Just at dawn, I woke up and got out on the platform of the
carriage, which is the favorite resort of smokers and their antithetics, those who
love pure fresh air, notwithstanding the printed caution, “It is dangerous to
stand on the platform;” and under the eye of early morn saw spread around a
flat sealike expanse, not yet warmed into color and life by the sun. The line
was no longer guarded from daring Secessionists by soldiers' outposts, and
small camps had disappeared. The train sped through the centre of the great
verdant circle as a ship through the sea, leaving the rigid iron wake behind it
tapering to a point at the horizon and as the light spread over it, the surface
of the crisping corn waved in broad undulations beneath the breeze from east to
west. This is the prairie indeed. Hereabouts it is covered with the finest
crops, some already cut and stacked. Looking around one could see church spires
rising in the distance from the white patches of houses, and by degrees the
tracks across the fertile waste became apparent, and then carts and horses were
seen toiling through the rich soil.
A large species of partridge or grouse appeared very
abundant, and rose in flocks from the long grass at the side of the rail or
from the rich carpet of flowers on the margin of the corn-fields. They sat on
the fence almost unmoved by the rushing engine, and literally swarmed along the
line. These are called “prairie chickens” by the people, and afford excellent
sport. Another bird about the size of a thrush, with a yellow breast and a
harsh cry, I learned was “the sky-lark;” and apropos of the unmusical
creature, I was very briskly attacked by a young lady patriot for finding fault
with the sharp noise it made. “Oh, my! And you not to know that your Shelley
loved it above all things! Didn't he write some verses — quite beautiful, too,
they are — to the sky-lark?” And so “the Britisher was dried up,” as I read in
a paper afterwards of a similar occurrence.
At the little stations which occur at every few miles — there
are some forty of them, at each of which the train stops, in 365 miles between
Cairo and Chicago — the Union flag floated in the air; but we had left all the
circumstance of this inglorious war behind us, and the train rattled boldly
over the bridges across the rare streams, no longer in danger from Secession
hatchets. The swamp had given place to the cornfield. No black faces were
turned up from the
mowing and free white labor was at work, and the type of the laborers was
German and Irish.
The Yorkshirenian expatiated on the fertility of the land,
and on the advantages it held out to the emigrant. But I observed all the lots
by the side of the rail, and apparently as far as the eye could reach, were
occupied. “Some of the very best land lies beyond on each side,” said he. “Out
over there in the fat places is where we put our Englishmen.” By digging deep
enough good water is always to be had, and coal can be carried from the rail,
where it costs only 7s. or 8s. a
ton. Wood there is little or none in the prairies, and it was rarely indeed a
clump of trees could be, detected, or anything higher than some scrub
brushwood. Those little communities which we passed were but the growth of a
few years, and as we approached the northern portion of the line we could see,
as it were, the village swelling into the town, and the town spreading out to
the dimensions of the city. “I dare say, Major,” says one of the passengers, “this
gentleman never saw anything like these cities before. I'm told they've nothing
like them in Europe?” “Bless you,” rejoined the Major, with a wink, “just
leaving out London, Edinbro', Paris, and Manchester, there's nothing on earth
to ekal them.” My friend, who is a shrewd fellow, by way of explanation of his
military title, says, “I was a major once, a major in the Queen's Bays, but
they would put troop-sergeant before it them days.” Like many Englishmen he
complains that the jealousy of native-born Americans effectually bars the way
to political position of any naturalized citizen, and all the places are kept
by the natives.
The scene now began to change gradually as we approached
Chicago, the prairie subsided into swampy land, and thick belts of trees
fringed the horizon; on our right glimpses of the sea could be caught through
openings in the wood — the inland sea on which stands the Queen of the Lakes.
Michigan looks broad and blue as the Mediterranean. Large farmhouses stud the
country, and houses which must be the retreat of merchants and citizens of means; and when the train, leaving the land altogether, dashes out on a pier and causeway built along the borders of the lake, we see lines of noble houses, a fine boulevard, a forest of masts, huge isolated piles of masonry, the famed grain elevators by which so many have been hoisted to fortune, churches and public edifices, and the apparatus of a great city; and just at nine o'clock the train gives its last steam shout and comes to a standstill in the spacious station of the Central Illinois Company, and in half-anhour more I am in comfortable quarters at the Richmond House, where I find letters waiting for me, by which it appears that the necessity for my being in Washington in all haste, no longer exists. The wary General who commands the army is aware that the advance to Richmond, for which so many journals are clamoring, would be attended with serious risk at present, and the politicians must be content to wait a little longer.
SOURCE: William Howard Russell, My Diary North and
South, Vol. 1, p. 351-3
