98 A WINTER LANDSCAPE. 



rowers in the fore part of the boat impelled it at the rate 

 of five to six miles an hour. 



Dreary was the aspect of the banks of the Ohio. 

 Winter had withered all the plants, and the only ver- 

 dure visible was that of a few canes mingled with reddish- 

 leaved lianas. The snow was falling thickly, and the 

 cold was as bitter as in Siberia or Kamtschatka ; but, at 

 daybreak, the storm was succeeded by a dead calm. We 

 reached the mouth of the Wabash, in the neighbourhood 

 of the small town of Henderson ; and already we could 

 see, as far as the eye could reach, that the extreme cold 

 had frozen the banks of the river, the lagoons, and fish- 

 ful ponds of the countryside ; for the air was darkened 

 by thousands of aquatic birds, which passed and repassed 

 from one bank to another, and sported on outstretched 

 wing over the frozen waters. Our boat was suffered to 

 drift into the midst of the plumaged race ; and after each 

 discharge of our guns, numerous victims were suspended 

 to the outside of our cabin. 



Thus amusing our leisure hours, we arrived, on the 

 fourth day of our voyage, at about six miles from the 

 mouth of the Ohio. This affluent of the Mississippi 

 unites with the " Father of Waters " a little below Creek 

 River ; whose banks, overshadowed with carob-trees, 

 maple-trees, and canes, interlaced with lianas and nettles, 

 offered to the eye an impassable wall, frequented by 

 hundreds of ducks, teal, coots, grebes, and water-hens. 

 The cold had driven these birds from the Polar regions, 

 and they had hastened to regions enjoying a milder 

 temperature. 



On a tongue of land below the confluence of the Creek 



