me a most extraordinary look, and said--under his breath--in a
whisper, 'No.'"

"CINCINNATI. _Fourth April, 1842._

"We arrived here this morning: about three o'clock, I believe, but I was
fast asleep in my berth. I turned out soon after six, dressed, and
breakfasted on board. About half-after eight, we came ashore and drove
to the hotel, to which we had written on from Pittsburgh ordering
rooms; and which is within a stone's throw of the boat-wharf. Before I
had issued an official notification that we were 'not at home,' two
Judges called, on the part of the inhabitants, to know when we would
receive the townspeople. We appointed to-morrow morning, from half-past
eleven to one; arranged to go out, with these two gentlemen, to see the
town, _at_ one; and were fixed for an evening party to-morrow night at
the house of one of them. On Wednesday morning we go on by the mail-boat
to Louisville, a trip of fourteen hours; and from that place proceed in
the next good boat to St. Louis, which is a voyage of four days. Finding
from my judicial friends (well-informed and most agreeable gentlemen)
this morning that the prairie travel to Chicago is a very fatiguing one,
and that the lakes are stormy, sea-sicky, and not over safe at this
season, I wrote by our captain to St. Louis (for the boat that brought
us here goes on there) to the effect, that I should not take the lake
route, but should come back here; and should visit the prairies, which
are within thirty miles of St. Louis, immediately on my arrival
there. . . .

"I have walked to the window, since I turned this page, to see what
aspect the town wears. We are in a wide street: paved in the
carriage-way with small white stones, and in the footway with small red
tiles. The houses are for the most part one story high; some are of
wood; others of a clean white brick. Nearly all have green blinds
outside every window. The principal shops over the way are, according to
the inscriptions over them, a Large Bread Bakery; a Book Bindery; a Dry
Goods Store; and a Carriage Repository; the last-named establishment
looking very like an exceedingly small retail coal-shed. On the pavement
under our window, a black man is chopping wood; and another black man is
talking (confidentially) to a pig. The public table, at this hotel and
at the hotel opposite, has just now finished dinner. The diners are
collected on the pavement, on both sides of the way, p