n of us in a miserable wagon, when one "new comer" asked his
neighbor, "What is the cause of these confounded _humps_ in the roads?"

"They are hog-wallows," responded the one interrogated, in a pompous
tone, as if proud to display his superior knowledge of the land into
which both the speakers had but recently made their advent.

"Hog-wallows!" exclaimed the man, more in doubt than ever by his
newly-acquired knowledge, "what makes so many of them then?"

"Why, you see when the great rains come on," commenced the "wise 'un,"
"the country gets all afloat, and when it begins to dry off a little,
the wild hogs come by thousands, and roll and flop about in the mud, and
that makes all these pitch-holes, which they call hog-wallows."

"Why don't they kill the hogs and eat 'em, and not have 'em rooting up
the roads in this awful way?" asked greeny number one.

"Lord! they do kill and kill, I'm told," said greeny number two; "but
Texas is such an almighty rich country that all sorts o' critters and
things grow up spontaneously everywheres."

"Creation! but why don't they build fences alongside their roads then!"

"O, they never make fences in Texas; first you'd know a hurricane would
come tearing along, and land them all in the Gulf of Mexico, quicker
than you could say 'Old Kentuck.'"

"Stars and gaiters! what a dreadful dangerous country is this we have
got into!" said number two, with a frightened aspect, as they dropped
the subject and relapsed into silence, while it was evident, from their
anxious visages, that their minds were harassed and disturbed, by
visions of hog-wallows, hurricanes and spontaneous animals.

We have heard other and more philosophical hypotheses as to the origin
of these uneven roads. Some suppose the country was once an inland sea,
and these ridges were occasioned by the continuous action of the waves;
others suppose the intense heat of the sun on the soft, clayey soil,
caused it to crack and spread asunder, leaving the surface broken and
ridgy. This latter is the more generally received opinion, we believe.

Here's half a chapter on hog-wallows, the unpoetical things! but as
utilitarians maintain nothing is made but what subserves some purpose,
we premise these humpy roads were made for the benefit of gouty men,
dyspeptic women, and love-sick lads and lasses. Thus disposed of, "we
resume the thread of our narrative," as novel-writers say. Our pen waxes
wild and intractable, whenever we get