CONCLUDED.

MISSISSIPPI.

Very little is known of the interior of this State from the reports of travellers, compared with what we learn of our Eastern States, from the same source. Descending the Mississippi

seized him on each side, and he was dismounted From the Saturday Evening Post. in a trice. The staff rushed in to the relief of VIEWS OF THE WEST. their commander, with a kind of howl which was gradually heightened into a shriek, and which sent the word" Claymore," loud on air. It was a moment of frightful confusion. They threw themselves on the guards. Fresh guards, consisting of students, poured themselves in upon them. And in their turn the forty men in the rear fell upon those. A fresh supply of towns-river to New Orleans, the passenger is shown the men and students rushed in upon them. The swords clashed. Poignards glanced in the air. They screamed: they cursed: they fought. The women and children shrieked, and tumbled down in heaps; while others ran pell mell upon them, as they lay groaning, and sprachlin, and banning those who had broken their limbs, and peeled their shins. Meantime the kettle drum, in the rear, kept up a constant roll, which effectually drowned the noise of the tumult, so that the main body neither saw their officers, nor, for this reason, heard them.

The result was, that they were all disarmed, and the officers deprived of their horses.

Written for the Casket.

COME BACK TO ME.

When the light upon the mountains
Shall have lost its ruddy glow,
And the music of the fountains

In untroubled murmurs flow;
When the evening birds are singing,
Their mild notes from the tree,

And echo's voice is ringing,
Wilt thou come back to me?

When the tired sun is sinking,
More glorious in its leave,
And the thirsty flowers are drinking
Distilments of the eve;
When the veil that gently trembles
Over land and over sea,
Soft evening shade resembles,

Wilt thou come back to me?
When softened winds are stealing,
Like spirit forms in chase,
Their mystic charms concealing

In some far off favour'd place;
When the weary world is sleeping,

Like moonlight on the sea,

And the stars their watch are keeping,
Wilt thou come back to me?

Oh! wilt thou view the mountains
By that dim and shadowy light,
And the gently flowing fountains,
And the murmuring birds of night;
And the brightly glittering shower,
On the flow'ret and the tree;
Then, in the evening hour,

Thou wilt come back to me.

C. H. W.

It matters not whether our good humor be construed by others into insensibility, or even idiotism; it is happiness to ourselves, and none but a fool would measure his satisfaction, by what the world thinks of it.-Goldsmith.

State which takes its name from the magnificent stream on which he is floating; but he sees a succession of bluffs and receding hills with very few inhabitants, and from so superficial a view would be led to conclude there was no population. Such a conclusion, however, would be very erroneous, the cultivated lands being situated more in the interior, and the planters themselves little given to travel.

Mississippi is bounded on the north by Tennessee; east by Alabama; south by the gulf of Mexico and Louisiana; west by Louisiana and the Mississippi, and contains according to Darby 32,640,900 acres, but Mr. Flint is probably nearer the fact when he states it at twenty-eight millions. It is 300 miles in average length, and from 150 to 160 miles in average breadth. The soil may be divided into three distinct positions, thus the alluvial borders of the rivers, the bluffs adjacent to the Mississippi alluvion, and the pine forest land. There are several distinct ranges of hills and eminences, some of which are washed by the river; two of them divide the State much as in Pennsylvania into sectional divisions, and a considerable portion of the table lands have precipitous sides which expose them to the misfortune of washing. Pine Ridge is a singular elevation, seen from the river and resembling an island. The bluff zone of Mississippi is supposed to equal in intrinsic value any other tract of similar extent in the Union. In its natural state this region was covered with a dense, heavy forest, consisting of oak, hickory, laurel, magnolia, sweet gum, ash, maple, the tulip tree or American poplar, and pine, with a great variety of vines and underwood, and so, much of it still continues. The soil is rich, black and deep, and presents the singular appearance in some places of hills covered with cane brake. The part inhabited by the Chickasaw Indians abounds in vallies of great fertility. Loftus Heights, 150 feet high, contain the last stones that have been discovered in descending the river, which washes the shores of the State, including all its meanders, for a distance of nearly seven hundred miles! The right line of the shore is less than half that distance, but the river here is remarkably circuitous, often curving round seven or eight leagues and almost returning back on its course. Much of this long line of river coast is inundated swamp, inhabited only by woodcutters for the steamboats, whose residences are peculiarly inconvenient and unwholesome. An occupied elevation occasionally peeps up, where a solitary settler has fixed upon a farm, and lives a life like Robinson Crusoe, except that for a servant Friday, he counts two or three for each day of the week.

