80 HUNTING SPORTS OF THE WEST. 



tion ; for now, as I approached Louisiana, the land was 

 more occupied. 



Several hundred miles above its junction with the Mis- 

 sissippi, the Great Red river is blocked up by numbers 

 of trees that have been carried down and become fixed, 

 and although the United States government has caused 

 a passage for steamers to be cut through them, yet I 

 was advised not to attempt it with my canoe, because the 

 current ran through it with such force, that the least ob- 

 stacle I might encounter, would infallibly overset the 

 canoe. I was therefore obliged to traverse two lakes, 

 called Clear Lake, and Soda Lake, which are connected 

 with the river above and below the Raft, as the collec- 

 tion of matted trees is called. 



I saw a great number of alligators sunning themselves 

 on the warm sands. I shot ten or twelve of them, 

 but could never prevail on myself to touch them. 

 They were from three to twelve feet long, and sometimes 

 even eighteen feet. Not far from the mouth of the river, 

 on the fifth day, just about dusk, seeing something white 

 in the water ahead of me, I paddled to it, and laid hold 

 of it, but drew my hand back with a shudder, and the 

 blood ran cold in my veins ; it was a corpse ; the naked 

 white back alone floated above the surface, head, arms, 

 and legs hanging down ; a wound several inches long, 

 was visible on the left side, just under the ribs. I pad- 

 dled hastily away in sickening disgust, and left the hor- 

 rid object behind me. 



On the following morning I entered the Mississippi, 

 the excessively dirty " Father of Waters." The scenery 

 assumed a more tropical character, and the long waving 



