But If The Past Is Blank, These Scenes Are Suggestive Of Happy Reflections As To The Future.

The long perspective is radiant with busy life and cheerful husbandry.

New forms spring into being. Villages and towns spring up as if by magic, along whose streets throngs of men are passing. And thus, as "coming events cast their shadows before," does the mind wander from the real to the probable. An hour and a half of this sort of revery, and we had come to the Fort Ripley ferry, over which we were to go for the mail. That ferry (and I have seen others on the river like it) is a marvellous invention. It is a flat-boat which is quickly propelled either way across the river by means of the resistance which it offers to the current. Its machinery is so simple I will try to describe it. In the first place a rope is stretched across the river from elevated objects on either side. Each end of the boat is made fast to this line by pullies, which can be taken up or let out at the fastenings on the boat. All that is required to start the boat is to bring the bow, by means of the pully, to an acute angle with the current. The after part of the boat presents the principal resistance to the current by sliding a thick board into the water from the upper side. As the water strikes against this, the boat is constantly attempting to describe a circle, which it is of course prevented from doing by the current, and so keeps on for it must move somewhere in a direction where the obstruction is less. It certainly belongs to the science of hydraulics, for it is not such a boat as can be propelled by steam or wind. I had occasion recently to cross the Mississippi on a similar ferry, early in the morning, and before the ferryman was up. The proprietor of it was with me; yet neither of us knew much of its practical operation. I soon pulled the head of the boat towards the current, but left down the resistance board, or whatever it is called, at the bow as well as at the stern. This, of course, impeded our progress; but we got over in a few minutes; and I felt so much interested in this new kind of navigation, that I would have been glad to try the voyage over again.

On arriving within the square of the garrison, I expected to find the mail ready for delivery to the driver; but we had to wait half an hour. The mail is only weekly, and there was nothing of any consequence to change. We repaired to the post office, which was in a remote corner of a store-room, where the postmaster was busy making up his mail. Some of the officers had come in with documents which they wished to have mailed. And while we stood waiting, corporals and privates, servants of other officers brought in letters which Lieutenant So-and-so "was particularly desirous of having mailed this morning." The driver was magnanimous enough to submit to me whether we should wait.

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