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THE most glorious morning! How I have enjoyed it and a solitary ramble on the banks of Rock River (a small tributary of the Mississippi), on which the little town stands. Many a thought also winged its way homeward, and said, "good-morning to my beloved, and I would that I could bear to them, and, above all, to you, my Agatha, this air, this sun of the New World's Indian summer!"

Watertown is a little, newly sprung-up, infant town of two thousand inhabitants. The small, neat houses, most of them of wood and painted white, and very smart and clean, were scattered upon the green slopes between the wood and the river. Columns of smoke ascended from their chimneys in the quiet morning, and the sun shone over them and the mirror-like river. "Are you sunflowers?" asked I (of course in petto). "Are the people within you like the inner blossoms of the sunflower, each bearing seed in itself?" Thus, of a certainty, will it become sometime in this country, which raises itself like a giant sunflower above the waves of the ocean; but the further I advance into the West, the more clear it becomes to me that as yet it is not so generally, and that people in the great West are as yet principally occupied in the acquisition of the material portion of life, in a word,   [p. 614]   by "business!" People have not as yet time to turn themselves to the sun.

But the churches, the schools, and the asylums which are in progress of erection, and those small houses and homes which are beginning to adorn themselves with flowers, to surround themselves with gardens--they prove that the light-life is struggling into being. First were the Hrimthursar (the giants of frost)--then the giants and dwarfs; to these succeeded the gods and goddesses. Thus say the Vala songs.

I wrote to you last from Chicago. From Chicago I went by steamer across Lake Michigan to Milwaukee, escorted by a pleasant and warm-hearted young man, Mr. R. The proprietor of the steamer would not allow me to pay for my passage. The voyage was sun-bright and excellent. We lay to at small infant towns on the shore, such as Southbord, Elgin, Racine, all having sprung up within the last seven or eight years, and in a fair way of growing great under the influence of trade and the navigation of the Lake.

I was met at Milwaukee by Herr L., a Swedish gentleman resident there as a merchant, who had invited me to his house, and who now conducted me thither, where I was most kindly received by his wife, a little, good-tempered Irish lady. That was in the evening. The next morning was rainy, but afterward cleared up, and became one of the most lovely days. The whole of the forenoon I was obliged to enact the lioness to an incessant stream of callers, ladies and gentlemen, received from them presents of flowers, books, verses, and through all was obliged to be polite, answer the same questions over and over again, and play over and over again on the piano the same ballads and polkas. Some of these people were evidently interesting people, from whose conversation I could have derived pleasure and profit; but ah! this stream carries all pearls along with it.

I was this forenoon in a large ladies' school, where I saw many handsome young girls, made them a speech, and congratulated them on being Americans; I also saw some agreeable teachers, and then, again, more gentlemen and ladies. An important reformation in female schools is taking place in these Western States at the present time under the guidance of a Miss Beecher, sister to the highly-gifted young minister at Brooklyn, and who is a kind of lady-abbess in educational matters. In the afternoon I was driven about to see all the lions of the place in a carriage, which a gentleman of the town had placed at my disposal. It was very agreeable, for the town is beautiful--has a charming situation on elevated ground, between Lake Michigan and Milwaukee River, and increases with all its might. Four great school-houses, one in each quarter of the town, shone in the sunlight with their ascending cupolas. They are as yet in progress of erection, are all alike, and in a good style of architecture--ornamental without pomp. I saw some handsome, well-built streets, with handsome shops and houses, quite different to those of Chicago. Nearly all the houses in Milwaukee are built of brick, a peculiar kind of brick, which is made here from the clay of the neighborhood, and which makes a brick of a pale yellow color, which gives the city a very cheerful appearance, as if the sun were always shining there. I saw also lovely country houses in the outskirts, with splendid and extensive prospects over lake and land. Milwaukee, not Chicago, deserves to be called "Queen of the Lake." She stands a splendid city on those sunny heights, and grows and extends herself every day. Nearly half of the inhabitants are Germans, and they occupy a portion of the city to themselves, which is called "German Town." This lies on the other side of the River Milwaukee. Here one sees German houses, German inscriptions over the doors or signs, German physiognomies. Here are published   [p. 616]   German newspapers; and many Germans live here who never learn English, and seldom go beyond the German town. The Germans in the Western States seem, for the most, to band together in a clan-like manner, to live together, and amuse themselves as in their fatherland. Their music and dances, and other popular pleasures, distinguish them from the Anglo-American people, who, particularly in the West, have no other pleasure than "business." This reminds me of a conversation I had on one occasion--I think it was at Augusta, in Georgia-- in a shop where I went to purchase something. A middle-aged woman stood behind the counter, and I heard by her mode of speaking that she was a German. I asked her, therefore, in German, how she liked this New World.

"Oh yes!" she replied, with a sigh, "it is all very well for business, and for making money. But when I have worked all day and the evening is come, I can not here have any 'plaisir.' In the Old Country, though one, perhaps, might not get so much by work, yet one could have some 'plaisir' when it was done. But here nobody has any idea of any 'plaisir,' but just business, business, day out and day in; so that one's life is not very amusing."

That was in the South, where immigration exists to a much less extent. In the Northwestern States the Germans come over in immense crowds, and band themselves together and have "plaisir" enough, and their music finds its way now and then, with a bewitching tone, to the ears of the Anglo-Americans, and those strong, blooming German girls sometimes attract them so irresistibly as to occasion an approximation in search for "plaisir," and whatever more there may be, also, in that German realm.

In the evening I supped at the house of the mayor of the city, where I saw many very agreeable people. One amiable young lady took a bracelet from her arm and   [p. 617]   clasped it around mine. I shall bear her memory in my heart.

The house of the mayor was upon a hill, extremely picturesque, looking down upon a deep valley, where also people lived and were building. That is one of the dangers of building a house upon a hill. You have, for instance, bought a piece of land upon a hill, a piece large enough for a house and a little garden; and you have built a beautiful house, and planted trees and flowers around it, rejoiced in your house and in your magnificent view, which extends over the whole lake and great part of the country. This is to-day. To-morrow you hear that the ground adjoining your house is purchased by somebody, who intends to cut it down many fathoms, and to build a street directly below your house. You protest, and declare that your house will fall down if the hill is undermined just below its walls! There is no help for it! The day after to-morrow you see that the digging and the delving have begun just outside your walls, and you have in a while the agreeable prospect of seeing the sand-hill tumble down, and your house tumbling down with it, make a summerset into the new street at its feet, and, if it has good luck, demolishing in its descent the house which your grave-digger had built. But this is a gloomy picture! Nevertheless, I beheld it with my own eyes in Milwaukee. I would very willingly live for a time in Milwaukee, upon its beautiful heights, among its kindly, lively people, but as to building a house there--No, I thank you!