"The pupils of the Common Schools may read such version of the Sacred
Scriptures as their parents or guardians may prefer, provided that such
preference of any version except the one now in use be communicated by
the parents or guardians to the Principal Teachers, and that no notes or
marginal readings be read in the school, or comments made by the
Teachers on the text of any version that is or may be introduced."

LETTER XI.

ST. LOUIS.--JEFFERSON CITY.--RETURN TO ST.
LOUIS.--ALTON.--SPRINGFIELD.--FIRES ON THE
PRAIRIES.--CHICAGO.--GRANARIES.--PACKING HOUSES.--LAKE
MICHIGAN.--ARRIVAL AT INDIANAPOLIS.

Jefferson City, on the Missouri,
Nov. 6th, 1858.

Here we are really in the Far West, more than 150 miles from the
junction of the Missouri with the Mississippi, though still 2950 from
the source of this great-grandfather of waters--for I can give it a no
less venerable name. We first caught sight of it, or struck the river,
as the phrase is here, about 98 miles below this city, and for a long
time we followed its banks so closely, that we could at any point have
thrown a stone from the car into the river. At Hermann, a little German
settlement on its banks, we stopped and had an excellent dinner, but it
was so late before we left St. Louis, that we passed the greater part of
what seemed very pretty scenery in the dark, so that I shall defer any
further description of it till we return over the ground on Monday.

We were most unfortunate in our weather during our stay at St. Louis,
and I had no opportunity of seeing the beauties of the neighbourhood,
which we hear much extolled, but respecting which we are rather
sceptical. The only drive we took, was to a new park being made outside
the town, called Lafayette Park, which gave us anything but a pleasant
impression of the _entourage_ of St. Louis; we must admit, however, that
a very short distance by railway brought us into a very pretty country,
and no doubt the dismal weather and bad roads made our drive very
different to what it might have been on a fine day. Still, with the
impression fresh in our memory of our drive in the neighbourhood of
Cincinnati in much the same sort of weather, we are compelled to think
that the country about the Queen of the West and the banks of the Ohio
greatly surpasses in beauty St. Louis and the muddy river which has so
great a repu