: the
materials and design were, I understood, all imported from England, at a
prodigious cost when the smallness of the population is considered; but
it is now, I fancy, rarely occupied.

On this occasion I had the pleasure of seeing it well filled for the
four nights I acted, and had to regret my time was of necessity so
limited, since my audience was as merry and intelligent as heart could
wish.

My days were passed at the hospitable house of Mr. G----n, where I
encountered many pleasant people; and was attended by the sleekest,
merriest set of negroes imaginable, most of whom had grown old or were
born in their master's house: his own good-humoured, active benevolence
of spirit was reflected in the faces of his servants.

The trade of this port was at one period great; it offered at this time
a cheerful prospect of well-lined quays, and I was glad to learn that
the prospects of the community were again brightening; indeed, the high
prices of produce this year are infusing additional life and spirit into
the whole Southern community: the speculators in cotton are ardent, and
the prices continually on the rise.

On the 15th, left this in a steamer called the George Washington, to
proceed up the Savannah river to Augusta; a distance, by this route, of
rather more than two hundred miles.

I got on board late at night, went immediately to bed, and, on coming on
deck the next morning, found myself in the bosom of a dense forest, the
trees growing as it were out of the very water, and all of them, with
the exception of the gloomy cypress, still thickly covered with their
gay autumnal foliage: numbers of the willow tribe were as fresh and
green as in early springtime, at which season a sail up this river must
be overpoweringly fragrant: even now, although offering little change of
character for two hundred miles, it was not wholly devoid of interest;
for it is constantly upon the wind, the longest reach limiting your
view to a few hundred yards.

Our boat was small and very deeply laden, making hardly four miles an
hour; but she had few passengers, was capitally provisioned, and
possessed an indefatigable and most obliging commander, so that the
tedium consequent upon such a progress had at least no nuisance
superadded to make it more irksome.

Every few miles we brought up to take in a fresh supply of fuel; we were
thus enabled constantly to stretch our legs in the forest; but
throughout the whole distance so exac