Early Western Travels, 1748-1846 (Volume XXVI) Part 11

"Away to the prairie! away!

Where the sun-gilt flowers are waving, When awaked from their couch at the breaking of day, O'er the emerald lawn the gay zephyrs play, And their pinions in dewdrops are laving."

On the morning of my arrival at Grafton, while my brisk little hostess was making ready for my necessities, I stepped out to survey the place, and availed myself of an hour of leisure to visit a somewhat remarkable cavern among the cliffs, a little below the village, the entrance of which had caught my attention while awaiting the movements of the ferryman on the opposite bank of the Mississippi. It is approached by a rough footpath along the {40} river-margin, piled up with huge ma.s.ses of limestone, which have been toppled from the beetling crags above: these, at this point, as before stated, are some hundred feet in perpendicular height. The orifice of the cave is elliptical in outline, and somewhat regular, being an excavation by the whirling of waters apparently in the surface of the smooth escarpment; it is about twenty feet in alt.i.tude, and as many in width.

Pa.s.sing the threshold of the entrance, an immediate expansion takes place into a s.p.a.cious apartment some forty or fifty feet in depth, and about the same in extreme height: nearly in the centre a huge perpendicular column of solid rock rears itself from the floor to the roof. From this point the cavern lengthens itself away into a series of apartments to the distance of several hundred feet, with two lesser entrances in the same line with that in the middle, and at regular intervals. The walls of the cave, like everything of a geological character in this region, are composed of a secondary limestone, abounding in testaceous fossils. The spot exhibits conclusive evidence of having once been subject to diluvial action; and the cavern itself, as I have observed, seems little else than an excavation from the heart of an enormous ma.s.s of marine petrifaction. Large quant.i.ties of human bones of all sizes have been found in this cavern, leaving little doubt that, by the former dwellers in this fair land, the spot was employed as a catacomb. I myself picked up the _sincipital_ section of a scull, which would have ecstasied a virtuoso beyond measure; and {41} several of the _lumbar vertebrae_, which, if they prove nothing else, abundantly demonstrate the aboriginal natives of North America to have been no pigmy race. The spot is now desecrated by the presence of a party of st.u.r.dy coopers, who could not, however, have chosen a more delightful apartment for their handicraft; rather more taste than piety, however, has been betrayed in the selection.

The view of the water and the opposite forest from the elevated mouth of the cavern is very fine, and three or four broad-leafed sycamores fling over the whole a delightful shade. The waters of the river flow onward in a deep current at the base, and the fish throw themselves into the warm sunlight from the surface. What a charming retreat from the fiery fervour of a midsummer noon!

The heavy bluffs which overhang the village, and over which winds the great road to the north, though not a little wearisome to surmount, command from the summit a vast and beautiful landscape. A series of inclined planes are talked of by the worthy people of Grafton to overcome these bluffs, and render their village less difficult of inland ingress and regress; and though the idea is not a little amusing, of rail-cars running off at an angle of forty-five degrees, yet when we consider that this place, if it ever becomes of _any_ importance, must become a grand thoroughfare and depot on the route from St. Louis and the agricultural regions of the Missouri to the northern counties of Illinois, the design seems less chimerical _than it might be_. A charter, indeed, for a railroad {42} from Grafton, through Carrolton to Springfield, has been obtained, a company organized, and a portion of the stock subscribed;[180] while another corporation is to erect a splendid hotel. The traveller over the bluffs, long before he stands upon their summit, heartily covets any species of locomotion other than the back of a quadruped. But the scenery, as he ascends, caught at glimpses through the forest, is increasingly beautiful. Upon one of the loftiest eminences to the right stand the ruins of a huge stone-heap; the tumulus, perchance, of some red-browed chieftain of other days. It was a beautiful custom of these simple-hearted sons of the wilderness to lay away the relics of their loved and honoured ones even upon the loftiest, greenest spots of the whole earth; where the freed spirit might often rise to look abroad over the glories of that pleasant forest-home where once it roved in the chase or bounded forth upon the path of war. And it is a circ.u.mstance not a little worthy of notice, that veneration for the dead is a feeling universally betrayed by uncivilized nations. The Indian widow of Florida annually despoils herself of her luxuriant tresses to wreathe the headstone beneath which reposes the bones of her husband. The Canadian mother, when her infant is torn from her bosom by the chill hand of death, and, with a heart almost breaking, she has been forced to lay him away beneath the sod, is said, in the touching intensity of her affection, to bathe the tombstone of her little one with that genial flood which Nature poured through her veins for his nourishment {43} while living. The Oriental nations, it is well known, whether civilized or savage, have ever, from deepest antiquity, manifested an eloquent solicitude for the sepulchres of their dead. The expiring Israelite, we are always told, "was gathered to his fathers;" and the tombs of the Jewish monarchs, some of which exist even to the present day, were gorgeously magnificent. The nations of modern Turkey and India wreathe the tombs of their departed friends with the gayest and most beautiful flowers of the season; while the very atmosphere around is refreshed by fountains.

