ried to the states eastward, via. the lakes, Ohio River and railroads. Its exports consist of pork, lard, grain, etc. Considerable amounts of produce are also sent to New-Orleans for shipment. The interior trade is rapidly increasing.

There is only one chartered bank in Indiana-the State Bank at Indianapolis In November, 1850, its capital amounted to $2,082,958, its circulation to $3,422,455, its deposits to $630,335, and other liabilities to $112,175. Its securities consisted of loans and discounts $4,395,099, real estate $364,233, other investments $108,485, due by other banks $815,062, notes of other banks $224,842. It had branches at Bedford, Evansville, Fort Wayne, Indianapolis, Lafayette, Lawrenceburg, Madison, Michigan city, New Albany, Richmond, South Bend, Terre Haute and Vincennes.

Indiana has numerous magnificent public works. The Wabash and Erie Canal connects the waters of Lake Erie with those of the Ohio, and has a total length of 458 miles. Eastward it also connects with the canal system of Ohio. The White Water Canal extends from Lawrenceburg to Cambridge, 76 miles. These great works have been made at an immense expense, and their completion has created a commensurate debt, but the state has lately surrendered the works to the bond holders on their assuming one-half the state debt. The railroads completed and in operation are the Madison and Indianapolis line, 86 miles long, with a branch to Shelbyville, 16 miles, and thence branches to Rushville, 20 miles, and Knightstown, 27 miles; the New Albany and Salem line to Crawfordsville, 125 miles; the Lafayette and Crawfordsville, 28 miles; the Columbus, Nashville and Bloomington line, 42 miles; the Martinsville line, 29 miles; the Indianapolis and Bellefontaine line, 76 miles; the Indianapolis and Peru line, 76 miles; the Indianapolis and Lafayette line, 69 miles; the Terre Haute and Richmond line, via. Indianapolis, 145 miles; the Jeffersonville and Columbus line, 66 miles; the Lawrenceburg and Greensburg line, 42 miles; and the Northern Indiana line, 76 miles. Numerous others are projected.

A new constitution has been lately provided for this state; it secures to every white male adult citizen and to foreigners who have resided one year in the United States and declared their intention to become citizens, the right of voting. No negro or mulatto is allowed to vote, and duellists, public defaulters, etc., are disfranchised, as are also those who bribe, threaten, or reward any elector. Elections are held on the second Tuesday of October. The Legislature consists of not more than 50 senators and 100 representatives; senators are elected for four, and representatives for two years, and the former must be at least 25 years of age, and the latter 21, at the time of election. Sessions are held biennally, commencing on the Thursday next after the first Monday in January, 1853.

The Governor must be at least 38 years of age, a citizen of the United States, and a resident of Indiana of five years' standing. He is elected for four years. The Governor's veto to any legislative act can only be annulled by a subsequent majority vote of all the members of both houses acting separately. The Lieutenant Governor must be qualified as the Governor. The people at large elect a Secretary, Auditor, and Treasurer of State.

The Judicial power is vested in a Supreme Court, in Circuit Courts, and such inferior Courts as the Legislature may establish. The Justices and other officers are elected by the people.

The revenue of the state for the year ending 31st Oct., 1849, including $694,096 balance from former years, amounted to $1,566,339, and the disbursements to $1,137,398, leaving $428,941 in the treasury.

Since the adjustment acts of 1846 and 1847 the state debt amounts only

to $6,816,600, of which $4,941,000 bear interest at the rate of 5 per cent., and the residue interest at the rate of 2 1-2 per cent. The canal bond holders assume an equal amount of debt.

The State Institutions are the Asylum for the Deaf and Dumb, the Institute for the Blind at Indianapolis, and the Hospital for the Insane.

The School Fund amounts to $715,748. The common schools are under the charge of a State Superintendent, and in 1850 numbered 5,899 schools, and the number of scholars was about 375,000. The census states that Indiana has 83 colleges at which 5,290 students were under tuition. In this number many academies must be counted. The principal are the Indiana State University at Bloomington, St. Gabriel's College at Vincennes, Hanover College at South Hanover, Wabash College at Crawfordsville, Indiana Ashbury University at Greencastle, and Franklin College, which together had in 1850, 339 students. There is a law department to the State University and Medical Colleges at La Porte and Indianapolis. The Indiana Theological Seminary, a Presbyterian school, is located at South Hanover. The total number of libraries in the state is 1,017, and of volumes 75,416; and the press consists of 98 publications, which have an aggregate circulation of 17,892 copies, chiefly issued weekly.

The Methodists, Baptists and Presbyterians are the numerically preponderating religious denominations. The Episcopalians and Catholics also have numerous churches. The whole number of churches are stated at 1,892, and the value of church property is assessed at $1,499,718.

