effort to get there. I attempted to crawl, but was too weak, and fell! I lay for some time, and still that fancy haunted me so singularly that my powerless limbs regained a partial vigor. I crawled on my hands and knees up the bank. It took me a long time to do this. I felt as if it were my last duty, and desperately I struggled to accomplish it. I passed my gun, and dragged it along with me. I thought of the wolves, and wanted to go to sleep in peace. I reached the mott. There was one bright green spot under the largest tree, in the centre. That's the place. It will be a lovely couch. I managed to reach it, and stretched myself upon my back, with my gun by my side, and my head resting on a cushion of moss near the root. My eyes were closed. An indescribable sense of weakness pervaded my being. I felt that I should never rise from that place again. But I was happy. The agony was over; the "fitful fever" had grown calm, and was slowly sinking me to rest. The loved faces of that far away home came round me for the farewell. Others stooped from the clouds and beckoned and smiled for me to come on. They wore wings. Oh! how I longed to be with them. It was a pleasant trance. I felt that I should never lose sight of them again; that before many hours I should feel myself, buoyant as they, rise up from the damp earth and float away to the stars. A sunbeam, struggling through the leaves, fell on my closed lids, and shocked me back to earth again. I opened my eyes for one more look at the glad sun and beautiful earth. I looked up. What! can it be? Strange! strange! There is a God! That very Being 1poor I had thought to scorn, is here in the sublimity of mercy. Weak, pitiful wretch! He has work for thee to do, and has willed thou shalt not die yet! Directly above me, within six feet of my face, crouching close to the body of the tree, was a large fox-squirrel. The instant my eye fell upon it, I felt that I had been reprieved, and life and all its objects rushed back upon my heart again. Not the shadow of an idea crossed my mind that there was even a possibility of the creature escaping me. I felt as well assured that I should get to Bexar, and home, as if I had already been sitting in the old rocking-chair. I felt awed, too; for here was the rebuke, broad and bright as the sun's path, of my feeble and im pious presumption! Who shall sound Thy compassion with a plummet, thou marvellous Majesty of Heaven? His hand-the hand of the God of Jacob is here! This is His act! I have looked upon that hand, and in that act have heard His pitying voice-" Go, thou poor worm-live, and sin no more!" I lay perfectly still several minutes, watching it breathe, and thinking how its poor life had been given for mine. I had been too weak to raise my hand before. Now I slowly, and with care, lifted my gun with one hand, without changing my position at all—raised it without aim, for I felt that I couldn't miss it, and fired. It fell upon my breast. I sat up, drew my knife, cut it up deliberately, and ate as much of it as I dared at once, raw! and then, with the first prayer of Faith, of thanksgiving, and of praise, that ever breathed upon my lips, sunk back, and was sound asleep in a moment. I slept for twenty-four hours, as near as I can judge. On waking I finished the remainder of the squirrel, and felt quite able to walk again; though, on attempting to rise, I staggered sorely for a while. But the conviction that I should meet with no further difficulty had become a matter of such positive certainty that I never dreamed of a doubt. "The evidence of things unseen" had reached me through the material at last. Faith looked farther and higher than the senses. knew that I knew! The Penates of the soul-the image of the desolation and the humble instrument-had assumed their holy niches! I was happy, full of love, and humble. Spring-time visions came again. The brazen, glowing sky, and the red, cloudy earth, had passed from before my eyes, and the blue heavens and a natural sun were over me. The ice-ring melted from around my heart-sense and thought and brain were clear again! The madness had passed away. I clapped my hands and laughed aloud for joy! 1 In about two hours, I saw two men on horseback, herding a drove of cattle. I was not surprised. I expected something of the sort. The men rode towards me. I saw they were Mexicans. I knew there was nothing to expect from these traitorous wretches, by fair means; so I concealed my gun by running it up my hunting-shirt, and waited for them to come within range. They approached very cautiously, and when they were within thirty paces of me, I drew my gun suddenly forth and brought it to bear upon them. They were desperately frightened, and would have wheeled and galloped off; but something in my look showed that I was not joking. I ordered them up to me; dismounted the one on the best horse; took his seat; waved my hand in adieu to the chopfallen looking scoundrels, who had expected to plunder me, and galloped off. The motion of the horse was dreadful. I remember dropping the bridle and seizing the high pummel with both hands, while the horse dashed off toward the eastward, at the top of his speed. The next thing I remember was being lifted off by the rangers, at the door of Johnson's, in the square, at Bexar some of them say, I heard "Poor fellow! I thought it was his ghost." The days were a blank then for several weeks. My next awaking was in