How strange it seemed, while gazing upon the view I have attempted to delineate, now fading away beneath the summer twilight--how very strange was the reflection that these two noble streams, deriving their sources in the pellucid lakes and the clear icy fountains of their highland-homes, meandering majestically through scenes of nature and of art unsurpassed in beauty, and draining, and irrigating, and fertilizing the loveliest valley on the globe--how strange, that the confluence of the waters of such streams, in their onward rolling to the deep, should take place at almost the only stage in their course devoid entirely of interest to the eye or the fancy; in the heart of a dreary and extended swamp, waving with the gloomy boughs of the cypress, and enlivened by not a sound but the croaking of bullfrogs, and the deep, surly misery note of {50} moschetoes! Willow Point is the property of a company of individuals, who announce it their intention to elevate the delta above the power of inundations, and here to locate a city.[47] There are as yet, however, but a few storehouses on the spot; and when we consider the incalculable expense the only plan for rendering it habitable involves, we can only deem the idea of a city here as the chimera of a Utopian fancy. For more than twelve miles above the confluence, the whole alluvion is annually inundated, and forbids all improvement; but were this site an elevated one, a city might here be founded which should command the immense commerce of these great rivers, and become the grand central emporium of the Western Valley. Upon the first elevated land above the confluence stands the little town called America. This is the proposed _terminus_ to the grand central railroad of the Internal Improvement scheme of Illinois, projected to pass directly through the state,[48] uniting its northern extremity with the southern. The town is said to have been much retarded in its advancement by the circumstance of a sand-bar obstructing the landing. It has been contemplated to cut a basin, extending from the Ohio to a stream called "Humphrey's Creek," which passes through the place, and thus secure a harbour. Could this plan be carried into execution, America would soon become a town of importance. _Ohio River._ V "The groves were God's first temples." BRYANT. "Oh! it's hame, and it's hame, it's hame wad I be, Hame, hame, hame, to my ain countrie." CUNNINGHAM. "Those Sabbath bells, those Sabbath bells, I hear them wake the hour of prime." LAMB. "She walks the waters like a thing of life." BYRON.