The population of Rhode Island is but 147,545, while that of South Carolina is 668,507. The area of Rhode Island is but 1,306 square miles, while that of South Carolina is 29,000!

Illinois is traversed by no ranges of hills or mountains, and is, with the two exceptions of Delaware and Louisiana, the most level of the United States. The southern portion, however, is hilly, and there are many high and abrupt bluffs upon the Illinois and Mississippi rivers. Prairies are not so numerous or extensive east of the Mississippi as west, south of the Ohio as north, but Illinois is emphatically a Prairie State. There is but one prairie west of the Mississippi larger than Grand Prairie in this State, none of greater fertility. This prairie has its southern commencement in Jackson county, and extends, varying in width from one to twelve miles, north through the counties of Perry, Washington, Jefferson, Marion, Fayette, Effingham, Cumberland, Coles, Champaign and Iroquois, where it connects with the prairies that project east from the Illinois river. Prairie is a French word signifying a meadow or pasture ground. In the West they are divided into those that are flat and those that are rolling. The soil of both is deep, friable, and of unexampled fertility. The flat present in summer an expanse of green grass as boundless as the ocean, and the effect is magnificent when the tall grass is bent to and fro by the winds. Like all plains they are monotonous, and especially desolate and dreary when covered with snow or blackened by recent conflagration. Their aspect is varied and even picturesque, when there is a large growth of uneven and scattered timber, following the streams that pass through them, which creates the impression that there are inequalities of surface.

The rolling prairies as they spread out before you, in their vastness resemble the waves of the ocean after a storm. Between the "swells," which vary in hight from twenty to sixty feet, there are sloughs, or sections of wet and marshy grounds-when ditched a running stream is produced and the ground is ready for the plow. For the most part they are interspersed with woodlands or solitary clumps of trees, which give them a diversified and beautiful appearance. They are covered during the spring and summer with an endless variety of bright and beautiful flowers. There have been many conjectures and theories as to the manner in which the prairies were formed. The indications are very conclusive that Illinois was once covered with water-was once the bottom of a great lake. The writer of the following lines has fallen, in my opinion, upon the true origin of the rich alluvions of the Mississippi valley and the contiguous prairies."

"There is no question that the richest soil in the United States is to be found in the Mississippi valley. There is not, as in so many other cases, a thin covering over the clay, the sand, the gravel, the chalk or the rock, but the deposit of ages, effected by the constant operation of mighty agencies. In some cases the rich black mould is found as much as a hundred feet deep, and when turned up is as light and free as the driven snow. The pedestrian as he walks over it can in most instances sink his cane to the very head of it. Nor is it any wonder that it should be found so deep, when we consider that the vast desert which intervenes between the Mississippi and the Rocky Mountains has been gradually despoiled, that this rich deposit should be made in the lower portions of the valley. The great trail which commencing some hundreds of miles to the west of the river slopes gently up toward the mountains, has been gradually denuded of its soil, nothing being now left upon it but the dry sand, through which the rocks project as the bones sometimes protrude through the skin, the whole looking like the cadaver of what was once a fertile region."

The entire northern portion of the State is composed of rolling prairies, dispersed with timber. The State of Illinois has been divided and arranged under three general heads: First, the alluvions of the rivers, which are from one to eight miles in width, in some places elevated and in others low and subject to inundation. They consist of an intermixture of wood and prairie. The most remarkable of these alluvions from its extent and the depth of its soil is known as the American bottom, which name it derived from having once been the western boundary of the United States. It commences at the mouth of the Kaskaskia river and runs up the Mississippi between 80 and 100 miles to the mouth of the Missouri. It is bounded on the east by a continuous bluff varying in hight from 50 to 200 feet. Its area is 450 square miles, or 288,000 square acres. Along the bank of the Mississippi there is a growth of timber, with an exceedingly thick undergrowth from a half to two miles in width. Second; after leaving the alluvions and the rising bluffs that bind them, there is a tract of level country elevated from 50 to 100 feet, which is sometimes called table land. The greater proportion of this is called prairie, which is sometimes dry and at others wet and marshy, depending on the convexity or concavity of the surface. Third; the hilly and broken sections, consisting of intermixtures of woods and prairies, the soil in places being indifferent, as in portions of Fayette and Clark counties. Cook county deserves to be mentioned in this connection, as it neither, properly speaking, is prairie or alluvion, and does not come under the third general head in the foregoing classification. It is more level than the genuine prairie, less fertile, owing to the presence of large quantities of sand, and resembles the low districts or salt marshes on the sea-coast. The nature of the soil and the traces left for some distance in the interior, have led to the conclusion that the lake at no distant day swept over it. Though these lands be not of equal fertility with others in the State, they have been successfully reduced into cultivation and are highly productive.

