cultural than the Creeks. The Creeks themselves corroborate this account, and say that but a few generations since, their fathers dispossessed a nation who were too feeble to resist their attacks. They affirm that the rectangular forts and circular mounds, that the steatite hatchets and pipes, and the arrow-heads of jasper and quartz which lie scattered over all the fields of the Gulf States, are not the workmanship of their hands, but are the relics of the 'old time people' who preceded them. The fortifications and mounds were frequently of a size which must have required much time and labor to have constructed them. The hatchets were sometimes bored for the purpose of inserting a handle, but the most of them were grooved, and the handle was fastened to them by making a fissure in a sapling near the ground, and inserting the hatchet as far as the groove. It was allowed to remain in this position for two or three years, till the growth of the young tree had fastened it securely. The tree was then cut off just below the hatchet, and also sufficiently far above to afford a suitable handle. Some of the pipes were curiously wrought in the form of birds and animals, while others were rude, and often weighed several pounds. The arrow-heads, however, are the most numerous and beautiful relics of this extinct race. They are found from one-half to five inches in length, with sharp points and serrated edges. They are said to have been used by attaching them to the end of a wooden shaft. The end of the shaft was first split open, the arrow-head was inserted, and the sinew of some animal wound around, which on exposure to the sunshine or fire would contract and firmly secure the two together. The variegated jasper of which they are chiefly made is only found among the highlands of Tennessee. So numerous are they on the alluvial lands of the south, that the writer has a collection of six hundred, found in ploughing a single field in the valley of the Chatahoochee. They are more skilfully formed than those found on the banks of the Hudson and Merrimac, and serve to illustrate the position, that the aborigines of the western continent were civilized in proportion to their proximity to a tropical climate; a rule which seems to be reversed among the Europeans and their descendants.

In former times, those of the Creeks who were too lawless to submit even to the loose restrictions of their tribe, were driven away to the lowlands of Florida. Strengthened by continual accessions, they became a distinct and independent tribe, known in later times as the Seminoles; a name in the Creek dialect signifying wild fellows,' or rowdies. The modern Seminoles seem to have not entirely lost the characteristics of their ancestors.

With the exception of a slightly darker complexion, the aborigines of the south do not differ in their personal appearance from those of the Canadas. Both have the same dark and coarse hair, the same projecting jaws and prominent cheek-bones. Both have coarse features, and an indolent, forbidding expression of the countenance. The beautiful and dark-eyed Indian girls, so frequently described by magazine and fancy writers, we have never seen while

travelling among either; and we have repeatedly been led to suspect that such transcendent specimens of the race were only creations of the imagination.

The Creek language, in paucity of words and simplicity of arrangement, had few if any equals. They had few ideas to express except those relating to external objects and the daily occurrences of savage life. Instead of twenty-four thousand substantives, they had less than one eighth of that number, and their whole vocabulary did not exceed four thousand words. We have been told by those who passed their early childhood among this tribe, that at ten years of age they had acquired their entire language. Names in their language were significant. Chatahoochee was The River of Beautiful Pebbles;' Talapoosa, The Swiftly-moving Stream;' Wetumpka, a Water-fall;' Dahlanega, Gold,' etc.

6

All of the Creek nation have removed to the Indian Territory, except one family, who, owning a large number of negroes, were unwilling to dispose of their planting interests, and were permitted to remain. It was doubtless better for this, and the other tribes of the Gulf States, to go westward. They are already increasing in wealth, numbers and intelligence. Previous to their removal, no people were ever more effectually the victims of fraud and speculation. They were exposed to all the vices of civilized life, without enjoying any of its benefits. The most enduring memorials they have left behind them are the names they had given to the mountains, streams and wood-lands of the south. Nearly all the rivers and creeks retain the names given them by the Indian. It is fitting that it should be so. Above all things did he love the rivers of his native land. Upon their banks he built his cabin and kindled his mighty watch-fires; and to this day you will find the high bluffs at the junction of two streams covered with the fragments of rude Indian workmanship.

