Who, that has been deprived of a sister, can reflect upon the closing scenes of her mortal existence, without the deepest sorrow and sadness of heart? A month, perhaps a short week since, and she was among the living; there was the same cheerful countenance; the same joyous spirit; the same care and thought for the interest of those whose happy lot it was to enjoy her society. But she is gone, and how sad the change! The returning brother will meet no more her welcome smile. He visits the home of his childhood with a heavy heart. He approaches the threshold, and looks upon a stranger's countenance; he listens, and a stranger's voice falls upon his ear. He fancies, for once that it is all a dream; he passes from chamber to chamber, seeking in vain for the departed one. She is not there! Oh! what agony fills his breast! what melancholy is resting upon his spirit! His once happy home has now no charms, no comforts, no allurements for him.

sympathies, her love and affections, these thoughts may seem idle and visionary; but they are sad, sober truths, and in a mourning brother, one who has been brought to feel too keenly the pangs of sundered ties of sisterly affection, cannot doubt their reality. -(Selected.)

LAKE SUPERIOR MINES-A correspondent of the Cleveland Herald writes from the Sault St. Marie as follows:

"I have seen heading towards this mineral region ex-Cabinet Ministers and Governors, Congressmen and Professors, Bankers and Capitalists, Adventurers, Woodmen and

Miners; and I have seen them on their return with their pockets full of rocks.'That this region abounds in copper ore to an inexhaustable extent, and of a quality vastly superior to any elsewhere discovered, are not matters of conjecture. This is now positively known, and that gold and silver also abound, recent explorations abundantly establish. In this greedy scramble for sudden wealth, in which all inen are more or less inclined to engage, some will obtain it and others will be disappointed. But the existence and locality of this mineral wealth are no new discovery. In 1650, Father Allouez heard of the existence of a mass of pure copper' on the Southern shore of Lake Superior, and searched for it. And as early as 1721, says Charlevoix, the bracelets of the Indians, the candlesticks, crosses and censors were made for the use of the Church, by a goldsmith at the "Sault," from the masses of pure copper found on the shore of Lake Superior."

SENDING ICE TO CHINA.-The ship Areatus, from Boston, for Hong Kong, carries out a cargo of ice, the first regular cargo, we believe, which has ever gone from this country to China. Ice honses have been set up at Hong-Kong, and arrangements made for the reception and sale of American ice in the Celestial Empire. She Areatus takes out about 600 tons-all of it " Wenham Lake" ice.

MANUFACTURES IN GEORGIA.-The Chatahoochie has now in the course of erection on its banks several fine establishments. The Columbus Enquirer says:-The mannfacturing excitement is rather on the increase.

avenues; while the height of the walls and the size and number of pagodas rising above them, accord with the extent of a large city, and the devotion of the people of that benighted land to the worship of their idols.

The course of the Canal along the city wall is in view, with specimens of some of the various boats which navigate it.

The grand Canal of China is one of the objects which naturally excite our most lively curiosity. So much have we to do with works of this kind of late years in our own country, and so manifest are the advantages which they afford, that we feel qualified to judge of them, while we are eager to learn the details of their construction, use, and management in foreign lands, and especially among a people so peculiar as the Chinese.

The canal of China extends from Lintsingchow, in Shantung, beyond the Yellow River, and has for its principal feeder, the Hunho, which pours in its waters on the summit level.

What is very remarkable, this stream comes in with such force, that after striking against a bulkhead of solid stone-work, it divides, and flows in both directions in a cur

rent.

In a Chinese manuscript volume, written by a Mongol historian, named Raschid udden, A. D., 1307, and translated by Messrs. Von Hammer & Klaproth, gives the followiug description of it :-"Ships can navigate it; and it is forty days' journey in length. When the ships arrive at the sluices, they are raised up, whatever be their size, by means of machines, and then they are let down on the other side into the water." This, according to the accounts given by the English ambassadors who navigated it on their way to Peking, is an accurate description of the practice at the present day.

We copy the following from the work of Gov. Davis of Hong Kong.

"Many persons, and among the rest Dr. Abel, have not been disposed to estimate very highly the labor and ingenuity displayed in the construction of that artificial chaunel. He observes, This famous monument of industry, considered simply as a channel of communication between different parts of the empire, appears to have been somewhat overrated as an example of the immense power of human labor and of human art. In every part of its course it passes through alluvial soil, readily penetrated by the tools of workmen, and is intersected by numerous streams.

It would be difficult to find any part of it car ried through twenty miles of country unaided by tributary rivers. The sluices which keep its necessary level are of the rudest construction: buttresses formed of blocks of stone, with grooves fitted with thick planks, are the only locks of the Imperial canal. It is neither carried through any mountain nor over any valley. Much of this is certainly true, and confirmed by the observation of Du Halde, that in all that space there were neither hills, quarries, nor rocks, which gave the workmen any trouble either to level or to penetrate.' But if the canal is admitted to be a work of high national utility in more lights than one, the simplicity of the means by which the end was attained can scarcely be considered to derogate from its merit: it would seem, on the contrary, to be a proof of the sagacity with which the plan was formed.