The alluvions constitute a considerable part of the territory of the State, as may be readily conjectured from the number of streams. It is a source of regret that there is no sufficient data for ascertaining their exact extent, but a tolerably correct idea will be derived from a view of the large number of rivers in the State. Much of the largest of these is the Illinois, an Indian name signifying THE RIVER OF MEN. It is formed by the Des Plaines and Kankakee some fifty miles southwest of Chicago, and after pursuing a course in this direction 500 miles empties into the Mississippi 25 miles above the mouth of the Missouri. The current below the mouth of the Vermillion is gentle, the bed is wide and deep, and the navigation good during the whole summer. It spreads out into a beautiful lake called Lake Peoria, about 200 miles from its mouth. The banks are uniformly low to the mouth of Spoon river. The alluvions are bounded by high bluffs consisting of perpendicular ledges of rocks from 200 to 300 feet in hight.

It receives the Fox, Aux Sable, Little Vermillion rivers, and Crookedcreek and other streams of less note from the north, and the Vermillion, Mackinaw, Sangamon and other streams from the south.

The Fox river is a clear and beautiful stream which rises near Lake Michigan and pursues a southwest course to the Illinois.

The Kankakee is a large and navigable stream, but near the State line it loses itself in a marsh.

Rock river rises in Wisconsin and pursues a westerly course 300 miles, emptying into the Mississippi 300 miles above the mouth of the Illinois. It is a beautiful stream, and the lands upon it are very fertile.

The Kaskaskia is a large stream rising in the south-eastern part of the State, near the head waters of the Embarras, and runs in a south-western direction and enters the Mississippi about 100 miles above the Ohio. It has numerous tributaries, of which the principal are Lost, Crooked, Elkhorn and Plumb creeks, Fort river, Hurricane fork, Shoal, Sugar, Silver, Richland and Horse creeks. The river is navigable 150 miles to Vandalia in high water. Its banks and those of its tributaries are generally fertile. The Little Wabash has a course of 150 miles. The banks are very fertile, but subject to excessive inundations. The country between it and Skillet fork is particularly liable to inundation, and is in many places low and marshy, so that the water remains upon it during the whole season. autumn the stream is very low and sluggish.

In

The Embarras River is a navigable stream, the banks of which are flat and subject to inundation, but very fertile and heavily timbered. Spoon River is a large and beautiful stream. The land on this river is high and undulating, well watered, and handsomely diversified with timber and prairie. It is considered one of the most eligible sections in the northern part of the State.

The Sangamon is a large stream, emptying into the Illinois, 130 miles above its mouth. It is about 150 miles in length. The lands bordering on it and its tributaries are uncommonly fertile.

The Big Muddy runs through a fine prairie country. It is navigable about fifty miles, and empties into the Mississippi about sixty miles above its junction with the Ohio.

In addition to these streams, there are one hundred and ten or twenty others not enumerated, whose banks are alluvial deposits. It is safe to affirm that there is not in this country a territory of similar extent and equal fertility, nor is there on the face of the globe any like quantity of land of greater resources. This fact will be fully demonstrated in a future number, by a reference to its productions, agricultural and mineral.

Lying between latitudes 37 deg. and 42 deg. 30 min. north, and longitudes 87 deg. 49 min. and 91 deg. 28 min. from Greenwich, Illinois has a climate differing with the different parts of the State. Every flat country is subject to extremes of temperature, unless it be surrounded by modifying circumstances. This is the case with Illinois. The causes which operate to correct the extremes of weather in the State are two great ranges of mountains on either side of the Mississippi Valley and the chain of lakes extending to the frozen regions of the North.

