statements relative to the prosperity or advantages
of any specified locality. Every man assures you that the town or the
county where he resides, or where he is interested, is the best and
the richest within a hundred miles. To an impartial observer, lying
appears to be the only personal accomplishment in a new country. I
presume those who wish to encourage Southern migration will be ready
to set forth all the advantages (but none of the disadvantages) of
their own localities.

Having fully determined where to go and what to do, having selected
his route of travel, and ascertained, as near as possible, what
will be needed on the journey, the emigrant will next consider his
financial policy. No general rule can be given. In most cases it is
better not to take a large amount of money at starting. To many this
advice will be superfluous. Bills of exchange are much safer to carry
than ready cash, and nearly as convenient for commercial transactions.
Beyond an amount double the estimated expenses of his journey, the
traveler will usually carry very little cash.

For the present, few persons should take their wives and children to
the interior South, and none should do so on their first visit. Many
houses have been burned or stripped of their furniture, provisions are
scarce and costly, and the general facilities for domestic happiness
are far from abundant. The conveniences for locomotion in that region
are very poor, and will continue so for a considerable time. A man can
"rough it" anywhere, but he can hardly expect his family to travel on
flat cars, or on steamboats that have neither cabins nor decks, and
subsist on the scanty and badly-cooked provisions that the Sunny South
affords. By all means, I would counsel any young man on his way to the
South not to elope with his neighbor's wife. In view of the condition
of the country beyond Mason and Dixon's line, an elopement would prove
his mistake of a lifetime.

I have already referred to the resources of Missouri. The State
possesses greater mineral wealth than any other State of the Union,
east of the Rocky Mountains. Her lead mines are extensive, easily
worked, very productive, and practically inexhaustible. The same may
be said of her iron mines. Pilot Knob and Iron Mountain are nearly
solid masses of ore, the latter being a thousand feet in height.
Copper mines have been opened and worked, and tin has been found in
several localities. The soil of the Northern port