Read Ebook: The South-West by a Yankee. In Two Volumes. Volume 2 by Ingraham J H Joseph Holt

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Characteristic scenery of the Mississippi--Card playing--Sabbath on board a steamboat--An old sinner--A fair Virginian--Inquisitiveness of Yankee ladies--Southern ladies--A general--Ellis's cliffs--Mines--Atala --Natchez in the distance--Duelling ground--Fort Rosalie--Forests--A traveller's remark. Page 9

Land at the Lev?e--African porters--First impression of passing travellers--"Natchez under the Hill"--A dizzy road--A rapid descent --View from the summit--Fine scenery in the vicinity--Reservoir--A tawny Silenus--A young Apollo--Warriors "hors du combat"--Indian females--Mississippian backwoodsman--Mansion House. 17

A northerner's idea of the south-west--Natchez and health--"Broadway" of Natchez--Street scenes--Private carriages--Auction store--Sale of a slave--Manner in which slaves view slavery--Shopping--Fashion-- Southern gentlemen--Merchants--Planters--Whip bearers--Planters' families. 27

First impressions--American want of taste in public buildings-- Agricultural bank--Masonic hall--Natchez academy--Education of Mississippians--Cemetery--Theatre--Presbyterian church--Court-house --Episcopal church--Light-house--Hotels--Planters, Houses and galleries--Jefferson hotel--Cotton square. 36

Society of Natchez--New-England adventurers--Their prospects--The Yankee sisterhood--Southern bachelors--Southern society--Woman--Her past and present condition--Single combats--Fireside pleasures unknown--A change--Town and country--Characteristic discrepancies. 45

A Sabbath morning in Natchez--A ramble to the bluff--Louisiana forests--Natchez under the Hill--Slaves--Holidays--Negroes going to church--Negro street coteries--Market day--City hotel--Description of the landing--Rail-way--A rendezvous--Neglected Sabbath-bell. 52

Reminiscences--An aged pastor--Streets of Natchez on the Sabbath-- Interior of a church--Church music--Pulpit oratory--A New England scene--Peculiar state of society--Wealthy ministers--Clerical planters--Health of Mississippi--Episcopalian church--Catholics-- The French language--Catholic education--Methodists--An alarm bell and slaves. 62

Catholic burying-ground--Evening in a grave yard--Sounds of a busy city--Night--Disturbers of the dead--Dishumation of human remains --Mourning cards--A funeral--Various modes of riding--Yankee horsemanship--Mississippian horsemen--Pacers--A plantation road --Residence--The grave--Slaves weeping for their master!--New cemetery. 73

National diversities of character--Diversities of language-- Provincialisms--A plantation and negroes--Natchez bar--A youthful judge--Physicians--Clergymen--Merchants, &c. &c.--A southern mania--"Washing"--Tobacco--Value of cotton planting and statistics --An easy "way to wealth." 84

An excursion--A planter's gallery--Neglect of grounds--Taste and economy--Mississippi forests--The St. Catharine--Cotton fields--Worm fences--Hedges--The pride of China--The magnolia tree and flower-- Plantation roads--White cliffs--General view of a plantation. 96

Horticulture--Chateaubriand--A Mississippi garden and plants--A novel scene--Sick slaves--Care of masters for their sick--Shamming --Inertness of negroes--Burial of slaves--Negro mothers--A nursery --Negro village on the Sabbath--Religious privileges of slaves-- Marriages--Negro "passes"--The advantages of this regulation-- Anecdote of a runaway. 113

Preparations for a deer hunt--A sailor, a planter, and an author--A deer driver--"Stands" for deer--The hunting ground--The hunt-- Ellis's cliff--Silver mine--An hypothesis--Alluvial formation of the lower valley of the Mississippi--Geological descriptions of the south-west. 132

