season, when the torrents from the mountains. cause it to rise as much as twenty feet.

Below Louisville, a canal, several miles in length, had been cut to obviate the action of the rapids, which are covered only with a very few inches of water, except when, from sudden thaws or similar causes, the river is unusually full. So that Madison was rather a growler over the loss of her former good fortune, and by no means an advocate for progress in the way of railroads. She seemed to think that man might. be content to take the good the gods provide by way of the river.

Indiana was not a slave-State; but being divided from Kentucky only by the river, she became a temporary haven for runaway slaves. The intercourse between the people of Indiana and of Kentucky had never been very cordial; the latter considering themselves much above the former-despising the Indianians, and stigmatising them as "Hoosiers"-in other words, "rowdies" and "ruffians." Nor does this seem to be altogether a misnomer, as there can exist no doubt as to the roughness and rudeness of their manners; not that the Kentuckians have much to boast of either.

An old gentleman of Indiana, to whom I took a letter of introduction, amused me very much by the evident dismay into which my presence

threw him. He strode about his little parlour in a state of the most comic perplexity, looking at me askance, and talking partly to himself and partly to me.

"I don't know what I am to do," said he, scratching his head, which was a very short, grey-haired, round one. "What does the fellow expect me to do ?"

The "fellow" did not mean me, but the writer of the letter. Then he looked at me hopelessly, and declared he did not "know what to do!" Feeling a malicious pleasure in his dilemma, I asked

Would you do it if you could?"

Here he scratched his head violently. This was a poser. He took another turn in the room, and at length, stopping before me, he said "Well, I don't know but what I would. What is it?"

I looked out at the window-there were a few chrysanthemums growing in the little garden. “Give me some of those flowers; that is what you are to do."

"Is that what he wants me to do?" he exclaimed, in utter bewilderment. "Well, that beats me, and no mistake."

He shook his round head in a bothered way, and said "You may take as many of them as you like."

I did so; then departed. It may be surmised that I shall never again be troubled with letters to American citizens after these disclosures; but I hereby acknowledge my obligations to all who favoured me with them, for they brought me more amusement, as well as knowledge of mankind, than I could possibly have obtained from other sources. For surely, no general acquaintance with human nature could have foreseen or imagined this very droll reception of a

letter of introduction.

There is a great deal of "'cuteness" about the inhabitants of this little town of Madison. They are not going to believe everything that is said or written, but take due precautions against being befooled by the rest of the world. Another gentleman, to whom I was introduced, said that he "certainly had seen that name in the New York papers frequently," and he "reckoned that she was a right smart woman from England, but he was not aware that she had come west," and appeared to be greatly of opinion that “she" was still in New York, or gone back to England.

"It would be so easy," he said, "for west of New York to set up for that right smart woman and impose upon people--she would never be a bit the wiser."

"We have had a good many impostors down

VOL. II.

14

here," I replied; "I should think you have learned to detect them at sight."

"Well, that's so; but it takes a pretty smart woman to carry out the character of another, and such another as, I understand from the New York papers, this English lady is."

I laughed, and put into his hand a New York paper of a recent date, giving an account of my tour in the West and my visits to the various cities of the Ohio. He read the paragraph, and slapping his knee, exclaimed, "If that isn't right smart of you! So you are the celebrated Englishwoman my friend writes me of? But don't you think it was 'cute of me to get such good evidence of it?" and he seemed quite elated at the result of his ruffianism.

There is not much literary advancement in Madison. Progress and development are manifested principally in the porcine race, for I noticed that the pigs in the gutters were the fattest of any I had ever seen in the United States. There is neither library nor public institute of any kind, but the Sisters of the Holy Cross are labouring with their usual zeal to found a convent for the instruction of youth, and thus to introduce a little refinement and culture.

But in Madison all were not stupid and suspicious, for I met there one of the most charm

ing families I had ever known in the United States. It consisted of three sisters and father and mother, the three sisters worthy of personating the three Graces in any part of the world. Three more beautiful girls could not be found in any family. They were dark, with the Italian cast of feature: delicately arched nose and slender nostril; soft full dark eyes, with that indescribable expression of sweetness, tenderness, and intellect combined, which makes the pure intellectual woman the most charming object under the sun. Their heads were purely classical, and undisfigured by any attempt at Chinois coiffure then the rage in America. Their figures were graceful and symmetrical, undistorted by "Grecian bend,” or the fifty and one appliances to render the human form divine, like unto a Hottentot Venus or Chinese joss idol. The youngest had the most perfect face I remember to have ever seen, and her rounded cheeks had the smoothness of marble. She was about seventeen, and her figure had the undulating grace of Hebe. of Hebe. Her voice was in keeping with her person: sweet, clear, rippling, and melodious; for although good voices are very frequent in America, they are, generally, shrill and hard, and convey the impression of breaking china and glass, yet of such voices the most brilliant ones could be made. The elder sister, still