It is now twenty-six years since I first entered the area of the Mississippi valley, with the view of exploring its then but imperfectly known features, geographical and geological. Twenty-two years of this period have elapsed since I entered on the duties of an Executive Agent for the United States Government in its higher northern latitudes among the Indian tribes in the west. Having devoted so large a portion of my life in an active sphere, in which the intervals of travel left me favourable opportunities of pursuing the languages and history of this branch of the race, it appears to be a just expectation, that, in sitting down to give some account of this people, there should be some preliminary remarks, to apprise the reader how and why it is, that his attention is recalled to a topic which he may have supposed to be well nigh exhausted. This it is proposed to do by some brief personal reminiscences, beginning at the time above alluded to.

The year 1814 constituted a crisis, not only in our political history, but also in our commercial, manufacturing, and industrial interests. The treaty of Ghent, which put a period to the war with England, was a blessing to many individuals and classes in America: but, in its consequences, it had no small share of the effects of a curse upon that class of citizens who were engaged in certain branches of manufactures. It was a peculiarity of the crisis, that these persons had been stimulated by double motives, to invest their capital and skill in the perfecting and establishment of the manufactories referred to, by the actual wants of the country and the high prices of the foreign articles. No pains and no cost had been spared, by many of them, to supply this demand; and it was another result of the times, that no sooner had they got well established, and were in the high road of prosperity than the peace came and plunged them headlong from the pinnacle of success. This blow fell heavier upon some branches than others. It was most fatal to those manufacturers who had undertaken to produce fabrics of the highest order, or which belong to an advanced state of the manufacturing prosperity of a nation. Be this as it may, however, it fell with crushing force upon that branch in which I was engaged. As soon as the American ports were opened to these fabrics, the foreign makers who could undersell us, poured in cargo on cargo; and when the first demands had been met, these cargoes were ordered to be sold at auction; the prices immediately fell to the lowest point, and the men who had staked in one enterprise their zeal, skill and money, were ruined at a blow.

Every man in such a crisis, must mentally recoil upon himself. Habits of application, reading, and an early desire to be useful, had sustained me at a prior period of life, through the dangers and fascinations of jovial company. There was in this habit or temper of room-seclusion, a pleasing resource of a conservative character, which had filled up the intervals of my busiest hours; and when business itself came to a stand, it had the effect to aid me in balancing and poising my mind, while I prepared to enter a wider field, and indeed, to change my whole plan of life. If it did not foster a spirit of right thought and self-dependence, it, at least, gave a degree of tranquillity to the intervals of a marked pause, and, perhaps, flattered the ability to act.

Luckily I was still young, and with good animal spirits, and a sound constitution I resolved I would not go down so. The result of seven years of strenuous exertions, applied with persevering diligence and success, was cast to the winds, but it was seven years of a young man’s life, and I thought it could be repaired by time and industry. What the east withheld, I hoped might be supplied by another quarter. I turned my thoughts to the west, and diligently read all I could find on the subject. The result of the war of 1812, (if this contest had brought no golden showers on American manufacturers, as I could honestly testify in my own case,) had opened to emigration and enterprise the great area west of the Alleghanies. The armies sent out to battle with Indian, and other foes, on the banks of the Wabash, the Illinois, the Detroit, the Raisin and the Miami of the Lakes, had opened to observation attractive scenes for settlement; and the sword was no sooner cast aside, than emigrants seized hold of the axe and the plough. This result was worth the cost of the whole contest, honour and glory included. The total prostration of the moneyed system of the country, the effects of city-lot and other land speculations, while the system was at its full flow, and the very backward seasons of 1816 and 1817, attended with late and early frosts, which extensively destroyed the corn crop in the Atlantic states, all lent their aid in turning attention towards the west and south-west, where seven new states have been peopled and organized, within the brief period to which these reminiscences apply: namely, Indiana, Illinois, Mississippi, Missouri, Alabama, Arkansas and Michigan, besides the flourishing territories of Wisconsin and Iowa, and the more slowly advancing territory of Florida. It appeared to me, that information, geographical and other, of such a wide and varied region, whose boundaries were but ill defined, must be interesting at such a period; and I was not without the hope that the means of my future advancement would be found in connexion with the share I might take in the exploration of it. With such views I resolved to go west. This feeling I find to be expressed on the back of an old slip of an account of the period:

Of the “seven years” to which allusion has been made I had spent four in New England, a land which is endeared to me at this distance of time, by recollections of hospitality, virtue, and manly intelligence.

While engaged in the direction of the business above named, I had prepared the notes and materials for my first publication, in which I aimed to demonstrate the importance of an acquaintance with Chemistry and Mineralogy in the preparation and fusion of numerous substances in the mineral kingdom, which result in the different conditions of the various glasses, enamels, &c. I had, from early youth, cultivated a taste for mineralogy, long indeed it may be said, before I knew that mineralogy was a science; and, as opportunities increased, had been led by my inquiries, (which I followed with ardour but with very slight helps,) to add to this some knowledge of elementary chemistry and experimental philosophy, and to supply myself, from Boston and New York, with books, apparatus, and tests. I do not know that there were any public lectures on mineralogy, &c. at this time, say from 1810 to ’16; certainly, there were none within my reach. I gleaned from the best sources I could, and believe that the late Professor Frederick Hall was the only person to whom I was indebted even for occasional instructions in these departments. He was a man strongly devoted to some of the natural sciences, particularly mineralogy; and was erudite in the old authors on the subject, whom he liked to quote; and I may say that I continued to enjoy his confidence and friendship to the time of his death, which happened in 1843. From such sources, from the diligent reading of books, and from experiments, conducted with the advantage of having under my charge extensive works, at various times, in the states of New York, Vermont and New Hampshire, I drew the principles which formed the basis of my treatise on Vitreology. With this work in hand, I left Keene, in New Hampshire, early in the winter of 1817; and, crossing the Connecticut river at Brattleboro, proceeded over the Green Mountains, by the route of Bennington,to Albany, and thence returned to my father’s house in western New York. No time was lost in issuing proposals for the work; and I had the satisfaction to find that the portions published, and the entire plan and merits of it were warmly approved by the pen of the late Mr. Maynard of Utica, and by several liberal minded and intelligent persons. Before quitting New England, I had determined to go to the Mississippi valley, and had begun to study its geography; and I now resolved to proceed, without unnecessary delay.

Means constitute the first object of solicitude in all such undertakings. The ebbing tide of manufacturing prosperity to which I have referred, had left me very poor. From the fragments of former acquisitions, for which, however, I was exclusively indebted to my own industry, I raised a small sum of money—much smaller I think than most men would be willing to start with, who had resolved to go so far. I had, in truth, but sixty dollars in the world; but I possessed a very good wardrobe, and some other personal means, such as it may be supposed will adhere to a man who has lived in abundance for many years. I put up a miniature collection of mineralogical specimens, to serve as a standard of comparison in the west, a few implements for analysis, some books which I thought it would be difficult to meet with in that region, and some drawing materials. I had connected these things in some way with my future success. In other respects, I had the means, as above hinted, of making a respectable appearance. Thus prepared, I bade adieu to my father and mother, and also to three sisters and a brother, all younger than myself, and set forward. The winter of 1818 had opened before I reached my brother’s house at Geneva, in western New York. From this point I determined to leave the main track, through the Genessee county west, and to strike the head waters of the Alleghany river, so as to descend that stream with the spring flood.

My brother drove me in his own sleigh, as far as Angelica. By the time we reached that place, being no traveller and much fatigued with the intricacies and roughness of the road, he was fain to give over his undertaking, and I parted from him, sending back the sleigh from Olean, to take him home.

The Alleghany river was locked with ice when I reached it. I had an opportunity to cross it on foot, and to examine in the vicinity those evidences of the coal formation which are found in masses of bituminous shale, slaty coal and petroleum. The river began to open about the middle of March. I left Olean in the first ark for the season, borne onwards down the sweeping Alleghany at the top of the flood, often through winding channels, and once in danger of being precipitated over a mill dam, by taking the wrong channel.

On another occasion, just as we were coming to the division of the channel, at the head of a group of islands, a tall Seneca Indian, standing in the bow of a very long pine canoe, cried out, in a tone of peculiar emphasis, “Keep to the right—I speak it.” This direction we followed, and were saved from another mishap. We tied the ark to the shore at night, built a fire on the bank and cooked a supper. On passing the Conowonga, it was at the height of its flood, and appeared to bring in as much water as the Allegheny. We stopped at the noted chief Cornplanter’s village, and also to gratify a reminiscent curiosity, at the mouth of French Creek, connected with Washington’s perilous adventure in visiting Fort de Boef, now Erie. At Kittaning, a great scow ferry boat was rowed and managed by two women or girls with a degree of muscular exertion, or rather ease, which would put to the blush many a man east or west of the Alleghanies. The tone, air, and masculine strength of these girl-boatmen, reminded me of nothing this side of Rollin’s description of the Amazons—save that the same provision was not apparent for drawing the bow. Bold hills line both banks of the river along its upper parts, and continue, indeed, at farther intervals apart, to very near the junction of the Monongahela; but long before this point, the stream is one of noble dimensions, clear, broad, and strong. After a voyage of exciting and vivid interest, I reached and landed at Pittsburgh.

NO. II.

It is Dr. Johnson, I think, who says, that we take slight occasions to be pleased. At least, I found it so, on the present occasion; the day of my arrival was my birth day, and it required but little stretch of imagination to convert the scene upon which I had now entered, into a new world. It was new to me.—I was now fairly in the great geological valley of the west, the object of so many anticipations.

The ark, in which I had descended the Alleghany, put ashore near the point of land, which is formed by the junction of the Monongahela with this fine clear stream. The dark and slowly moving waters of the one, contrasted strongly with the sparkling velocity of the other. I felt a buoyancy of spirits as I leapt ashore, and picked up some of its clean pebbles to see what kind of geological testimony they bore to the actual character of their parent beds in the Appalachian range.

