HEALTH. 163 



impelled, by the father's example, to labor beyond their 

 strength, and more land is cleared and planted with corn than 

 is well tended ; for over-exertion, change in the manner of 

 living, and the influence of other debiUtating causes, bring 

 sickness on at least a part of the family before the summer 



is half over. 



* * * * * * * 



" Many persons, on moving into the back woods, who have 

 been accustomed to the decencies of life, think it is little 

 matter how they live, because no one sees them. Thus we 

 have known a family of some opulence to reside for years in 

 a cabin unfit for the abode of any human being, because they 

 could not find time to build a house ; and whenever it rained 

 hard the females were necessarily engaged in rolling the beds 

 from one corner of the room to another, in order to save them 

 from the w^ater that poured in through the roof. This cabin 

 was intended at first as only a very temporary residence, and 

 was erected on the edge of a swamp, for the convenience of 

 being near to a spring. How unreasonable must such people 

 be if they expect health !" 



THE PUBLIC LANDS. 



The immense body of unappropriated and unsettled lands 

 in this country, comprising more than 270,000,000 acres,* is 

 commonly denominated government lands, and in all action 

 upon them, both by individuals and by public bodies, legis- 



* By the returns in the Land Office, dated June, 1845, which is the 

 latest return, the whole amount purchased of the Indians, and yet in the 

 hands of the Government, not granted to individuals, surveyed and un- 

 surveyed, amounts to 272,825,055 acres. At the time of writing this note, 

 a treaty, just concluded with the Potawatamis, and also another, are before 

 the Senate. These will probably make the amount about 300,000,000 

 acres. 