a pleasant room, in bed, with the little Doctor bending anxiously over me. was safe-the crisis was past! I Doctor had been wounded, and was now The a spare, thin, little body. So I supposed he, too, had seen his troubles. It appeared that the body of Comanches had been very large. They had attacked the different detachments of our scattered party very nearly at the same time, and so entirely dispersed it, that not more than two ever got together again. Two men had been killed and several others wounded. Hays had saved the Doctor's life with the faithful aid of Pony; and it is said the Doctor means to have Pony embalmed when he dies. All had a hard time of it getting in; but my case was rather the most desperate. The sagacious sceptic will no doubt smile at the importance we have attached sneer-they are facts, and the most remarkto these simple incidents. He is free to able, under the circumstances, that ever came under my observation. This "mott" the trees dwarfish, and none of them nutwas not more than thirty feet square; bearing. It was fully six miles above and below to the other motts, and they were not so large as this one, and were thirty miles from any other timber. The could perceive to be natural food for such sterile prairie produced nothing which I but they generally do so in large numan animal. It may have been migrating; bers, keeping near the water; there was got there, and how it lived, will always none in this region. How the creature be a positive mystery to me. The imgular circumstances-the fact of its bepression made by this combination of sining there at all-then of my seeing it just its crouching so close to me as to make it at the crisis when I thought I was dyingfail of killing it, even in my feeble condia matter of impossibility almost for me to tion-all together it can never fade from my memory. Ir stood, a solitary thing to see, The populous grove, did that imperial tree; Of which we'll little reck if only thus, 4 THE COMMERCE OF LAKE ERIE. WHEN, in the year 1679, the Cavalier De La Salle launched the first vessel moved with sails upon the waters of Lake Erie, every portion of the great West was covered with its ancient forests. The echoing axe had never rung through their solitudes, and the battle for mastery was yet undecided between the wild beast and his wild foe, the savage hunter. The three guns which were fired by La Salle when the GRIFFIN was launched, were probably the first sounds of gunpowder that ever broke upon the stillness of this vast region. The wondering Iroquois heard in them the thunders and saw the lightnings of heaven. The white man was equally an object of admiration and of fear. The arts of navigation, at this period, upon this great inland sea, were confined to the bark canoe and the rude paddle with which it was propelled. Never before had the canvas here opened itself to the wind. The voyage of La Salle was an era in the history of this portion of the world. The immense fur trade with the natives at the extremities of this lake, which was carried on first by the French and afterwards by the English, was then almost entirely unknown. It was but the year before that the sites of the first trading-houses had been selected. La Salle set sail from the foot of Lake Erie on the 7th day of August, 1679, with a crew of thirty men, and arrived at Mackinaw on the 28th day of that month. The first cargo of peltries was put on board the Griffin, and she was ordered by La Salle to return with a crew of six men to Niagara. But a storm was encountered, and the vessel with all on board was lost. The ship and cargo were valued at fifty or sixty thousand francs. Thus was made the first great sacrifice of life and property to the commerce of Lake Erie. Since that period the changes that have been wrought in the county bordering upon and lying beyond this lake, surpass the dreams of enchantment. Enterprise has penetrated those vast solitudes; the beasts of prey have slunk back into deeper fastnesses of the woods; the native tribes have vanished away like their own majestic forests, and the white man, following fast upon their rustling foot steps, has subdued the wilderness to the forms of civilization. Delightful Culture, who is able to make men forget the wild charms of a life with Nature, in the beautiful comforts she can accumulate for their use, spreads many myriads of fields with a yearly exuberance of flowers and fruits. Where, also, were the idols and altar-mounds of savage worship, with their columns of smoke ascending among the still forest-tops, to appease the wrath of offended Manitou, now rise the temples and spires of the Christian religion. The votaries of commerce have been attended, often preceded, in the New World, by the worshippers of the Cross. The great region thus changed, is one of the most beautiful and important of the many noble sections of the American continent. In scenery and agricultural resources, it is unsurpassed. Its capabilities for inland commerce are also remarkable. The latter will form the present subject of a few pages. The country from which the furs were gathered at the trading-houses at Niagara, Detroit and Mackinaw, including a large portion of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan and Wisconsin, now contains a population of more than two millions of souls. Since the day when La Salle first opened, as it were, to future generations the great highway upon the