“What shall I pay you, for my passage, from Olean,” said I, to the gentleman with whom I had descended, and at whose ark-table I had found a ready seat with his family. “Nothing, my dear sir,” he replied with a prompt and friendly air,—“Your cheerful aid in the way, taking the oars whenever the case required it, has more than compensated for any claims on that score, and I only regret that you are not going further with us.”

Committing my baggage to a carman, I ascended the bank of diluvial earth and pebbles with all eagerness, and walked to the point of land where Fort Pitt (old Fort Du Quesne) had stood. It is near this point that the Alleghany and Monongahela unite, and give birth to the noble Ohio. It is something to stand at the head of such a stream. The charm of novelty is beyond all others. I could realize, in thought, as I stood here, gazing on the magnificent prospect of mingling waters, and their prominent and varied shores, the idea, which is said to be embodied in the old Mingo substantive-exclamation of O-he-o! a term, be it remembered, which the early French interpreters at once rendered, and truly, it is believed, by the name of La Belle RiviÈre.

So far, I said to myself, all is well,—I am now west of the great spinal chain. All that I know of America is now fairly east of me—bright streams, warm hearts and all. I have fairly cast myself loose on the wide waters of the west. I have already come as many hundred miles, as there are days in the week, but I begin my travels here. I have, as it were, taken my life in my hand. Father and mother, I may never see more. God wot the result. I go to seek and fulfil an unknown destiny. Come weal or woe, I shall abide the result. All the streams run south, and I have laid in, with “time and chance” for a journey with them. I am but as a chip on their surface—nothing more! Whether my bones are to rest in this great valley, or west of the Cordilleras, or the Rocky Mountains, I know not. I shall often think of the silver Iosco, the farther I go from it. To use a native metaphor, My foot is on the path, and the word, is onward! “The spider taketh hold with her hands,” Solomon says, “and is in king’s palaces.” Truly, a man should accomplish, by diligence, as much as a spider.

Pittsburgh was, even then, a busy manufacturing town, filled with working machinery, steam engines, hammers, furnaces, and coal smoke. I visited Mr. O’Hara, and several other leading manufacturers. They made glass, bar iron, nails, coarse pottery, castings, and many other articles, which filled its shops and warehouses, and gave it a city-like appearance. Every chimney and pipe, perpendicular or lateral, puffed out sooty coal smoke, and it required some dexterity to keep a clean collar half a day. I met ladies who bore this impress of the city, on their morning toilet. I took lodgings at Mrs. McCullough’s, a respectable hotel on Wood street, and visited the various manufactories, for which the place was then, and is now celebrated. In these visits, I collected accurate data of the cost of raw material, the place where obtained, the expense of manufacture, and the price of the finished fabric. I had thus a body of facts, which enabled me, at least to converse understandingly on these topics, to give my friends in the east, suitable data, and to compare the advantages of manufacturing here with those possessed by the eastern and middle states. Every thing was, in the business prospects of the west, however, at a comparatively low ebb. The prostrating effects of the war, and of the peace, were alike felt. We had conquered England, in a second contest, but were well exhausted with the effort. The country had not recovered from the sacrifices and losses of a series of military operations, which fell most heavily on its western population. Its agricultural industry had been crippled. Its financial affairs were deranged. Its local banks were broken: its manufactories were absolutely ruined. There was little confidence in business, and never was credit, public and private, at a lower ebb. There was however, one thing, in which the west held out a shining prospect. It had abundance of the finest lands in the world, and in fact, it promised a happy home to the agricultural industry of half the world. It was literally the land of promise, to the rest of the union, if not to Europe.

Having seen whatever I wished in Pittsburgh, I hired a horse and crossing the Monongahela, went up its southern banks, as high as Williamsport. I found the country people were in the habit of calling the city “Pitt” or “Fort Pitt,” a term dating back doubtless to the time of the surrender, or rather taking possession of Fort Du Quesne, by Gen. Forbes. Mineral coal (bituminous) characterizes the entire region, as far as my excursion reached. By a happy coincidence in its geological structure, iron ores are contained in the series of the coal deposits. On returning from this trip, night set in, very dark: on the evening I approached the summit of the valley of the Monongahela, called Coal Hill. The long and winding road down this steep was one mass of moving mud, only varied in its consistence, by sloughs, sufficient to mire both man and horse. I was compelled to let the animal choose his own path, and could only give him aid, when the flashes of lightning lit up the scene with a momentary brilliance, which, however, had often no other effect but to remind me of my danger. He brought me, at length, safely to the brink of the river, and across the ferry.

To be at the head of the Ohio river, and in the great manufacturing city of the West, was an exciting thought, in itself. I had regarded Pittsburgh as the alpha, in my route, and after I had made myself familiar with its characteristics, and finding nothing to invite my further attention, I prepared to go onward. For this purpose, I went down to the banks of the Monongahela, one day, where the arks of that stream usually touch, to look for a passage. I met on the beach, a young man from Massachusetts, a Mr. Brigham,—who had come on the same errand, and being pleased with each other, we engaged a passage together, and getting our baggage aboard immediately, set off the same evening. To float in an ark, down one of the loveliest rivers in the world, was, at least, a novelty, and as all novelty gives pleasure, we went on charmingly. There were some ten or a dozen passengers, including two married couples. We promenaded the decks, and scanned the ever changing scenery, at every bend, with unalloyed delight. At night we lay down across the boat, with our feet towards the fire-place, in a line, with very little diminution of the wardrobe we carried by day,—the married folks, like light infantry in an army, occupying the flanks of our nocturnal array. The only objection I found to the night’s rest, arose from the obligation, each one was tacitly under, to repair on deck, at the hollow night-cry of “oars!” from the steersman. This was a cry which was seldom uttered, however, except when we were in danger of being shoved, by the current, on the head of some island, or against some frowning “snag,” so that we had a mutual interest in being punctual at this cry. By it, sleep was to be enjoyed only in sections, sometimes provokingly short, and our dreams of golden vallies, studded with pearls and gems, were oddly jumbled with the actual presence of plain matter of fact things, such as running across a tier of “old monongahela” or getting one’s fingers trod on, in scrambling on deck. We took our meals on our laps, sitting around on boxes and barrels, and made amends for the want of style or elegance, by cordial good feeling and a practical exhibition of the best principles of “association.” There was another pleasing peculiarity in this mode of floating. Two or more arks were frequently lashed together, by order of their commanders, whereby our conversational circle was increased, and it was not a rare circumstance to find both singers and musicians, in the moving communities for “the west,” so that those who were inclined to, might literally dance as they went. This was certainly a social mode of conquering the wilderness, and gives some idea of the buoyancy of American character. How different from the sensations felt, in floating down the same stream, by the same means, in the era of Boon,—the gloomy era of 1777, when instead of violin, or flageolet, the crack of the Indian rifle was the only sound to be anticipated at every new bend of the channel.

Off Wheeling the commander of our ark made fast to a larger one from the Monongahela, which, among other acquaintances it brought, introduced me to the late Dr. Sellman of Cincinnati, who had been a surgeon in Wayne’s army. This opened a vista of reminiscences, which were wholly new to me, and served to impart historical interest to the scene. Some dozen miles below this town, we landed at the Grave Creek Flats for the purpose of looking at the large mound, at that place. I did not then know that it was the largest artificial structure of this kind in the western country. It was covered with forest trees of the native growth, some of which were several feet in diameter, and it had indeed, essentially the same look and character, which I found it to present, twenty-five years afterwards, when I made a special visit to this remarkable mausoleum to verify the character of some of its antiquarian contents. On ascending the flat summit of the mound, I found a charming prospect around. The summit was just 50 feet across. There was a cup-shaped concavity, in its centre, exciting the idea that there had been some internal sub-structure which had given way, and caused the earth to cave in. This idea, after having been entertained for more than half a century, was finally verified in 1838, when Mr. Abelard Tomlinson, a grandson of the first proprietor, caused it to be opened. They discovered two remarkable vaults, built partly of stone, and partly of logs, as was judged from the impressions in the earth. They were situated about seventeen feet apart, one above the other. Both contained bones, the remains of human skeletons, along with copper bracelets, plates of mica, sea shells, heads of wrought conch, called “ivory” by the multitude, and some other relics, most of which were analogous to articles of the same kind occurring in other ancient mounds in the west. The occasion would not indeed have justified the high expectations which had been formed, had it not been for the discovery, in one of the vaults, of a small flat stone of an oval form, containing an inscription in ancient characters. This inscription, which promises to throw new light on the early history of America, has not been decyphered. Copies of it have been sent abroad. It is thought by the learned at Copenhagen, to be Celtiberic. It is not, in their view Runic. It has, apparently, but one hieroglyphic, or symbolic figure.

A good deal of historical interest clusters about this discovery of the inscribed stone. Tomlinson, the grandfather, settled on these flats in 1772, two years before the murder of Logan’s family. Large trees, as large as any in the forest, then covered the flats and the mound. There stood in the depression I have mentioned, in the top of the mound, a large beech tree, which had been visited earlier, as was shewn by several names and dates cut on the bark. Among these, there was one of the date of A. D. 1734. This I have seen stated under Mr. Tomlinson’s own hand. The place continued to be much visited from 1770 to 1790, as was shewn by newer names and dates, and indeed, continues to be so still. There was standing at the time of my first visit in 1818, on the very summit of the mound, a large dead or decayed white oak, which was cut down, it appears, about ten years afterwards. On counting its cortical layers, it was ascertained to be about 500 years old. This would denote the desertion of the mound to have happened about the commencement of the 13th century. Granting to this, what appears quite clear, that the inscription is of European origin, have we not evidence, in this fact, of the continent’s having been visited prior to the era of Columbus? Visited by whom? By a people, or individuals, it may be said, who had the use of an antique alphabet, which was much employed, (although corrupted, varied and complicated by its spread) among the native priesthood of the western shores and islands of the European continent, prior to the introduction of the Roman alphabet.

