the Creek prefer bringing their horses down and teaming oil to working the land or felling wood. This is emphatically the oil region."

Arrived at Schaeffer's or Shaffer's Farm, the present terminus of the Oil Creek Railway, Miselle was relieved from much anxiety by seeing upon the platform Friend Williams, to whom she had, in a fit of temporary insanity, written that she should leave home on Tuesday instead of Monday.

"And how shall we go down the Creek?" asked she, when the first greetings had been exchanged.

"In the packet-boat, to be sure. The hack-carriage will take us right down to the wharf."

Miselle opened her eyes. Here was metropolitan luxury! Here was ultra civilization in the heart of the wilderness! Oil-boats and lumber-wagons, avaunt! Those women at Corry had evidently been practising upon her ignorance, and amusing themselves with her terrors!

A sudden rush of citizens toward the edge of the platform interrupted these meditations.

"What is it?" asked Miselle, wildly, as her companion seized her arm, and hurried her along with the crowd.

"The carriage. There is a rush for places. There! we're too late, I'm afraid."

They halted, as he spoke, beside a long, heavy wagon, such as is used in the Eastern States for drawing wood, springless, with boards laid across for seats, and with no means of access save the clumsy wheels. Upon an elevated perch in front sat the driver, grinning over his shoulder at the scrambling crowd of passengers, most of whom were now loaded upon the wagon, while a circle of disappointed aspirants danced wildly around it, looking for a yet possible nook or cranny.

"Can't you make room for this lady? I will walk," vociferated Mr. Williams.

"Can't be did, Capting. Reckin, though, both on ye kin hitch on next load," drawled the driver, turning his horses into the slough of mud extending in every direction.

"I will walk with you. How far is it?" asked Miselle, after a brief contemplation of the prospect.

"Not so very far; but the mud is about two feet deep all the way, and you might soil your feet," suggested Mr. Williams, with a quizzical smile.

The objection was unanswerable; and Miselle, folding herself in the mantle of resignation, waited until the next troubling of the pool, when, rushing with the rest, she was safely hoisted into the cart, and the drive commenced.

"You had better cling to my arm here; it's a mud-hole; don't be frightened," exclaimed Mr. Williams, as the horses suddenly disappeared from view, and the wagon poised itself an instant on the edge of a chasm, and then plunged madly after them.

"Heavens! what has happened? Have they run away? Didn't the driver see where they were going? There! we're going o—ver!" shrieked Miselle.

"No, no; we're all right now, don't you see? The poor nags aren't likely to run much here; and though the driver saw it well enough, he couldn't help going through. That's a fair specimen of the road all down the Creek. Now here's a gully. Cling to me, and don't be frightened."

It is very easy to say, "Don't be frightened"; but when a wagon with four wheels travels for a considerable distance upon only two, while those on the upper side are spinning round in the air, and the whole affair inclines at a right angle toward a bottomless gulf of mud, it is rather difficult for a nervous person to heed the injunction.

Miselle did not shriek this time; but she fancies the "sable score of fingers four remain on the" arm "impressed," to which she clung during the ordeal.

Another plunge, a lurch, a twist, a sharp descent, and the breathless horses halted on the bank of a stream whose shallow waters were crowded with flatboats, generally laden with oil.

"Here is the packet-boat," remarked Mr. Williams, with mischievous smile, as he lifted his charge from the "hack-carriage," and led her toward one of these boats, a trifle dirtier than the rest, with planks laid across for seats, and several inches of water in the bottom. In shape and size it much resembled the mud-scows navigating the waters of Back Bay, Boston, and was propelled by a gigantic paddle at either end.

Miselle's lingering vision of a neat little steamboat with a comfortable cabin died away; and she placed herself without remark upon the board selected for her, accepting from her attentive companion the luxury of a bit of plank for her feet,—an invidious distinction, regarded with much disapproval by her fellow-passengers.

The sad and homesick lady was again Miselle's nearest neighbor, and now found her tongue in expressions of dismay and apprehension so vehement and sincere that her auditor hardly knew whether to weep with her or smile at her.

Fifty luckless souls, more or less decently clothed in bodies, having been crowded upon the raft, the shore-line was cast off, and she drifted magnificently out into the stream, and stuck fast about a rod from the landing.

The most terrific oaths, the most strenuous exertion of the paddles, failing to move her, "a team" was loudly called for by the irate passengers, and presently appeared in the shape of two horses with a small blue boy perched upon one of them. These were hitched to the forward part of the boat, and the swearing and pushing recommenced, with an accompaniment of slashing blows upon the backs of the unfortunate horses, who strained and plunged, but all to no effect, until another boat appeared round the bend, slowly towed up against the stream by two more horses with a placid driver, whose less placid wife sat upon a throne of oil-barrels in the centre of the craft, alternately smoking a clay pipe and shouting profane instructions to her husband touching the management of the boat. To this dual boatman the skipper of the packet loudly appealed for aid, desiring him to "crowd along and give us a swell."

"What in nater was ye sich a cussed fool as ter git stuck fer?" replied the two heads; and in spite of the disapproval conveyed by the question, the stranger boat was driven as rapidly as possible close beside the packet, the result being a long wave or "swell," enabling that luckless craft to float off into the deeper water.

"Now, gen'lemen, locate, if you please; please to locate, gen'lemen! You capting with the specs on, ef yer don't sit down, I'll hev to ax yer to," vociferated the skipper; and the passengers were nearly seated when the boat grounded again, and was this time got off only by the aid of a double team, a swell, and the shoulders of the captain and several of the passengers, who walked in and out of the boat as recklessly as Newfoundland dogs. After this style, the passage of five miles was handsomely accomplished in six hours, and it was the gloaming of a November day when Miselle, cold, wet, and weary, first set foot, or rather both her feet, deep in the mud of Tarr Farm, and clambered through briers and scrub oak up the bluff, where stood her friend's house, and where the panacea of "a good cup of tea and a night's rest" soon closed the eventful day.

The next morning was meant for an artist, and it is to be hoped that there was one at Tarr Farm to see the curtain of fog slowly lifting from the bright waters of the Creek, and creeping up the bluff beyond it, until it melted into the clear blue sky, and let the sunshine come glancing down the valley, where groups of derricks, long lines of tanks, engine-houses, counting-rooms replaced the forest growth of a few years previous, and crowds of workmen, interspersed with overseers and proprietors on foot or horseback, superseded the wild creatures hardly yet driven from their lifelong haunt.

Through the whole extent of Oil Creek, one picturesque feature never fails: this is the alternation of bluff and flat on the opposite sides of the Creek, so that the voyager never finds himself between two of either,—but, as the bluff at his right hand sinks into a plain,