From the site of the stone-heap of which I have spoken, and which may or may _not_ have been erected to the memory of some Indian chieftain, a glorious cosmorama of the whole adjacent region, miles in circ.u.mference, is unfolded to the eye. At your feet, far below, flow on the checkered waters of the Mississippi, gliding in ripples among their emerald islands; while at intervals, as the broad stream comes winding on from the west, is caught the flashing sheen of its surface through the dense old woods that fringe its margin. Beyond these, to the south, lies spread the broad and beautiful Mamelle Prairie, even to its faint blue blending with the distant horizon laid open to the eye, rolling and heaving its heavy herbage in the breeze to the sunlight like the long wave of ocean. And the bright green island-groves, the cape-like forest-strips swelling out upon its bosom, the flashing surface of lakes and water-sheets, almost buried in the luxuriance of vegetation, with thousands of {44} aquatic birds wheeling their broad flight over them, all contribute to fill up the lineaments of a scene of beauty which fails not to enrapture the spectator. Now and then along the smooth meadow, a darker luxuriance of verdure, with the curling cabin-smoke upon its border, and vast herds of domestic cattle in its neighbourhood, betray the presence of man, blending _his_ works with the wild and beautiful creations of Nature. On the right, at a distance of two miles, come in the placid waters of the Illinois, from the magnificent bluffs in the back-ground stealing softly and quietly into the great river through the wooded islands at its mouth. The day was a sultry one; the atmosphere was like the breath of a furnace; but over the heights of the bluffs swept the morning air, fresh and cool from the distant prairie. For some miles, as is invariably the case upon the banks of the Western rivers, the road winds along among bluffs and sink-holes; and so constantly does its course vary and diverge, that a pocket compa.s.s is anything but a needless appendage. Indeed, all his calculations to the contrary notwithstanding, the traveller throughout the whole of this region describes with his route a complete Virginia fence. The road is not a little celebrated for its tortuosity. At length the traveller emerges upon a prairie. On its edge beneath the forest stands a considerable settlement, bordering on Macoupin Creek, from which it takes a name.

In the latter part of 1816 this settlement was commenced, and was then the most northern location of whites in the Territory of Illinois.[181]

{45} It was evening, at the close of a sultry day, that the village of Carrolton appeared before me among the trees.[182] I was struck with the quiet air of simple elegance which seemed to pervade the place, though its general outlines are those of every other Western village I have visited. One broad, regular street extends through the town, upon either side of which stand the stores and better cla.s.s of private residences; while in the back-ground, scattered promiscuously along the transverse avenues, are log-cabins surrounded by cornfields, much like those in the villages of the French. Three sides of the town are bounded by forest, while the fourth opens upon the prairie called "String Prairie." In the centre of the village, upon the princ.i.p.al street, is reserved a square, in the middle of which stands the courthouse, with other public structures adjacent, and the stores and hotels along its sides. One thing in Carrolton which struck me as a little singular, was the unusual diversity of religious denominations.

Of these there are not less than five or six; three of which have churches, and a fourth is setting itself in order to build; and all this in a village of hardly one thousand inhabitants. The courthouse is a handsome edifice of brick, two stories, with a neat spire. The neighbouring region is fertile and healthy; well proportioned with prairie and timber, well watered by the Macoupin and Apple Creeks,[183] and well populated by a st.u.r.dy, thriving race of yeomanry. This is, indeed, strictly an agricultural village; and, so far as my own observation {46} extended, little attention is paid or taste manifested for anything else.

About a dozen miles north of Carrolton is situated the village of Whitehall, a flourishing settlement in the prairie's edge, from the centre of which, some miles distant, it may be seen.[184] Three years ago the spot was an uncultivated waste; the town has now two houses of worship, a school, an incorporation for a seminary, two taverns, six hundred inhabitants, and a steam mill to feed them withal. A few miles from this place, on the outskirts of another small settlement, I was met by a company of emigrants from Western New-York. The women and children were piled upon the top of the household stuff with about as much ceremony as if they const.i.tuted a portion thereof, in a huge lumbering baggage-wagon, around which dangled suspended pots and kettles, dutch-ovens and tin-kitchens, cheese-roasters and bread-toasters, all in admired confusion, jangling harsh discord. The cart-wheels themselves, as they gyrated upon the parched axles, like the gates of Milton's h.e.l.l on their hinges, "grated harsh thunder." In the van of the cavalcade strode soberly on the patriarch of the family, with his elder sons, axe upon shoulder, rifle in hand, a veritable Israel Bush. For six weeks had the wanderers been travelling, and a weary, bedusted-looking race were they, that emigrant family.