The next object of antiquarian interest, in my descent, was at Gallipolis—the site of an original French settlement on the west bank, which is connected with a story of much interest, in the history of western migrations. It is an elevated and eligible plain, which had before been the site of an Indian, or aboriginal settlement. Some of the articles found in a mound, such as plates of mica and sea shells, and beads of the wrought conch, indicated the same remote period for this ancient settlement, as the one at Grave Creek Flats; but I never heard of any inscribed articles, or monuments bearing alphabetic characters.

All other interest, then known, on this subject, yielded to that which was felt in witnessing the antique works at Marietta. Like many others who had preceded me and many who have followed me, in my visit, I felt while walking over these semi-military ruins, a strong wish to know, who had erected works so different from those of the present race of Indians, and during what phasis of the early history of the continent? A covered way had, evidently, been constructed, from the margin of the Muskingum to the elevated square, evincing more than the ordinary degree of military skill exercised by the Western Indians. Yet these works revealed one trait, which assimilates them, in character, with others, of kindred stamp, in the west. I allude to the defence of the open gate-way, by a minor mound; clearly denoting that the passage was to be disputed by men, fighting hand to hand, who merely sought an advantage in exercising manual strength, by elevation of position. The Marietta tumuli also, agree in style with others in the Ohio valley.

A leaden plate was found near this place, a few years after this visit, of which an account was given by Gov. Clinton, in a letter to the American Antiquarian Society, in 1827, but the inscription upon it, which was in Latin, but mutilated, proved that it related to the period of the French supremacy in the Canadas. It appeared to have been originally deposited at the mouth of the river Venango, A. D. 1749, during the reign of Louis XV.

While at Marietta, our flotilla was increased by another ark from the Muskingum, which brought to my acquaintance the Hon. Jesse B. Thomas, of Illinois, to whose civilities I was afterwards indebted, on several occasions. Thus reinforced, we proceeded on, delighted with the scenery of every new turn in the river, and augmenting our circle of fellow travellers, and table acquaintance, if that can be called a table acquaintance which assembles around a rustic board. One night an accident befel us, which threatened the entire loss of one of our flotilla. It so happened, at the spot of our landing, that the smaller ark, being outside, was pressed by the larger ones, so far ashore, as to tilt the opposite side into the stream below the caulked seam. It would have sunk, in a few minutes, but was held up, partly by its fastening to the other boats. To add to the interest felt, it was filled with valuable machinery. A congress of the whole travelling community assembled on shore, some pitching pebble-stones, and some taking a deeper interest in the fate of the boat. One or two unsuccessful efforts had been made to bail it out, but the water flowed in faster than it could be removed. To cut loose the rope and abandon it, seemed all that remained. “I feel satisfied,” said I, to my Massachusetts friend, “that two men, bailing with might and main, can throw out more water, in a given time, than is let in by those seams; and if you will step in with me, we will test it, by trying again.” With a full assent and ready good will be met this proposition. We pulled off our coats, and each taking a pail, stepped in the water, then half-leg deep in the ark, and began to bail away, with all force. By dint of determination we soon had the satisfaction to see the water line lower, and catching new spirit at this, we finally succeeded in sinking its level below the caulked seam. The point was won. Others now stepped in to our relief. The ark and its machinery were saved. This little incident was one of those which served to produce pleasurable sensations, all round, and led perhaps, to some civilities at a subsequent date, which were valuable to me. At any rate, Mr. Thomas, who owned the ark, was so well pleased, that he ordered a warm breakfast of toast, chickens, and coffee on shore for the whole party. This was a welcome substitute for our ordinary breakfast of bacon and tea on board. Such little incidents serve as new points of encouragement to travellers: the very shores of the river looked more delightful, after we put out, and went on our way that morning. So much has a satisfied appetite to do with the aspect of things, both without, as well as within doors.

The month of April had now fairly opened. The season was delightful. Every rural sound was joyful—every sight novel, and a thousand circumstances united to make the voyage one of deep and unmixed interest. At this early season nothing in the vegetable kingdom gives a more striking and pleasing character to the forest, than the frequent occurrence of the celtis ohioensis, or Red Bud. It presents a perfect bouquet of red, or rose-coloured petals, while there is not a leaf exfoliated upon its branches, or in the entire forest.

No incident, further threatening the well being of our party, occurred on the descent to Cincinnati, where we landed in safety. But long before we reached this city, its outliers, to use a geological phrase, were encountered, in long lines and rafts of boards and pine timber, from the sources of the Alleghany, and arks and flat-boats, from all imaginable places, with all imaginable names, north of its latitude. Next, steamboats lying along the gravel or clay banks, then a steam-mill or two, puffing up its expended strength to the clouds, and finally, the dense mass of brick and wooden buildings, jutting down in rectangular streets—from high and exceedingly beautiful and commanding hills in the rear. All was suited to realize high expectations. Here was a city indeed, on the very spot from which St. Clair set out, on his ill-fated expedition in 1791, against the hostile Indians. Twenty-five years had served to transform the wilderness into scenes of cultivation and elegance, realizing, with no faint outlines, the gay creations of eastern fable.

NO. III.

Cincinnati had, at this time, (1818,) the appearance of a rapidly growing city, which appeared to have, from some general causes, been suddenly checked in its growth. Whole rows of unfinished brick buildings had been left by the workmen. Banks, and the offices of corporate and manufacturing companies, were not unfrequently found shut. Nor did it require long looking or much inquiry to learn that it had seen more prosperous times. A branch bank of the U. S. then recently established there, was much and bitterly, but I know not how justly, spoken against. But if there was not the same life and air in all departments, that formerly existed, there was abundant evidence of the existence of resources in the city and country, which must revive and push it onward in its career and growth, to rank second to no city west of the Alleghanies. This city owes its origin, I believe, to John Cleves Symes, father-in-law of the late President Harrison, a Jerseyman by birth, who, in planning it, took Philadelphia as his model. This has imparted a regularity to its streets, and squares, that visitors will at once recognize, as characteristic of its parentage. It stands on a heavy diluvial formation of various layers of clay, loam, sand, and gravel, disposed in two great plateaux, or first and second banks, the lowest of which is some thirty or forty feet above the common summer level of the Ohio. Yet this river has sometimes, but rarely, been known to surmount this barrier and invade the lowermost streets of the city. These diluvial beds have yielded some curious antiquarian relics, which lead the mind farther back, for their origin, than the Indian race. The most curious of these, if the facts are correctly reported to me, was the discovery of a small antique-shaped iron horse-shoe, found twenty-five feet below the surface in grading one of the streets, and the blunt end, or stump of a tree, at another locality, at the depth of ninety-four feet, together with marks of the cut of an axe, and an iron wedge. I have had no means to verify these facts, but state them as credible, from the corroborative testimony afforded them by other discoveries in the great geological basin of the west, examined by me, which denote human occupancy in America prior to the deposition of the last of the unconsolidated and eocene series.

Our flotilla here broke up, and the persons who had formed its floating community separated, each to pursue his several way, and separate views. I made several acquaintances, whose names are recollected with pleasure. Dr. S. invited me to dine with him, introduced me to his young partner, Dr. Moorhead, and put me in the way of obtaining eligible private lodgings. The three weeks I spent in this city were agreeably passed, varied as they were, by short excursions in the vicinity, including the Licking valley—a stream which comes in on the Kentucky side, directly opposite the city. I went, one day, to see an experimental structure, built at the foot of the Walnut hills, with a very long pipe, or wooden chamber leading up their sides, and rising above their tops. This was constructed by an ingenious person, at the expense of the late Gen. Lyttle, under the confident hope of his realizing a practical mechanical power from the rarifaction of atmospheric air. There was confessedly a power, but the difficulty was in multiplying this power, so as to render it practically applicable to the turning of machinery. The ratio of its increase, contended for, namely, the length of the pipe, appeared to me to be wholly fallacious, and the result proved it so. The thing was afterwards abandoned. There was an ancient mound here, which had not then been opened, but which has since yielded a curious ornamented stone, bearing a kind of arabesque figures, not dissimilar, in the style of drawing, to some of the rude sculptured figures of Yucatan, as recently brought to light by Mr. Stephens and Mr. Catherwood.

I received, one day, a note from one of the directors of the White Lead Works, above the city, requesting me to visit it, and inspect in detail the processes of the manufacture. The latter I found to be defective in the mode of corroding the lead by the acetic acid; there was also an unnecessary complication and amount of machinery in bringing the oxide into the condition of a good pigment, and putting it into kegs, which had been very onerous in its cost, and was perpetually liable to get out of order.

It was during my stay here that I first felt the effects of the western limestone waters in deranging the stomach and bowels, and paid for my initiation into the habit, as all strangers must, by some days confinement. Dr. M. brought me about, and checked the disease, without any permanently injurious effects on my general health.

When I was ready to proceed down the river, I went to seek a passage along the landing, but found no boat (steamboats were few and far between in those days). While pacing the beach, I met a man of gentlemanly appearance, who had experienced the same disappointment, and was desirous to go forward in his journey. He told me, that he had found a small row boat, well built, and fitted with seats, which could be purchased for a reasonable sum; that it would hold our baggage very well, and he thought we could make a pleasant trip in it as far as Louisville at the Falls, where the means of communication by steamboats were ample. On examining the boat, and a little inquiry, I acceded to this proposition, and I had no cause to regret it. This gentleman, whose name I have forgotten, but which is somewhere among my papers, was a native of the city of Nancy, but a resident of Baltimore. He was, like the city itself I believe, Franco-German, speaking the two languages very well, and the English with peculiarities. He had a benevolent and honest countenance and social, agreeable manners, not too free, nor stiffly reserved; and we performed the trip without accident, although we had a narrow escape one day from a sawyer, one of that insidious cast of these river pests, called in western parlance, a sleeping sawyer. It was now the month of May; the atmosphere was mild and balmy, loaded with the perfumes of opening vegetation; we took the oars and the helm alternately; we had a constant succession of pretty views; we put ashore to eat and to sleep, and the whole trip, which occupied some three or four days at the farthest, was perfectly delightful.

