University of Mississippi; so amply endowed by the State, and now just going into operation under the auspices of some of the ablest professors from the eastern colleges. There is no overgrown wealth among them, and yet no squalid poverty; the people being generally comfortable, substantial, and independent farmers. Considering its climate, soil, wealth, and general character of its inhabitants, I should think no more desirable or delightful residence could be found than among the hills and sunny valleys of the Chickasaw Cession."[1]
And here among the hills of this Paradise of the Southwest,
we were, Yazoo and I—he, savagely hungry, as may
be guessed from his observations upon "the finest people of
the West," among whose cabins in the pine-wood toiled our
stage-coach.
The whole art of driving was directed to the discovery of a passage for the coach among the trees and through the fields, where there were fields, adjoining the road—the road itself being impassable. Occasionally, when the coachman, during the night, found it necessary, owing to the thickness of the forest on each side, to take to the road, he would first leave the coach and make a survey with his lantern, sounding the ruts of the cotton-waggons, and finally making out a channel by guiding-stakes which he cut from the underwood with a hatchet, usually carried in the holster. If, after diligent sounding, he found no passage sufficiently shallow, he would sometimes spend half an hour in preparing one, bringing rails from the nearest fence, or cutting brushwood for the purpose. We were but once or twice during the night called upon to leave the coach, or to assist in road-making, and my companion frequently expressed his gratitude for this—gratitude not to the driver but to Providence, who had made a country, as he thought, so unusually well adapted for stage-coaching. The night before, he had been on a much worse road, and was half the time, with numerous other passengers, engaged in bringing rails, and prying the coach out of sloughs.
- ↑ See "Resources;" article, "Mississippi," etc.