LOCATION OF COLUMBUS: POLITICS AT THE SOUTH: METHOD OF CONDUCTING A CANVASS: THE FLOATING VOTE: STUMP SPEAKING: UNCLE THOMAS JONES: PUBLIC MEN OF GEORGIA: A QUERY.

Columbus, Georgia, March 4, 1847.

COLUMBUS, one of the largest inland towns of the south, is at the head of steam-boat navigation on the Chatahoochee. It has five thousand inhabitants, and a delightful and healthy location. It is the centre of a thrifty inland trade, and from the abundant waterpower opposite the town, may at some future day become a manufacturing city.

We had several years ago heard a veteran editor at Washington denominate Columbus as the Belgium of Georgia.' Others had also spoken of it, and truly, as we afterward discovered, as having the ablest bar and pulpit and the most active politicians of any town in the state. It was with some interest, therefore, on our first visit southward, that we watched the progress of the contest previous to the state election in the fall of 184-.

There is at the south a class of citizens, who for general intelligence and enlarged and liberal views are not surpassed by those of any section of the Union. There is also a medium class, who, though their knowledge of books is not equivalent to that of the northern farmer, yet from habits of observation and reflection have acquired pretty accurate views of the leading topics which come before the community. There is yet a third and numerous class, who are destitute of the facilities for information, and who know but little of the principles which distinguish the two political parties of the country. They are many of them the victims of idle and intemperate habits. To them it is a matter of indifference what party shall triumph. They are in the market, and the highest bidder is sure of their suffrages. Such constitute what in common parlance is called the 'floating vote.' They are more numerous in some counties than in others, and in the one from which we are writing are said a few years ago to have comprised about one-fourth of the popular vote. When the two parties are nearly equal, they hold the balance of power, and on this account acquire an importance to which under different circumstances they could never attain. At the election just referred to, there were in the county eight candidates for the legislature; four of each party. They were all 'game' men, as a Georgian would say, or in other words, men who would spare neither time, money, nor effort to secure their election. For several weeks previous to the day of election the candidates of both parties thoroughly traversed the county, attending the justices' courts, and public auctions, and occasionally, at some central point, giving a barbacue at their own expense. On these occasions they manifested their willingness to become the servants of the public by bountifully providing meat and drink, and indiscriminately shaking hands with the sovereign people. More especially were they courteous when they came in contact with one of the floaters.' However slight might have been their former acquaintance, they were at once recognized as old and familiar friends. There was no paucity of complimentary allusions and expressions of personal regard; and among other kind sayings, the candidates did not permit the good looks of wives and children, if such happened to be present, to pass unnoticed. In truth, each one of the would-be servants of the people was, for the time being, a most cozy and confidential personage. We have sometimes heard it hinted, that if the 'floater' required a more tangible evidence of friendship to secure his suffrage, his demand was not unfrequently complied with. Now all these surmises may be mere scandal; yet this much is certain, that on election-day nothing was more common than to see new hats and new boots adorning the heads and feet of those whose zenith and nadir had not been so fortunate for at least a twelve-month previous.

In Georgia, the state election takes place on the first Monday of October. On the morning previous to election-day every disposable vehicle was despatched into the country to bring to the polls the voters whose support might otherwise be doubtful. During the day

carriages were now and then coming in and depositing their cargoes at the place of rendezvous. One party had selected a dilapidated tavern in the upper extremity of the town, and their opponents a similar tenement in the lower. By night, about two hundred were collected at each dépôt, the most of them, except the supervisors, in a high state of excitement. During the night, each party endeavored to decoy voters from their opponents, and to prevent this, large fires were kindled, and a watchful guard stationed around each building. An abundance of food and drink was also provided, to remove every inducement to migrate. Within, all was mirth and talk and laughter. If the bill of each guest had been, after the custom of the old Dutch eating-houses, in proportion to the noise he made, few could have settled for their fare. Longfellow's description of a German 'studenten knieppe' would fail to give one a just conception of the incessant jargon. The midnight slumbers of the citizens were disturbed by the shouts echoing from the 'Bloody Fourth' and the 'Old Kentucky House.'

