Illinois is three hundred and fifty miles in length; one hundred and eighty in breadth; and lies between thirty-seven and a half, and forty-two and a half degrees north latitude. It contains fifty thousand square miles--equal to forty millions of acres. It is divided into fifty-five counties, and, probably, now contains more than two hundred thousand inhabitants. All the streams, lakes and marshes are lined with a fine growth of timber, sometimes a mile or two in width, and sometimes merely a narrow strip. And as the southern part of the State contains the most low, wet land, it has also the most timber. The high land is generally prairie; but there are some exceptions to this. I found quite a number of beautiful groves of timber on high land; sometimes there were only scattering trees, called oak openings. It is probably as level as any State in the Union. At the northwest of Shawneetown, there is a range of hills; and high bluffs are seen along the banks of the Mississippi and Illinois rivers. In the mineral regions at the northwest corner of the State, there are high hills, and the land is somewhat broken; but the largest portion of the State is composed of gently rolling prairies. These prairies are some of them level and wet, but generally, they are high, dry and gently undulating. They all have an exceedingly fertile soil, and are covered with tall coarse grass and a great variety of beautiful flowers. The soil is a rich, black loam, entirely inexhaustible, and produces abundant crops without the aid of manure. In some of the old settled towns at the lower part of the State, the same spot of ground has been cultivated with Indian corn for a hundred years, and it now produces equally as well as it did at first. In the time of strawberries, thousands of acres are reddened with this delicious fruit. But this country, which so delightfully strikes the eye, and has millions of acres that invite the plough, wants timber for fuel, building and fences. It wants good water in many places, and in too many instances, the inhabitants want health. These evils will probably all be remedied by the expedients of cultivation. Bricks will be used for building; coal and peat will be used for fuel; hedges and ditches will be made for fences; forests will be made to grow on the prairies; and deep wells will be sunk for pure water.