Geography of Mississippi--Ridges and bottoms--The Mississippi at its efflux--Pine and table lands--General features of the state-- Bayous--Back-water of rivers--Springs--St. Catharine's harp-- Bankston springs--Mineral waters of this state--Petrifactions-- Quartz crystals--"Thunderbolts"--Rivers--The Yazoo and Pearl. 146

Topography--Natchez--Washington--Seltzertown--Greenville--Port Gibson--Raymond--Clinton--Southern villages--Vicksburg--Yeomen of Mississippi--Jackson--Vernon--Satartia--Benton--Amsterdam--Brandon and other towns--Monticello--Manchester--Rankin--Grand Gulf--Rodney --Warrenton--Woodville--Pinckneyville--White Apple village. 159

Coloured population of the south--Mississippi saddle and horse caparisons--Ride through the city--Chain gang--Lynch law--Want of a penitentiary--Difficulties in consequence--Summary justice--Boating on the Mississippi--Chain gang and the runaway--Suburbs--Orphan asylum--A past era. 182

Slave mart--Scene within--File of negroes--"Trader"--Negro feelings --George and his purchaser--George's old and new wife--Female slaves--The intellect of the negro--A theory--An elderly lady and her slaves--Views of slaves upon their condition--Separation of kindred among slaves. 192

XL.

Towns of Mississippi--Naming estates--The influence of towns on the social relations of the planters--Southern refinement--Colleges --Oakland--Clinton--Jefferson--History of the latter--Collegiate system of instruction--Primary departments--Quadrennial classes. 204

Indian mounds--Their origin and object--Tumuli near Natchez--Skulls and other remains--Visit to the fortifications or mounds at Seltzertown--Appearance and description of the mounds--Their age-- Reflections--History of the Natchez. 215

Slavery in the south-west--Southern feelings--Increase of slaves --Virginia--Mode of buying slaves, and slave-traders--Mode of transportation by sea--Arrival at the mart--Mode of life in the market--Transportation by land--Privileges of slaves--Conduct of planters toward their negroes--Anecdotes--Negro traders--Their origin. 231

THE SOUTH WEST.

Characteristic scenery of the Mississippi--Card-playing-- Sabbath on board a steamboat--An old sinner--A fair Virginian--Inquisitiveness of Yankee ladies--Southern ladies--A general--Ellis's cliffs--Mines--Atala--Natchez in the distance--Duelling ground--Fort Rosalie--Forests--A traveller's remark.

The rich and luxuriant character of the scenery, which charms and attracts the eye of the traveller as he ascends the Mississippi from New-Orleans to Baton Rouge, is now changed. A broad, turbid flood, rolling through a land of vast forests, alone meets the eye, giving sublime yet wild and gloomy features to the scene. On looking from the cabin window, I see only a long, unbroken line of cotton trees, with their pale green foliage, as dull and void of interest as a fog-bank. The opposite shore presents the same appearance; and so it is, with the occasional relief of a plantation and a "landing place," comprising a few buildings, the whole distance to Natchez. A wretched cabin, now and then, varies the wild appearance of the banks--the home of some solitary wood-cutter. Therefore, as I cannot give you descriptions of things abroad, I must give you an account of persons on board.

"It is indeed, madam."

Ellis's cliffs, which present the wildest and most romantic scenery upon the Mississippi below St. Louis, are now in sight. They rise proudly from the river, and compared with the tame features of the country, are invested with the dignity of mountains. They exhibit a white perpendicular face to the river, and are about one hundred and fifty feet in height. Gold and silver ore have been lately found in the strata of the cliffs; but not in sufficient purity and quantity to induce the proprietors to excavate in search of them. Here are discovered the first stones--small pebbles of recent formation--that are seen on ascending the river. The surrounding country, which is nearly on a level with the summit of the cliffs, recedes pleasantly undulating from the river, rich with highly cultivated cotton plantations, and ornamented with the elegant residences of the planters. It is said that few countries in the world possess a more beautifully diversified surface--or one more pleasantly distributed in hills and valleys. In the vicinity also, of this romantic spot, Chateaubriand has laid some of the scenes of his wild and splendid fiction "Atala."

