"Although you may not have a very high opinion of the West, yet I think you would have liked to be with me in my late trip to St. Peters. The weather was delightful and the scenery grand and very novel. You have probably seen my letter to your sister; I will therefore say, we arrived at the end of our voyage last friday night, and as the fog was very thick the next morning we could not see where we were until 8 oclock. Then the fort on a high hill, with its flag flying, had a fine appearance. Mr. Gear the chaplain soon called at the boat and appeared greatly rejoiced to see me. I accompanied him to his quarters and saw his family and some of the officers and ladies of the garrison, and then he and I rode out 8 miles to the falls of St. Anthony. Though very inferior to those of Niagara, they are still well worth seeing. The scenery is wild--there are many immense rocks in the river, evidently broken off from the precipice over which the water is dashed with considerable noise--the water in its fall is frequently broken--but even when it is not so, the height is not more than 17-1/2 feet. Returning we went to a hill from whence we could see the whole of the fall for there is an island in the middle of the river which hides one half of it when you are near. A mile or two further brought us to a most beautiful and lofty cascade on Nine Mile river. The quantity of water was not large, but it fell amidst the wildest scene, unbroken, over a ledge of rock which extended far beyond its foundation.--There were not many Indians. The few I saw were Sioux who looked much degenerated by their contact with the Whites. The families of the officers appeared very happy; the ladies told me they were like sisters. For months they have no visitors but wild Indians--Sioux or Chippeways. An old Scotchman who had been in this country 50 years told me that all the tribes to the North and West speak the Chippeway language or its dialects; that the Sioux is entirely different from it, but that a dialect of it is spoken by the Winnebagoes, with this difference that the Sioux language has not the sound of the letter R in it while almost every word of the Winnebago abounds with Rs. He thinks that a person knowing the two languages--the C. and S. could travel through the indian country from Mexico to the N. Pole and make himself understood.--We had to return to the boat by one oclock, and soon after we started down the river. Near the Mouth of the St. Croix--about 45 miles below St. Peters, I saw on a prairie a large stone painted a bright red, to which the Indians offer sacrifices of tobacco &c. and consider a _Wa-Kon_ or Spirit.--As we were on our journey sunday afternoon I saw a bark canoe paddling towards us with great rapidity containing as I first thought an Indian and a white Man. The steamer was stopt, and soon the chattels (kettle, coffee-pot, &c) then the men afterwards the boat itself were on board. They proved to be