The rapidity with which a Western village goes forward, and begins to a.s.sume importance among the nations, after having once been born and {47} christened, is amazing. The mushrooms of a summer's night, the wondrous gourd of Jonah, the astonishing bean of the giant-killer, or the enchantments of the Arabian Nights, are but fit parallels to the growth of the prairie-village of the Far West. Of all this I was forcibly reminded in pa.s.sing through quite a town upon my route named Manchester, where I dined, and which, if my worthy landlord was not incorrect, two years before could hardly boast a log-cabin.[185] It is now a thriving place, on the northern border of Mark's Prairie, from which it may be seen four or five miles before entering its streets; it is surrounded by a body of excellent timber, always the _magnum desideratum_ in Illinois. This scarcity of timber will not, however, be deemed such an insurmountable obstacle to a dense and early population of this state as may have been apprehended, when we consider the unexampled rapidity with which a young growth pushes itself forward into the prairies when once protected from the devastating effects of the autumnal fires; the exhaustless ma.s.ses of bituminous coal which may be thrown up from the ravines, and creeks, and bluffs of nearly every county in the state; the facility of ditching, by the a.s.sistance of blue gra.s.s to bind the friable soil, and the luxuriance of hedge-rows for enclosures, as practised almost solely in England, France, and the Netherlands; and, finally, the convenience of manufacturing brick for all the purposes of building.

There is not, probably, any quarter of the state destined to become more populous and powerful {48} than that section of Morgan county through which I was now pa.s.sing. On every side, wherever the traveller turns his eye, beautiful farms unfold their broad, wavy prairie-fields of maize and wheat, indicative of affluence and prosperity. The _worst_ soil of the prairies is best adapted to wheat; it is _generally_ too fertile; the growth too rapid and luxuriant; the stalk so tall and the ear so heavy, that it is lodged before matured for the sickle. Illinois, consequently, can never become a celebrated wheat region, though for corn and coa.r.s.er grains it is now unequalled.

The rapidity with which this state has been peopled is wonderful, especially its northern counties. In the year 1821, that section of country embraced within the present limits of Morgan county numbered but twenty families; in 1830 its population was nearly fourteen thousand, and cannot now be estimated at less than seventeen thousand!

Many of the settlers are natives of the New-England States; and with them have brought those habits of industrious sobriety for which the North has ever been distinguished. In all the enterprise of the age, professing for its object the amelioration of human condition and the advancement of civilization, religion, and the arts, Morgan county stands in advance of all others in the state. What a wonderful revolution have a few fleeting years of active enterprise induced throughout a region once luxuriating in all the savageness of nature; while the wild prairie-rose "blushed unseen," and the wilder forest-son pursued the deer! Fair villages, {49} like spring violets along the meadow, have leaped forth into being, to bless and to gladden the land, and to render even this beautiful portion of G.o.d's beautiful world--though for ages a profitless waste--at length the abode of intelligence, virtue, and peace.

It was near the close of the day that the extent and frequency of the farms on either side, the more finished structure of the houses, the regularity of enclosures, the mult.i.tude of vehicles of every description by which I was encountered, and the dusty, hoof-beaten thoroughfare over which I was travelling, all reminded me that I was drawing nigh to Jacksonville, the princ.i.p.al town in Illinois. Pa.s.sing "Diamond Grove," a beautiful forest-island of nearly a thousand acres, elevated above the surrounding prairie to which it gives a name,[186]

and environed by flourishing farms, the traveller catches a view of the distant village stretching away along the northern horizon. He soon enters an extended avenue, perfectly uniform for several miles, leading on to the town. Beautiful meadows and harvest-fields on either side sweep off beyond the reach of the eye, their neat white cottages and palings peeping through the enamelled foliage. To the left, upon a swelling upland at the distance of some miles, are beheld the brick edifices of "Illinois College," relieved by a dark grove of oaks resting against the western sky.[187] These large buildings, together with the numerous other public structures, imposingly situated and strongly relieved, give to the place a dignified, city-like aspect in distant {50} view. After a ride of more than a mile within the immediate suburbs of the town, the traveller ascends a slight elevation, and the next moment finds himself in the public square, surrounded on every side by stores and dwellings, carts and carriages, market-people, horses, and hotels.

_Jacksonville, Ill._

XXVII

"What a large volume of adventures may be grasped in this little span of life by him who interests his heart in everything, and who, having his eyes to see what time and chance are perpetually holding out to him as he journeyeth on his way, misses nothing he can _fairly_ lay his hands on."--STERNE'S _Sentimental Journal_.