waters of Lake Erie, the progenitors of this mighty multitude have been borne upon its waves by the favoring winds; and innumerable little bands, gaining the mouth of some fair river, have thence radiated over the wide spread domain, from which their descendants are now pouring down upon the trusting bosom of the lake the abundant products of an almost inexhaustible soil. Great as has been the change since the country was first explored, it has almost wholly taken place since the year 1800. The population of Ohio in that year, was but 45,365; and that was the only State, with the exception of New York and Pennsylvania, of all those bordering upon the great lakes, which contained any considerable settlements, or in which any enumeration of the people was taken. Even Ohio was not then admitted into the Union; and the commercial advantages of Lake Erie were scarcely begun to be developed till twenty-five years af terwards. The first vessel bearing the American flag, upon Lake Erie, was the sloop Detroit, of seventy tons, which was purchased of the Northwest Company by the General Government, in 1796. It was, however, soon after condemned as unseaworthy, and abandoned. Up to the time of the declaration of war in 1812, the whole number of vessels of all descriptions, upon this lake, did not exceed twelve; and these were employed either in the fur trade, or in transporting to the west such goods and merchandise as were required for the scattered population that had found their way there. A few vessels were built during the war: but as many, and probably more, were destroyed. And during the three years of its continuance, as all emigration to the west, if any had before existed, must have ceased, there cannot be said to have been any commerce upon the Lake. Peace having been restored, some time was requisite for those whose attention had been diverted from their peaceful employments to the arts of war, to become profitably engaged in commercial or agricultural pursuits. This whole country, then new and poor, and weakened by the exhaustion of a painfully protracted war, could scarcely maintain its own sparse population. But it was fast increasing, both by its own natural growth, and by continued accessions from abroad. During our unhappy strug gle, the enterprise of the woodman had been exchanged for the courage of the soldier and agriculture, the first employment of every people in a new land, had languished and died out in the infant settlements, almost before it had being. But the invader had been driven from the homes of the settlers, and they were now ready to engage anew in the arts of husbandry. In 1818, there were but thirty vessels in all upon this lake; and in that year, the first steamboat that ever traversed Lake Erie, "THE WALK-IN-THE-WATER," was built at Black Rock. This boat successfully navigated the lake till the month of November, 1821, when she was wrecked. From 1818 to 1824, there was but one steamboat on Lake Erie, which, with the few sail vessels, was fully adequate to the commerce of that period. During that time, there was very little trade. The people of the new States were rather buyers than sellers. A foreign population was slowly coming in upon them, and children were being born, and they were rapidly becoming a great people. But as they could scarcely produce their own bread, and had no agricultural productions to export, they of the East or of the old world. Though were unable to pay for the manufactures struggling with poverty and accomplishing little, the West, during this period, was gathering up her energies for a great stride to wealth and power. The Erie Canal had crept along the borders of the and threading its way through forests Mohawk-and passing hill and plain, and morasses, it was fast journeying westward, forming a channel from the waters of the Hudson to those of the Niagara. The hardy emigrant was coming with his scanty effects, as far as he could pursue this new channel of trade and travel, and was overleaping the rocky barrier that separated it from the waters of Lake Erie. the trade upon the lake was of little mo- harbors upon the lake, and but few that 1845.] The Commerce of Lake Erie. falo. The expenditure of this sum, with To estimate briefly what had been ac- sand and sixty-six, and the amount of The num In 1840, the number of arrivals and departures of steamboats and sail vessels at and from the port of Buffalo, was four thousand and sixty-one, and in 1844, five thousand nine hundred and seventy-eight. The value of merchandise landed at BufThe falo from the West, during the season of 1844, can scarcely be estimated. amount of canal tolls received at this place and at Black Rock, for the same time, was $542,452, which was more than one-fourth part of all the tolls received on the whole line of the Erie Canal for that year, being an increase of one hundred and sixty-six thousand dollars over those of 1840, though less, by more than seventeen hundred dollars, than the amount received at those places in 1843. It must not, however, be forgotten that, during the last year, a much larger portion than heretofore of the trade of Lake Erie was diverted from this channel, and, instead of contributing to reward the State of New York for its munificent and enlightened policy in being the first to open a way for the commerce of the West, has paid a portion of its tribute into the treasury of a foreign power. In 1844, there |