LIFE OF WILSON. cxli 



sullen and silent On this plain are beds of shells, of a large 

 species of clam, some of which are almost entire. I this day 

 stopt at the house of a white man, who had two Indian wives, 

 and a hopeful string of young savages, all in their fig-leaves; 

 not one of them could speak a word of English. This man 

 was by birth a Virginian, and had been forty years among the 

 Chickasaws. His countenance and manners were savage and 

 worse than Indian. I met many parties of boatmen to-day, 

 and crossed a number of bad swamps. The woods continued 

 to exhibit the same open luxuriant appearance, and at night I 

 lodged at a white man's, who has also two wives, and a nume- 

 rous progeny of young savages. Here I met with a lieutenant 

 of the United States army, anxiously inquiring for General 

 Hampton. On Friday the same open woods continued; I met 

 several parties of Indians, and passed two or three of their 

 hamlets. At one of these were two fires in the yard, and at 

 each, eight or ten Indians, men and women, squat on the 

 ground. In these hamlets there is generally one house built of 

 a circular form, and plastered thickly all over without and 

 within with clay. This they call a hot house, and it is the 

 general winter quarters of the hamlet in cold weather. Here 

 they all kennel, and having neither window nor place for the 

 smoke to escape, it must be a sweet place while forty or fifty 

 of them have it in occupancy. Round some of these hamlets 

 were great droves of cattle, horses, and hogs. I lodged this 

 night on the top of a hill far from water, and suffered severely 

 for thirst. On Saturday I passed a number of most execrable 

 swamps, the weather was extremely warm, and I had been at- 

 tacked by something like the dysentery, which occasioned a 

 constant burning thirst, and weakened me greatly. I stopt 

 this day. frequently to wash my head and throat in the water, 

 to allay the burning thirst, and putting on my hat, without 

 wiping, received considerable relief from it. Since crossing 

 the Tennessee the woods have been interspersed with pine, 

 and the soil has become more sandy. This day I met a Cap- 

 tain Hughes, a traveller, on his return from Santa Fee. My 