"Take this in good part, whosoever thou be, And wish me no worse than I wish unto thee."

TURNER.

It was a remark of that celebrated British statesman, Horace Walpole, that the vicissitudes of no man's life were too slight to prove interesting, if detailed in the simple order of their occurrence. The idea originated with the poet Gray, if an idea which has suggested itself to the mind of every man may be appropriated by an individual.

a.s.suming the sentiment as true, the author of these SKETCHES has alone presumed to lay his observations and adventures as a traveller before the _majesty of the public_; and upon this principle _solely_ must they rely for any interest they may {51} claim. A mere glance at those which have preceded must convince the reader that their object has been by no means exact geographical and statistical information.

Errors and omissions have, doubtless, often occurred in the hasty view which has been taken: partially through negligence, sometimes through lack of knowledge, misinformation, or attempt at brevity, but never through aforethought or malice prepense. Upon the whole, the writer admits himself completely laid open to criticism; and, should any public-spirited worthy deem it his duty to rise up in judgment and avenge the wrongs of literature and the community, he has undoubted right so to do: nathless, he is most veritably forewarned that he will hardly gather up his "labour for his pains!" But _allons_.

It is only ten or twelve years since the town site of Jacksonville, now, perhaps, the most flourishing inland village in Illinois, was first _laid off_; and it is but within the past five years that its present unprecedented advancement can be dated.[188] Its site is a broad elevated roll in the midst of a beautiful prairie; and, from whatever point it is approached, few places present a more delightful prospect. The spot seems marked and noted by Nature for the abode of man. The neighbouring prairie is undulating, and the soil uncommonly rich, even in this land of fertility. It is mostly under high cultivation, and upon its northern and western edge is environed by pleasant groves, watered by many a "sweet and curious brook." The public square in the centre of the town is of n.o.ble dimensions, {52} occupied by a handsome courthouse and a market, both of brick, and its sides filled up with dwelling-houses, stores, law-offices, a church, bank, and hotel. From this point radiate streets and avenues in all directions: one through each side of every angle near its vertex, and one through the middle of every side; so that the town-plat is completely cut up into rectangles. If I mistake not in my description, it will be perceived that the public square of Jacksonville may be entered at no less than twelve distinct avenues. In addition to the s.p.a.cious courthouse, the public buildings consist of three or four churches. One of these, belonging to the Congregational order, betrays much correct taste; and its pulpit is the most simply elegant I remember ever to have seen. It consists merely of a broad platform in the chancel of the building, richly carpeted; a dark mahogany bar without drapery, highly polished; and a neat sofa of the same material in a plain back-ground. The outline and proportion are perfect; and, like the doctrines of the sect which worships here, there is an air of severe, dignified elegance about the whole structure, pleasing as it is rare. The number of Congregational churches in the West is exceedingly small; and as it is always pleasant for the stranger in a strange land to meet the peculiarities of that worship to which from childhood-days he has been attached, so it is peculiarly grateful to the New-England emigrant to recognise in this distant spot the simple faith and ceremony of the Pilgrims. Jacksonville is largely made up of emigrants from {53} the North; and they have brought with them many of their customs and peculiarities. The State of Illinois may, indeed, be truly considered the New-England of the West. In many respects it is more congenial than any other to the character and prejudices of the Northern emigrant. It is not a slave state; internal improvement is the grand feature of its civil polity; and measures for the universal diffusion of intellectual, moral, and religious culture are in active progression. In Henry county, in the northern section of the state, two town-plats have within the past year been laid off for colonies of emigrants from Connecticut, which intend removing in the ensuing fall, accompanied each by their minister, physician, lawyer, and with all the various artisans of mechanical labour necessary for such communities. The settlements are to be called Wethersfield and Andover.[189] Active measures for securing the blessings of education, religion, temperance, etc., have already been taken.[190]

The edifices of "Illinois College," to which I have before alluded, are situated upon a beautiful eminence one mile west of the village, formerly known as "Wilson's Grove." The site is truly delightful. In the rear lies a dense green clump of oaks, and in front is spread out the village, with a boundless extent of prairie beyond, covered for miles with cultivation. Away to the south, the wildflower flashes as gayly in the sunlight, and {54} waves as gracefully when swept by the breeze, as centuries ago, when no eye of man looked upon its loveliness. During my stay at Jacksonville I visited several times this pleasant spot, and always with renewed delight at the glorious scenery it presented. Connected with the college buildings are extensive grounds; and students, at their option, may devote a portion of each day to manual labour in the workshop or on the farm. Some individuals have, it is said, in this manner defrayed all the expenses of their education. This system of instruction cannot be too highly recommended. Apart from the benefits derived in acquiring a knowledge of the use of mechanical instruments, and the development of mechanical genius, there are others of a higher nature which every one who has been educated at a public inst.i.tution will appreciate. Who has not gazed with anguish on the sunken cheek and the emaciated frame of the young aspirant for literary distinction? Who has not beheld the funeral fires of intellect while the lamp of life was fading, flaming yet more beautifully forth, only to be dimmed for ever! The lyre is soon to be crushed; but, ere its hour is come, it flings forth notes of melody sweet beyond expression! Who does not know that protracted, unremitting intellectual labour is _always_ fatal, unaccompanied by corresponding physical exertion; and who cannot perceive that _any_ inducement, be it what it may, which can draw forth the student from his retirement, is invaluable. Such an inducement is the lively interest which the cultivated mind {55} always manifests in the operations of mechanical art.

