"

I had never regarded these manuscripts, gleaned from the lodges with no
little pains-taking, as mere materials to be worked up by the literary
loom, although the work should be done by one of the most popular and
fascinating American pens. I feared that the roughness, which gave them
their characteristic originality and Doric truthfulness, would be
smoothed and polished off to assume the shape of a sort of Indo-American
series of tales; a cross between the Anglo-Saxon and the Algonquin.

_28th_. Switzerland enters the missionary field of America for the
purpose of improving the condition of the aborigines. This impressed me
as well. We leave the red man sitting in every want, at our doors, and
rush to India. It is true, that field counts its millions, where we can
thousands. But an appeal to the missionary record shows, if I am not
greatly mistaken, that the proportionate number of converts from an
Indian tribe is greater than that of the tribes of Asia, and that an
infinitely greater sum is expended by our churches for every convert to
Christianity made among the heathen of Asia than of America. The Rev.
Henry Olivier, from the Evangelical Society in Switzerland, visited me,
this day, with a companion in his labors. He detailed to me his plans.
It is his design to select the Dacotah tribe, on the Upper Mississippi,
as the object of his exertions.

_June 2d_. Commenced setting new pickets in front of the agency lot, and
removing the old ones of white cedar, which, tradition says, have stood
near half a century.

_15th_. The editors of the Knickerbocker Magazine (Clark and Edson)
solicit contributions to its pages. This periodical has always
maintained a respectable rank, and appears destined to hold on its
course. I am too far out of the world to judge well. The conflict of
periodicals appears to increase; but I do not think that the number of
sound readers, who seek useful knowledge, keeps pace with it. I think
not. We seem to be on the eve of a light and trifling kind of
literature, which is hashed up with condiments for weak stomachs.

_July 2d_. The weather, for the entire month of June, was most
delightful and charming. On one of the latter days of the month the
fine and large steamer "Michigan" came into the harbor, with a brilliant
throng of visitors, among the number the Secretary of War (Gen. Cass)
and his daughter. The arrival put joy and animation into every
countenance. The Secretary reviewed the tro