We are now within twenty miles of Natchez. The river is here very circuitous, making the distance much greater than by land. The shores continue to exhibit the peculiarly gloomy and inhospitable features which, with the occasional exception of a high bluff, plantation or village, they present nearly to the mouth of the Ohio. The loud and startling report of a cannon in the bows of the boat, making her stagger and tremble through every beam, is the signal that our port is in sight--a pile of gray and white cliffs with here and there a church steeple, a roof elevated above its summit, and a light-house hanging on the verge! At the foot of the bluffs are long straggling lines of wooden buildings, principally stores and store-houses; the Lev?e is fringed with flat boats and steamers, and above all, tower majestically the masts of two or three ships. The whole prospect from the deck presents an interesting scene of commercial life and bustle. But this is not Natchez! The city proper is built upon the summit level, the tops of whose buildings and trees can be seen from the boat, rising higher than the cliff. The ascent from the lower town, or as it is commonly designated, "under the hill", is by an excavated road, of moderate elevation. The whole appearance of the place from the deck is highly romantic. On our left, opposite Natchez, is Vidalia, in Louisiana, a pleasant village of a few houses, built on one street parallel with the river. Here, in a pleasant grove above the town, is the "field of honour," where gentlemen from Mississippi occasionally exchange leaden cards--all in the way of friendship.

On our right, a few hundred yards below Natchez, crowning a noble eminence, stand the ruins of Fort Rosalie, celebrated in the early history of this country. Its garrison early in the last century was massacred, by the Natchez tribe, to a single man, who escaped by leaping from the precipice. Here is the principal scene of Chateaubriand's celebrated romance. The position of the fort, in a military point of view, commanding, as it does, a great extent of river and country, is well chosen. Beyond the fort, a peep at rich woods, green hills, and tasteful country-seats, is agreeably refreshing to the eye, so long accustomed to gaze upon melancholy forests, and dead flats covered with cane-brakes. Indeed, the mournful character of the forests along the Mississippi, is calculated to fill the mind with gloom. The long black moss, well known at the north as the "Carolina moss", hangs in immense fringes from every limb, frequently enveloping the whole tree in its sombre garb. The forests thus clothed present a dismal yet majestic appearance. As the traveller gazes upon them his mind partakes of their funereal character, and the imagination is ready to assent to the strong and highly poetical remark of a gentleman on board, with whom I was promenading the "guard," who observed that it would seem that the DEITY was dead, and that nature had clothed herself in mourning.

Land at the Lev?e--African porters--First impression of passing travellers--"Natchez under the Hill"--A dizzy road --A rapid descent--View from the summit--Fine scenery in the vicinity--Reservoir--A tawny Silenus--A young Apollo --Warriors "hors du combat"--Indian females--Mississippian backwoodsmen--Mansion House.

Since the date of my last letter, a period sufficiently long to enable me to make my observations with correctness has elapsed; and from memoranda collected during the interval, I shall prepare this and subsequent letters from this place.

We landed last evening at the Lev?e, amid the excitement, noise, and confusion which always attend the arrival or departure of a steamer in any place. But here the tumult was varied and increased by the incessant jabbering, hauling, pulling, kicking and thumping, of some score or two of ebony-cheeked men and urchins, who were tumbling over each other's heads to get the first trunk.

"Trunk, massa--trunk! I take you baggage".

"You get out, for a nigger!" exclaimed a tall, strapping fellow, as black as night, to his brother ebony. "I'm the gemman, massa, what care de trunk." "Dis nigger, him know noffing, massa--I'm what's always waits on um gentlemans from de boats!" roared another; and stooping to take one of the handles, the other was instantly grappled by a rival, and both giving a simultaneous jerk, the subject of the contest flew violently from their hands, and was instantly caught up by the first "gemman", and borne off in triumph. This little by-play was acted, with variations, in every part of the cabin, where there was either a gentleman or a trunk to form the subject.

