h
horses and cattle that never smell corn keep perfectly fat all
winter. The climate is delightful, the nights pleasant, a fine
south breeze in summer continually playing over the face of our
broad prairies, and the atmosphere so pure and invigorating, that
it is more conducive to good health to sleep out in the open air
than to sleep in-doors. There is something so attractive in this
section of country, that those who live here a short time are
seldom satisfied to live anywhere else.

Our citizens are generally intelligent, enterprising, industrious,
religious, sober, and, _laying politics aside_, honest.--_Texas
Almanac_.

COMAL COUNTY.

BY THE ASSESSOR.

Mostly settled by Germans. In this county there are in cultivation
600 acres in cotton, 15,000 acres in corn, 500 acres in wheat. The
acre yields 500 pounds of clean cotton, 40 bushels of corn, 20
bushels of wheat. From 3,500 to 4,000 white inhabitants; 188
slaves; 396 farms. Improved lands $30, unimproved $3 an acre.
_Most of the farms are cultivatd by white labor_; a white hand
cultivates thirty acres of corn. Peaches yield abundantly; apples
and quinces have been tried successfully. The wild grape, plum,
cherry, _mulberry_, and blackberry grow luxuriantly. Wine of good
quality has been made here.

New Braunfels is the county seat. It has 2,000 inhabitants, and
boasts of having the only free school in the State, supported by
aid from the State school fund, and by direct taxation on the
property of the school district. Four teachers are employed, and
there are 250 pupils.

The letters of my Texas friend give the following description of the
climate of Texas:--

The climate of Texas is very peculiar. This is owing to the body
of water to the eastward of it, and to the dry and elevated plain
of the Llano Estacado, and the lofty mountains which lie to the
westward. To these two causes are due the moisture and the cool
temperature, and at times and in certain localities the excessive
dryness of Texas.

The Gulf stream, in its course along the coast of Florida and in
the Gulf of Mexico, has beneath it, running to the south, a cold
stream, nearly down to the freezing point. The great equatorial
current which strikes north of Cape St. Roque and through the
Caribbean Sea is suddenly narrowed between Cape Sa