the city, not undertaking to "do it," for it is six miles long and five wide, but to get a glimpse of the interior.

The City Hall is a splendid edifice of brick; so is Veranda Hall, with its veranda style. The Presbyterian Church is a large, well finished building, occupying an eligible site on the high grounds of the city, surrounded with ornamental trees. The Unitarian Church is of tasteful architecture. The Court House is after the style of the capitol at Washington. My friend remarked that he had heard Toм BENTON make many a speech in it.

As we passed by the St. Louis University-a Catholic school-I thought of IGNATIUS LOYOLA, the founder of the Jesuits, and that celebrated maxim of his: "Give me the teaching of the child, and I care not who preaches to him."

But the Roman Catholic Cathedral attracted my attention most. This is a very large and splendid pile. It has a peal of six bells in its steeple, the three largest of which weigh nearly three thousand pounds each. The front of the building is of polished free-stone, with a portico of four massive, Doric columns. The interior is splendidly finished and furnished, containing several elegant paintings of celebrated masters. I spent an hour or more in it. Here, as I leaned against one of its massive pillars, and looked about me and saw the meaning of those hitherto unmeaning terms, the "nave," the "transept," and the "choir," I thought of all I had read about these venerable piles; how they were all built at one time throughout Europe, and, 'tis said, under the supervision of one man; and that they were the expression of the Gothic idea in Architecture; while SHAKSPEARE, afterwards, gave expression to the same idea in poetry.

And then that thrilling and unequal passage of CONGREVE'S, which Dr. JOHNSON calls the most poetical paragraph in the whole range of the drama-finer than any

one in SHAKSPEARE. It is where the awe of the place overcomes ALMERIA—

"LEONARD.

"ALMERIA.

Hark!

No; all is hushed and still as death. 'Tis dreadful!
How reverend is the face of this tall pile,

Whose ancient pillars rear their marble heads
To bear aloft its arched and ponderous roof,
By its own weight made steadfast and immovable,
Looking tranquility! It strikes an awe
And terror on my aching sight; the tombs
And monumental caves of death look cold,
And shoot a chillness to my trembling heart.
Give me thy hand, and let me hear thy voice;
Nay, quickly speak to me, and let me hear

Thy voice-my own affrights me with its echoes."

While here, the dead were brought in. The priest, the ceremony, the boys swinging burning incense about the coffin, the mumbling and strict silence of all present; how strange, and yet with what devotion! The Catholics have no infidels among them. Is it not strange that the higher, purer, better the religion is, the more infidels it has ?

I noticed many a fine and costly building devoted to benevolent and religious purposes, aside from the grand churches that ornament the city.

We had gone down to the river, in the morning, to select a steamer for Vicksburgh, Mississippi. The levee, as we have said, is a paved limestone bank, running along the river for nearly three miles, and almost all this distance I saw a dense and nearly double row of steamers, with the · places of their destination painted on canvas and hoisted above their fore-castles.

Surely, thought I, all the "carrier pigeons" of the great valley of the west are waiting here for their messages. While I stood gazing, and doubting which one I should choose, I asked a gentleman to point me out a first-class steamer that was going down the river to-day.

He pointed up the river and said, "There is the Minneha-ha; she starts out, at noon, for New Orleans."

"Minne-ha-ha!" That's beautiful! To sail down the Mississippi in the "Laughing water!" How much Indian romance there will be in it! But she was some way up stream. I had to wait the mending of a broken trunk, so she sailed off and left me. The "James E. Woodruff" sailed.in the afternoon. I was soon "ticketed” and aboard of her. She did not go, though, till the next day in the afternoon.

The officers on board of these steamers think of the traveler as CORTES did of the Mexicans-that truth is too precious for them. You must bide your time and learn to wait. But if you are not in haste-your board is freeone has enough to occupy his time walking about the city seeing its curiosities; or they can sit here, on deck, and look at this mass of men, mules and horses

"Drays, carts, cabs and coaches, roaring all

goods of all kinds, and even more; some carried on board the steamer, some taken off; all stir, noise, bustle, tustle, pulling, hauling, rallying, hallooing, doing all things and everything; lifting, dragging, lugging, tugging, urging, driving and whipping cattle, horses, mules, sheep, hogs"et id omne genus,' aboard.

Sitting in the fore-castle of the steamer, and looking out upon all this confused scene, I longed for a term to express a thousand things at once-that would syllable forth in one word all I saw and heard. I longed to give expression to something unutterable, till "melee" occurred. I uttered it aloud and felt relieved.

I remember that I noticed on the doors and walls of the Central depot, Chicago, this placard : "Beware of pickpockets and watch-stuffers!" But these steamboats lying

B

along this levee, especially when the passengers come aboard, the day they are to start, should be conspicuously placarded with such warnings. Gangs of thieves prowl about them, and when you are at breakfast, or any of your meals, or out of your state-room, unless it is locked, as it should be when you leave it, they steal into it, and rifle the room of anything valuable, even breaking open car⚫ pet-bags.

This morning, on board the "Woodruff," a fine gold watch, and porte-monnaie, with considerable gold in it, was stolen from one of the state-rooms. On the "Alleghany," lying near us, the same morning, a carpet-bag was broken and rifled of its contents. The owner of the watch and porte-monnaie applied to our Captain; he referred him to the Detective Police. This officer was found. The story was told.

open

"My friend," said he, "this is an ower true tale." Not a morning passes but what I hear the story of some of these passengers being robbed-watches, money, or valuables stolen from them." He said it was useless to search the boat while lying along the levee.

"'Tis true-tis a pity,

And pity 'tis, 'tis true,"

that the Detective Police, though Argus-eyed, would be eluded and baffled in detecting and apprehending these thieves, or getting back the stolen treasures.

CHAPTER II.

"'Twas an Autumn morning, as the clock struck ten,
That we left St. Louis, on our route again;

Gazing on the river, thick with yellow mud,

And dreaming of disaster, fire, and fog, and flood

Of boilers ever bursting, of snags that break the wheel,

And sawyers, ripping steamboats through all their length of keel,
While on our journey southward, in our gallant ship,
Floating, steaming, panting down the Mississip."

MACKAY.

We were

We left St. Louis at 12 o'clock, November 5th. "bannered" away by the waving of handkerchiefs of friends on the other steamers and the levee.

Passing Jefferson Barracks, down the river "aways," I could not but think with sadness of the early death of young MASON, STEWART and ANDRUS, of Battle Creek, Michigan. Here they lie buried, with

"No tomb to plead their remembrance."

They were enjoying the happiness of a farm-life, in their own Peninsular State, when the "pibroch" for the Mexican war sounded near their homes. Young and ambitious, they were influenced by a love of military glory-they went to the war. And thus far had they got on their return home, when they found that the

66

"Paths of glory lead but to the grave."

'Requescat in pace"-friends of my early days.

Our passage down the Mississippi was a slow one, long drawn out. The river was nearly at low water mark, and