Much attention has been given the drinking water of late years in the riverine cities, and generally they have water on which they pride themselves. Artesian wells are mostly utilized. The river water is muddy and unsightly, but probably safe and certainly palatable. We depend on our Puritan still, and a tripoli filter, and utilize the rain water we catch in the canvas cover of the launch. No trouble has as yet affected us from this source; and we are satisfied it pays well to take precautions. From St. Louis down the river fairly bristles with opportunities for men who understand business and have a little capital. But timber lands are pretty well taken up. An Ohio party paid $100 an acre for 100 acres here in this Atchafalaya country the other day. The people? Well, we have simply adopted the whole--white--population, and find them delightful. There has not been a discordant note in our intercourse with this warm-hearted, hospitable folk, who unite the courtesy of the French with a sincerity that makes itself felt every moment. Dogs! Everyone seems to own hounds here. We had a few runs with them; they came aboard and inspected us, and after due deliberation approved of us, took up their home with us and declined to stay away; so that at night one can scarcely set foot outside the cabin without stepping on a sleeping hound. Even the women folk are disarmed when these dogs look up with their big, beautiful eyes and nuzzle their cold noses into the hand for a caress. One great fellow reared up against us, placed his paws on our shoulders and silently studied our face awhile, then dropped to the ground and henceforth devoted himself to us, never being far from our side. We felt complimented! Go out with the gun, and see how these slumberous animals awake to joyous life and activity. Then the long, musical bay, the ringing of the hunters' horns, the quick dash of the deer past your stand, with the dogs after, in full cry--say, brother, these low lands when leveed, cleared and cultivated, will yield two bales of cotton to the acre, and with cotton at 15 cents and over, is not that splendid? So shut your ears against the cry of the wild, and only consider what Progress means, and how the individual and civic wealth is increasing as these wild lands are brought under the plow and made productive of dollars. For is not all of life simply a question of dollars, and success measurable only in the bank account? So put away from you the things that make life worth living, and devote yourself with a whole heart to the task of making your son a millionaire, that he may make his son a multimillionaire, and so on. It will do you so much good in the Great Beyond to know this. That the money for which we give up all that renders life enjoyable will either render our descendants dissipated and useless, or enable them to oppress their fellowmen, need not be considered. Money is all there is in life.