INTRODUCTION. 



How often, Good Reader, have I longed to see the day on 

 which my labours should be brought to an end ! Many times, 

 when I had laid myself down in the deepest recesses of the 

 western forests, have I been suddenly awakened by the appa- 

 rition of dismal prospects that have presented themselves to 

 my mind. Now, sickness, methought, had seized me with 

 burning hand, and hurried me away, in spite of all my fond 

 wishes, from those wild woods in which I had so long lingered, 

 to increase my knowledge of the objects which they offered to 

 my view. Poverty, too, at times walked hand in hand with me, 

 and on more than one occasion urged me to cast away my pen- 

 cils, destroy my drawings, abandon my journals, change my 

 ideas, and return to the world. At other times the Red Indian, 

 erect and bold, tortured my ears with horrible yells, and threat- 

 ened to put an end to my existence; or white-skinned murderers 

 aimed then- rifles at me. Snakes, loathsome and venomous, 

 entwined my limbs, while vultures, lean and ravenous, looked 

 on with impatience. Once, too, I dreamed, when asleep on a 

 sand-bar on one of the Florida Keys, that a huge shark had 

 me in his jaws, and was dragging me into the deep. 



