ve, notwithstanding, induced several
English families to settle here. Their houses are built of brick, and
their gardens and farms are laid out and fenced tastefully.

After traversing the wood, we at length came in sight of the Mississippi,
which is here about three quarters of a mile broad. There is a steam
ferry-boat stationed at this point, (opposite St. Louis), the construction
of which is rather singular. It is built nearly square, having in the
middle a house containing two spacious apartments, and on each side decks,
on which stand horses, oxen, waggons and carriages of every description.

St. Louis is built on a bluff bank. The _principal_ streets rise one above
the other, running parallel with the river; the houses are mostly built of
stone, the bank being entirely composed of that material, the walls
whitewashed, and the roofs covered with tin: from the opposite side it
presents a very gay appearance. The ascent from the water's edge to the
back of the town is considerable, but regular. The streets intersect each
other at right angles, as do those of most American towns. They are much
too narrow, having been laid down and built on from a plan designed by the
Spanish commandant, previous to the Missouri territory becoming part of
the United States. The population is estimated at six thousand, composed
of Creole-French, Irish, and Americans.

St. Louis must, at some future period, become decidedly the most important
town in the western country, from its local and relative situation. It is
seated on the most favourable point below the mouths of two noble rivers,
the Missouri and the Illinois,[5] having at its back an immense tract of
fertile country, and open and easy communication with the finest parts of
the western and north-western territories. These advantages, added to the
constant and uninterrupted intercourse which it enjoys with the southern
ports, must ultimately make St. Louis a town of wealth and magnitude.

We visited General Clarke's museum, which chiefly contains Indian costumes
and implements of war, with some minerals and fossils, a portion of which
he collected while on the expedition to the Rocky mountains with Lewis;
and also, two sods of good black turf, from the bogs of Allen, in Ireland.
A sight which was quite exhilarating, and reminded me so strongly of the
fine odour which exhales from the products of illicit distillation, that
guagers and potteen, like the phantoms of hallucination, w