Doubtless there are
moments when excessive heat, a want of fresh water, and other privations
remind one that life is a toil; but these drawbacks are of short duration.
There are no concealed dangers--no difficulties of road; a far-spreading
verdure, relieved by a profusion of variously colored flowers, the azure
of the sky above, or the tempest that can be seen from its beginning to
its end, the beautiful modifications of the changing clouds, the curious
looming of objects between earth and sky, taxing the ingenuity every
moment to rectify--all, everything, is calculated to excite the
perceptions and keep alive the imagination. In the summer season,
especially, everything upon the prairies is cheerful, graceful, and
animated. The Indians, with herds of deer, antelope and buffalo, give life
and motion to them. It is then they should be visited; and I pity the man
whose soul could remain unmoved under such a scene of excitement."
[Footnote: Report intended to illustrate a map of the hydrographical basin
of the upper Mississippi River, Washington, 1843, 26th Cong.
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