IOWA AND ILLINOIS. 375 



downward course until we touched the great thirsty 

 prairie, with its withered clump-grass struggling for an 

 existence. Here the dust became insufferable, until at 

 last we got to the rich and fertile plains of Nebraska, 

 where we passed many emigrant parties wending their 

 weary steps westward ; at night these form an encamp- 

 ment by placing horses and cattle around their wagons, 

 —a proof that there are no wild beasts in the district. 

 At Omaha we crossed the Missouri, and on its bank 

 a pretty red-brick villa, situated within the inclosures 

 of a park, was pointed out to me as the home of Mr. 

 Francis Train, who, some years previously, had made the 

 round of the globe within eighty days. Thence through 

 the great granaries, Iowa and Illinois, passing the 

 mighty Mississippi between Davenport and Rock Island, 

 — both large manufacturing towns, — and on to Chicago, 

 through a magnificent country resembling a succession 

 of vast English parks. 



One sultry afternoon I ascended the fine flight of 

 steps of Sherman's Hotel, since burnt down and 

 no doubt rebuilt, a grand place, doing honour to this 

 opulent neopolis. Those who have visited the house 

 will agree that there was nothing to grumble about 

 excepting the bill, which was double that of the 

 " Grand " at San Francisco. The town is well built, 

 and pleasantly situated on the shores of Lake Michigan ; 