We put ashore at Vevay, where the Swiss had then newly introduced the cultivation of the vine, to see the vineyards and the mode of cultivation. I have since witnessed this culture on the banks of the Rhine, and found it to be very similar. The vines are closely pruned and kept from becoming woody, and are trained to slender sticks, which, are arranged with the order of a garden bean-bed, which at the proper season, they much resemble. We also tasted the wine, and found it poor.

On the last day of the voyage, we took into our boat a young physician— a Hollander, recently arrived in the country, telling him, that by way of equivalent, we should expect him to take his turn at the oars. He was a man of small stature—well formed, rather slovenly, yet pretty well dressed, with blue eyes, a florid face, and very voluble. Of all that he said, however, by far the most striking part, was his account of his skill in curing cancer. It was clear that he was an itinerating cancer-doctor. He said, amid other things, that he had received an invitation to go and cure the Governor of Indiana. We now had Indiana on our right hand, and Kentucky on our left.

These are the principal incidents of the trip. We reached our destination in safety, and landed on the superb natural sylvan wall, or park, which is formed by the entrance of Beargrass Creek with the Ohio, just in front of, or a little above, Louisville. Here we sold our boat, took separate lodgings, and parted. I found in a day or two, that my friend from Nancy had a flourishing school for military tactics and the sword exercise, where, at his invitation, I went to visit him. From this man, I learned, as we descended the Ohio, that the right and left banks of a river, in military science, are determined by the supposed position of a man standing at its head, and looking downwards.

I found in the limestone rocks which form the bed of the river between the town and Corn Island, the cornu ammonis and some other species of organic remains; and while I remained here, which was several weeks, I wrote a notice for one of the papers, of a locality of manganese on Sandy river, Ky., and others of some other objects of natural history in the west, which I perceived, by their being copied at the eastward, were well taken. It was my theory, that there was a general interest felt in the Atlantic States for information from the west, and this slight incident served to encourage me.

The steamboat canal since constructed around the falls at this place, was then a project only spoken of, and is here alluded to for no higher purpose than to mention, that in its actual subsequent execution, we are informed the workmen came, at the depth of fourteen feet below the surface of the calcareous rock, to a brick hearth, covered with what appeared to be the remains of charcoal and ashes.

I took walks almost daily, on the fine promenade, shaded with lofty trees, festooned with their native vines, along the Beargrass Creek, which is the common place of landing for arks and boats. On one of these occasions, there came in a large ark, which had been freighted at Perryopolis, on the Yioughagany, some thirty miles from Pittsburgh. The two proprietors were K. and K., Marylanders, both young men, or verging to middle life, who had clubbed together the necessary funds, and in the spirit of adventure, resolved on a trading voyage. There was something in the air and manners of both, which I thought I could trust in for an agreeable voyage, especially as they saw in me, not a rival in commerce of any kind, but a mere observer,—a character which I found, on more than one occasion, placed me on grounds of neutrality and advantage. Steamboats are the worst vehicles ever invented by the ingenuity of man to make observations on a country, always excepting the last improvement on locomotive rail-roads. To a naturalist, especially, they are really horrible. Not a tree or plant can be examined; not a shell, or a rock certainly identified. Hundreds of miles are passed in a few hours; the effect of speed is to annihilate space; town succeeds town, and object object, with such rapidity, that there is no distinct time left for observation or reflection; and after the voyager has reached his point of destination, he is often seriously in doubt, what he has seen, and what he has not seen, and is as much puzzled to put together the exact feature of the country’s geography, as if he were called to re-adjust the broken incidents of a night’s dream. I had yet another objection to this class of boats, at the era mentioned. Their boilers and machinery were not constructed with elaborate skill and strength; their commanders were often intemperate, and a spirit of reckless rivalry existed, whose results were not infrequently exhibited in exploded, sunk, or grounded boats, and the loss of lives.

It is a regulation of law that pilots are provided for all boats, descending the falls—a descent, by the way, which can only be made on the Indiana side. When this officer came on board, the owners thought best to go by land to Shippingport. I had less at stake in its safety than they, yet felt a desire to witness this novel mode of descent; nor did the result disappoint me. Standing on the deck, or rather flat roof of the ark, the view was interesting and exciting. The first point at which the mass of water breaks was the principal point of danger, as there is here a powerful reflux, or eddy current, on the right hand, while the main velocity of the current drives the vessel in a direction which, if not checked by the large sweeps, would inevitably swamp it. The object is to give this check, and shoot her into the eddy water. This was done. The excitement ceased in a few moments, and we passed the rest of the way with less exertion to the men, and got down the remainder of the falls in perfect safety. All this danger to the growing commerce of the west, is now remedied by the Louisville canal, which, by a work of but two miles in length, which holds the relative position of a string to the bow, connects the navigable waters above and below those falls, and permits all river craft of the largest burden to pass.

It was about the falls of the Ohio, or a little above, that I first saw the gay and noisy paroquet, or little parrot of the west; a gregarious bird, whose showy green and yellow plumage makes it quite an object to be noticed and remembered in a passage on the lower Ohio. One of these birds, which had been wounded, was picked up out of the river, a few miles below the falls. It was evident, from the occurrence of this species, and other features in the natural history of the country, that we were now making a rapid southing. The red-bud, the papaw, the buckeye, and the cucumber tree, had all introduced themselves to notice, among the forest species, below Pittsburgh; although they are all, I think, actually known to extend a little north of that latitude; and we now soon had added to the catalogue, the pecan and cypress, and the cane, with the constant attendant of the latter, the green briar. I had no opportunity to examine the pecan, until we reached the mouth of the Wabash and Shawneetown, where I went on a shooting excursion with a young Kentuckian, who gave me the first practical exhibition of bringing down single pigeons and other small game with the rifle, by generally striking the head or neck only. I had heard of this kind of shooting before, and witnessed some capital still shots, but here was a demonstration of it, in brush and brier—catching a sight as best one could. The ball used on these occasions was about the size of a large buckshot.

Shawneetown is a word which brings to mind one of the North American tribes, who, between 1632 and the present time, figure as one of the frontier actors in our history. They have, in this time, with the ubiquity of one of their own genii, skipped over half America. They were once, certainly dwellers on the Savannah, if not, at a still earlier day, on the Suanee, in Florida; then fled north, a part coming down the Kentucky river, and a part fleeing to the Delaware, and thence west. They are now on the Konga, west of the Missouri. So much for the association of names. History never remembers any thing which she can possibly forget, and I found at least, one high-feeling personage here, who did not like the manner in which I associated the modern town with reminiscences of the savages. “Why, sir,” said he, as we walked the deck of the ark, floating down the Ohio, and getting nearer the place every moment, “we have a bank there, and a court house; it is the seat of justice for Gallatin county;—and a printing press is about to be established;—it is a very thriving place, and it bids fair to remain second to none below the Wabash.” “All this, truly,” I responded, willing to reprove pride in an easy way, “is a great improvement on the wigwam and the council-fire, and wampum coin-beads.” It is sometimes better to smile than argue, and I found it so on the present occasion. I did not wish to tread on the toes of rising greatness, or pour upon a love of home and locality, honorable and praise-worthy in my fellow traveller, the chilling influence of cold historical facts. My allusions were the mere effect of the association of ideas, resulting from names. If the residents of Shawneetown do not like to be associated with the native race, who would not have exchanged a good bow and arrows for all the court houses in Christendom, they should bestow upon the place some epithet which may sever the tie.

NO. IV.

After stopping a day or more at Shawneetown, and reconnoitering its vicinity, I proceeded to the mouth of the Cumberland, and from thence, after many days detention at that point waiting for a boat, to the mouth of the Ohio. I found this to be a highly interesting section of the river, from its great expanse and its fine water prospects. The picturesque calcareous cliffs on the west banks, display a novel and attractive line of river scenery. The Ohio had, from its commencement, well sustained the propriety of its ancient appellation of the Beautiful River; but it here assumed something more than beautiful—it was majestic. Let it be borne in mind that this stream, in the course of some seven or eight hundred miles flow from Pittsburgh to Shawneetown, had been swelled on the right and left hand by the Scioto, the Muskingum, the Kentucky, the Miami, Green River, Wabash, and other rivers of scarcely inferior size. It is still further augmented, from the left bank, with those noble tributaries, the Cumberland and Tennessee, which bring in the gathered drain of the middle ranges of the Alleghanies. It is below Shawneetown, too, that the cliffs of the Cave-in-Rock-Coast present themselves on the west shore—with their associations of the early robber-era which has been commemorated by the pen of fiction of Charles Brockden Brown. These cliffs are cavernous, and assume varied forms. They rise in bold elevations, which bear the general name of the Knobs, but which are well worthy of the name of mountains. Distinct from the interest they have by casting their castle-like shadows, at sunset, in the pure broad stream, they constitute a kind of Derbyshire in their fine purple spars, and crystalized galena and other mineralogical attractions. I was told that a German of the name of Storch, who pretended to occult knowledge, had, years before, led money and mineral diggers about these Knobs, and that he was the discoverer of the fine fluates of lime found here.

One can hardly pass these broken eminences, with the knowledge that they tally in their calcareous structure and position with the rock formation of the Missouri state border, lying immediately west of them, without regarding them as the apparent monuments of some ancient geological change, which affected a very wide space of country north of their position. A barrier of this nature, which should link the Tennessee and Missouri coasts, at Grand Tower, would have converted into an inland sea the principal area of the present states of Illinois, Indiana, and Southern Ohio. The line of separation in this latitude is not great. It constitutes the narrowest point between the opposing rock formations of the east and west shores, so far as the latter rise through and above the soil.

