CHESTER, STATE OF ILLINOIS, January 21, 1843. DEAR BROTHER WARD--I take this opportunity of communicating a few items of news which may be of use to your readers. I arrived here two weeks since with my family. We are all well, except my eldest daughter, Olivia, who has the whooping cough. We are living here a few weeks, waiting for the river to open for Nauvoo. We are comfortably situated, a few yards from the landing, in a stone house in a small village, eighty miles below St. Louis, and three hundred from Nauvoo. Provisions are cheaper than ever; Indian corn is 20 cents per bushel; wheat, 40 cents; flour 3 1/2 dollars per barrel; oats, 15 cents per bushel; pork and beef, from 2 to 3 cents per lb.; butter, 10 cents; sugar, 5 cents; chickens, 8 cents each. Cows, from 8 to 10 and 12 dollars per head; good horses, from 25 to 50 dollars; land, from 1 1/4 to 4 dollars per acre. We were ten weeks on the "Emerald," and one in coming up the river. The weather was very fine until the day before we landed, when it became extremely cold and snowy; but after a week of severe weather, it became suddenly warm and pleasant, and it remains so yet--all ice and snow have disappeared, and the weather is like May. I have not heard from Nauvoo, except by the public prints. From these I learn that Brother Joseph Smith gave himself up to the authorities of Illinois, agreeably to the governor's writ of last fall to attempt to deliver him to the State of Missouri. He was brought by _habeas corpus_ before the Judge of the Supreme Court of the United States, and after a trial at Springfield, the seat of government for Illinois, he was honorably discharged--the Judge deciding that he must not be delivered to the Missouri authorities, according to the demand of the governors of the two States. Thus, one more malicious lawsuit has terminated in which the rulers have been disappointed and bloodthirsty men have lost their prey the prophet of the Lord having found protection under the wings of the eagle. Brother William Smith, Joseph's brother, is a member of the legislature of Illinois, which is now in session. They have introduced two bills for the purpose of taking away all our Nauvoo charters, but they have both been lost without becoming a law, and the charters still stand good. The first was a bill for the repealing of all city charters in the State (for the avowed object of getting rid of Nauvoo), this bill was lost by a majority of one. Next a bill was introduced to repeal the Nauvoo charter alone. This was too barefaced to be countenanced, and was lost by an overwhelming majority; but not until some warm debating on Mormonism had occupied the house for some time. The fact is, it grieves the enemies of the Saints very much to see them enjoying political privileges in common with others, and every exertion is made to hinder the progress of a people and of principles which they consider as already becoming too formidable to be easily trampled under foot.