The following account of the process of crossing the Yellow river, at the point where it is intersected by the canal, is given from two unpublished journals of the last English embassy. On our left (proceeding south) was a stream called the New Salt river, which, like the canal, opened into the Yellow river; and on our right we had for several days, very close to us, the Yellow river itself, which, just before this point of junction with the canal, suddenly turns northeastward, after having run in a south easterly direction. When we had been a short time at anchor, during which interval some of the chief mandarius visited the ambassador, we all got under weigh, and prepared to cross the famous Hoang-ho. All the boats on entering the river, struck right across the stream without observing any order, and gained the opposite bank in less than an hour. The weather being fine and moderate, and the water perfectly smooth, our boatmen were not so particular in the observance of their ceremo nies and libations on the passage of the river as those of the last embassy: but every boat, I believe, burnt a few pieces of gilt paper, and let off a volley of crackers in honor of the occasion. The breadth of the river in this part was about three quarters of a mile per hour, but the water not much more muddy or yellow at this point than it has been observed in the Peiho and elsewhere.

The stream was certainly violent, and carried us down a considerable distance before. we could reach the opposite bank, which was lined with a great number of boats, of various shapes and dimensions, some of them being constructed exactly in the form of oblong boxes. Many of these were stationary, and laden with the straw or stalk of the holcus sorghum, and with coarse reeds, ready to be transported to different parts of the river and caual for the repair of the banks. This assemblage of boats, though the greatest we have yet noticed in this part of China, bore no comparison to what may be daily seen in the river of Canton. When the current had carried us down some distance to the east

ward, we had a mile or two to re-ascend the river, before we came to the opening through which we were to pursue our route to the south; and the passage in the vicinity of the bank, to which we kept on account of the current, was so obstructed with boats, that this was not effected under four hours from our first getting under weigh. The worst part was now to come in passing through a sluice, on the hither side of which the water, which had been confined in its passage through the abutments, raged with such fury as to suck down large floating substances in its eddies. This sluice upon a large scale was near one hundred yards across, and through it the waters rushed into the river at a rate of not less than seven or eight miles an hour. The projecting banks at the sides were not constructed of stone-work, but entirely of the straw or reeds already mentioned, with earth intermixed, and strongly bound with cordage.

Through this opening or sluice, and in close contact with the bank on our left, our boats were successively dragged forward by ropes communicating with several large windlasses, which were worked upon the bank; by these means the object was slowly accom plished, without the least damage or accident. After thus effecting a passage through the sluice, we found ourselves nearly in sull water; not yet, however, in the southern division of the great canal, as we had expected, but in the main stream of another large river, hardly inferior in breadth to that which we had quitted. We were told it communicated at no great distance with the great lake Hoong-ise Hooo, to the right of our course. The stream by which this lake discharges its waters into the Yellow river is marked in all the maps of China, but represented as totally distinct and unconnected with the grand canal. It seems evident, therefore, that the course of the navigation has been latterly altered here, either from the overflowing of the Yellow river, or some other cause. That a change has taken place hereabouts seems indicated by the name The Salt river,' on the other side of the main stream of the Hoang-ho.

Entered the southern division of the grand canal. A great deal of labor and contrivance has been employed here in constructing the embankments and regulating the course of the waters. In the first place, two or three artificial bays or basins have been hollowed out in the bank of the river, where the boats proceeding to the southward, assemble in security and wait their turn to pass.

There

are then two other narrow passes, or imperfect sluices, subsequent to the first opening that leads from the river to the canal, having also broad basins between them, and embankments constructed as before, with the straw or reeds confined with cordage. The object of this repetition of sluices, with the basins between, seems in some degree similar to that of the locks on our own canals."

For the internal commerce of the empire,

the Chinese are rendered almost wholly independent of ecast navigation by their Im perial canal, which in point of extent and magnitude of undertaking, is, as well as the great wall, unrivalled by any other works of the kind in the whole world. The canal was principally the work of Kobblai Khan and his immediate successors of the Yuen race.

The two principal rivers of China occupy a very high rank in the geographical history of the globe. Taking the Thames as a unit, Major Rennel estimated the proportions of the Yangtse-keang and Yellow river at fifteen and a half and thirteen and a half respectively, and they are secondary only to the Amazon and the Mississippi. The Yangtse-keang, the river, or the "Son of the sea," has been by some people styled the Blue river, but there is no such name for it in Chinese. It rises in Kokonor, the country between Thibet and China, not far from the sources of the Yellow river; turning suddenly south, it makes an abrupt bend through the provinces of Yun-nan and See-chuen, where it takes the name of the "Golden-sanded river;" and then flowing north-east and east, it subsequently makes a gentle bend southward, and receives the superfluous waters of the Tongting Hoo, the largest lake of China; thence, in its course towards the sea, it serves as a discharger to another large lake, the Poyang Hoo, in Keang sy province; after which it runs nearly north-east, and flows past Nanking into the ocean, which it reaches exactly under the thirty second parallel of latitude. This great stream runs with such a strong and prevailing ebb, that Lord Amherst's embassy found great difficulty in sailing up its course towards the Poyang lake, being nnable to make any way at all, except with a strong north-easterly breeze. The filcod tide was felt no higher than Kua-chow, below Nanking.

