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Lewis and Clarke, were stopped at 3000 miles from St. Louis, a few miles above which place, the Missouri joins the Mississippi. The extreme source of the Missouri was no doubt a considerable distance beyond; but counting only from that point, to its mouth in the Gulf of Mexico, the length of this river is 4,178 miles.*

The Valley of the Missouri, as it is called by Volney, comprises all that great extent of country, reaching from the Rocky Mountains to the Gulf of Mexico, and from the Alleghanies, and the great Lakes, almost to the territory, of (what was, till lately,) Spanish America.

The tributaries of the Missouri which help to drain this region, would, in the old world, be considered of enormous magnitude. The Red River, the Arkansas reaching almost to Santa Fé, the La Platte, the Osage, the Ohio, and the Mississippi, are rivers of which an Englishman can hardly form any idea. It may be sufficient to mention, that the Ohio, which holds but the third place in the rank of tributaries, is considerably larger than the Danube. The length of this

According to Smith's chart of the comparative length of the principal rivers of the world, the river of the Amazons is 3375 miles long, and the "Missouri" 3365. With regard to the "Missouri," Melish and the other American geographers, who make it 813 miles longer than Smith does, have surely the greatest claim to our credit. In this case the South American river must be 803 miles shorter than its rival of the North.

last-mentioned river is indeed 1300 miles; but the Ohio is navigable, even for large steam-boats, to Pittsburg, 1121 miles from its mouth. The Alleghany and Monongahela, which meeting at Pittsburg form the Ohio, are both considerable rivers; the latter being often navigated by large steam-boats, as high up as Brownsville.

As population always becomes dense in proportion to the ease with which subsistence may be procured, it is clear that the Valley of the Missouri, from the richness of its soil, and from the great facilities which it presents for internal navigation, will be ultimately filled with inhabitants.

Mr. Darby tells us, that by repeated admeasurements on the best constructed maps, this river and its tributary streams, drain more than 1,400,000 square miles; and that consequently if this expanse were peopled, only in the same ratio that Connecticut was in 1810, or with about sixty persons to each square mile, the aggregate number of inhabitants would be 84,000,000. † A lively imagination wandering into futurity, may therefore behold this great and as yet almost desert country, teeming with human life, studded with large towns and cities, and abounding in all the luxuries and comforts of civilized society. How delightful is it also to consider, that in America the seeds of freedom are so widely spread, and so

* Pittsburgh Navigator.

+ Darby's Louisiana.

deeply rooted, that no human power can eradicate them; and that even should the great Republic of the United States fall to pieces from diversity of interests, or merely from its own magnitude, yet still the independent nations, into which it will be formed, will adhere to the laws and institutions of their ancestors.

St. Louis is a small town containing between two and three thousand inhabitants. It was founded by the French, at the time when Louisiana, of which the present state of the Missouri forms a part, belonged to that nation. It increased in size very rapidly after it came into the hands of the Americans; and at one time was the great emporium of all the fur-trade with the Indians. But it has of late years declined both in prosperity and рориlation, partly owing to the dreadful sickness, and partly to the rivalship of the villages which are springing up on the banks of the Missouri and upper Mississippi, and which now participate in the fur-trade with the Indians.

When I was there, it contained one thousand less inhabitants, than it did at the close of the last war between Great Britain and the United States.There are still among its population many French, who continue to speak their old language, and in some degree keep up the manners of their native country.

Governor Clarke, the enterprising companion of Captain Lewis, has at St. Louis a small but well

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arranged Museum, which contains a great number of Indian curiosities, and which he very kindly opens to all strangers.

To show how soon literary knowledge spreads itself in America, I will here mention that several gentlemen of St. Louis and its vicinity, with whom I became acquainted, had not only read all the first Waverley novels, but even the last one, the Fortunes of Nigel, which had only been published a short time before I left England. One of the gentlemen informed me, that he received copies of these novels by the mail, about two months after their publication in America, and probably within fourteen or sixteen weeks of their first appearance in England. He said, that this was also the case with most popular works. O'Meara's account of Napoleon, was read by almost every one; and as all the newspapers contained copious extracts from it, every body could read with feelings of just indignation, the vexations imposed on the splendid despot, by his mean-spirited governor.

Every year, expeditions set out from St. Louis or the neighbourhood, for the purpose of hunting, and obtaining skins and furs. These parties are composed of active, enterprising young men, generally to the number of twenty or thirty, and who, during an absence of two or three years, proceed either to the Rocky Mountains and the Pacific Ocean, or towards the territory of Mexico. One would suppose that few men would undertake so long

an expedition, among savage Indian tribes, with the certainty of living a great part of the time upon nothing but animal food. Yet the enterprising spirit of the Americans is such, and a wild life has such charms for them, that nothing is easier than to find persons ready to join one of these parties. A Backwoodsman will propose a journey of a thousand miles, with as much sang froid, as a cockney would ride from London to Greenwich. The following is the manner in which these hunting expeditions are organized:-Some one either animated by a spirit of adventure, or by a hope, that on his return, he shall make some money by the sale of furs and skins, intimates to his friends that he wants twenty or thirty young men to form his party. He himself finds arms, ammunition, horses, presents for the Indians, and in short, every thing that is required for the general benefit of the expedition. He is to receive in return a certain portion of all the skins and furs obtained by hunting or barter. Sometimes also a small sum of money is given to each individual. These expeditions often turn out very profitable, as a gentleman of Kentucky proved last year, by clearing on his return 15,000 dollars.

While I was at St. Louis, a gentleman with whom I was acquainted, told me, that an expedition of this kind was to set out in the spring with the intention of penetrating to Santa Fé. "As you are a traveller," continued my informant, "you