Washington Telegraph

The West.—Thirty years ago Buffalo was a mere hamlet, and the vast region of country lying west of Lake Michigan and north of St. Louis was an uninhabited solitude, save here and there a trapper and hunter, with a few voyagers who went always a little in advance of civilization. We have seen Chicago and Milwaukie rise from their infancy to cities each of 20,000 inhabitants, and have often stood on the shore of the lake and watched the gentle ripple and the boisterous wave approach and recede from the pebbly beach, with nothing upon the broad surface save the canoe of the red man, or the different water fowls that sport in its crystal beauty. Well do we remember making a tour from the west shore of Lake Michigan, ten years ago, into the interior of Wisconsin when the entire middle frontier of the then territory was uninhabited, not even a log cabin in which the traveller could find protection from the storm. Now, all is changed; the West, the West; the mighty, boundless West, the happy abode of millions of freemen, the large and small prairies, alike the grove and the heavy wood, have been reclaimed from their native state, and every avenue of commerce is now employed in carrying to the Atlantic and foreign markets their rich products.

We shall soon see projected and in successful operation different lines of railway connecting the East with the West, the West with the East, the North with the sunny South, equally engaged in promoting and advancing their own and the best interest of the whole, until the Atlantic, on the east, and the Pacific, on the west, shall be made tributaries to the great father of waters. Hence we conclude (judging the future by the past) that but a brief period must elapse before the valley of the Mississippi will more than balance the eastern States; and her commerce will control the commerce of the Union. And upon either bank of this great arm of the sea, where the untaught savage so recently had full control, will most inevitably arise cities in comparison second to none,

Keokuk (Iowa) Despatch.