never, I think, be so described by any who have experienced
that of the United States. A gentleman, on whose accuracy
I could depend, told me he had repeatedly known the ther-
mometer vary above 40 degrees in the space of twelve hours.
This most unpleasant caprice of the temperature is, I con-
ceive, one cause of the unhealthiness of the climate.

At length, however, after shivering and shaking till we
were tired of it, and having been half ruined in fire-wood,
(which, by the way, is nearly as dear as at Paris, and dearer
in many parts of the Union,) the summer burst upon us
full blown, and the ice-house, the piazza, and the jalousies,
were again in full requisition.

It was in the early summer of this year ( 1829) that Cin-
cinnati offered a spectacle unprecedented, I believe, in any
age or country. Mr. Owen, of Lanark, of New Harmony,
of Texas, well known to the world by all or either of these
additions, had challenged the whole religious public of the
United States to discuss with him publicly the truth or false-
hood of all the religions that had ever been propagated
on the face of the earth; stating further, that he undertook
to prove that they were all equally false, and nearly equally
mischievous. This most appalling challenge was conveyed
to the world through the medium of New Orleans news-
papers, and for some time it remained unanswered; at length
the Reverend Alexander Campbell, from Bethany, (not of
Judæa, but of Kentucky,) proclaimed, through the same
medium, that he was ready to take up the gauntlet. The
place fixed for this extraordinary discussion was Cincin-
nati; the time, the second Monday in May, 1829, being
about a year from the time the challenge was accepted; thus
giving the disputants time to prepare themselves.

Mr. Owen's preparation, however, could only have been
such as those who run may read; for, during the interval,
he traversed great part of North America, crossed the At-

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