Illinois College has been founded but five or six years, yet it is now one of the most flourishing inst.i.tutions west of the mountains. The library consists of nearly two thousand volumes, and its chymical apparatus is sufficient. The faculty are five in number, and its first cla.s.s was graduated two years since. No one can doubt the vast influence this seminary is destined to exert, not only upon this beautiful region of country and this state, but over the whole great Western Valley. It owes its origin to the n.o.ble enterprise of seven young men, graduates of Yale College, whose names another age will enrol among our Harvards and our Bowdoins, our Holworthys, Elliots, and Gores, great and venerable as those names are. And, surely, we cannot but believe that "some divinity has shaped their ends," when we consider the character of the spot upon which a wise Providence has been pleased to succeed their design. From the Northern lakes to the gulf, where may a more eligible site be designated for an inst.i.tution whose influence shall be wide, and powerful, and salutary, than that same beautiful grove, in that pleasant village of Jacksonville.

To the left of the college buildings is situated the lordly residence of Governor Duncan, surrounded by its extensive grounds.[191] There are other fine edifices scattered here and there upon the eminence, among which the beautiful little cottage of Mr. C., brother to the great orator of the {56} West, holds a conspicuous station.[192]

Society in Jacksonville is said to be superior to any in the state. It is of a cast decidedly moral, and possesses much literary taste. This is betrayed in the number of its schools and churches; its lyceum, circulating library, and periodicals. In fine, there are few spots in the West, and none in Illinois, which to the _Northern_ emigrant present stronger attractions than the town of Jacksonville and its vicinity. Located in the heart of a tract of country the most fertile and beautiful in the state; swept by the sweet breath of health throughout the year; tilled by a race of enterprising, intelligent, hardy yeomen; possessing a moral, refined, and enlightened society, the tired wanderer may here find his necessities relieved and his peculiarities respected: he may here find congeniality of feeling and sympathy of heart. And when his memory wanders, as it sometimes must, with melancholy musings, mayhap, over the loved scenes of his own distant New-England, it will be sweet to realize that, though he sees not, indeed, around him the beautiful romance of his native hills, yet many a kindly heart is throbbing near, whose emotions, like his own, were nurtured in their rugged bosom. "_Caelum non animum mutatur._" And is it indeed true, as they often tell us, that New-England character, like her own ungenial clime, is cold, penurious, and heartless; while to her brethren, from whom she is separated only by an imaginary boundary, may be ascribed all that is lofty, and honourable, and chivalrous in man! This is an old {57} calumny, the offspring of prejudice and ignorance, and it were time it were at rest. But it is not for me to contrast the leading features of Northern character with those of the South, or to repel the aspersions which have been heaped upon either. Yet, reader, believe them not; many are false as ever stained the poisoned lip of slander.

It was Sat.u.r.day evening when I reached the village of Jacksonville, and on the following Sabbath I listened to the sage instruction of that eccentric preacher, but venerable old man, Dr. P. of Philadelphia, since deceased, but then casually present. "_The Young Men of the West_" was a subject which had been presented him for discourse, and worthily was it elaborated. The good people of this little town, in more features than one, present a faithful transcript of New-England; but in none do they betray their Pilgrim origin more decidedly than in their devotedness to the public worship of the sanctuary. Here the young and the old, the great and small, the rich and poor, are all as steadily church-goers as were ever the pious husbandmen of Connecticut--men of the broad breast and giant stride--in the most "high and palmy day" of blue-laws and tything men.

You smile, reader, yet

"n.o.ble deeds those iron men have done!"

It was these same church-going, psalm-singing husbandmen who planted Liberty's fair tree within our borders, the leaves of which are now for the "healing of the nations," and whose broad branches are overshadowing the earth; and they watered it--ay, watered it with their blood! The Pilgrim Fathers!--{58} the elder yeomanry of New-England!--the Patriots of the American Revolution!--great names!

they shall live enshrined in the heart of Liberty long after those of many a railer are as if they had never been. And happy, happy would it be for the fair heritage bequeathed by them, were not the present generation degenerate sons of n.o.ble sires.

