is not universal, but it is
prevalent--prevalent in the towns, certainly, if not in the cities; and
to a degree which one cannot help noticing, and marveling at. I heard a
Westerner who would be accounted a highly educated man in any country,
say 'never mind, it DON'T MAKE NO DIFFERENCE, anyway.' A life-long
resident who was present heard it, but it made no impression upon her.
She was able to recall the fact afterward, when reminded of it; but
she confessed that the words had not grated upon her ear at the
time--a confession which suggests that if educated people can hear such
blasphemous grammar, from such a source, and be unconscious of the deed,
the crime must be tolerably common--so common that the general ear has
become dulled by familiarity with it, and is no longer alert, no longer
sensitive to such affronts.

No one in the world speaks blemishless grammar; no one has ever written
it--NO one, either in the world or out of it (taking the Scriptures for
evidence on the latter point); therefore it would not be fair to exact
grammatical perfection from the peoples of the Valley; but they and
all other peoples may justly be required to refrain from KNOWINGLY and
PURPOSELY debauching their grammar.

I found the river greatly changed at Island No. 10. The island which
I remembered was some three miles long and a quarter of a mile wide,
heavily timbered, and lay near the Kentucky shore--within two hundred
yards of it, I should say. Now, however, one had to hunt for it with a
spy-glass. Nothing was left of it but an insignificant little tuft, and
this was no longer near the Kentucky shore; it was clear over against
the opposite shore, a mile away. In war times the island had been an
important place, for it commanded the situation; and, being heavily
fortified, there was no getting by it. It lay between the upper and
lower divisions of the Union forces, and kept them separate, until a
junction was finally effected across the Missouri neck of land; but the
island being itself joined to that neck now, the wide river is without
obstruction.

In this region the river passes from Kentucky into Tennessee, back into
Missouri, then back into Kentucky, and thence into Tennessee again. So a
mile or two of Missouri sticks over into Tennessee.

The town of New Madrid was looking very unwell; but otherwise unchanged
from its former condition and aspect. Its blocks of frame-houses were
still grouped in the same old flat plain, and