The Yazoo river is the most considerable river having its whole course in the State. There are

some of our readers who will remember the speculation in Yazoo stock with the unenviable feelings of lame ducks on the stock exchange.The first broker who offered the scrip for sale was laughed at, but those who bought low and held it, ultimately realised a large profit. This river rises near Tennessee, runs a north-west course, receiving many tributary streams, and by a mouth 300 feet wide falls into the Mississippi twelve miles below the Walnut Hils, having its course through a high, salubrious, and pleasant district, mostly inhabited by Indians, who live along its banks for a distance of 150 miles from its mouth. The Yazoo is boatable for large boats fifty miles, and in high stages of the water much further. Building stone is brought down it for the New Orleans market, being the nearest point where the article is met with. Twelve miles above its mouth are situated the Yazoo Hills, and four miles higher is the scite of the old Fort S.. Peter, where an old French settlement was destroyed a hundred years ago by the Yazoo Indians, who in turn are now extinct. On the Big Black, or Lousa Chitto river which has a course of 200 miles, some New England settlers, headed by General Putnam, selected a place for a town in 1773. On Bayou Pierre is the important settlement of Port Gibson, in the centre of a rich country, and rapidly becoming populous and wealthy. Pearl river is next to the Yazoo the most important, and has its whole course in this State, through a country generally fertile, though it sometimes traverses the sterile region of pine woods. Some efforts have been made to improve its navigation, which is of great importance, as it is one of the chief points of communication between the State and the Gulf of Mexico. The Pascagoula river has a course of 250 miles, and at its mouth broadens into an open bay, where is a town of the same name, resorted to by the inhabitants of New Orleans in the sickly season.

There are several islands on the coast, but they are low and inundated, sterile and covered with pine.

449

exhibit a vigour which approaches to that of the New England States.

The principal bodies of Indians belong to the Choctaw and Chickasaw nations, amounting in all to about 24,000, in a semi-savage state, exhibiting a curious compound of character. Many of them hold slaves, have good houses, enclosures and cattle-ploughs, looms, and black-smith shops, but their ancient instincts and changes may be traced even through the changes introduced by the missionaries, and municipal regulations. They have an Indian judge, who endeavors to imitate our mode of judicature.They keep good houses of entertainment for travellers, and many white men have married into their families, and seem quite contented to adopt some of their customs. A rich squaw is quite a belle with the whites, and may be seen riding on horseback behind her husband going to church, dressed in all her finery, ear bobs, turban, &c. like an Eastern princess.

The missionaries have established boarding schools, where the young Indian ladies really sometimes acquire much information, and are trained to habits of domestic economy like our own, which they retain after going home. We have taken tea with a family thus educated whose manners would have graced a Philadelphia drawing room. The tea service was neat and in good taste, and the politeness of the fair entertainers was extremely fascinating, though they evidently had not many ideas they were willing to communicate, and probably very few in common with our party. The missionaries continue to witness a growing partiality for our modes of life, and their late reports respecting the schools are encouraging. Christianity makes certain progess, and instead of the savage war song and dance, the praises of God resound in these ancient forests. These benevolent individuals are patronised and countenanced in some degree by our government.