Early the next morning the floaters' were marched in single file, with votes in hand, to the ballot box. After the votes were deposited, a strange indifference to the comforts of their recent friends came over the feelings of the candidates; and the 'floaters,' though not in the best condition to do so, were left to provide for their own conveyance homeward. It need not be mentioned that the public career of political aspirants of this grade terminates with the ephemeral existence of the means which they had employed to attain to it.

The practice of stump-speaking has long prevailed at the south. Its efficiency is universally acknowledged, and in a doubtful canvass, conventions and caucuses select for candidates those upon whose talents in this department they can best rely. To be a successful stump-speaker requires not so much of logical ability as fluency of language, quickness at repartee, and especially an aptitude for relating and embellishing anecdotes. In the last accomplishment the southern stump-orators exhibit a peculiar tact, and are never at a loss to find an incident to illustrate any favorite position.

'Our party,' said a Georgian member of congress, to whom we were listening during the memorable presidential campaign of 1844, 'our party are called destructives, disorganists, and agrarians by our opponents, and they make the charge with a degree of vehemence which indicates that their imaginations are really disturbed by visions of

'Gorgons, hydras and chimeras dire.'

Their condition reminds me of an incident which happened some years ago to an old neighbor of my father's, Uncle Thomas Jones, who lived up in Coweta. Uncle Thomas was a famous old hunter, almost as unerring in his aim as Davy Crockett, and with as eminent a reputation in his own immediate settlement. One morning,' said uncle Tommy, for I shall use the language of my old friend, 'one morning, just after day-break, I took my rifle and started

down the valley toward the swamp. I had not gone more than a mile, when casting my eye on the other side of the creek, what should I see, on the limb of a tall sweet gum, about sixty feet from the ground, but a huge animal, which from its size and form I at once knew to be a stranger in these diggin's. I drew up my rifle, took deliberate aim, and fired. The huge creature did not move a limb, but lay stretched out as tranquilly as if nothing had happened. I now carefully re-loaded my piece, examined the priming, advanced some ten paces nearer, and fired again. The animal did not move this time, except that I thought I could see him rustle his head and shoulders slightly, as much as to say, 'You can't come it no how, old hunter!' I acknowledge I was a good deal vexed, and thought some rather hard words; but as I had been for years a member of the Mount Hope church, I curbed my temper and said nothing aloud. I now put in an extra charge of powder, selected one of the fairest balls, and did, what I had not done since the days of boyhood, rested the muzzle upon a sapling, and blazed away. As soon as the smoke had cleared away, there lay the supernatural monster, undisturbed and 'calm as a summer's morning!' I felt almost dizzy from amazement. I laid down the rifle, took off my hat, and crossing over the creek, came directly opposite to the tree on which the strange prodigy had perched himself. The sun had now risen above the hills. I stooped down, placed my hand above my forehead, took a full view; and judge of my mortification, on discovering that the huge creature at which I had expended my powder and lead was only an enormous louse, creeping on my own eye-brow!' Now, fellow-citizens, the predicament into which Uncle Tommy had fallen is precisely analagous to that of our opponents. Party-zeal has so disordered the organs of their political vision that they imagine the vermin of their own partisan theories to be heresies in the political creed of those who venture to differ from them!'

Of late there has been but little political excitement at the south, and we believe a more healthy and liberal state of public feeling is becoming prevalent. Of many of her sons who have been, and are now, in her national councils, Georgia may well be proud. Her Crawford, her Forsyth, and her Habersham, were men of preëminent talents, and passed a long public life unblemished and uncensured. Among her present public men there are those who by their public abilities and private worth would do honor to any section of the Union.

The inquiry is often suggested, why the southern people, a community acknowledged both at home and abroad to be mercurial and impulsive, have never, from the days of the Salem witchcraft to the present time, been disturbed by any of the exciting and popular fallacies or isms so prevalent at the north. Neither Millerism, Mormonism, or Mesmerism, to say nothing of Fourierism and AntiRentism, have existed at the south. By some it is maintained that public opinion at the south is controlled by a few leading minds; themselves too intelligent to be deluded by any erroneous excitement; and as the mass of the community adopt their views, and