We set forth in a strong wagon, almost as large, and with the look of those used elsewhere for transporting caravans of wild beasts, loaded with everything we might want, in case nobody would give it to us,--for buying and selling were no longer to be counted on,--with, a pair of strong horses, able and willing to force their way through mud-holes and amid stumps, and a guide, equally admirable as marshal and companion, who knew by heart the country and its history, both natural and artificial, and whose clear hunter's eye needed, neither road nor goal to guide it to all the spots where beauty best loves to dwell.
Add to this the finest weather, and such country as I had never seen, even in my dreams, although these dreams had been haunted by wishes for just such a one, and you may judge whether years of dulness might not, by these bright days, be redeemed, and a sweetness be shed over all thoughts of the West.
The first day brought us through woods rich in the moccason-flower and lupine, and plains whose soft expanse was continually touched with expression by the slow moving clouds which "Sweep over with their shadows, and beneath The surface rolls and fluctuates to the eye; Dark hollows seem to glide along and chase The sunny ridges," to the banks of the Fox River, a sweet and graceful stream.

We readied Geneva just in time to escape being drenched by a violent thunder-shower, whose rise and disappearance threw expression into all the features of the scene.
Geneva reminds me of a New England village, as indeed there, and in the neighborhood, are many New-Englanders of an excellent stamp, generous, intelligent, discreet, and seeking to win from life its true values.

Such are much wanted, and seem like points of light among the swarms of settlers, whose aims are sordid, whose habits thoughtless and slovenly.[A] [Footnote A: "We passed a portion of one day with Mr.and Mrs .-- --, young, healthy, and, thank Heaven, _gay_ people.

In the general dulness that broods over this land where so little genius flows, and care, business, and fashionable frivolity are equally dull, unspeakable is the relief of some flashes of vivacity, some sparkles of wit.

Of course it is hard enough for those, most natively disposed that way, to strike fire.