At Jacksonville I tarried only a few days; but during that short period I met with a few things of tramontane origin, strange enough to my Yankee notions. It was the season approaching the annual election of representatives for the state and national councils, and on one of the days to which I have alluded the political candidates of various creeds _addressed the people_; that is--for the benefit of the uninitiated be it stated--each one made manifest what great things he had done for the people in times past, and promised to do greater things, should the dear people, in the overflowing of their kindness, be pleased to let their choice fall upon him. This is a custom of universal prevalence in the Southern and Western states, and much is urged in its support; yet, sure it is, in no way could a Northern candidate more utterly defeat his election than by attempting to pursue the same. The charge of _self-electioneering_ is, indeed, a powerful engine often employed by political partisans.

The candidates, upon the occasion of which I am speaking, were six or seven in number: and though I was not permitted to listen to the _eloquence_ of all, some of these harangues are said to have been powerful productions, especially that of Mr. S. The day {59} was exceedingly sultry, and Mr. W., candidate for the state Senate, was on the _stump_, in shape of a huge meat-block at one corner of the market-house, when I entered.[193] He was a broadfaced, farmer-like personage, with features imbrowned by exposure, and hands hardened by honourable toil; with a huge rent, moreover, athwart his left shoulder-blade--a badge of democracy, I presume, and either neglected or produced there for the occasion; much upon the same principle, doubtless, that Quintilian counselled his disciples to disorder the hair and tumble the toga before they began to speak. Now mind ye, reader, I do not accuse the worthy man of having followed the Roman's instructions, or even of acquaintance therewith, or any such thing; but, verily, he did, in all charity, seem to have hung on his worst rigging, and that, too, for no other reason than to demonstrate the democracy aforesaid, and his affection for the _sans-culottes_. His speech, though garnished with some little rhodomontade, was, upon the whole, a sensible production. I could hardly restrain a smile, however, at one of the worthy man's figures, in which he likened himself to "the _morning sun_, mounting a stump to scatter the mists which had been gathering around his fair fame." Close upon the heels of this _ruse_ followed a beautiful simile--"a people free as the wild breezes of their own broad prairies!" The candidates alternated according to their political creeds, and denounced each other in no very measured terms. The approaching election was found, indeed, to be the prevailing topic of thought and conversation all over the land; insomuch {60} that the writer, himself an una.s.suming wayfarer, was more than once, strangely enough, mistaken for a _candidate_ as he rode through the country, and was everywhere _catechumened_ as to the articles of his political faith. It would be an amusing thing to a solitary traveller in a country like this, could he always detect the curious surmisings to which his presence gives rise in the minds of those among whom he chances to be thrown; especially so when, from any circ.u.mstance, his appearance does not betray his definite rank or calling in life, and anything of mystery hangs around his movements.

Internal Improvement seems now to be the order of the day in Northern Illinois. This was the hobby of most of the stump-speakers; and the projected railway from Jacksonville to the river was under sober consideration. I became acquainted, while here, with Mr. C., a young gentleman engaged in laying off the route.

It was late in the afternoon when I at length broke away from the hustings, and mounted my horse to pursue my journey to Springfield.

The road strikes off from the public square, in a direct line through the prairie, at right angles with that by which I entered, and, _like_ that, ornamented by fine farms. I had rode but a few miles from the village, and was leisurely pursuing my way across the dusty plain, when a quick tramping behind attracted my attention, and in a few moments a little, portly, red-faced man at my side, in linsey-woolsey and a broad-brimmed hat, saluted me frankly with the t.i.tle of "friend," and forthwith announced himself a "Baptist {61} circuit-rider!" I became much interested in the worthy man before his path diverged from my own; and I flatter myself he reciprocated my regard, for he asked all manner of questions, and related all manner of anecdotes, questioned or not. Among other edifying matter, he gave a full-length biography of a "_billards fever_" from which he was just recovering; even from the premonitory symptoms thereof to the relapse and final convalescence.

At nightfall I found myself alone in the heart of an extensive prairie; but the beautiful crescent had now begun to beam forth from the blue heavens; and the wild, fresh breeze of evening, playing among the silvered gra.s.s-tops, rendered the hour a delightful one to the traveller. "Spring Island Grove," a thick wood upon an eminence to the right, looked like a region of fairy-land as its dark foliage trembled in the moonlight. The silence and solitude of the prairie was almost startling; and a Herculean figure upon a white horse, as it drew nigh, pa.s.sed me "on the other side" with a glance of suspicion at my closely-b.u.t.toned surtout and m.u.f.fled mouth, as if to say, "this is too lone a spot to form acquaintance." A few hours--I had crossed the prairie, and was snugly deposited in a pretty little farmhouse in the edge of the grove, with a crusty, surly fellow enough for its master.