INDIANAPOLIS, the capital of the state, is situated on the left bank of the west fork of White River, and is the centre of the state system of railroads. The state-house is one of the most splendid buildings in the west. It is 180 feet long, by 80 feet wide, and 45 feet high, with an appropriate dome. It is built after the model of the Parthenon at Athens, with a portico on each front, having 10 Doric columns, and has elegant halls for the two houses of the legislature, a court-room and rotunda. Population 8,034.

LA FAYETTE is situated on the left bank of the Wabash River, at the head of steamboat navigation, and is a place of commercial importance.

NEW-ALBANY, on the Ohio, is a large and flourishing town, containing a number of manufacturing establishments. JEFFERSONVILLE, Opposite Louisville, is the site of the state-prison. MADISON is a large and flourishing village, with great natural facilities. Population in 1850, 8,037. EVANSVILLE is also an important point, and the southern terminus of the canal. VEVAY, a Swiss colony, has a fine location, and is prettily laid out, being surrounded by vineyards; LAWRENCEBURG, below the mouth of the Whitewater, has an extensive trade, and is now a place of some importance; NEWHARMONY, founded by the German Harmonites, and subsequently purchased by Mr. Owen, the eminent socialist, is a flourishing settlement. VINCENNES is the oldest town in the state. TERRE HAUTE, on the national road, and LOGANSPORT, on the Wabash, are considerable towns. RICHMOND, on the western state line; MICHIGAN CITY, at the base of Lake Michigan, and the only lake port in the state; COVINGTON, on the Wabash, are places of note. VINCENNES was originally settled by French soldiers from Canada. This occurred in 1702. Separated from the world, they became assimilated to the savages, by whom they were surrounded, and with whom they intermarried. In 1763, Indiana came into possession of the British. The revolution gave it to the United States, the government of which granted it to the inhabitants who had taken sides with the patriThe fort on the opposite side of the river was built in 1778, as

ots.

a protection against the savages. The inhabitants at that time, consisted of French, Canadians and Indians. Wayne's victory and the treaty of 1797, put an end to hostilities. Incited by the British, the Indians commenced depredations, and committed a number of murders in 1810-11, in consequence of which Gen. Harrison was despatched to subjugate these savage marauders. The battle of Tippecanoe compelled them to sue for peace. In 1816, Indiana took her place as a state of the Union, and formed a constitution for its own government. Since that period it has rapidly progressed in population and wealth, but unfortunately has contracted a large public debt which still continues to enthrall the energies of the people, and must for a long time to come, remain unpaid. The resources of the state, however, are ample, and full provision has been made for its ultimate liquidation.

THE STATE OF ILLINOIS.

ILLINOIS, SO celebrated for the extent of its prairies, is situated between 370 and 42° 30' N. latitude, and between 87° 49' and 91° 30′ W. longitude; and is bounded north by the State of Wisconsin; east by the Lake Michigan and the State of Indiana; south-east and south by the Ohio River, which separates it from Kentucky, and west by the Mississippi River, which flows from the north southward between it and the states of Iowa and Missouri. In extreme length it is 372 miles, and in extreme breadth 210 miles; having an area of 55,055 square miles, or 35,235,209 acres.

The surface is generally level; the southern and the northern parts of the state are somewhat broken and hilly, but no where rising to an elevation deserving the name of a mountain. That portion of the state south of a line from the mouth of the Wabash to the mouth of the Kaskaskia, is mostly covered with timber; thence northward, prairie predominates. "The eye sometimes wanders over immense plains covered with grass, finding no limit to its vision but the distant horizon; while more frequently it wanders from grove to grove, and from one point of woodland to another, charmed and refreshed by an endless variety of scenic beauty." A range of bluffs commences on the margin of the Mississippi (a short distance above the mouth of the Ohio,) and extends north of the Des Moines Rapids, sometimes rising abruptly from the water's edge, but most generally at a few miles distance, having, between the bluffs and the river, a strip of alluvial formation of most exhaustless fertility. The soil throughout the state is generally very fertile. The forest trees most abundant are oak, of various kinds, walnut, ash, elm, sugar-maple, locust, hackberry, buckeye, sycamore, &c. Lead is a very important mineral production of this state; copper and iron ores exist. Coal abounds in the bluffs: and several fine salt springs exist in the southern part of the state. Vegetable productions are Indian corn, wheat, rye, oats, buckwheat, potatoes, turnips, cotton, hemp, flax, tobacco, the castor bean, &c.

A large part, probably two-thirds of the surface of the state, is covered with prairies. A common error has prevailed that the prairie land is Much of it is undulating and entirely dry. Prairie is a French word signifying meadow, and is applied to any description of surface that is

wet.

destitute of timber and brushwood, and clothed with grass. Wet, dry. level and undulating are terms of description merely, and apply to prairies in the same sense as they do to forest lands.