On landing, there was yet another trial of the tympanum.

"Carriage, massa--mighty bad hill to walk up!" was vociferated on all sides; and

"No, no, no!" was no argument with them for a cessation of attack; denial only made them more obstinate; and, like true soldiers, they seemed to derive courage from defeat.

Forcing my way through the dingy crowd--for four out of five of them were black, and, "by the same token", as ragged as Falstaff's regiment, of shirtless memory--I followed my athletic pioneer; who, with my heavy baggage poised accurately upon his head, moved as rapidly and carelessly along the thronged Lev?e as though he carried no weight but his own thick cranium. On looking round me for a moment, on landing, I was far from agreeably impressed with the general appearance of the buildings. This part of the town is not properly Natchez--and strangers passing up and down the river, who have had the opportunity of seeing only this place, have, without dreaming of the beautiful city over their heads, gone on their way, with impressions very inaccurate and unfavourable. These impressions, derived only, but justly, from this repulsive spot, have had a tendency to depreciate the city, and fasten upon it a bad name, which it is very far from meriting. Like the celebrated "Five Points," in New-York, "Natchez under the Hill," as it has been aptly named, has extended its fame throughout the United States, in wretched rhyme and viler story. For many years it has been the nucleus of vice upon the Mississippi. But, for two or three years past, the establishment of respectable mercantile houses, and an excellent hotel, combined with an efficient police, and a spirit of moral reform among the citizens, has, in a great measure, redeemed the place--changed its repulsive character and cancelled its disgraceful name. Though now on the high way of reform, there is still enough of the cloven-hoof visible, to enable the stranger to recognise that its former reputation was well earned.

On arriving at the summit of the hill, I delayed a moment, for the double purpose of taking breath and surveying the scene spread out around me. Beneath lay the roofs of warehouses, stores, and dwellings, scattered over a flat, sandy surface, which was bordered, on the water side, by hundreds of up-country flat-boats, laden with the produce of the rich farming states bordering the Ohio and "Upper Mississippi." Lower down, steamers were taking in and discharging freight; while the mingled sounds of the busy multitude rose like the hum of a hive upon the ear. Immediately opposite me lay two ships, which, with their towering masts, gay flags, and dark hulls, agreeably relieved the otherwise long and unbroken line of boats. To the north the river spreads its noble bosom till lost in the distance; while the continuous line of cliffs, extending along its shore like a giant wall, seem to speak in the language of power, "thus far shalt thou flow and no farther, and here shall thy proud waves be stayed." To the south, the view is confined by the near projection of the obtruding cliffs. Yet the river stretches boldly out many miles on its course toward the sea, till lost to sight within the bosom of the distant forests which bound the southern horizon. To the west, the eye travels over the majestic breadth of the river, here a mile wide, and rests for a moment upon level and richly cultivated fields beyond, a quiet village and noble forests, which spread away to the west like a vast sea of waving foliage, till they blend with the bending sky, forming a level and unbroken horizon. Turning from this scene of grandeur and beauty to the east, Natchez, mantled with rich green foliage like a garment, with its handsome structures and fine avenues, here a dome and there a tower, lies immediately before me. It is the very contrast to its straggling namesake below. The city proper consists of six streets, at right angles with the river, intersected by seven others of the same length, parallel with the stream. The front, or first parallel street, is laid out about one hundred yards back from the verge of the bluff, leaving a noble green esplanade along the front of the city, which not only adds to its beauty, but is highly useful as a promenade and parade ground. Shade trees are planted along the border, near the verge of the precipice, beneath which are placed benches, for the comfort of the lounger. From this place the eye commands one of the most extensive prospects to be found on the Mississippi. To a spectator, standing in the centre of this broad, natural terrace, the symmetrical arrangement of the artificial scenery around him is highly picturesque and pleasing.

