. They all rush about, though lethargic German keeps paced with the energetic Yankee, and the Irishman, no longer in rags, guesses and speculates in the brogue of Aaron. Western travelers pass through Buffalo, tourists bound for Canada pass through Buffalo, the traffic of lakes, canals, and several lines of rail-centers at Buffalo, so engines scream and steamers puff all day long. It has a great ship-building trade, and to all appearances is one of the most progressive and go-ahead cities in the Union. I left Buffalo on a clear frosty morning by a line which ran between lumber-yards on a prodigious scale and the hard white beach of Lake Erie. Soon after leaving the city, the lake becomes narrow and rapid, and finally hurries along with fearful velocity. I knew I was looking at the commencement of the rapids of Niagara, but the cars ran into some clearings and presently stopped at a very bustling station, where a very officious man shouted, Niagara Falls Station! The name graded unpleasantly on my ears. A man appeared at the door of the car in which I was the only passenger, you for Lewiston, quick this way, and hurried me into a stage of uncouth construction, drawn by four horses. We jolted along the very worst road I ever traveled on. Corderoy was Elysium to it. No level was observed. It seemed to be a mere track along Wasteland, running through holes over hillocks and stumps of trees. We were one hour and three quarters and going a short seven miles. If I had been better acquainted with the neighborhood, I might, as I only found out when I was too late, have crossed the bridge at Niagara Falls, spent three hours inside of Niagara, proceeding to Queenston in time for the steamer by the Canada cars. On our way to Lewiston we met forty of these four horse stages. I caught a distant view of the Falls and a nearer one of the yet incomplete suspension bridge, which when finished will be one of the greatest triumphs of engineering art. Beyond this the scenery is very beautiful. The road runs among forest trees of luxuriant growth and peach and apple orchards upon the American bank of the Niagara River. This bank is a cliff three hundred feet high and from the edge of the road you may throw a stone into the boiling torrent below. Yet the only parapet is a rotten fence, in many places completely destroyed. When you begin to descend the steep hill to Lewiston the drive is absolutely frightful. The cumbrous vehicle creaks, jolts, and swings, and in spite of friction brakes and other appliances gradually acquires an impetus which sends it at full speed down the tremendous hill and round the sharp corner to the hotel at Lewiston. While I was waiting there watching the stages and buying peaches, of which I got six for a penny, a stage came at full speed down the hill with only two men on the driving seat. The back straps had evidently given way and the whole machine had a tendency to jump forward, when in coming down the steep part of the declivity it got a jolt and in the most ridiculous way turned topsy-turvy, the roof coming down upon the horse's backs. The men were thrown off unhurt, but the poor animals were very much cut and bruised. I crossed Lake Ontario to Toronto in the peerless, a very smart, safe iron steamer with the saloon and chief weight below. The fittings of this beautiful little vessel are in perfect taste. We stopped for two hours at the wharf at Niagara, a town on the British side, protected once by a now-disused and dismantled fort. The cars at length came up, two hours after their time, and the excuse given for the delay was that they had run over a cow. In grim contrast to the dismantled English fort, Manassequah, Fort Niagara stands on the American side and is a place of considerable strength. There I saw sentinels in grey uniforms and the flag of the stars and stripes. Captain D. of the peerless brought his beautiful little vessel from the Clyde in six thousand pieces and is justly proud of her. I sat next to him at dinner and found that we knew some of the same people in Scotland. Gaelic was a further introduction, and though so many thousand miles away, for a moment I felt myself at home when we spoke of the majestic Colcullens and the hearty braze of Balkeeter. In the peerless everyone took wine or liquors. There was no bill of fare, but a long list of wines and spirits was placed by each plate. Instead of being disturbed in the middle of dinner by a poke on the shoulder and the demand dinner ticket, or fifty cents, I was allowed to remain as long as I pleased, and at the conclusion of the voyage a gentlemanly Highland purser asked me for my passage and dinner-money together. We passed a number of bricks and schooners under full sail. Their canvas remarkable for its whiteness, their hulls were also snowy white. They looked as though they were drifting with the dead to shores where all was dumb. Late in the evening we entered the harbour of Toronto, which is a very capacious one, and is protected by a natural mole of sand some miles in extent. Though this breakwater has some houses and a few trees, it is the picture of dreary desolation. The city of Toronto, the stronghold of Canadian learning and loyalty, presents an imposing appearance as seen from the water. It stands on ground sloping upwards from the lake, and manufactories, colleges, asylums, church spires, and public buildings, the hull faced by a handsome line of quays, present themselves at once to the eye. A soft and familiar sound came from off the shore. It was the well-known note of the British bugle, and the flag whose silken folds were rising and falling on the breeze was the meteor flag of England. Long may it brave the battle in the breeze. English uniforms were glancing among the crowd on the quay. English faces surrounded me. English voices rang in my ears. The negligee costumes which met my eyes were in the best style of England. A thrill of pleasure went through my heart on finding, more than four thousand miles from home, the characteristics of my own loved land. But I must add that there were unpleasant characteristics peculiarly English also. I could never have landed, the confusion was so great, had not Captain D. assisted me. One porter ran off with one trunk, another with another, while three were fighting for the possession of my valise, till silenced by the cane of a custom house officer. Then there was a clamorous demand for a wharfage, and the hackman charged half a dollar for taking me a quarter of a mile. All this somewhat damped my ecstasies and contrasted unfavorably with the orderly and easy way in which I landed on the shore of the United States. At Russell's Hotel I rejoined Mr. and Mrs. Walrants, who said they would have been extremely surprised if a lady in their country had met with the slightest difficulty or annoyance in traveling alone for seven hundred miles. My ecstasies were still further toned down when I woke the next morning with my neck, hands, and face stinging and swollen from the bites of innumerable mosquitoes. End of Chapter 9, read by Cibella Denton. For more information, please visit LibriVox.org.