As much excellent land exists along the streams of the whole State, all the kinds of grains, fruits and vegetables suited to the cliThe climate may be said to be between the mate are grown here. The sugar cane has been wheat and sugar cane regions, or in other words, attempted near the southern frontier; the sweet the climate adapted to the growth of cotton. The orange is found to succeed in places, and in the long moss as in most cotton regions is abundant, middle regions, figs, grapes of all sorts, tobacco, and the palmeto in the brightness of its winter Indian corn, sweet potatoes, rice, melons, plums, verdure gives a tropical aspect to the landscape, peaches, &c. &c. come to perfection. Castor oil and the traveller feels himself in a new region beans are cultivated, and on high and middle refor botanical research. Compared with Louisi- gions, the apple and pear may be found, but ana, its waters are inhabited by the same fish, cotton is the great staple, growing in great perand covered with the same water fowls, and fection all over the State. Cotton is the grand birds of beautiful plumage and song. In health topic of conversation every where, and a man it is acknowledged to have decidedly the advan- who can't talk the cotton language, calculate a tage, and those planters remote from stagnant crop, or tell its price in every market of the waters, with access to spring water, enjoy as world might as well talk Spanish or Portuguese, good constitutions as any where in the Union.- for he would be quite as much listened to. Many The summers it is true are long and warm, when planters realised immense fortunes when cotton bilious attacks more or less prevail, but pulmo-bore a high price, and some of them visit us in nary consumption is almost unheard of, and they the summer months to spend their large revelook upon that disease which kills its thousands nues, but in general Mississippians are a home on our Atlantic coast as much the worse evil of people, who have their own habits, and perhaps the two, wondering how any body will risk his know less of those of other States than is common life in a climate where the bills of mortality ex-in America. They are plain, simple, honest and hibit their hundreds of victims of that disease in every city. From October to June no climate can be more delightful; many of the inhabitants

industrious, and withal very hospitable. Many have 200 slaves and even a larger number is common, who are treated humanely. A few,

says Mr. Flint, who have acquired fortunes without much previous education or refinement, and measuring their own knowledge, acquirements and importance, by their intercourse with their slaves, are astonished to find, when they go abroad, that there are other requisites, in order to be sought after and received into the best circles, than the possession of money and slaves. Monticello is a pleasant and flourishing town on the Pearl river. Port Gibson we have already alluded to. Greenville, Woodville, and Winchester, are flourishing villages. Shieldsborough is on the west side of Bayou St. Louis, and a resort from New Orleans during the ravages of yellow fever.

ALEXANDER SCOTT. The following little circumstance, the particu lars of which I received from one of the parties engaged, will possibly amuse for the moment, and at the same time illustrate the humanity and noble disinterestedness of our late lamented hero Decatur, and form an interesting and true incident of one of the scenes during the late war. It was when the English Fleet lay off New London, among which were the Ramilies, Majestic, La Hogue, Bulwark, &c. &c. that a boat's crew belonging to the first ship, formed the resolute determination of freeing themselves from that oppressive yoke which galled so many noble necks, and forced them to raise their arms Jackson near the head of Pearl river has been against those, whom their hearts readily acknowrecently selected as the permanent seat of gov-ledged as brothers and friends, but which a cruel ernment. Being central and healthy, it will pro- and unjust policy forced them to oppose as bably become an important place. Warrenton enemies. on the banks of the Mississippi is a considerable village. Vicksburgh which has rapidly sprung up, is rising very fast in importance. It is a great point for the shipment of cotton, and steamboats regularly ply to New Orleans. It is on a shelving declivity of hills on the bank of the great river of the West, with the houses scattered on the terraces.

Natchez is incorporated as a city, and by far the largest place in the State. Romantically situated on the east bank of the river, about 280| miles above New Orleans, with a free navigation for vessels of great burden. Natchez is an important city. So many boats are always lying here, it may be supposed the population partakes of the character of its interior visitors, and access may readily be had in the lower town to all kinds of dissipation and gambling. The upper town is on a bluff 300 feet above the level of the river, from which a most romantic view is presented. The public buildings are handsome, the streets broad, and the whole place wears the aspect of a capital, where the people of the State resort for society and amusement. Being the great cotton mart of the vicinity, the streets in the fall months are barricaded with cotton, and if you arrive there from New Orleans you must be sure to carry accurate accounts of prices and quantities. The opulent planters who reside here, and many distinguished lawyers and physicians, give a tone and polish to the society, not met with in other sections. From this place may be seen the site of Fort Rosalie, the scene of Chateaubriand's wild romance of Atala. The churches are well attended. It has occasionally been visited by yellow fever, which circumstance has retarded its advance in population; it numbers now from 3 to 4000 inhabitants.

