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of any village containing 100 inhabitants, no not 20 inhabitants, I think. I wrote to you some descriptions of our first stopping place. We found such all the way through, some perhaps a little better, and some worse. I should have preferred taking a tent with our wagon, and making ourselves as comfortable as we could with our own shelter, but the arrangements were made before I came, partly from the impossibility of finding water except at the houses. So we boarded everywhere at the Farmer's houses. On one account I liked the arrangement. It gave greater facilities for getting acquainted with the people, mode of life etc etc. I suppose the people here are quite different from there in the Northern part of Illinois. Here they are mostly from the South, some few from Ohio & Pennsylvania. About all came here very poor. This is however one of the most fertile regions in the world; almost every kind of crop, cotton, rice, & tobacco, as well as wheat, corn & oats, grown here with very little labor. The people are the most indolent I ever saw and yet every one has big fields of corn and great herds of Cattle and hogs. They all eat Cornbread & bacon, and drink sour milk and lots of coffee. They seem to want nothing more, only some sort of log hovel for shelter; or if they ever think of more, are too lazy to work for it. Still they have many good qualities, are kindhearted hospitable, and if they would take as much pains or exert themselves to better themselves as they will to accommodate or oblige another, they might soon be comfortably off. A real "Yankee" is quite a curiosity to most of these people, and they stare well at first to see a man eat who will drink neither coffee or sour milk. "As well as" I can judge however they generally soon form a pretty good opinion of a "Yankee."! One of the worst things here is the water. I have always been in habit of drinking a good deal, especially when employed out of doors. I soon got so as to like the River Water,(well iced) even the thick cream colored