The yellow river rises also in the country of Kokonor, but soon turning as abrubtly north as the Keang does south, it passes across the great wall, and makes an elbow round the territory of the Ortous; passing back again across the wall, it flows due south, and forms the boundary of Shan-sy and Shensy; whence it turns sharply eastward and reaches the sea in latitude 34°. From the excessive rapidity of its stream, this river is nearly unnavigable through its greater length. In the old maps of China, the yellow river has been represented as flowing into the Gulf of Pechele, north of the Shantung promentory. If then, in the construction of the canal under Kubblai Khan, its ancient course was turned, it is possible that this violence to nature has occasioned the constant recurrence of the dreadful accidents which attend the bursting of its artificial, but ill-constructed, banks and dikes. It is a source of perpetual anxiety and heavy expense to the government, and there is a tax on the Hong merchants at Canton, expressly on this account. Yellow river is so called from the quantity of mud which it contains.

676

Captain Fremont's Second Exploring Expedition.

Captain Freemont departed on his second expedition from the little town of Kansas, on the Missouri frontier, on the 29th of May, 1813. His party consisted principally of Creole and Canadian French, and Americans, amounting in all to thirty-nine men; among whom were several of those who had accomMr. Thomas panied him on his former tour.

Fitzpatrick was selected as the guide, and Mr. Charles Preuss was associated with the the expedition as before. The party were armed generally with Hall's carbines, and were furnished with a brass twelve-pound howitzer. The camp equipage and provisions were transported in twelve carts, each drawn by two mules, and a light coloured wagon, mounted on springs, conveyed the in

struments.

"To make the exploration as useful as possible. I determined," says Captain Fremont, "in conformity with my general instructions, to vary the route to the Rocky Mountains from that followed, in the year 1842. The route then was up the Valley of Great Platte river to the South Pass, in north latitude 42°; the route now determined on was up the valley of the Kansas river, and to the head of the Arkansas, and to some pass in the mountains, if any could be found, at the sources of that river.

By making this deviation from the former route, the problem of a new road to Oregon and California, in a climate more genial, might be solved, and a better knowledge obtained of an important river and the country it drained, while the great object of the expedition would find its commencement at the termination of the former, which was at that great gate in the ridge of the Rocky Moun tains ealled the South Pass and on the lofty peak of the mountain which overlooks it, deemed the highest peak in the ridge, and from the opposite sides of which four great rivers take their rise, and flow to the Pacific, or the Mississippi."

The route appears to have been for many days through a pleasant and level prairie country, intersected with numerous streams, in general well timbered on their margin with ash, elm, cotton-wood, and very large oak. This agreeable state of things did not, however, long continue.

44

these prairies are every where covered with afclose and vigorous growth of a great variety grasses, among which the most abundant is the buffalo grass, (sesleria dactyloides.) Between the Platte and Arkansas rivers, the soil is excellent, admirably adapted to agricul tural purposes, and would support a large agricultural and pastoral population.

Throughout the western half of the plain bottom lands, bordered by bluffs, vary from five to five hundred feet in height. In all this region the timber is entirely confined to the streams."

On the 17th of July Captain Fremont visitthe celebrated Springs, from which the Boiling Springs' river takes its name, and gives the following graphic sketch of their locality: Leaving the camp to follow slowly, I rode abead in the afternoon in search of springs. In the mean ime, the clouds, which had been gathered all the afternoon over the mountains, began to roll down their sides; and a storm so violent burst upon me, that it appeared I had entered the store house of the thunder storms. I continued, however, to ride along up the river until about sunset, and was beginning to be doubtful of finding the springs before the next day, when I came suddenly upon a large smooth rock, about twenty yards in diameter, where the water from several springs was bubbling and boiling up in the midst of a white incrustation with which it had covered a portion of the rock.-As ibis did not correspond with a description given me by the hunters, I did not stop to taste the water, but dismounting, walked a little way up the river, and passing through a narrow thicket of shrubbery, bordering upon the stream, stepped directly upon a huge white rock, at the foot of which the river, already become a torrent, foamed along, broken by a small fall. A deer which had been drinking at the spring was startled at my approach, and springing across the river, bounded off up the monntain. In the upper part of the rock which had apparently been formed by a deposition, was a beautiful white basin overhung by currant bushes, in which the cold clear water bubbled up, kept in constant mo tion by the escaping gas and overflowing the rock which it had almost entirely covered with a smooth crust of glistening white. I had all day refrained from drinking, reserving myself for the spring; and as I could not be more wet than the rain had already made me, I lay down by the side of the basin and drank heartily of the delightful water, immediately at the foot of lofty mountains, beautifully timbered, which sweep closely round, shutting up the little valley in a kind of cove. As it was beginning to grow dark, I rode quickly down the river, on which I found the camp a few miles below.

July 20.-We continued our march up the stream, along a green sloping bottom, between pine hills on the one hand, and the main Black hills on the other, towards the ridge which separates the waters of the Platte from those