The smoking steamers, as they ascend and descend the river mostly round to here, and from the upper town add greatly to the picturesque appearance of the scene.

Mississippi was admitted into the Union in 1817. Near the city of Natchez, was situated the villages of the Natchez tribe of Indians now extinct, about whom so much interesting tradition remains in the histories of the Catholic missions. The first actual settlement was made at this point by the French about 1716, but the colony consisting of 500 persons was massacred by the natives in 1729.

Amongst those who were most obnoxious to this boat's crew, for his tyranny and cruelty, was a Master'sMate, by the name of Briley, and it so happened that this officer was ordered to take charge of the boat to row guard, the day formed by these men to effect their emancipation. They had previous to this circumstance settled every thing, and strange as it may appear, depended upon a boy of fifteen years of age, to conquer this formidable tyrant. Their hearts dilated with hope and anticipations of the most sanguine nature when they reflected, that a few short hours would place them upon the land of liberty. For to go, says my informant, we were resolved, be the consequence what it might-aye, even to the death itself.

There were six rowers belonging to the boat, and the lad Alexander Scott, who acted as coxswain. It was settled that the man who pulled the after oar, by name Benjamin Baker, (since a gunner's mate in our service) was to give the signal when little Scott was to show his mettle and free himself and boatmates from the British yoke.

At length the hour arrived. The Boatswain's Mate's shrill pipe and "array there, black cutter's array," sounded through the atmosphere of a clear October evening, and each man belonging to the boat again felicitated themselves upon their near approach to liberty, at the same time watching the boy's movements, to observe if he betrayed signs of reluctance or dismay at this critical juncture, but nothing of the kind was seen. They tossed their oars. Little Alexander with a silver star in the front of his hat to denote his station-jumped nimbly into the stern sheets-their victim and tyrant muffled in a cloak, seated himself-the word was given-"let fall, give way," and immediately the boat began to leave the Ramilies astern. They pulled on for some time in utter silence, the lad's eye fixed upon Baker, and the men "giving way smartly," that the distance between them and the ship might be the greater, and the chance of escape in their favor. At length the moment arrived, the sign was given, the boy gently drew the tiller from the rudder head, and as he sat immediately behind the officer, held it over his head —“ shall I!" exclaimed Alexander (in his anxiety, probably, too, some feelings of remorse touched his heart at the thoughts of the officers' death.) The

ALEXANDER SCOTT-PRINCESS S

451

signal was repeated and with all the force he "Give you up? no-no-you are a brave little could collect, he struck Briley over the head, fellow." Then turning to the rest of the men, he who being in a dose had not attended to the boy's added,"my lads, so long as that flag waves o'er exclamation, he started instantly from his seat my head, you shall receive its protection. You -staggered-Baker closed with and threw him should have retained the boat-common hu-and another blow from the tiller left them manity would have dictated this-but 1 hopemasters of the boat. They resumed their stations I trust the unfortunate man yet lives. No more and made for the land and in a very little time at present (observing one of the men about to were all safe on shore at Gales' Ferry-having speak.) I know how to make allowances for first secured their arms, a cutlass and pistol your feelings, placed in the situation you were each, they turned the boat adrift, in which still go forward, 1 will see you again to-morrow." remained the dead body, or apparently so, of the He now called the boy aside, interrogated him unfortunate Master's Mate. respecting the situation of the fleet--the size of their guns-their method of watching, &c. and finding his answers to correspond with his own notes, put such implicit confidence in his relations, that three nights after, in a heavy snow storm, the U. S. Sloop of war Hornet run the gauntlet, and passed clear through the enemy's fleet.

They made for the first house they discovered, which proved to be Gale's Tavern, and were met at the door by an American Middy, who, seeing the men armed, and having paid his respects too ardently at the shrine of Bacchus, retired in disorder, exclaiming gentlemen-gentlemen, New London is taken, the British are at the door! Upon the gentlemen appearing (who proved to be a party of officers at dinner)an explanation took place without bloodshed, and our heroes were regaled with a plentiful repast, received the congratulations of their new friends, and retired to rest half seas over.