I was still in a floating Monongahela ark as we approached this coast of cliffs. The day was one of the mildest of the month of June, and the surface of the water was so still and calm that it presented the appearance of a perfect mirror. Our captain ordered alongside the skiff, which served as his jolly boat, and directed the men to land me at the Great Cave. Its wide and yawning mouth gave expectations, however, which were not realized. It closes rapidly as it is pursued into the rock, and never could have afforded a safe shelter for gangs of robbers whose haunts were known. Tradition states, on this point, that its mouth was formerly closed and hid by trees and foliage, by which means the unsuspecting voyagers with their upward freight were waylaid. We overtook the slowly floating ark before it had reached Hurricane Island, and the next land we made was at Smithfield, at the mouth of the Cumberland. While here, several discharged Tennessee militiamen, or volunteers from the still unfinished Indian war in the south, landed on their way home. They were equipped after the fashion of western hunters, with hunting shirts and rifles, and took a manifest pride in declaring that they had fought under “old Hickory”—a term which has, since that era, become familiar to the civilized world. I here first saw that singular excrescence in the vegetable kingdom called cypress knees. The point of land between the mouth of the Cumberland and Ohio, was a noted locality of the cypress tree. This tree puts up from its roots a blunt cone, of various size and height, which resembles a sugar loaf. It is smooth, and without limb or foliage. An ordinary cone or knee would measure eight inches in diameter, and thirty inches high. It would seem like an abortive effort of the tree to put up another growth. The paroquet was exceedingly abundant at this place, along the shores, and in the woods. They told me that this bird rested by hooking its upper mandible to a limb. I made several shooting excursions into the neighbouring forests, and remember that I claimed, in addition to smaller trophies of these daily rambles, a shrike and a hystrix.

At length a keel boat came in from the Illinois Saline, commanded by a Captain Ensminger—an Americo-German—a bold, frank man, very intelligent of things relating to river navigation. With him I took passage for St. Louis, in Missouri, and we were soon under weigh, by the force of oars, for the mouth of the Ohio. We stopped a short time at a new hamlet on the Illinois shore, which had been laid out by some speculators of Cincinnati, but was remarkable for nothing but its name. It was called, by a kind of bathos in nomenclature, “America.” I observed on the shores of the river at this place, a very recent formation of pudding-stone, or rather a local stratum of indurated pebbles and clay, in which the cementing ingredient was the oxyde of iron. Chalybeate waters percolated over and amongst this mass. This was the last glimpse of consolidated matter. All below, and indeed far above, was alluvial, or of recent origin. Nothing could exceed the fertile character of the soil, or its rank vegetation and forest growth, as we approached the point of junction; but it was a region subject to periodical overflows, the eras of which were very distinctly marked by tufts and bunches of grass, limbs, and other floating matter which had been lodged and left in the forks and branches of trees, now fifteen or twenty feet above our heads. It was now the first day of July, and I felt the most intense interest as we approached and came to the point of confluence. I had followed the Ohio, in all its sinuosities, a thousand miles. I had spent more than three months in its beautiful and varied valley; and I had something of the attachment of an old friend for its noble volume, and did not well like to see it about to be lost in the mighty Mississippi. Broad and ample as it was, however, bringing in the whole congregated drain of the western slopes of the Alleghanies and the table lands of the Great Lakes, the contest was soon decided. The stream had, at that season, sunk down to its summer level, and exhibited a transparent blue volume. The Mississippi, on the contrary, was swelled by the melting snows of the Rocky Mountains, and was in its vernal flood. Coming in at rather an acute angle, it does not immediately arrest the former, but throws its waters along the Tennessee shores. It runs with prodigious velocity. Its waters are thick, turbid, and replete with mingled and floating masses of sand and other comminuted rock and floating vegetation, trees, and rubbish. For miles the line of separation between the Ohio and Mississippi waters was visible by its colour; but long before it reaches the Iron Banks, the modern site of Memphis—the Father of Waters, as it is poetically, not literally, called—had prevailed, and held on its way to make new conquests of the St. Francis, the White, the Arkansas, and other noble streams.

Our captain, although he had no lack of self-confidence, did not seem to be in haste to grapple with this new foe, by plunging at once into the turbid stream, but determined to try it next morning. This left me, a good part of the day, in a position where there was not much to reward inquiry. I fished awhile from the boat’s side, but was rewarded with nothing besides a gar, a kind of sword, or rather billed fish, which appears to be provided with this appendage to stir up its food or prey from a muddy bottom. Its scales and skin are nearly as hard and compact as a shark’s, and its flesh is equally valueless. It is at this point that the town of Cairo has since been located. There were, at the period mentioned, several arks and flat-boats lying on the higher banks, where they had been moored in high water. These now served as dwellings, and by cutting doors in their sides they formed rude groceries and provision stores. Whatever else, however, was to be seen at so low and nascent a point, the mosquito as night came on, soon convinced us that he was the true magnate of those dominions.

The next morning at an early hour our stout-hearted commander put his boatmen in motion, and turned his keel into the torrent; but such was the velocity of the water, and its opacity and thick turbidness, that I thought we should have been precipitated down stream, and hurled against sunken logs. Those who have ascended this stream in the modern era of steamboats, know nothing of these difficulties. It seemed impossible to stem the current. A new mode of navigation, to me at least, was to be tried, and it was evidently one which the best practised and stoutest-hearted men by no means relished. These boats are furnished with a plank walk on each side, on which slats are nailed to give a foothold to the men. Each man has a pole of ash wood about 16 feet long, with a wooden knob at the head to rest against the shoulder, and a blunt point at the other end shod with iron. Planting these upon the bottom near shore, with their heads facing down stream, the men bend all their force upon them, propelling the boat by their feet in the contrary direction. This is a very laborious and slow mode of ascent, which has now been entirely superseded on the main rivers by the use of steam.

Such is the fury and velocity of the current, that it threatens at every freshet to tear down and burst asunder its banks, and run lawless through the country. Often whole islands are swept away in a short time. We had an instance of this one night, when the island against which we were moored, began to tumble into the channel, threatening to overwhelm us by the falling earth and the recoil of the waves, and we got away to the main shore with much effort, for night was set in, the current furious, and the shore to which we were going entirely unknown. To have struck a sunken log on such a traverse, under such circumstances, must have been fatal. We got at length upon a firm shore, where we moored and turned in at a late hour; but a curious cause of alarm again roused us. Some animal had made its appearance on the margin of the stream, not far below us, which in the dimness of the night appeared to be a bear. All who had arms, got them, and there was quite a bustle and no little excitement among the cabin passengers. The most knowing pronounced it to be a white bear. It produced a snorting sound resembling it. It seemed furious. Both white and furious it certainly was, but after much delay, commendable caution, and no want of the display of courage, it turned out to be a large wounded hog, which had been shot in the snout and head, and came to allay its fevered and festered flesh, by night, in the waters of the Mississippi.

To stem the current along this portion of the river required almost superhuman power. Often not more than a few miles can be made with a hard day’s exertions. We went the first day six miles, the second about the same distance, and the third eight miles, which brought us to the first cultivated land along a low district of the west shore, called the Tyewapety Bottom. There were six or eight small farms at this spot; the land rich, and said to be quite well adapted for corn, flax, hemp, and tobacco. I observed here the papaw. The next day we ascended but three miles and stopped, the crew being found too weak to proceed. While moored to the bank, we were passed by several boats destined for St. Louis, which were loaded with pine boards and plank from Olean, on the sources of the Alleghany. They told us that sixty dollars per thousand feet could be obtained for them.

Additional men having been hired, we went forward the next day to a point which is called the Little Chain of Rocks, where, from sickness in some of the hands, another halt became necessary. It is at this point that the firm cherty clay, or diluvial soil of the Missouri shore, first presents itself on the banks of the river. This soil is of a sterile and mineral character. I noticed beneath the first elevated point of it, near the river’s edge, a locality of white compact earth, which is called chalk, and is actually used as such by mechanics. On giving a specimen of it, after my return to New York in 1819, to Mr. John Griscom, he found it completely destitute of carbonic acid; it appears to be a condition of alumine or nearly pure clay. Large masses of pudding-stone, disrupted from their original position, were seen lying along the shore at this locality, being similar in their character to that seen on approaching the mouth of the Ohio.

We ascended the river this day ten miles, and the next five miles, which brought us to Cape Girardeau, at the estimated distance of fifty miles above the mouth of the Ohio. At this place I was received with attention by one of the principal residents, who, on learning that my object was to examine the natural history of the country, invited me to his house. In rambling the vicinity, they showed me a somewhat extra but dilapidated and deserted house, which had been built by one Loramee, a Spanish trader, who has left his name on one of the branches of the river St. Mary’s of Indiana. This old fabric excited a strong interest in my mind as I walked through its open doors and deserted rooms, by a popular story, how true I know not, that the occupant had been both a rapacious and cruel man, siding with the Indians in the hostilities against our western people; and that he had, on one occasion, taken a female captive, and with his own hands cut off her breasts.

The journey from Cape Girardeau to St. Louis occupied nineteen days, and was fraught with scenes and incidents of interest, which I should detail with pleasure were it compatible with my limits. Indeed, every day’s voyage along this varied and picturesque shore presented objects of remark, which both commended themselves to my taste, and which the slow mode of ascent gave me full means to improve. This might be said particularly of its geological structure and its mineralogical productions—themes which were then fresh and new, but which have lost much of their attractions by the progress which natural science has made in the country during six and twenty years. To these topics it is the less necessary to revert, as they were embraced in the results of my tour, given in my “View of the Mines,” published in 1819.

