CI-DEVANT DANDY. 23 



covetous, grasping spirit works is pretty equally di- 

 vided. 



These thoughts work in me here in the woods as I 

 lean on my rifle, and look on that sturdy backwoods- 

 man making the forest ring with his axe as he devotes 

 himself to a life of toil and ignorance. Ah, our religion 

 but half performs its work. It simply turns the icild 

 animal into a domestic one, but leaves him an animal 

 still. It does not elevate him, so that the poor can be 

 intelligent, refined, and spiritual. He is still doomed 

 to toil, toil, for the mere animal nature. Religion was 

 designed by its great Author to accomplish more than 

 this. 



My stopping place is at the house of an old friend, 

 on the frontier of this wild region, who, when I last 

 knew him, was called a New York dandy. Designed 

 by his friends for a profession, he broke away from his 

 studies and entered upon a mercantile life. In the 

 crash of 1837, he went down with the multitude. 

 Land, scattered here and there over the country, was 

 all that was left him to fall back upon, and he resolved 

 to turn farmer. I could hardly believe my eyes, when 

 I saw what a rock and mountain farm he was on. 

 As I came up to the door, he was engaged in filling a 



