"This is a peculiar city, with streets diverging from the centre and running out upon ridges while the intervening spaces are not built upon, just as if the map were a wagon-wheel and the business were near and around the hub and the residences were built along the spokes to the outer rim. Many of these residences are elegant and convenient, with large lots and fine shrubbery. The native growth is a mixture of small oak and pine, while the hand of culture has interspersed the China tree, Grape, Myrtle, Rose, Laurel, Holly, Honey-suckle, Sensitive plant, and a multitude of beautiful shrubs, full of odors and rich colors. Indeed, nothing can exceed the beauty of the plants and trees of this region. "The city has contained a population of eighteen thousand inhabitants (about six thousand are here now), and on account of the salubrity of the climate and purity of its waters, it being on the dividing ridge between the Gulf and the Atlantic, has become a place of residence to many wealthy persons. "Here figs are now ripe and hanging on the trees, this being the second crop. Grapes grow in abundance, and wine is made of a delicious flavor. "The houses are, many of them, disfigured with marks of our shot, splintered cornices and doorways--shattered roofs and chimneys, perforated walls and torn fences show the frightful look of these swift messengers whirling night and day over the doomed place. Many a tenement has its underground retreat; some are lined with cotton bales, some with timbers, and some banked around with earth. "When the enemy's troops were about to leave they set fire to immense trains of cars and wagons, loaded with army stores and ammunition. More than a hundred cars were burned at the Augusta depot, shell, torpedoes, fireballs, and boxes of ammunition popping, blazing and roaring, shook the city and were heard plainly by us at the river. When Colonel Coburn entered the city they were exploding in the forts, and sounded like the continual discharge of artillery. "What machinery had not been removed has been destroyed. The great rolling mill has been taken to Augusta, and it is said, will be taken to Deep River, North Carolina, and put up. Our position here cuts the enemy off from his greatest iron works in Northern Georgia. There are some of considerable extent yet used by them near Selma, Alabama. We see fire brick here which are made near Augusta, the bed of clay having been discovered since the war; before that time they were procured in the North. We see also in the ruins of the rolling mill a quantity of gunboat iron five inches thick, ready rolled for plating. "The surrounding county is hilly and poor. South of this the water is not good, and the land is much lower and richer. To the east, about fifteen miles, is Stone Mountain, a grand elevation of more than two thousand feet, affording a prospect of unequalled extent and beauty.