The article improperly called pumice, which floats down the Missouri during its floods, from the burning coal banks in the Black Hills, I first picked up on the shore in the ascent above Cape Girardeau, and it gave me an intimation that the waters had commenced falling. We came to, the same night, at a well known fountain, called the Moccasin Spring, a copious and fine spring of crystal water, which issues from an elongated orifice in the limestone rock.

While lying at the mouth of the river Obrazo, where we were detained on account of hands, several boats touched at the place, carrying emigrants from Vermont and New York, whose destination was the most westerly settlements on the Missouri. At higher points in the ascent we encountered emigrants from Maine, Connecticut, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, and Kentucky, which denotes the wide range of the spirit of migration at the era. The ends of the Union seemed to be brought together by this general movement towards the west. It was not uncommon to find representatives from a great number of the states in these accidental meetings; they were always of a social and highly friendly character, and the effect of such a system of intercommunication and residence, from districts widely separated, could not but be highly auspicious in promoting uniformity of manners and opinions, and assimilating customs, dress, and language. If long continued it must destroy provincialisms, and do much to annihilate local prejudices.

Every one who has ascended this stream will recollect the isolated cliff, standing in its waters, called Grand Tower, with the corresponding developments of the coast on the contiguous shores, which tell the traveller plainly enough that here is the site of some ancient disruptive process in the physical history of the valley. The current has an increased velocity in sweeping around this obstacle; and we found, as the waters fell, that there were numerous eddies and strong jets or currents along this precipitous coast, which it required extra force to surmount. We saw one day a number of pelicans standing on a sand bar. The wild turkey and quail were daily encountered on shore.

Our approach to St. Genevieve was preceded by a sight of one of those characteristic features in all the early French settlements in this quarter—the great public field extending several miles, five miles I think, along the banks of the river. St. Genevieve itself lies about a mile from the river, and is concealed by irregularities in the surface. It is a highly characteristic antique French town, and reminds one strongly of the style and manner of building of the provincial villages and towns of the parent country, as still existing. Three miles above this place we came to a noted point of crossing called the Little Rock Ferry; a spot worthy of note at that time as the residence of a very aged Frenchman, called Le Breton. Statements which are believed to be true, made him 109 years old. From his own account he was at the siege of Bergen-op-zoom, in Flanders; at the siege of Louisburg; at the building of Fort Chartres, in Illinois; and at Braddock’s defeat. After his discharge, he discovered those extensive lead mines in Washington county, about forty miles west of the river, which still bear his name.

The coast between St. Genevieve and Herculaneum is almost one continuous cliff of precipitous rocks, which are broken through chiefly at the points where rivers and streams discharge. Herculaneum itself is seated on one of these limited areas, hemmed in by cliffs, which, in this case, were rendered still more picturesque by their elevated shot towers. I landed at this place about noon of my twenty-second day’s ascent, and finding it a convenient avenue to the mine district, determined to leave my baggage at a hotel till my return from St. Louis, and pursue the rest of the journey to that place on foot. It was at this point that I was introduced to Mr. Austin, the elder, who warmly approved my plan of exploring the mines, and offered every facility in his power to further it. Mr. Austin was, he informed me at a subsequent stage of our acquaintance, a native of Connecticut. He had gone early into Virginia and settled at Richmond, where his eldest son was born, and afterwards removed to Wythe county. In 1778 he went into Upper Louisiana, enduring severe sufferings and the risk of life, in crossing the country by way of Vincennes to St. Louis, where he was well received by the Spanish local governor. He obtained a grant of land in the present area of Washington county, the principal seat of the older mines. About the time I went to Missouri, or soon after it, he resolved to visit San Antonio, in Texas, with a view of introducing a colony of Americans into that quarter. This plan he carried into execution, I think, in 1820, and returned with an ample grant; but he did not live to carry its stipulations into effect, having died suddenly after his return, at the house of his daughter, Mrs. Bryant, at Hazel Run.

Mr. Austin was a man of great zeal and fervour of imagination, and entered very warmly into all his plans and views, whatever they were. He was hospitable, frank, intelligent, and it is with feelings of unmixed pleasure, that I revert to my acquaintance with him, no less than with his talented son, Stephen, and the excellent, benign, and lady-like Mrs. Austin, and other members of this intelligent family.

NO. V.

Herculaneum had nothing in common with its sombre Italian prototype, which has been dug out of dust and ashes in modern times, but its name. Instead of buried palaces and ruins of a luxurious age of marble, bronze and silver, most of the houses were built of squared oak logs, and had bulky old fashioned chimneys, built outside with a kind of castelated air, as they are seen in the old French and Dutch settlements in Canada, and along the vallies of the Hudson and Mohawk. The arts of painting and gilding and cornices, had not yet extended their empire here. Mr. Austin’s residence, was the only exception to this remark, I remember. The Courts of Justice were content to hold their sessions in one of the oaken timber buildings named; the county jail had a marvellous resemblance to an ample smoke-house, and my kind host, Ellis, who was a native of South Carolina, was content to serve up substantial and good cheer in articles, not exhumed from a city buried in volcanic ashes, but in plain fabrics of Staffordshire and Birmingham. In addition to the host-like and agreeable resort, which travellers unexpectedly found at his hands, in a mansion whose exterior gave no such signs, he presided over the department of a public ferry, established at this place, across the wild and fluctuating Mississippi; and had he kept note book, he could have given account of many a one, from other lands, with golden hopes of the far west, whom he had safely conducted, against the most adverse floods, to the Missouri shore. I found a few old books at his house, which showed that there had been readers in his family, and which helped to while away moments, which every traveller will find on his hands.

I have intimated that there was nothing in the way of the antique, in Herculaneum, but its name. To this I might add, that there was no exception, unless it be found in the impressions of objects, in the structure, of the rocks, in this quarter, denoting a prior age of existence. I was shown an impression, in the surface of a block of limestone, quarried here, which was thought to resemble a man’s foot. It did not appear to me to bear this similitude, but was rather to be referred to some organic extinct forms, which are not yet well understood.

Having passed a couple of days here, I set out early one morning, on foot, for St. Louis, accompanied by two young men from Pennsylvania, with whom I had become acquainted on prior parts of my route. They had come with an adventure of merchandize from the waters of the Yioughagany, and were desirous of seeing the (then) capitol of the Territory. Nothing untoward occurred, until we reached and crossed the river Merrimack, where night overtook us, and set in with intense darkness, just as we reached the opposite shore. There was but one house in the vicinity; and not distant more than a mile, but such was the intensity of the darkness, owing to clouds and a gathering storm, that we lost the road, wandered in the woods for some hours, during which the rain commenced, and were at length directed to the house we sought, by the faint and occasional tinkling of a cow bell.

We travelled the next morning twelve miles, to breakfast at the antique looking village of Carondalet. The route lies over an elevated tract of uplands, eligibly situated on the right bank of the Mississippi, in which a growth of wild prairie grass and flowers, filled up the broad spaces between the trees. There was no habitation visible on the route—a standing spring under a ledge of rocks, about halfway, was the only spot where we could get a drop of water to allay our thirst—for it was a hot August day. We encountered several deer, and from the frequent occurrence of their tracks, deemed such an occurrence to be common. It is on this elevated and airy tract, that the site of Jefferson Barracks, has since been judiciously established by the government.

Beyond Carondalet, the country has the appearance of a grown-up heath. It is a bushy uninviting tract, without mature forest trees. The most interesting feature we saw, consisted of a number of regular depressions, or cup-shaped concavities in the soil, caused by the passage of springs over a clay basis, upon which there is deposited a heavy diluvial stratum of sand, mixed earth and pebbles. Within about three miles of the city, this heathy and desolate tract began to assume a cultivated character; dwellings and gardens soon succeeded, and we found ourselves, by almost imperceptible grades, introduced into the city, which we reached about four o’clock in the afternoon. On entering its ancient Spanish barriers, we noticed one of the old stone towers, or defences, which constituted a part of the enclosure. This town, I afterwards learned, had been regularly walled and fortified, during the possession of the country by the Spanish crown. As soon as I had taken lodgings, I called on R. Pettibone Esq., a friend formerly of Vernon, in western N. Y. who had established himself in this central city of the west, in the practice of the law; he was not in, at the moment, but his family received me with cordiality. He returned my visit in the evening, and insisted on my taking up my quarters at his house. The time that I spent here, was devoted to the most prominent objects which the town and its vicinity presented to interest a stranger, such as the private museum of the late Gen. Wm. Clark, containing many articles of rich and valuable Indian costume; the large natural mounds above the city, and the character of the rock formation along the shores of the river, which was said to have had the impressions of human feet, on its original surface. The latter I did not see till the summer of 1821, when the block of stone containing them was examined in Mr. Rapp’s garden, at Harmony, on the Wabash.

My inclinations having led me, at this time, to visit the extensive lead mines, south-west of this city, on the waters of the Merrimack, I lost no time in retracing my way to Herculaneum, by descending the Mississippi.

When I was prepared to descend the river, the two gentlemen who had been my travelling companions, on the journey up, had completed the business of their adventure, and offered me a seat, in a small boat, under their control. It was late in the afternoon of the day that this arrangement was proposed, and it was dusk before we embarked; but it was thought the village of Cahokia, some five or six miles below, could be reached in good season. A humid and misty atmosphere rendered the night quite dark, and we soon found ourselves afloat on the broad current of the stream, without knowing our position, for it was too intensely dark to descry the outlines of either shore. Being in a light open boat, we were not only in some peril, from running foul of drifting trees, but it became disagreeably cold. On putting in for the Illinois shore, a low sandy bar, or shoal was made, but one of my companions who had landed came running back with an account of a bear and her cub, which caused us to push on about a mile further, where we passed the night, without beds or fire. Daylight disclosed to us the fact that we had passed Cahokia; we then crossed over to the Missouri shore, and having taken breakfast at Carondalet, continued the voyage, without any further misadventure, and reached Herculaneum at noon.

