might be some Alfred* of this western world, the future founder of institutions, which were to enlighten and civilize his country; some Choctaw Swartz or Elliot, destined to disseminate the blessings of Christianity, from the Mississippi to the Pacific, from the Gulf of Mexico to the Frozen Sea. I contrasted them in their social, their moral, and their religious condition, with the straggling hunters, with their painted faces, who occasionally stared through the windows; or, with the half-naked savages, whom we had seen in the forests a few nights before, dancing round their midnight fires, with their tomahawks and scalping knives, rending the air with their fierce war-whoop, or making the woods thrill with their savage yells. But they formed a yet stronger contrast with the poor Indians, whom we had seen on the frontier-corrupted, degraded, and debased by their intercourse with English, Irish, or American traders.

It was not without emotion that I parted, in all human probability for ever, from my kind

*"Some Alfred.-In the rolls of Fame,

And on a midnight page

To blaze his broad refulgent name,

The watchlight of his age."

Montgomery.

and interesting friends, and prepared to return to the tumultuous scenes of a busy world; from which, if life be spared, my thoughts will often stray to the sacred solitudes of Yaloo Busha, as to a source of the most grateful and refreshing recollections. I was almost the first person from a distance, who had visited this remote settlement; and was charged with several letters to the friends of the Missionaries. I believe they had pleasure in thinking that I should probably in a few weeks see those, the endearments of whose society they had renounced for ever in this world: it seemed to bring them nearer the scenes to which they had recently bid a last adieu. I felt a strange emotion, in being thus made the link of communication between these self-devoted followers of our blessed Lord, and the world which they had for ever quitted; and when I saw with what affection they cherished the recollection of many, whose faces they expected to see no more in this life, I turned with peculiar pleasure to our Saviour's animating assurance-" There is no man that hath left house, or brethren, or sisters, or father, or "mother, or wife, or lands, for my sake and the gospel's, but he shall receive a hundred-fold "now in this time, and in the world to come, "life everlasting."

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I left with them a late number of the Missionary Register, and another of the Christian Observer, which I had received from England, while at New Orleans.

Mr. Kingsbury rode with us till we had safely forded the Yaloo Busha; but our route to the spot where I am finishing this letter, which I began at Elliot, I must reserve for my next. I forgot to say, that the Indians call the Misssionaries Aba-on-om-poolé, "Talking above."

Letter XFV.

Foot of the Cumberland Mountain, Tennessee, 29th May, 1820.

My two last letters were from Elliot; and as I found none waiting for me at Huntsville, to my great disappointment, I have now no hope of having later dates from home than the 19th of February, till I reach Richmond.

After parting with the Rev. Mr. Kingsbury on the banks of the Yaloo Busha, we proceeded through the woods, along an Indian path, till evening, when we reached the dwelling of a half-breed Choctaw,whose wife was a Chickasaw, and whose hut was on the frontier of the two nations. We found him sitting before the door, watching the gambols of fifty or sixty of his horses, which were frolicking before him; and of more than 200 very fine cattle, which, at sunset, were coming up as usual, of their own accord, from different parts of the surrounding forest, where they have a boundless and luxu

riant range. * The whole scene reminded me

* He told us, that by giving the cattle a little salt, at the cowpen, at fixed periods, he secured the return of the most

strongly of pastoral and patriarchal times. He had chosen this situation, he said, for its retirement, (in some directions he had no neighbours for fifty or a hundred miles,) and because it afforded him excellent pasturage and water for his cattle: he added, that occupation would give him and his family a title to it as long as they chose. He had a few slaves to cultivate as much land as was necessary, and killed a few deer as he wanted them. Near the house were some bones of the buffalo; but that animal has

extensive herds, from whatever distance they might have strayed. Where persons divide their stock into herds of 100 to 200 each, and send them to different parts of the forest, that they may not interfere with each other's pasturage, it is usual, if possible, to place them within a few miles of a salt-lick, as it is called, since they are certain to visit it every few days; and the owner, when going to reclaim them, has only to pitch his tent there for a day or two, in order to be visited by the whole. When the herds are sent to a distance from home, it is common to go and see them every

three or

four weeks, for the purpose of keeping up a sort of acquaintance with them; but without some centre of attraction, it would be a hopeless task to look for them in these boundless forests.

Bradbury observes, in speaking of Upper Louisiana, "Salt furnishes the means, by the aid of which the shepherd or the herdsman obtains a complete dominion over the will of his flocks or his herds, and, in the midst of this vast region, can call them around him at pleasure.”

I saw two salt-licks, which had the appearance of plains of very white marble, of a sufficient consistency to retain the

R