On his right, to the south, a noble colonnaded structure, whose heavy appearance is gracefully relieved by shrubbery, parterres, and a light latticed summer-house, crowning a gentle eminence in the rear, and half suspended over the precipice, strikes his eye with a fine effect. From this admirable foreground, gently sloping hills, with here and there a white dwelling, half concealed in foliage, spread away into the country. Between this edifice and the forest back ground rise the romantic ruins of Fort Rosalie, now enamelled with a rich coating of verdure. On his left, at the northern extremity of the esplanade, upon the beautiful eminence, gradually yet roundly swelling away from the promenade, stands another private residence, nearly resembling and directly opposite to the other, its lofty colonnades glancing in the sun--a magnificent garden spreading out around it, luxuriant with foliage--diversified with avenues and terraces, and adorned with grottoes and summer-houses. Imagine these handsome residences, flanking the city, and forming the extreme northern and southern terminations of the broad terrace before the town, with the mighty flood of the Mississippi rolling some hundred feet beneath you--the dark forests of Louisiana stretching away to infinity in the west, with Natchez--its streets alive with promenaders, gay equipages and horsemen--immediately before you, and you will form some idea of this beautiful city and its environs from this point. But as the spot upon which the town is built, originally a cluster of green hills, has been, by levelling and filling, converted into a smooth surface, with a very slight inclination to the verge of the cliff, a small portion only of the city is visible. The buildings on the front street face the river, and, with the exception of one or two private houses, with galleries and shrubbery, reminding one of the neat and beautiful residences on the "coast," possess no peculiar interest. The town is entered from the parade by rude bridges at the termination of each street, spanning a dry, dilapidated brick aqueduct of large dimensions, which has been constructed along the whole front of the city, but is now, from some unknown cause, suffered to fall to ruin. It was probably intended as a reservoir and conductor of the water which, after heavy rains, rushes violently down the several streets of the city.

On the opposite side of the way was another of a different character, but not less interesting. Seated in a circle around their bread and cheese, were half a dozen as rough, rude, honest-looking countrymen from the back part of the state, as you could find in the nursery of New-England's yeomanry. They are small farmers--own a few negroes--cultivate a small tract of land, and raise a few bales of cotton, which they bring to market themselves. Their carts are drawn around them forming a barricade to their camp, for here, as is customary among them, instead of putting up at taverns, they have encamped since their arrival. Between them and their carts are their negroes, who assume a "cheek by jowl" familiarity with their masters, while jokes, to season their homely fare, accompanied by astounding horse-laughs, from ivory-lined mouths that might convey a very tolerable idea of the crater of Etna, pass from one group to the other, with perfect good will and a mutual contempt for the nicer distinctions of colour.

FOOTNOTES:

A northerner's idea of the south-west--Natchez and health --"Broadway" of Natchez--Street scenes--Private carriages --Auction store--Sale of a slave--Manner in which slaves view slavery--Shopping--Fashion--Southern gentlemen-- Merchants--Planters--Whip bearers--Planters' families.

To the northerner, to whom every verdant hill is a magazine of health, every mountain torrent and limpid river are leaping and flowing with life, who receives a new existence as the rays of the summer's sun fall upon his brow, and whose lungs expand more freely and whose pulse beats more strongly under the influence of every breeze, Natchez has been, till within a very short period, associated with miasma and marshes over which the yellow fever, like a demon king, held undisputed sway. This idea is not without foundation. Like New-Orleans, this city has been the grave of many young and ambitious adventurers. Pestilence has here literally "walked at noonday." The sun, the source and preserver of life and health, in its path over this devoted city, has "become black as sackcloth," and "the moon that walketh in brightness," shedding her calm and gentle light upon the earth, has been "turned into blood," poisoning the atmosphere with exhalations of death, and converting the green earth into a sepulchre. But this is a record of the past. The angel of vengeance has gone by, leaving health and peace to exercise their gentle dominion over this late theatre of his terrible power. No city in our happy country is more blessed with health than is now, this so often depopulated place. For several years past its catalogue of mortality has been very much smaller than that of many towns in Vermont and Maine, containing the same number of inhabitants. Even that insatiable destroyer, the Asiatic cholera, which has strewn both hemispheres with the bones of its victims, has passed over this city without leaving a trace of his progress, except among the blacks and a few imprudent strangers. Not a citizen fell a victim to it. If any place demanded a dispensation of mercy it was this--if past misfortunes can challenge an exemption from farther infliction.

