I wish to see more of the country and the aborigines, but do not exactly see how and in what manner. Neither roads nor means of conveyance are to be met with here, as in the more cultivated states. Besides which, I must not any longer remain in this family, which has so hospitably provided me a chamber by sending the only child of the family, a beautiful little infant, and its nurse, into a cold room. The child must return into its warm chamber, for the nights are getting cold. I long for the South, and dread these cold nights on the Mississippi; and it is too far, and the roads are too difficult for me to go to another family, residing at some distance, who have kindly invited me to their house, and-the inward light does not afford me any illumination, and the inward voice is silent. I shall therefore commence my journey, but someway I have a presentiment that I shall have to repent it.

I shall part from my cheerful and kind hostess with regret. I shall take with me a pair of Indian moccasins for your little feet, and another pair for Charlotte's, and a bell-purse of Indian work for mamma. The work of the Indian women is ornamental and neat, ficient in taste and knowledge of design. fine colors predominate in their embroidery as well as in the festal attire of their people. Scarlet seems to be a favorite color with all children of nature.

although de

Scarlet and

I have gained some information from the young Presbyterian missionary here regarding the effect of missionary labors among the Indians, which seems to promise a brighter future for them than I had hitherto imagined. Since the Gospels have been translated into the language of the principal tribes and have been studied by them, Christianity has made considerable advances among the savage people, and with each succeeding year have the results of missionary labors been more and more striking.

When, in 1828, "a revival" in the religious life occasioned a reanimation and a new organization of mission

ary labor, there were only thirty-one missionaries among the Indians, with a revenue of only 2400 dollars for carrying out the work of instruction.

The

At this time (1850) there are 570 missionaries-more than half of whom are women, among the Indians, with a revenue of 79,000 dollars yearly; to these missionaries must be added 2000 preachers and helpers among the natives themselves. A thousand churches of various Christian denominations have been erected, and the number of professing Christians of the Indian tribes amounts at this time to 40,537. A great number of schools have been established, and are increasing daily, where the Indian children may receive instruction in reading, writing, and arithmetic, as well as in handcraft trades. women easily acquire these latter. The boys learn to read and write with greater facility than the girls; but it is very difficult to accustom them to order and punctuality. It is not until after religious conversion that it is possible to impart moral and physical cultivation to them, before which they will have nothing to do with it. The number of schools has already increased to between four and five hundred, and the number of scholars, both boys and girls, is more than 30,000. Seminaries for boys and girls have also been established. Printing-presses have been introduced, and printed works in thirty different languages have been produced. Mr. Williamson, the missionary of Kaposia, considers the ignorance of the Indians to be the greatest impediment to their cultivation. The women are the most accessible to religious impressions; the men, in particular those of the warlike tribes, as the Sioux, for instance, are more difficult to influence, and they will not listen to a doctrine which is diametrically opposed to that which constitutes their heathenish virtue and happiness. The missionaries, therefore, have as yet made but little way among the Sioux, nor indeed have they yet advanced among the savage tribes lying

between Minnesota and the Rocky Mountains. It will not be long, however, before they do so.

From the annual report of the American Board of Missions for the year 1850, from which I have taken many of the above facts, I extract the following words:

"How long will it be before we establish a synod on the shores of the Pacific Ocean? Already are our missionaries scattered over the whole of the United States cast of the Mississippi, with the exception of one little valley in the northeast. They have crossed that river, and are now beginning zealously to occupy that immense country which extends westward of it, from the Mexican Gulf to the British colonies of the North. Nay, more still; they have wandered over the whole continent, and in that new world of the West have begun to found a kingdom of God. What will our progress be ultimately? The spires of our churches along the shores of the Atlantic are illumined by the light of the morning sun. Advancing over the country, it shines upon them through the whole day; and when it sets, its last rays still rest upon these as they rise upward along the shores of the Pacific Ocean. Yes, we have done something, with God's aid; but we have yet infinitely more to do before we have fulfilled the measure of our duty."

That is a good little specimen of the labor and the eloquence of the West.

Thus a little flock even of the red men have on earth entered the kingdom of Christ. And if, out of those 40,000 who publicly acknowledge themselves of the Church of Christ, 10,000 only, nay if only 1000 be really Christians, there is still enough for an infinite future. In those "happy lands" where the red children of God will one day be at home, beyond the dark abyss, will they labor for the liberation of their brethren, "the children of the twilight," who remain in the realm of shadows.

The kingdom of the Savior and the work of salvation

are not circumscribed to this little space and to this short time. Their space and their time are eternal as the heart of God. I know that the missionaries here promulgate another doctrine; and it is incomprehensible how they by that means are able to make any progress, incomprehensible how they can have any satisfaction in so doing. But a light, stronger, mightier, than that of these circumscribed doctrines must proceed from the Word of Christ to the heart of the heathen, and attract it to His cross and His crown, from the hunting-grounds and the wild dances of earth to His heaven. I can not believe otherwise.

the

It is evening, and the bright glow of fires lights up western heaven, as it has done every evening since I came here. It is the glow of the Indian prairie fires, which they kindle to compel the deer to assemble at certain points, as it is now their hunting season. In this manner they take a vast number of deer, but at the same time destroy the chase, and by that means occasion still greater want, or are compelled to go still further westward into the wilderness.

But the West is brilliant, and all the saints-St. Peter, St. Paul, St. Charles, a settlement still higher up, St. Anthony, who is beginning to build a city-who have taken up their abode on the Northern Mississippi, and who now are lit up by the fires of the Indians, will give a new dawn to the wilderness and a new light to life.

The West is brilliant from the burning prairies, from the wild chase. I love that glow, because it has a poetical splendor; it shines over the moon-dances, and the councils, and the feasts of the spirits. But it is, after all, rather brightness than light.

When homes such as those of Andrew Downing and Marcus S., and of my good friend Mrs. W. H., which is almost a Swedish home, stand upon the heights of the Mississippi and St. Peter's; when church spires shine out and scalp-dances are no longer danced there; when voices

such as those of Channing, and Emerson, and Beecher, and Bellows, lift themselves in the councils, and when Lucretia Motts speak there also for freedom, peace, and the rights of woman; when the Christian Indian States, Nebraska, &c., stand peacefully side by side of Minnesota, then-it may be in a hundred years-then will I return to Minnesota and celebrate a new feast of the spirits; and I will return thither in-the spirit!

LETTER XXVIII.

On the Mississippi, Oct. 24.

FLOATING down the Great River, "the Father of Rivers," between Indian camps, fires, boats, Indians standing or leaping, and shouting, or rather yelling, upon the shores; funeral erections on the heights; between vine-clad islands, and Indian canoes paddling among them! I would yet retain these strange foreign scenes; but I proceed onward, passing them by. We leave this poetical wilderness, the region of the youthful Mississippi, and advance toward that of civilization. The weather is mild, the sun and the shade sport among the mountains-a poetical, romantic life!

Oct. 25th. Sunbright, but cold. The Indians have vanished. We have passed the "Prairie du Chien;" the idolstone of the red Indian; the Indian graves under the autumnally yellow trees. The hills shine out, of a splendid yellow-brown. The ruins and the pyramids of primeval ages stand forth gloomy and magnificent amid the brilliant forests. With every bend of the river new and astonishing prospects present themselves. I contemplate them, read Emerson's Essays, and live as at a festival. We approach the commencement of two towns on the shore of Iowa, Gottenborg, a descendant, as I imagine, of our Götheborg, and Dubuque.