_Springfield, Ill._

XXVIII

"Hee is a rite gude creetur, and travels _all_ the ground over most faithfully."

"The web of our life is of a mingled yarn, good and ill together."--SHAKESPEARE.

It is a trite remark, that few studies are more pleasing to the inquisitive mind than that of the _nature of man_. But, however this may be, sure it is, few situations in life present greater facilities for watching its developments than that of the ordinary _wayfaring_ traveller. Though I fully agree with Edmund Burke, that "the age of chivalry has pa.s.sed away," with all its rough virtues and its follies, yet am I convinced that, even in this degenerate era of sophisters, economists, and speculators, when a solitary individual, unconnected with any great movements of the day, throws himself upon his horse, and sallies fearlessly forth upon the arena of the world, whether in _quest_ of adventure or not, he will be quite sure to meet, at least, with some slight "inklings" thereof. A thousand exhibitions of human character will fling themselves athwart his pathway, inconsiderable indeed in themselves, yet which, as days of the year and seconds of the day, go to make up the lineaments of man; and which, from the observation of the pride, and pomp, and circ.u.mstance of wealth and equipage, would of necessity be veiled. Under the eye of the solitary {63} wanderer, going forth upon a pilgrimage of observation among the ranks of men--who is met but for once, and whose opinion, favourable or otherwise, can be supposed to exert but trifling influence--there is not that necessity for enveloping those petty weaknesses of our nature in the mantle of selfishness which would, under more imposing circ.u.mstances, exist. To the mind of delicate sensibility, unschooled in the ways of man, such exhibitions of human heartlessness might, perchance, be anything but _interesting_; but to one who, elevated by independence of character above the ordinary contingencies of situation and circ.u.mstance, can smile at the frailties of his race, even when exhibited at his own expense, they can but afford a fund of interest and instruction. The youthful student, when with fresh, unblunted feeling he for the first time enters the dissecting-room of medical science, turns with sickened, revolting sensibilities from the mutilated form stretched out upon the board before him, while the learned professor, with untrembling nerve, lays bare its secrecies with the crimsoned knife of science. Just so is it with the exhibitions of human nature; yet who will say that dissection of the moral character of man is not as indispensable to an intimate acquaintance with its phenomena, as that of his physical organization for a similar purpose.

But, then, there are the brighter features of humanity, which sometimes hang across the wanderer's pathway like the beautiful tints of a summer evening bow; and which, as they are oftenest met reposing beneath the cool, sequestered shades of {64} retirement, where the roar and tumult of a busy world are as the heavy swing of the distant wave, so there, oftener than elsewhere, they serve to cheer the pilgrim traveller's heart. Ah! it is very sweet, from the dull Rembrandt shades of which human character presents but too much, to turn away and dwell upon these green, beautiful spots in the wastes of humanity; these _oases_ in a desert of barrenness; to hope that man, though indeed a depraved, unholy being, is not that _thing_ of utter detestation which a troubled bosom had sometimes forced us to believe.

At such moments, worth years of coldness and distrust, how inexpressibly grateful is it to feel the young tendrils of the heart springing forth to meet the proffered affection; curling around our race, and binding it closer and closer to ourselves. But your pardon, reader: my wayward pen has betrayed me into an episode upon poor human nature most unwittingly, I do a.s.sure thee. I was only endeavouring to present a few ideas circ.u.mstances had casually suggested, which I was sure would commend themselves to every thinking mind, and which some incidents of my wayfaring may serve to ill.u.s.trate, when lo! forth comes an essay on human nature. It reminds one of Sir Hudibras, who _told the clock by algebra_, or of Dr. Young's satirised gentlewoman, who _drank tea by stratagem_.

"How little do men realize the loveliness of this visible world!" is an exclamation which has oftentimes involuntarily left my lips while gazing upon the surpa.s.sing splendour of a prairie-sunrise. This is at all times a glorious hour, but to a lonely traveller {65} on these beautiful plains of the departed Illini, it comes on with a charm which words are powerless to express. We call our world a RUIN. Ah! it _is_ one in all its moral and physical relations; but, like the elder cities of the Nile, how vast, how magnificent in its desolation! The astronomer, as he wanders with scientific eye along the sparkling galaxy of a summer's night, tells us that among those cl.u.s.tering orbs, far, far away in the clear realms of upper sky, he catches at times a glimpse of _another_ world! a region of untold, unutterable brightness! the high empyrean, veiled in mystery! And so is it with our own humbler sphere; the glittering fragment of a world _we_ have never known ofttimes glances before us, and then is gone for ever.

