96 Prairies of Alabama. 
projects more than in any other part of the prairies, and there are cliffs 
fifteen or twenty feet high. 
There are open prairies of every size from one hundred to one 
thousand or twelve hundred acres, mixed and interspersed in every 
form and mode with timbered land of all kinds; some producing only 
black-jack and post-oak, not exceeding fifteen or twenty feet in 
height ; others again covered with the most majestic oak, poplar, elm, 
hickory, walnut, pecaun, hackberry, grapevine and cane, equal in 
size and beauty, I understand, to similar kinds in the Mississippi 
alluvions. 
The extent of this country may not be unimportant. F am inform- 
ed that traces of prairie soil may be seen in Georgia, perhaps as far 
east as Milledgeville. It is indeed said to exist in North Carolina; 
but of this I have not evidence such as to warrant the assertion. That 
it stretches nearly five hundred miles eastward from the vicinity of 
the Mississippi, on the west almost to Milledgeville, there is no doubts 
and if it extends, as is said, to be the fact, to North Carolina, it reaches 
four hundred or five hundred miles farther ; being perhaps nine hun- 
dred or one thousand miles long and from forty to sixty in breadth.* 
That the prairies were once the boundary of the Atlantic is evi- 
dent 1. From the fact, that on both sides, they exhibit the indented 
and regular appearance of a coast, uniformly stretching up the 
large water courses; and in general, the sandy low country stretches 
in a corresponding degree up the rivers into the praries; but except 
where it is more or less alluvial, it is unlike the prairies. 2. They 
are nearly or quite parallel to the present shore. 3. The great 
quantities of sea shells, found scattered on so large a tract of coun- 
try, very little of which is within one hundred miles of the coast, sup- 
port the opinion now advanced. ‘The idea of their having been 
carried thither by the action of winds or tides, is precluded by the 
fact that in that case they must, have been raised three or four hun- 
dred feet and I presume in no place less than one hundred above the 
level of the Gulf. of Mexico. 
That the change was the effect of earthquakes, is evident from 
the appearance of the Mississippi. ‘The ‘‘ father of rivers” bears 
* This kind of country contiues to the vicinity of New York. The author, has not 
employed the usual terms of modern geological science, but there can be no doubt, 
that the region which he describes, is upper secondary or tertiary, or both. The 
bituminous coal, we presume, belongs to an older formation. Mr. McGuire, has 
sent us large and distinct equiseta with bituminous coal adhering. We presume, 
therefore, that the proper coal measures are near at hand.— Ed. 