I lost no time in preparing to visit the mines, and having made arrangements for my baggage to follow, set out on foot for Potosi. The first day I proceeded eighteen miles, and reached Steeples, at the head of the Zwoshau, or Joachim river, at an early hour. The day was excessively hot, and the road lay for the greater part of the distance, over a ridge of land, which afforded no water, and very little shelter from the sun’s rays. I met not a solitary individual on the route, and with the exception of the small swift footed lizard, common to the way side, and a single wild turkey, nothing in the animal kingdom. The antlers of the deer frequently seen above the grass, denoted it however to abound in that animal. I was constrained while passing this dry tract, to allay my thirst at a pool, in a rut, not, however, without having disconcerted a wild turkey, which had come apparently for the same purpose.

Next day I crossed the valley of Grand or Big river, as it is commonly called, and at the distance of twelve miles from the Joachim, I entered the mining village of Shibboleth—the feudal seat, so to say, of the noted “John Smith T.” of whose singularities rumour had already apprized me. Here was a novel scene. Carts passing with loads of ore—smelting furnaces, and fixtures, and the half-hunter, half-farmer costumes of the group of men who were congregated about the principal store, told me very plainly, that I was now in the mining region. Lead digging and discovering, and the singular hap-hazards of men who had suddenly got rich by finding rich beds of ore, and suddenly got poor by some folly or extravagance, gave a strong colouring to the whole tone of conversation at this spot, which was carried on neither in the mildest or most unobtrusive way; quite a vocabulary of new technical words burst upon me, of which it was necessary to get the correct import. I had before heard of the pretty term, “mineral blossom,” as the local name for radiated quartz, but here were tiff (sulphate of barytes), glass-tiff (calcareous spar), “mineral sign,” and a dozen other words, to be found in no books. At the head of these new terms stood the popular word “mineral,” which invariably meant galena, and nothing else. To hunt mineral, to dig mineral, and to smelt mineral, were so many operations connected with the reduction of the ores of galena.

I soon found the group of men about the village store, was a company of militia, and that I was in the midst of what New Yorkers call a “training,” which explained the hunter aspect I had noticed. They were armed with rifles, and dressed in their every day leather or cotton hunting shirts. The officers were not distinguished from the men, either because swords were not easily procured, or more probably, because they did not wish to appear with so inefficient and useless an arm. “Food for powder,” was the first term that occurred to me on first surveying this group of men, but nothing could have been more inapposite; for although like “lean Jack’s” men, they had but little skill in standing in a right line, never were men better skilled for personal combat,—from the specimens given, I believe there was hardly a man present, who could not drive a bullet into the size of a dollar at a hundred yards. No man was better skilled in this art, either with rifle or pistol, than the Don of the village, the said John Smith T, or his brother, called “the Major,” neither of whom travelled, or eat, or slept, as I afterwards witnessed, without their arms. During my subsequent rambles in the mine country, I have sat at the same table, slept in the same room, and enjoyed the conversation of one or the other, and can say, that their extraordinary habit of going fully armed, was united in both with courteous manners, honourable sentiments, and high chivalric notions of personal independence; and I had occasion to notice, that it was none but their personal enemies, or opponents in business, that dealt in vituperation against them. John Smith T. was doubtless a man of singular and capricious humours, and a most fiery spirit, when aroused; of which scores of anecdotes are afloat. He was at variance with several of his most conspicuous neighbours, and, if he be likened to the lion of the forest, it will be perfectly just to add, that most of the lesser animals stood in fear of him.

My stop here had consumed some time, but thinking I could still reach MinÈ a Burton, I pushed on, but had only proceeded a couple of miles when I was hastily compelled to seek shelter from an impending shower. As it was late, and the storm continued, I remained at a farm house, at Old Mines during the night. They gave me a supper of rich fresh milk and fine corn bread. In the morning, a walk of three miles brought me to Potosi, where I took lodgings at Mr. Ficklin’s, proprietor of the principal inn of the place. Mr. F. was a native of Kentucky, a man of open frank manners, and most kind benevolent feelings, who had seen much of frontier life, had lived a number of years in Missouri, and now at a rather advanced period of life, possessed a fund of local knowledge and experience, the communication of which rendered the time I spent at his house both profitable and pleasing.

I reached Potosi on the second of August. The next day was the day of the county election[1], which brought together the principal miners and agricultural gentlemen of the region, and gave me a favourable opportunity of forming acquaintance, and making known the object of my visit. I was particularly indebted to the civilities of Stephen F. Austin, Esq. for these introductions. During my stay in the country he interested himself in my success, omitted no opportunity of furthering my views, and extending my acquaintance with the geological features and resources of the country. He offered me an apartment in the old family mansion of Durham Hall, for the reception and accumulation of my collections. Mr. Bates and sons, Mr. Jones and sons, Mr. Perry and brothers, Mr. Elliot, Mr. Brickey, Mr. Honey and others, seconded these civilities. Indeed the friendly and obliging disposition I uniformly met with, from the inhabitants of the mines, and the mine country generally, is indelibly impressed on my memory.

I was now at the capital of the mines, and in a position most favourable for obtaining true information of their character and value. Three months devoted to this object left scarcely a nook of the country which I had not either personally explored, or obtained authentic information of. I found forty-five principal mines, or mineral diggings as some of them are called, within a circumference of less than forty miles. Potosi, and its vicinity yielded annually about three millions of pounds of lead, and furnished employment to the estimated number, of eleven to twelve hundred hands. The business was however depressed, like almost every other branch of domestic arts or industry, after the peace of 1814, owing to the great influx and low prices of foreign products, and the general derangement of currency and credit. Prepared ore, delivered at the furnaces, was worth two dollars per cwt., paid chiefly in merchandize. Pig lead sold at four dollars, at the mines; and but half a dollar higher on the banks of the Mississippi, and was quoted at seven dollars in the Atlantic cities. Judged from these data, there appeared no adequate cause for the alleged depression; for in addition to the ordinary merchant’s profit, in the disposition of his stock to the operative miner or digger of ore, a profit of one cent and a half per pound was left, over and above the cost of transportation to an eastern market; besides, the difference in exchange, between the south-western and eastern cities. And it was evident, from a view of the whole subject, that the business could not only be profitably pursued, with economical arrangements, but that the public domain, upon which most of the mines are seated, might be made to yield a revenue to the treasury, at least equal to the amount of this article required for the national consumption, over the expenses, the superintendence and management. Besides which, there was great room for improved and economical modes of mining; and there was hardly one of the manipulations, from the making of a common drill or pick, to the erection of a smelting furnace, which did not admit of salutary changes for the better. The recovery of the mere waste lead, in its sublimated form, around the open log furnaces of the country, promised to add a valuable item to the profit of the business. The most wasteful, hurried, and slovenly of all systems is pursued in exploring and raising the ore, by which the surface of the country is riddled with pit holes, in the most random manner; the loose and scattered deposits in the soil hastily gathered up, and the real lead and veins of metal left, in very many cases, untouched. Thousands of square acres of land were thus partially rifled of their riches, and spoiled, and condemned, without being exhausted. By having no scientific knowledge of mineral veins and geological structure, as practically adopted in Europe, all rule in the process of mining and raising the ore had degenerated into mere guess work, and thousands of dollars had been wasted, in some places, where the application of some of the plainest mining principles, would not have warranted the removal of a shovel full of earth. In short, there was here observed, a blending of the miner and farmer character. Almost every farmer was a miner. Planters who had slaves, employed them part of the year in mining; and every miner, to some extent was a farmer. Because the ore found in the clay beds did not occur in east and west, or north and south lines, or its rules of deposition had not been determined by careful observation, all success in the exploration was supposed to be the result of chance. And whoever surveys the mineral counties of Missouri, will be ready to conclude, that more labour has been thrown away in the helter-skelter system of digging, than was ever applied to well directed or profitable mining. Had an absolute monarch called for this vast amount of labour from his people to build some monument, he would have been declared the greatest tyrant. Indeed, I know of no instance in America, of the misapplication of so great an amount of free labour—labour cheerfully bestowed, and thrown away without a regret. For the losers in mining, like the adventurers in a lottery, have no one to blame but themselves.

It appeared to me that a statement of the actual condition of the mines, would be received with attention at Washington, and that a system for the better management of them could not but be approved, were it properly brought forward. I determined to make the attempt. It did not, however, appear to me, that nature had limited the deposits of ore to one species, or to so limited an area, and I sought means to extend my personal examinations farther west and south. To bring this about, and to collect the necessary information to base statements on, in a manner correspondent to my wishes, required time, and a systematic mode of recording facts.

To this object, in connexion with the natural history of the country, I devoted the remainder of the year, and a part of the following year. I soon found, after reaching the mines, that I had many coadjutors in the business of collecting specimens, in the common miners, some of whom were in the habit of laying aside for me, any thing they found, in their pits and leads, which assumed a new or curious character. Inquiries and applications relative to the mineralogy and structure of the country were made, verbally and by letter, from many quarters. I established my residence at Potosi, but made excursions, from time to time, in various directions. Some of these excursions were fruitful of incidents, which would be worth recording, did the cursory character of these reminiscences permit it. On one occasion, I killed a horse by swimming him across the Joachim river, at its mouth, whilst he was warm and foaming from a hard day’s ride. He was put in the stable and attended, but died the next day, as was supposed, from this sudden transition. There was scarcely a mine or digging in the country, for forty miles around, which I did not personally examine; and few persons, who had given attention to the subject, from whom I did not derive some species of information.

The general hospitality and frankness of the inhabitants of the mine country could not but make a favourable impression on a stranger. The custom of riding on horseback, in a region which affords great facilities for it, makes every one a horseman and a woodsman, and has generated something of the cavalier air and manners. But nothing impressed me more, in this connexion, than the gallant manner, which I observed here, of putting a lady on horseback. She stands facing you, with the bridle in her right hand, and gives you her left. She then places one of her feet in your left hand, which you stoop to receive, when, by a simultaneous exertion and spring, she is vaulted backwards into the saddle. Whether this be a transmitted Spanish custom, I know not, but I have not observed it in the French, or American settlements west of the Alleghanies.

The earthquakes of 1812, which were so disastrous in South America, are known to have propagated themselves towards the north, and they exerted some striking effects in the lower part of the valley of the Mississippi, sending down into the channel of the latter, large areas of diluvial earth, as was instanced, in a remarkable manner, at New Madrid. Portions of the forest, back of this town, sunk, and gave place to lakes and lagoons. These effects were also witnessed, though in a milder form, in the more solid formations of the mine country. Soon after reaching Potosi, I visited the Mineral Fork, a tributary of the Merrimack, where some of these effects had been witnessed. I descended into the pit and crevices of the Old Mines. These mines were explored in the metalliferous rock. Every thing had an old and ruinous look, for they had been abandoned. Large quantities of the ore had been formerly raised at this mine, which was pursued into a deep fissure of the limestone rock. I descended into this fissure, and found among the rubbish and vein stones, large elongated and orbicular masses of calc spar, the outer surfaces of which bore strong marks of geological abrasion. They broke into rhombs very transparent, and of a honey-yellow colour. Mr. Elliot, the intelligent proprietor of this mine, represented the indications of ore to have been flattering, although every thing was now at a stand. Masses of sulphuret of zinc, in the form of blende, were noticed at this locality. Mr. Elliot invited me to dine, and he filled up the time with interesting local reminiscences. He stated, among other facts, that a copious spring, at these mines, dried up during the remarkable earthquakes of 1812. These earthquakes appear to have discharged their shocks in the direction of the stratification from the south-west to the north-east, but they spent their force west of the Mississippi. Their chief violence was at Natchitoches and New Madrid, at the latter of which they destroyed an immense area of alluvial land. Their effects in the Ohio valley, lying exactly in the direction of their action, were slight. A Mr. Watkins, of Cincinnati, accompanied me on this examination, and rode back with me to Potosi.

On the 9th of August, I had dined with Samuel Perry, Esq., at Mine Á Burton, one of the principal inhabitants of the county, and was passing the evening at Mr. Austin’s, when Mr. and Mrs. Perry came suddenly in. They had hardly taken seats, when a rabble of persons with bells and horns surrounded the house, and kept up a tumult that would have done honor to one of the wildest festivals of St. Nicholas, headed by Brom Bones himself. This, we were told, was a Chiraviri. And what is a Chiraviri? I am not deep enough read in French local customs to give a satisfactory answer, but the custom is said to be one that the populace may indulge in, whenever a marriage has taken place in the village, which is not in exact accordance with their opinions of its propriety. I was, by this incident informed of Mr. Perry’s recent marriage, and should judge, moreover, that he had exercised both taste and judgment in his selection of a partner. The affair of the Chiraviri is said to have been got up by some spiteful persons.

Towards the middle of the month (12th,) I set out, accompanied by Mr. James B. Austin, on horseback, for Herculaneum, by the way of Hazel Run, a route displaying a more southerly section of the mine country than I had before seen. A ride on horseback over the mine hills, offers one of the most delightful prospects of picturesque sylvan beauty that can be well conceived of. The hills are, with a few exceptions, not precipitous enough to make the ride irksome. They rise in long and gentle swells, resembling those of the sea, in which the vessel is, by an easy motion, alternately at the top of liquid hills, or in the bottom of liquid vales. From these hills the prospect extends over a surface of heath-grass and prairie flowers, with an open growth of oaks; giving the whole country rather the aspect of a park than a wilderness. Occasionally a ridge of pine intervenes, and wherever there is a brook, the waters present the transparency of rock crystal. Sometimes a range of red clay hillocks, putting up rank shrubs and vines of species which were unknown before, indicates an abandoned digging or mine. Farms and farm houses were then few; and every traveller we met on horseback, had more or less the bearing of a country cavalier, with a fine horse, good equipments, perhaps holsters and pistols, sometimes a rifle, and always something of a military air, betokening manliness and independence. Wherever we stopped, and whoever we met on the way, there was evinced a courteous and hospitable disposition.

We did not leave Potosi till afternoon. It was a hot August day, and it was dusk before we entered the deep shady valley of Big River. Some delay arose in waiting for the ferryman to put us across the river, and it was nine o’clock in the evening when we reached Mr. Bryant’s, at Hazel Run, where we were cordially received. Our host would not let us leave his house, next morning, till after breakfast. We rode to McCormick’s, on the Platten, to dinner, and reached Herculaneum before sunset. The distance by this route from Potosi is forty-five miles, and the road, with the exception of a couple of miles, presented a wholly new section of the country.

The Mississippi was now low, displaying large portions of its margin, and exhibiting heavy deposits of mud and slime, which broke into cakes, as they dried in the sun. I know not whether these exhalations affected me, but I experienced a temporary illness for a few days during this visit. I recollect that we had, during this time, some severe and drenching rain storms, with vivid and copious lightning, and heavy pealing thunder. These drenching and rapid showers convert the brooks and rills of the mine country to perfect torrents, and this explains one cause of the washing away and gullying of roads and streets, so remarkable on the west bank of the Mississippi. My illness induced me to give up returning on horseback; and I set out, on the 18th of the month, in a dearborn, accompanied by Mrs. Austin. On descending the long hill, near Donnell’s, beyond the Joachim, the evening was so dark that I became sensible I must have got out of the road. I drove with the more care a few moments, and stopped. Requesting Mrs. Austin to hold the reins, I jumped out and explored the ground. I found myself in an abandoned, badly gullied track, which would have soon capsized the wagon; but leading the horse by the bridle, I slowly regained my position in the direct road and got down the hill, and reached the house without further accident. Next day we drove into Potosi by four o’clock in the afternoon. This was my second visit, and I now accepted a room and quarters for my collection, at their old homestead called Durham Hall.

From this period till the middle of September, I pursued with unremitting assiduity, the enquiry in hand, and by that time had made a cabinet collection, illustrating fully the mineralogy, and, to some extent, the geological structure of the country. I erected a small chemical furnace for assays. Some of the clays of the country were found to stand a high heat, and by tempering them with pulverized granite, consisting largely of feldspar, I obtained crucibles that answered every purpose. Some of the specimens of lead treated in the dry way, yielded from 75 to 82 per cent.

Accident threw in my way, on the 25th of August, a fact which led to the discovery of a primitive tract, on the southern borders of the mine country, the true geological relation of which to the surrounding secondary formations, formed at the outset rather a puzzle. I rode out on horseback on that day, with Mr. Stephen F. Austin, to Miller’s, on the Mineral Fork, to observe a locality of manganese, and saw lying, near his mills, some large masses of red syenitic granite, which appeared to have been freshly blasted. He remarked that they were obtained on the St. Francis, and were found to be the best material at hand for millstones. On examination, the rock consisted almost exclusively of red feldspar and quartz. A little hornblende was present, but scarcely a trace of mica. This species of syenitic granite, large portions of which, viewed in the field, are complete syenite, and all of which is very barren of crystals, I have since found on the upper Mississippi, and throughout the north-western regions above the secondary latitudes. The hint, however, was not lost. I took the first opportunity to visit the sources of the St. Francis: having obtained letters to a gentleman in that vicinity, I set out on horseback for that region, taking a stout pair of saddle-bags, to hold my collections. I passed through Murphy’s and Cook’s settlements, which are, at the present time, the central parts of St. Francis county. Mine a la Motte afforded some new facts in its mineralogical features. I first saw this red syenite, in place, on Blackford’s Fork. The westernmost limits of this ancient mine extends to within a mile or two of this primitive formation. The red clay formation extends to the granitic elevations, and conceals their junction with the newer rock. The nearest of the carboniferous series, in place, is on the banks of Rock Creek, at some miles’ distance. It is there the crystalline sand stone. How far this primitive district of the St. Francis extends, has not been determined. The St. Francis and Grand rivers, both have their sources in it. It is probable the Ozaw Fork of the Merrimack comes from its western borders. Not less than twenty or thirty miles can be assigned for its north and south limits. The Iron mountain of Bellvieu is within it. The vicinity of the pass called the Narrows, appears to have been the locality of former volcanic action. A scene of ruder disruption, marked by the vast accumulation of broken rock, it would be difficult to find. Indeed the whole tract is one of high geological, as well as scenic interest. Had the observer of this scene been suddenly dropped down into one of the wildest, broken, primitive tracts of New England, or the north-east angle of New York, he could not have found a field of higher physical attractions. Trap and greenstone constitute prominent tracts, and exist in the condition of dykes in the syenite, or feldspathique granite. I sought in vain for mica in the form of distinct plates. Some of the greenstone is handsomely porphyritic, and embraces green crystals of feldspar. Portions of this rock are sprinkled with masses of bright sulphuret of iron. Indeed iron in several of its forms abounds. By far the largest portion of it is in the shape of the micaceous oxyde. I searched, without success, for the irridescent specular variety, or Elba ore. In returning from this trip, I found Wolf river greatly swollen by rains, and had to swim it at much hazard, with my saddle-bags heavily laden with the results of my examination. It was dark when I reached the opposite bank: wet and tired I pushed for the only house in sight. As I came to it the doors stood open, the fences were down, a perfect air of desolation reigned around. There was no living being found; and the masses of yawning darkness exhibited by the untenanted rooms, seemed a fit residence for the genius of romance. Neither my horse nor myself were, however, in a temper or plight for an adventure of this kind, and the poor beast seemed as well pleased as I was, to push forward from so cheerless a spot. Four miles’ riding through an untenanted forest, and a dark and blind road, brought us to a Mr. Murphy’s, the sponsor of Murphy’s settlement.

FOOTNOTES: