"Dear Sir,--_The poor tax in this township amounts to about five cents to each inhabitant per annum_, and our special expense for police matters, when any body happens to be engaged on an emergence, amounts to an average expense _of about one half cent each_. In fact, it may be said we have little or no crime or breach of the peace; and, though I am no total-abstinence man, I ascribe this state of things to the absence of liquor shops, and on this account have always voted against licensing. Before I came here I acted as constable in Massachusetts, and have been deputy sheriff and overseer of the poor for five years, and I know from actual observation that more happiness is secured to men themselves, to their wives and children, and more peace to the home, than by any other cause in the world, not excepting all the churches--so help me God! "Yours respectfully, T. T. CORTIS, Deputy Sheriff." In the journal from which I take this letter it is stated that the poor and police expenses of Perth Amboy, also in New Jersey, amount in the same year to _two dollars_ per head! The figures need no comment. _Prairie Home._ The Prairie Home Colony, in Franklin County, Kansas, was established by a French gentleman, E. V. Boissiere. He owns three thousand acres of land, and has been engaged during the last three years in putting it in order for settlement, upon a plan to which he gives the title, "Association and Co-operation, based on Attractive Industry." So far as the details of his plan are developed, it appears that he wishes to secure to colonists constant employment at reasonable wages, and to enable them to live in an economical manner. It is evident from what follows that he does not intend to establish a benevolent institution, and that at _Prairie Home_ there will be no accommodations for idlers. I reprint here a circular, which is issued by Mr. Boissiere, and parts of a private note from him, in which, in March, 1874, he gave me some particulars of the progress of his enterprise: "A domain of more than three thousand acres, purchased about four years ago, and then called the 'Kansas Co-operative Farm,' but since named 'Silkville,' from the fact that the weaving of silk-velvet ribbons is one of its branches of industry, and silk-culture is contemplated, for which ten thousand mulberry-trees are now thriftily growing, having had two hundred and fifty acres subjected to cultivation, and several preliminary buildings erected upon it, it is now thought expedient to inform those who wish to take part in the associative enterprise for which the purchase was made, that the Subscribers, as its projectors, will be prepared to receive persons the ensuing spring, with a view to their becoming associated for that purpose.