Before the dawn I had left the farmhouse where I had pa.s.sed the night, and was thridding the dark old forest on my route to Springfield. The dusky twilight of morning had been slowly stealing over the landscape; and, just as I emerged once more upon my winding prairie-path, the flaming sunlight was streaming wide and far over the opposite heavens.

Along the whole line of eastern horizon reposed the purple dies of morning, shooting rapidly upward into broad pyramidal shafts to the zenith, till at last the dazzling orb came rushing above the plain, bathing the scene in an effulgence of light. The day which succeeded was a fine one, and I journeyed leisurely onward, admiring the mellow glories of woodland and prairie, until near noon, when a flashing cupola above the trees reminded me I was approaching {66} Springfield.[194] Owing to its unfavourable situation and the fewness of its public structures, this town, though one of the most important in the state, presents not that imposing aspect to the stranger's eye which some more inconsiderable villages can boast. Its location is the border of an extensive prairie, adorned with excellent farms, and stretching away on every side to the blue line of distant forest. This town, like Jacksonville, was laid out ten or twelve years since, but for a long while contained only a few scattered log cabins: all its present wealth or importance dates from the last six years. Though inferior in many respects to its neighbour and rival, yet such is its location by nature that it can hardly fail of becoming a place of extensive business and crowded population; while its geographically central situation seems to designate it as the capital of the state.

An elegant state-house is now erecting, and the seat of government is to be located here in 1840. The public square, a green, pleasant lawn, enclosed by a railing, contains the courthouse and a market, both fine structures of brick: the sides are lined with handsome edifices. Most of the buildings are small, however, and the humble log cabin not unfrequently meets the eye. Among the public structures are a jail, and several houses of worship. Society is said to be excellent, and the place can boast much literary taste. The plan of Internal Improvement projected for the state, when carried out, cannot fail to render Springfield an important place.

It was a cool, beautiful evening when I left Springfield and held my way over the prairie, rolling its {67} waving verdure on either side of my path. Long after the village had sunk in the horizon, the bright cupola continued to flame in the oblique rays of the setting sun. I pa.s.sed many extensive farms on my route, and in a few hours had entered the forest and forded Sangamon _River_--so styled out of pure courtesy, I presume, for at the spot I crossed it seemed little more than a respectable creek, with waters clear as crystal, flowing over clean white sand.[195] At periods of higher stages, however, this stream has been navigated nearly to the confluence of its forks, a distance of some hundred miles; and in the spring of 1832 a boat of some size arrived within five miles of Springfield. An inconsiderable expense in removing logs and overhanging trees, it is said, would render this river navigable for keelboats half the year. The advantages of such a communication, through one of the richest agricultural regions on the globe, can hardly be estimated. The Sangamon bottom has a soil of amazing fertility, and rears from its deep, black mould a forest of enormous sycamores; huge, overgrown, unshapely ma.s.ses, their venerable limbs streaming with moss. When the traveller enters the depths of these dark old woods, a cold chill runs over his frame, and he feels as if he were entering the sepulchre. A cheerless twilight reigns for ever through them: the atmosphere he inhales has an earthly smell, and is filled with floating greenish exhalations; the moist, black mould beneath his horse's hoofs, piled with vegetable decay for many feet, and upon whose festering bosom the cheering light of day has not smiled for {68} centuries, is rank and yielding: the enormous shafts leaning in all att.i.tudes, their naked old roots enveloped in a green moss of velvet luxuriance, tower a hundred feet above his head, and shut out the heavens from his view: the huge wild-vine leaps forth at their foot and clasps them in its deadly embrace; or the tender ivy and pensile woodbine cl.u.s.ter around the aged giants, and strive to veil with their mantling tapestry the ravages of time. There is much cathedral pomp, much of Gothic magnificence about all this; and one can hardly fling off from his mind the awe and solemnity which gathers over it amid the chill, silent, and mysterious solitude of the scene.

Emerging from the river-bottom, my pathway lay along a tract of elevated land, among beautiful forest-glades of stately oaks, through whose long dim aisles the yellow beams of summer sunset were now richly streaming. Once more upon the broad prairie, and the fragment of an iris was glittering in the eastern heavens: turning back, my eye caught a view of that singular but splendid phenomenon, seldom witnessed--a heavy, distant rain-shower between the spectator and the departing sun.

Nightfall found me at the residence of Mr. D., an intelligent, gentlemanly farmer, with whom I pa.s.sed an agreeable evening. I was not long in discovering that my host was a candidate for civic honours; and that he, with his friend Mr. L., whose speech I had subsequently the pleasure of perusing, had just returned from Mechanicsburg,[196] a small village in the vicinity, where they had been exerting themselves upon the stump to win the _aura popularis_ for the coming election.