326 



FARMERS' REGISTER, 



[No. 6. 



on one side or other of llie river, we have already 

 seen, arc very fine for three hundred miles up, gen- 

 erally covered with heavy timber; the greatest 

 part of which is cotton wood of enormous size. 

 The bottoms are usually about two miles in width, 

 and entirely free from inundation. The bottoms 

 of the Mississippi are equally extensive and rich, 

 but not so well wooded. They are in fact a con- 

 tinued succession of the most beautiful prairies or 

 meadows. The tract called Les Mamelles, from 

 the circumstance of several mounds, bearing the 

 appearance of art, projecting from the bluff some 

 distance into the plain, may be worth describing 

 as a specimen. It is about three miles from St. 

 Charles; I visited it last summer. To those who 

 have never seen any of tbese prairies, it is very 

 difficult to convey any just idea of them. Per- 

 haps the comparison to the smooth green sea, is 

 the best. Ascending the mounds, I was elevated 

 about one hundred feet above the plain; I had a 

 view of an immense plain below, and a distant 

 prospect of hills. .Every sense was delighted, and 

 every faculty awakened. After gazing for an 

 hour, I still continued to experience an unsatiated 

 delight, in contemplating the rich and magnificent 

 scene. To the right, the Missouri is concealed by 

 a wood of no great width, extending to the Mis- 

 sissippi, the distance of ten miles. Before me, I 

 could mark the course of the latter river, its banks 

 without even a fringe of wood; on the other side, 

 the hills of the Illinois, faced with limestone, in 

 bold masses of various hues, and the summits 

 crowned with trees: pursuing tbese hills to the 

 north, we sec, at the distance of twenty miles, 

 where the Illinois separates them, in his course 

 to the Mississippi. To the left, we behold the 

 ocean of prairie, with islets at intervals. The 

 whole extent perfectly level, covered with long 

 waving grass, and at. every moment changing co- 

 lor, from the shadows cast by the passing clouds. 

 In some places there stands a solitary tree of cot- 

 ton wood or walnut, of enormous size, but from 

 the distance, diminished to a shrub. A hundred 

 thousand acres of the finest, land are under the 

 eye at once, and yet on all this space, there is but 

 one little cultivated spot to be seen." — pp. 204,206. 



" Nothing else was visible — not a 



deer, not a tree — all was prairie — a wide unbroken 

 sea of green — where hollow succeeded hollow, 

 and the long grass waved on the hills with a hea- 

 .vy surf-like motion, until at last it was blended 

 with the hazy atmosphere, which met the horizon. 

 The power of sight was shut out by nothing; it, 

 had its full scope, and we gazed around until our 

 eyes ached with the very vastness of the view 

 that lay before them. There was a degree of pain, 

 of loneliness, in the scene. A tree would have 

 been a companion, a friend. It would have taken 

 away the very desolation which hung round us, 

 and would have thrown an air of sociability over 

 the face of nature; but there were none. The an- 

 nual fires which sweep over the whole face of the 

 country during the autumn of every year, effectu- 

 ally destroy every thing of the kind. There will 

 be no forest as long as the Indians possess these 

 regions; for every year, when the season of hunt- 

 ing arrives, they set fire to the long dry grass. 

 Once fairly on its errand, the destructive messen- 

 ger speeds onward, licking up every blade and 

 every bush; until some strip of timber, whose tall 



trees protect the shrubbery, by the dampness 

 which they diffuse beneath, or some stream, stops 

 it in its desolating path. 



"The object of burning the grass is to drive the 

 deer and elk that are raving over the broad extent 

 of the prairies, into the small groves of timber 

 scattered over the, surface. Once enclosed within 

 these thickets, they fall an easy prey to the hunt- 

 ers." — Irving's Indian Sketches, 1835. 



The next extracts are. from an article in Silli- 

 man's Journal, by W. W. McGuire, on the prai- 

 ries of Alabama. 



"In speaking of the prairies, the rock formation 

 claims particular attention. It is uniformly found 

 below the prairie soil, at various depths, ranging 

 from ten to fifteen feet, and it sometimes projects 

 above the ground. This rock is generally known 

 by the name of rotten limestone; when removed 

 for several leet on the top, and exposed to the ac- 

 tion of the atmosphere for sometime, it assumes 

 a beautiful white color. In its soft state it is easi- 

 ly quarried, and blocks of almost any dimensions 

 can be procured. It has been dressed by planes 

 and other instruments, and used in building chim- 

 aeysjsomeof wh?ch have stood twelve or fifteen 

 years without injury or decay. A summer's sea- 

 soning is requisite to fit it for building. This rock 

 has been penetrated by boring to depths varying 

 from one hundred to five hundred and fifty Jeet; 

 after the, first six or seven feet, it is of a blueish or 

 gray color, but still soft except in a few instances, 

 where flinl strata ol a foot thick or more have been 

 met w'nh. On perforating the rock, a full supply 

 of good waier is always obtained, which uniformly 

 flows over (he top. I have heard of no constant 

 running stream ol' water over this rock, except one 

 in Pickens county, near the lower line. The 

 superincumbent earth is for a few feet composed 

 principally of stiff clay, of whiteish color; then 

 comes the mould of soil, which is very black — in 

 wet weather it is extremely miry and stiff*, and in 

 dry, very hard and compact. 



"Shells, such as the oyster, muscle, periwinkle, 

 and some other kinds, are found in great quanti- 

 ties throughout almost cdl the prairies of Alabama 

 and Mississippi; the first, named being the most 

 numerous, mixed in every proportion with the 

 others. The oyster shells arc perfectly similar to 

 those now obtained from the oyster banks on the 

 shores of the Atlantic. The largest beds of shells 

 in the open prairies seem to occupy rather elevated 

 but. not the highest places. They have probably 

 been removed from the more elevated situations 

 by torrents of rain. It may be that the lowest 

 places never contained any shells; or if they did, 

 table matter accumulates in greater quan- 

 tities in low situations, they may have been thus 

 covered. In some instances I believe they have 

 been found in such places, several feet below the 

 surface. They are not found in very large quanti- 

 ties in the timbered prairies; and indeed, so far as I 

 have observed, wherever the shells are numerous, 

 vegetation is not so luxuriant as where there is a 

 proper admixture of the decomposed or decompo- 

 sing shells and vegetable matter. 



"These shells and other decomposing materials 

 appear to have given a peculiar character to the 

 prairie soil, which causes it. to adhere so strongly 

 to the legs of horses and to the wheels of car- 

 riages afi-to remain several days in travelling, un- 