"You know dat nigger, they gwine to sell, George?"

"No, he field nigger; I nebber has no 'quaintance wid dat class."

"Well, nor no oder gentlemens would. But he's a likely chap. How much you tink he go for?"--"I a'n't much 'quainted wid de price of such kind o' peoples. My master paid seven hundred dollar for me, when I come out from ole Wirginney--dat nigger fetch five hun'red dollar I reckon."

"You sell for only seben hun'red dollars!" exclaimed the gentleman upon the coach-seat, drawing himself up with pride, and casting a contemptuous glance down upon his companion: "my massa give eight hundred and fifty silver dollars for me. Gom! I tink dat you was more 'spectable nigger nor dat." At this turn of the conversation the negro was struck off at seven hundred, at which the colloquist of the same price became highly chagrined; but, stepping upon the stirrup, and raising himself above the crowd, that he might see "the fool massa what give so much for a miserable good-for-nothing nigger, not wort' his corn," consoled himself with the reflection that the buyer was "a man what made no more dan tirty bale cotton; while my master make tree hun'red, and one of de firs' gemmans too!"

Thus, though denied the privileges of his desired "caste," by the estimation of his personal value, he aspired to it by a conclusive argument, in the eye of a negro, viz. his master's wealth and rank in society. Can individuals, who are thus affected at the sale of their fellow-men, and who view their state of bondage in this light, feel deeply their own condition, or be very sensitive upon the subject of equal rights? Yet thus do negroes view slavery. Thus do they converse upon it; and are as tenacious of the limited privileges, which, like flowers, are entwined among the links of their moral bondage. There is one, proud that his chain weighs down a few more gold pieces than that of his fellow, while the latter is in no less degree mortified at the deficiency in weight of his own. Do such men "pine in bondage" and "sigh for freedom?" Freedom, of which they know nothing, and cannot, therefore, feel the deprivation; a freedom of which they have heard only, as the orientals of their fabled genii, but to which generally they no more think of aspiring than the subjects of the caliph to the immortality and winged freedom of these imaginary beings. These two negroes I have seen repeatedly since, and am assured that they are as intelligent, well informed, and "respectable," as any of their class; none of whom, allowing a very few exceptions, entertain higher or different views of their state as slaves, or of their rank in the scale of human beings. Do not mistake me: I am no advocate for slavery; but neither am I a believer in that wild Garrisonian theory, which, like a magician's wand, is at once to dissolve every link that binds the slave to his master, and demolish at one blow a system that has existed, still gaining in extent and stability, for centuries. The familiar French proverb, "imagination gallops while the judgment advances only on a walk," is most applicable to these visionary theorists who would build Rome in a day.

There are several public buildings in this street of which I shall make more particular mention hereafter. My object now is merely to give you some idea of things as, when presented to it in the novel hues of "first impressions," they strike the eye of a stranger.

First impressions--American want of taste in public buildings --Agricultural bank--Masonic hall--Natchez academy--Education of Mississippians--Cemetery--Theatre--Presbyterian church-- Court-house--Episcopal church--Light-house--Hotels--Planters' Houses and galleries--Jefferson hotel--Cotton square.

