are,
for the most part, extravagant stories, caricature descriptions, police
reports, infidel vulgarity and profanity, and, in short, of just such
matter as unprincipled, selfish, and bad men know to be best fitted to
pamper the appetites and passions of the populace, and so uproot and
destroy all that is valuable and sacred in our literary, civil, and
religious institutions.

"A spirit of ultraism seems to pervade the whole community. The language
of Milton's archdevil 'Evil, be thou my good,' is the creed of modern
reformers, or, in other words--_anything for a change_. What is to come
of all this, I have not wisdom even to guess. It is an age of
_transition_, and whether you and I live to see the elements of the
moral and political world at rest, is, I think, extremely doubtful. But
our consolation should be that the Lord reigns--that he loves good order
and truth better than we do--and, blessed be his name, he is able to
establish and maintain them.

"This is the anniversary of our national independence, and ought to be
celebrated with thanksgiving and praise to God. Alas! how it is
perverted."

_22d_. Mr. Green, of the Missionary Rooms, Boston, again writes about
the Mackinack Mission. "I believe that my views accord very nearly with
your own, as to what it would be desirable to do, provided the suitable
persons could be procured to perform the work. There is a great
deficiency in well qualified laborers. We can generally obtain persons
who will answer our purpose, if we will wait long enough, but it often
happens, in the mean time, that the circumstances so change that the
proposed plan becomes of doubtful expediency. We have been continually
on the lookout, since Mr. Ferry left Mackinack, for some one to fill his
place, but as yet have found no one, and have no one in view."

_28th_. Mr. W. Fred. Williams, of Buffalo, communicates information
respecting three boxes of specimens of natural history, which I lost in
the fall of 1821. "My conversation with you having made me acquainted
with the fact that you once lost two boxes of minerals and one of
shells, I have been rather on the lookout for information respecting
them, and am now able to inform you as to what became of them, and to
correct the statement which I made (as I said) on supposition of the
manner in which Edgerton became possessed of them.

"In the spring of 1832, a stranger from Troy or Albany came to Mr.
Edgerton, at Utica, and told him that h