In a State of such size, stretching through five degrees of latitude, there is a wide difference between the climate of the north and south. In southern Illinois the climate is exceedingly mild and pleasant, except for a short time in summer, when the sun is very powerful and the heat extremely enervating. Fruits, wines, and almost every production of the soil which delights in a warm climate, flourish here. In middle Illinois the climate is delightful, owing to the exhilarating breezes which prevail during the whole summer from the northwest. During the most oppressive weather of the summer, the nights are cool and bracing-the thermometer sinking at night to sixty deg. and frequently below, when during the day it has stood as high as 96 deg. and 100 deg.

The following results, drawn from three years' observations made upon the state of the thermometer near the center of the State, furnish a correct idea of the temperature through the entire year for this region:

MEAN TEMPERATURE FOR EACH MONTH DURING THE ABOVE YEARS:

THE FOLLOWING STATEMENT WILL SHOW THE ANNUAL RANGE OF THE THERMOM

THE AVERAGE MONTHLY RANGE DURING THESE YEARS IS AS FOLLOWS:

THE MEAN TEMPERATURE OF THE DIFFERENT SEASONS IS AS FOLLOWS:

The winter generally commences about the middle of December, and continues till the middle of February. In the same latitude, west of the Alleghanies, the climate is milder than it is east. In the winters of 1819 and 1820, the Mississippi at St. Louis was covered with ice for two months; but this is very unusual. In the winters of 1851, 1852, 1853, and 1854, it was covered over, but not during the winter.

In northern Illinois, the springs are wet and disagreeable, the summers pleasant, the autumns excellent, but the winters extremely cold. There is not, during the winter, a great fall of snow; nor is it the extremity of the cold which makes the weather so disagreeable, but the perpetual winds which blow from almost every quarter over the open country. The winds, when from the lake, can be borne; but from the prairies, they are icy, freezing, merciless.

The following meteorological observations, taken in Hancock county, during three years, give the following large proportion of fair, to rainy days:

Fair days. Cloudy. Rainy.

Snow.

246

74

42

With such a display of figures, it ceases to be remarkable that this climate is regarded as one of the mildest and most agreeable in the northern portion of the country.

About the middle of October or first of November, the Indian summer commences, and continues from fifteen to twenty days. During this season the weather is dull and cheerless, the atmosphere is smoky, and the sun and moon are sometimes almost totally obscured.

Notwithstanding, then, the varieties of her climate-its severity during the winter at the north, and the enervating heat of the summer at the south-Illinois may be regarded as having one of the most desirable and favored climates of the States in the Union.

With all the advantages of her fine situation-an empire in extent the richest portion of the richest country in the world with navigable streams on every border, and penetrating her remotest sections-rapidly increasing her population with an industrious, enterprising, and educated class of citizens-can any one doubt her future position of empire in that great valley fated to control the destinies of our republic?

Art. III. PROGRESS OF POPULATION IN THE UNITED STATES.

CHAPTER 1.

THE CENSUS OF 1850, BEING THE SEVENTH DECENNIAL ENUMERATION UNDER THE CONSTITUTION.

THIS census differs from every other which preceded it in one important particular. Hitherto the population had been distributed into classes, according to age, sex, and race, by the officers who took the census, but by the act of Congress for taking the seventh census, the census-taker was required to return each individual by name, with his or her sex, age, color, occupation, &c., and left the classification to be made at the seat of government, in the office of the Secretary of the Interior.

This mode was recommended by its promise of greater accuracy, and by its affording materials for additional classes of the individual citizens, according to other points of similarity. It has, however, been found to be attended with the disadvantages of adding largely to the expense, and of requiring a much longer time to complete a digest of the returns. These objections, which, if not obviated, must acquire additional force at each succeeding census, have given rise to a doubt whether the certain inconveniences of the new mode do not outweigh its presumed benefits.

The act also greatly enlarged the field of inquiry. It appointed a Census Board which had the power of prescribing the objects of inquiry, not exceeding one hundred. In the exercise of its authority, this Board augmented the number of agricultural items from twenty-nine to forty-five. It required a valuation of each person's lands, improved and unimproved, and of their implements and machinery; the annual taxes levied in each district; the number of aliens, with the places of their nativity; of paupers; of convicted criminals; of church establishments, with the property of each; and of the public libraries; and, lastly, it aimed at copious details of medical statistics-as the number of deaths within the year preceding the census, the age and color of each person deceased, and the disease of which he died. Though this part of the census is not to be relied on, from the incompetency or carelessness of most of those from whom the census-takers received their information, the seventh census, on the whole, furnishes the materials for a greater stock of statistical information than