First impressions, if preserved, before the magnifying medium of novelty through which they are seen becomes dissipated, are far more lively and striking than the half-faded scenes which memory slowly and imperfectly brings up from the past. Yet, if immediately recorded, while the colours are fresh and glowing, there is danger of drawing too much upon the imagination in the description, and exaggerating the picture. On the other hand, if the impressions are suffered to become old and faint, invention is too apt to be called in unconsciously, to fill up and complete the half-forgotten and defective sketch. The medium is safer and more accurate. A period of time sufficiently long should be suffered to elapse, that the mind, by subsequent observation, may be enabled to correct and digest its early impressions, exercise its judgment without a bias, and from more matured experience, be prepared to form its opinions, and make its comparisons with certainty. How far I have attained this desirable medium, the general character and justice of my descriptions must alone determine.

The deficient perception of architectural beauty, in the composition of American minds, has frequently, and with some truth, been a subject upon which foreign tourists love to exercise their castigating pens--weapons always wielded fearlessly and pitilessly against every thing on this side of the Atlantic. The very small number of handsome public buildings in the United States, and the total contempt for order or style which, they evince, would give a very plausible foundation for this animadversion, did not Americans redeem their reputation in this point, by the pure and correct taste they universally exhibit in the construction of their private residences. Herein, they are not surpassed by any other nation. Natchez, like most of the minor cities of this country, cannot boast of any public buildings remarkable for harmonious conformity to the rules or orders of architecture. They are, nevertheless, well deserving of notice, highly ornamental to the city, and reflect honour upon the public spirit of its citizens. The Agricultural bank is unquestionably the finest structure in the city. It has been erected very recently on the south side of Main-street, presenting a noble colonnaded front, of the modernized Grecian style; being built somewhat after the model of the United States bank at Philadelphia; though brick and stucco are here substituted for marble, and heavy pillars for the graceful column. It is entered from the street by a broad and spacious flight of steps, leading to its lofty portico, from which three large doors give admission into its vast hall, decidedly the finest room south or west of Washington. The whole structure is a chaste and beautiful specimen of architecture. It is partially enclosed by a light, iron railing. To a stranger this edifice is a striking object, and, contrasted with the buildings of less pretension around it, will call forth his warmest admiration. The other banks, of which there are, in all, three, including a branch of the United States bank, are plain brick buildings, undistinguished from the adjoining stores, except by a colder and more unfurnished appearance, and the absence of signs. A short distance above this fine building is the Masonic Hall; a large square edifice, two lofty stories in height. Its front is beautifully stuccoed, and ornamented with white pilasters. The hall is in the second story; a large, plain, vaulted apartment, almost entirely destitute of the splendid furniture and rich decorations which characterise such places at the north. Here masonry, with its imposing forms, ceremonies, and honours, is yet preserved in all its pristine glory. The first story of the building is used as an academy--the only one in this state. It is a well-conducted institution, and its pupils are thoroughly instructed by competent officers, who are graduates of northern colleges, as are most of the public and private instructors of this state. The number of students is generally large. Those who are destined for professional life, after completing their preparatory course here, usually enter some one of the colleges at the north. Yale, Princeton, and Harvard annually receive several from this state; either from this academy or from under the hands of the private tutors, who are dispersed throughout the state, and from whom a great majority of the planters' sons receive their preparatory education. But on the subject of education in this country, I shall speak more fully hereafter. I could not pass by this institution, which reflects so much honour upon the city, without expressing my gratification at its flourishing condition and high character. It is the more gratifying from being unexpected at the south, which, till very lately, has been wholly dependent upon the northern seminaries or private institutions for the education of her sons. To see here an institution that cannot be surpassed by any of the same rank in other states, must not only be pleasing to the friends of education, but particularly so to the citizens of this state, to whom it is ably demonstrated, by the success of this academy, that literature is not an exotic, though its germs may heretofore have been transplanted from another soil. There is a female seminary also in the city, which, though of a very respectable character, is not so celebrated and flourishing as many others in the state.

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