The day after the event occurred, a flag of truce was received from Commodore Hardy to Decatur. He demanded the men and offered an exchange of 5 to 1 for the black cutter's crew, but Decatur told the officer, that to give up men who claimed the protection of the American flag, was more than his commission was worth, and in short, as he believed the greater part were Americans, he would protect, but he would not exchange them, were they to offer 50 for 1.

On the following morning an officer conducted the black cutter's crew on board the Frigate United States, Commodore Stephen Decatur. My informer states, that although now in the place they had risked so much for, they felt somewhat aback, surrounded by strangers requiring It is only necessary to state, that Decatur furexplanations which the men did not think proper nished these men with money and a passport for to give. Nine o'clock arrived-the Guard was New York, using them with great humanity. turned out, the side piped, and the Commodore They wished to enter on board the United advanced towards the capstan-where he re- States. This he would not permit on their own mained in conversation with the officers. The account. Alexander he attempted to keep by cutter's crew feeling diffident in their new situa-him, but the boy insisted upon following his shiption and likewise knowing the necessity of an mates-and he did so. interview and explanation, were at a stand how to act, when little Scott stepped forward and said he would speak to the Commodore.

The boy advanced to the mainmast, where uncovered he remained standing: at length the Commodore turned, looked at him, spoke to an officer, who bowed and with that placid expression of countenance for which he was so celebrated, beckoned the boy to advance. Making his best bow, he obeyed.

"What's your name, my lad?” "Alexander Scott, sir." "What induced you to desert your country's flag?"

Ill usage, Sir,-besides, it is not my country's flag. I am a Scotchman."

The commodore eyed him for a moment, then added, "did you kill your officer?"

From this time I lost sight of the boy, but no doubt he acted a pretty conspicuous part during the war, as he entered the service.

The present year, I accidentally learned that Alexander Scott was the Boatswain of one of our finest Sloops of war, upon the West India Station.

A travelling correspondent of the New York Mirror, now in Europe, gives the following overwrought description of two rare beauties whom he met at Florence. The pictures are evidently drawn by an enthusiast:

"The Princes S- may be twenty-four years of age. She is of the middle height, with a slight stoop in her shoulders, which is rather a grace than a fault. Her bust is exquisitely turned, her neck slender but full, her arms, hands, and feet, those of a Psyche. Her face is the abstraction of highborn Italian beautycalm, almost to indifference, of an indescribably glowing paleness-a complexion that would be "Oh! no, Sir, his head is too hard for a few alabaster, if it were not for the richness of the blows, like those we gave, to kill him."

"Not quite killed him, Sir, although Johnson there would have done so, (pointing to one of the men, all of whom, had by this time advanced)but I begged for him, Sir."

"Then he was not dead?"

"How so?"

"Because the men said he was a blockhead." "You are a wag I see and a young one too," said the Commodore laughing

Alexander seized this moment of saying, "you will not give us up, sir."

blood beneath, betrayed in lips whose depth of color and fineness of curve seem only too curiously beautiful to be the work of nature. Her eyes are dark and large, and must have had an indolent expression in her childhood, but are now the seat and soul of feeling. She dresses her hair with a kind of characteristic departure from the

mode, parting its glossy flakes on her brow with | dome, spires and pinnacles, and every sublime, nymph-like simplicity, a peculiarity which one regrets not to see in the too Parisian dress of her person. In her manners she is strikingly elegant, but without being absent; she seems to give an unconscious attention to what is about her, and to be gracious and winning without knowing or intending it, merely because she could not listen or speak otherwise. Her voice is sweet, and in her own Italian, mellow and soft to a degree inconceivable by those who have not heard this delicious language spoken in its native land. With all these advantages, and a look of pride that nothing could insult, there is an expression in her beautiful face that reminds you of her sex and its temptations, and prepares you fully for the history which you may hear from the first woman that stands at your elbow.