Level prairie is sometimes wet: the water not running off freely is left to be absorbed by the soil, or evaporated by the sun. Crawfish throw up their hillocks in this soil, and the farmer who cultivates it will find his labors impeded by the water.

In the southern part, that is, south of the national road, leading from Terre Haute to the Mississippi, the prairies are comparatively small, varying in size from those of several miles in width, to those which contain only a few acres. As we go northward, they widen and extend on the more elevated ground between the water courses to a vast distance, and are frequently from six to twelve miles in width. Their borders are by no means uniform. Long points of timber project into the prairies, and line the banks. of the streams, and points of prairie project into the timber between these streams. In many instances are copses and groves of timber, from one hundred to two thousand acres, in the midst of prairies, like islands in the ocean. This is a common feature in the country between the Sangamon River and Lake Michigan, and in the southern parts of the state. The lead mine region, both in this state and the Wisconsin Territory, abounds in these groves.

The origin of these prairies has caused much speculation. We might as well dispute about the origin of forests, upon the assumption that the natural covering of the earth was grass. Probably one-half of the earth's surface, in a state of nature, was prairies or barrens. Much of it, like our western prairies, was covered with a luxuriant coat of grass and herbage. The steppes of Tartary, the pampas of South America, the savannas of the southern and the prairies of the western states, designate similar tracts of country. Mesopotamia, Syria and Judea had their ancient prairies, on which the patriarchs fed their flocks. Missionaries in Burmah and travellers in the interior of Africa mention the same description of country. Where the tough sward of the prairie is once formed, timber will not take root. Destroy this by the plough, or by any other method, and it is soon converted into forest land. There are large tracts of country in the older settlements, where, thirty or forty years since, the farmers mowed their hay, that are now covered with a forest of young timber of rapid growth.

Extensive prairies existed in the Atlantic states at the period of the first visits of Europeans. Captain John Smith noticed them when he visited the Chesapeake. The late Mungo Park describes the annual burning of the plains of Mandingo in Western Africa, in the same manner as one would describe the prairie fires of the western states.

The term barrens, in the western dialect, does not indicate poor land, but a species of surface of a mixed character, uniting forest and prairie. These are called "openings" in Michigan and northern Illinois. The timber is generally scattering, of a rough and stunted appearance, interspersed with patches of hazel and brushwood, and there the contest between the fire and timber is kept up, each striving for the mastery.

In the early settlements of Kentucky, much of the country below and south of Green River presented a dwarfish and stunted growth of timber, scattered over the surface or collected in clumps, with hazel and shubbery intermixed. This appearance led the first explorers to the inference that the soil itself must necessarily be poor, to produce so scanty a growth of timber, and they gave the name barrens to the whole tract of country. Long

since it has been ascertained that this description of land is amongst the most productive soil in the state. The term barren has since received a very extensive application throughout the west. Like all other tracts of country, the barrens present a considerable diversity of soil. In general, however, the surface is more uneven or rolling than the prairies, and sooner degenerates into ravines and sink-holes. These tracts are almost invariably healthy; they possess a greater abundance of pure springs of water, and the soil is better adapted for all kinds of produce, and all descriptions of seasons, wet and dry, than the deeper and richer mould of the bottoms and prairies.

The Mississippi, Ohio and Wabash rivers form more than two-thirds of the boundary of the state. The Big Muddy, Kaskaskia, Illinois and Rock rivers, and many smaller streams, empty themselves into the Mississippi River. Chicago River empties into Lake Michigan. Vermillion, Embarras and Little Wabash into the Wabash, and Saline and Big Bay Creeks into the Ohio River.

The climate of Illinois is, in general, excellent. In the south it is sufficiently mild to raise cotton, and peaches come to maturity in the most northerly districts. Except on the river-bottoms and in the neighborhood of swamps, the state is healthy and free from endemic diseases.

The minerals of Illinois are various. Iron and bituminous coal are abundant, and native copper, in small quantities, has been found in the southern counties. The most important of these productions, however, is the vast quantities of lead which exist in the neighborhood of Galena, the mines of which are the richest in the world. The ore is generally found in horizontal strata, of various depths, and the yield of pure metal averages 75 per The lead region extends from Galena, beyond the limits of the state, being found on both sides of the Mississippi, and is supposed to occupy a district 200 miles long and 60 broad. Mining operations have been carried on in this region for the last quarter of a century, and the quantity of lead smelted has been immense. Salt is manufactured on the Saline River, and in the neighborhood of Brownsville, on Muddy Creek.

cent.

Illinois contained, in 1850, a population of 851,470, or one person to every 41 acres; and its distribution to the several counties was in the following proportions: