Embark amidst the ice of the Mississippi—Run aground on Wolf’s island in attempting to land—relieved from this situation—but find ourselves again involved in it, and are imposed upon by the extortion of a neighbouring voyager—Pass the Iron banks—Cypress—Solitude of the country—New Madrid—Oscillations of the earth still frequent—Point Pleasant—Vestiges of the great earthquake—The Little Prairie settlement almost destroyed by it—The Canadian reach—A dangerous and difficult pass of the river—The first Chicasaw Bluffs—Additional danger and uncertainty of the navigation—Stratification of the Bluff—A dangerous accident—The second Chicasaw Bluffs—Observations on their stratification.

19th.] This morning, after breakfast, our more than usually timid neighbours and ourselves ventured into the floating ice of the Mississippi, which we soon found to be less formidable than we had imagined, though still not without some danger of drifting imperceptibly or unavoidably upon some sunken tree, of which there are no small abundance throughout the bed of the Mississippi. Carried upon these by the rapid current, our boats might be staved or entirely overturned, accidents which not infrequently happen to those who give way to negligence or incaution.

About half an hour before sun-set, our company came to alongside a breaking sand-bar, where lay also two other boats; governed by their example we attempted to land, but floated by the current to a distance below, and here, unfortunately, attempting to make a landing, and trusting too confidently to the lightness of our boat, we were instantly carried upon a shallow and miry bar. I was sensible of the dilemma {44} into which we had fallen, and lost no time to plunge into the water, though at the point of freezing, attempting, but in vain, to float off the boat by a lever. The effort was beyond my strength, and after remaining in the water nearly an hour, I had reluctantly to submit to our situation. At length, two boatmen offered their assistance, for the consideration of five dollars, with which I complied, and in a few moments we again floated. They took us in the dark about 100 yards further down, and there made a landing. I still felt suspicious of our situation, notwithstanding their assurances of safety: and at day-light, we found ourselves (in consequence of the rapid falling of the river) as far as ever grounded upon the bar; to obviate which, all our strength and ingenuity availed nothing. The boatmen also, who had assisted us the preceding night, and put us off our guard by false assurances, now passed us with indifference, and denied us the assistance which they had promised. We immediately commenced unloading, and had proceeded pretty far in our labour, when we were visited by the owner of a neighbouring boat, who, pretending to commiserate our situation, offered to assist us gratuitously; and hearing how we had been cheated out of five dollars, expressed his dislike at any boatman having acted with such want of fellow-feeling. We had scarcely time to breakfast, before our yankees arrived with two skiffs; and one of them now assured us that we should never be able to get off until the rise of the river; though, as appeared in the sequel, merely with the friendly view of putting a good price upon his services. The other, instead of the gratuitous assistance which he had offered, made a tender of his services at three dollars. At length, like genuine Arabs, they demanded the value of eight dollars, with which I was reluctantly obliged to comply. After about ten minutes further unloading, a lever placed under the bow, set us readily afloat {45} in one minute; so much had these kind gentlemen deceived us, as to our real situation. They now also refused to fulfil the bargain of assisting us to reload, until brought to some sense of duty by remonstrance.—I shall not indeed soon forget Wolf’s island, and its harbour of sharpers.

20th.] The day was far advanced when we got off, and after floating 10 miles we moored for the night, taking care to have deep water.

The land appears low and uninhabited on every side, except at the Iron-banks⁠[54] (called Mine au Fer by the French) we passed yesterday, and which are cliffs of friable and argillaceous earth, the upper bed being ferruginous, beneath which occurs a very conspicuously-coloured band of pink clay about 12 inches thick, and below are white beds of the same material, improperly considered chalk.

The Cyprus (Cupressus disticha) which continues some distance along the Ohio above its estuary, is here much more common, and always indicates the presence of annual inundation and consequent swamps and lagoons, but we do not yet meet with the long moss (Tillandsia usneoides), a plant so characteristic of the prevalence of unhealthy humidity in the atmosphere.

21st.] We commenced our voyage at the dawn of day, and continued to float along without interruption. The river here appears truly magnificent, though generally bordered by the most gloomy solitudes, in which there are now no visible traces of the abode of man. It is indeed a sublime contrast to the busy hum of a city, and not altogether destitute of interest. In the course of the day we passed a number of capacious islands, but all as they ever were from their creation, and most of them even without names, the property of any one who will assume the possession; but they are in general, I suspect, annually submerged by inundation.

{46} This evening we were 10 miles above New Madrid, and moored opposite to one of the islands which had been convulsed by the earthquake of 1811.

22d.] We commenced our voyage early, and arrived before noon at New Madrid.⁠[55] We found both sides of the river unusually lined with sunken logs, some stationary and others in motion, and we narrowly avoided several of considerable magnitude.

New Madrid is an insignificant French hamlet, containing little more than about 20 log houses and stores miserably supplied, the goods of which are retailed at exorbitant prices: for example, 18 cents per pound for lead, which costs seven cents at Herculaneum; salt five dollars per bushel; sugar 31¼ cents per pound; whiskey one dollar 25 cents per gallon; apples 25 cents per dozen; corn 50 cents per bushel; fresh butter 37½ cents per pound; eggs the same per dozen; pork six dollars per hundred; beef five dollars. Still the neighbouring land appears to be of a good quality, but people have been discouraged from settling in consequence of the earthquakes, which, besides the memorable one of 1811, are very frequently experienced, two or three oscillations being sometimes felt in a day. The United States, in order to compensate those who suffered in their property by the catastrophe, granted to the settlers an equivalent of land in other parts of the Territory.

The site of the town, as we learn from La Vega, the historian of Soto, bears unequivocal marks of an aboriginal station; still presenting the remains of some low mounds, which, as usual, abound with fragments of earthen ware.⁠[56]

23d.] We proceeded about six miles, and came to at another small French hamlet called Point Pleasant. {47} Here I saw the Catalpa (Catalpa cordifolia) in the forests, apparently indigenous, for the first time in my life, though still contiguous to habitations.

This place and several islands below were greatly convulsed by the earthquake, and have in consequence been abandoned. I was shown a considerable chasm still far from being filled up, from whence the water of the river, as they say, rushed in an elevated column. The land is here of a superior quality, but flat, and no high grounds have made their appearance since we passed the Iron-Banks, no rock is any where to be seen; the banks of the river are deep and friable; islands and sand-bars, at this stage of the river connected with the land, are almost innumerable. In the midst of so much plenty provided by nature, the Canadian squatters⁠[57] are here, as elsewhere, in miserable circumstances. They raise no wheat, and scarcely enough of maize for their support. Superfine flour sold here at 11 dollars per barrel.

The dresses of the men consist of blanket capeaus, buckskin pantaloons, and mockasins.

25th.] Christmas-day. We left Point Pleasant,⁠[58] and floated along without encountering any material obstacle, except glancing against an enormous moving log (or sawyer), which for the moment threw us into terror. Indeed the submerged trees become more and more numerous.

In the evening we arrived at the remains of the settlement called the Little Prairie, where there is now only a single house, all the rest, together with their foundations, having been swept away by the river, soon after the convulsion of the earthquake, in consequence (as the inhabitants say, and as they also affirm in New Madrid) of the land having sunk 10 feet or more below its former level.⁠[59]

{48} 26th.] After continuing about 10 miles below the Little Prairie, we were detained for the remainder of the day by the commencement of a storm, which towards evening increased to violence, and continued so throughout the night. I felt under some apprehension that we should break our cable, and so be cast away upon some of the many snags and sawyers which obstruct the river.

27th.] Towards noon, the north-west wind moderating, we continued as usual, and proceeded about 12 miles through a portion of the river filled with islands and trunks of trees. No habitations whatever appeared since we left the Little Prairie.

28th.] Proceeded a few miles, to the head of the 25th island, as marked in the Pittsburgh Navigator,⁠[60] and remained about four hours, waiting the abatement of the wind, which did not permit us to proceed in safety. Our company did not appear inclined to advance towards the Canadian reach until the following morning; but not wishing to spend any time unnecessarily, we continued about five miles further.

29th.] Proceeding at day-break, we looked with apprehension for the dangers described by the Navigator, but passed along with so little difficulty as almost to doubt our actual situation. A few miles below, however, we observed the river contracted within a narrow space by a spreading sand-bar (or island), and planted almost across with large and dangerous trunks, some with the tops, and others with the roots uppermost, in a perpendicular posture. The water broke upon them with a noise which I had heard distinctly for two miles, like the cascade of a mill-race, in consequence of the velocity of the current; with all our caution to avoid them, the boat grazed on one, which was almost entirely submerged, and we received a terrific jar. All day we had experienced uninterrupted rain, but it was now pouring down in torrents. About two o’clock in the afternoon, as soon {49} as the fog had cleared away, we perceived ourselves again moving towards the field of danger. I counted, in the space of a minute, about 100 huge trees fixed in all postures, nearly across the whole river, so as scarcely to leave room for a passage. We proceeded towards a bank of willows on the Louisiana side, thinking to land for the night, in consequence of the unremitting and drenching rain, but found it impracticable, by reason of the rapid current. At length we descended to water which had the appearance of an eddy, and here I was strongly urged to land, in which attempt the boat would, in all probability, have been sunk amidst a host of snags and half-concealed trunks which lined the shore. With all our exertions in rowing off, we but narrowly escaped from being drawn into the impassable channel of a sand island which spread out into the river, presenting a portion of water resembling a sunken forest. The only course which we had left appeared no less a labyrinth of danger, so horribly filled with black and gigantic trunks of trees, along which the current foamed with terrific velocity—Scylla on one hand, and more than one Charybdis on the other. Fortunately, however, our voyage was not destined to end here, and, after an hour’s drenching amidst torrents of rain, we at length obtained a landing place about 10 miles above the first Chicasaw Bluffs.⁠[61] On the point of one of these bars at Flour island, we observed the wreck of two large flat boats which we supposed might have been lost during the earthquake. Nothing still appeared on every hand but houseless solitude, and gloomy silence, the inundation precluding the possibility of settlement.

30th.] We proceeded as soon as the dense fog this morning would permit, but could not ascertain our situation any longer by the vague trifling of the Navigator,{50} and after proceeding some distance at the beck of the current, came in sight of Flour island. Here the Navigator says, “the channel is on the right side, but some prefer the left,” but the very sight of the right-hand channel was to me sufficient, and finding the main body of the river carrying us to the left, I felt satisfied to go farther round rather than venture through such a horrid pass, which indeed resembled a submerged forest, and through which no flat boat, I should suppose, could ever proceed with safety, however deep might be the water. That we had got a passable channel to the left, I was fully satisfied on perceiving the intersection of the first Chicasaw Bluffs or hills, all the high lands of the Mississippi being uniformly washed at their base by a deep and rapid current. Here we landed for a few moments, to survey those hills, the only ones we had seen since leaving the Iron banks. The ascent was steep, and the elevation between 2 and 300 feet above the level of the river. These banks appeared to consist of a stratified, ferruginous, and bluish sandy clay, probably a disintegrated sandstone, which it perfectly resembled to the eye, though altogether friable to the touch. In some places, lower down the river, we observed masses of ferruginous conglomerate blackened by the atmosphere, the pebbles chiefly hornstone, and some of them quartz. The debris of which this conglomerate consists is entirely adventitious, or unconnected with the existing rocks, which form the basis of this ancient deposit.

At this place, we saw the first cabin since our departure from the Little Prairie. On approaching the 34th island from the mouth of the Ohio, which presents itself rounding, and nearly in the middle of the river, we had at first determined to take the left-hand side, set down by the Navigator as the channel, but finding ourselves to float very slowly, we rowed a little, and then submitted to the current. It was soon {51} observable, that we drifted towards the right-hand channel, though much the narrowest, and my companion advised that we should keep the left, especially as it was the nearest, and as the wind accompanied by rain blew strongly up the river. However, on finding still that the current drew to the right, even against the wind, and having arrived at the commencement of the bar of the island, I determined, at all events, to keep to the right. At length, after considerable labour, we landed at a neighbouring cabin, and were informed that the left channel had not in places more than 12 inches of water, being nearly dry, and almost destitute of current. Here, again, we made a fortunate escape. We also learnt, that not more than two days ago, a flat boat was sunk by the snags, which filled the right-hand channel of Flour island.

At this place, we met with two or three families of hunters, with whom were living some individuals of the Shawnees and Delawares. They had lately caught an unusual abundance of beaver in the neighbourhood, and were anxious to barter it for whiskey, though scarcely possessed either of bread or vegetables. Amongst their furs, I also saw a few skins of the musk-rat, (Arctomys monax, L.) which are never met with further to the south.

31st.] We continued our voyage as usual at daylight, and floating with a brisk current down the right side of the 34th island, had nearly cleared ourselves of a host of snags and sawyers, when at last, puzzled on which side of one of these terrific objects to steer, we unfortunately struck it with considerable force, and the young man who accompanied us (the son of Mr. G.), an amiable youth of 16, was precipitated headlong into the river, together with the steering oar, which was suddenly jerked off by the snag; our boat was at the same instant careened over so far, as at first to appear overturning, but I instantly had the satisfaction to see that she was free, had received no {52} injury, and that Edwin on this emergency could swim, and, though much alarmed, had come within our reach, and got safely on board. As to our steering oar it remained across the snag, and was now become a sawyer; working horizontally upon the back of the black and fearful trunk which had so justly thrown us into consternation.

The wind springing up against us, we came to under the second Chicasaw Bluff, and had time to examine and contemplate these romantic cliffs, now doubly interesting after such a monotonous and cheerless prospect of solitary brakes and enswamped forests. This fasçade, or perpendicular section, precisely of the same materials and consistence as that of the Iron banks above, continues, I think, uninterruptedly for near two miles, and is about 150 feet high. The uppermost bed (all of them as nearly horizontal as may be), 12 to 20 feet thick, commencing immediately below the present vegetable loam, consists of a yellowish, homogeneous, now friable, sandy, and argillaceous earth, which is succeeded by a thinner and more ferruginous bed; below occurs a layer or band of pink-red clay, now and then variegated with white specks, and, though constant in its appearance and relative position, no where exceeding 18 inches in thickness; below again occur ferruginous earths and clays more or less sandy, then a bed of a brownish-black colour, and about 18 inches in thickness, which, on examination, I found to be lignite, or wood-coal, containing less bitumen than usual, and so distinctly derived from the vegetable kingdom, exhibiting even the cross grain of the wood, as to remove all doubts of its origin. To the taste it was sensibly acid, and smelt in burning like turf. Beneath this coal, and in connection with it, occurs a friable bed of dark-coloured argillaceous and sandy earth, in which I could very distinctly perceive blackened impressions of leaves of an oak, like the red oak and the willow oak, with {53} Equisetum hiemale or Shave-rush, and other vegetable remains, not much unlike the black beds of leaves which occur along the banks of the Ohio, but much more intermingled with earth. In this bed also occur masses or nodules of a hard and very fine-grained light gray sandstone, bordering almost upon hornstone, likewise charged with vegetable remains, resembling charred wood, together with leaves of oaks and of other forest trees. Nearly on a level with the present low stage of the river, there was a second bed of this coal, more interrupted than the first in its continuity, though constant in its locality, no less in some places (like basins) than 8, 12 or 15 feet in thickness. Below, clays again succeeded, and terminated the visible stratification.

In two or three places, I observed that the mud, which was very deep, had been boiling up into circular masses like fumeroles, and have no doubt, but that the decomposition of this vast bed of lignite or wood-coal, situated near the level of the river, and filled with pyrites, has been the active agent in producing the earthquakes, which have of late years agitated this country. The deposition of vast rafts of timber, thus accidentally brought together by the floods of the river, are continually, even before our eyes, as I may say, accumulating stores of matter, which, in after ages, will, no doubt, exert a baneful influence over the devoted soil, beneath which they are silently interred! How much has the vegetable kingdom to do with the destiny of man! The time, though slowly, is perhaps surely approaching, which will witness something like volcanic eruptions on the banks of the Mississippi. The inhabitants frequently, and almost daily, experience slight oscillations of the earth: I have even witnessed them myself while descending the river.