CHAP. XXXIII.] UNDERMINING OF RIVER-BANK. 229 



are in the act of shifting their quarters half a mile 

 inland. At the bottom of the wasting bank, there 

 is a semi-fluid quick-sand, which greatly accelerates 

 the process of destruction. Yesterday, the ruins of 

 a house, with the wooden fence of a garden, were 

 precipitated into the river, and some of the wreck 

 has formed a talus, up which I saw some hogs, after 

 several unsuccessful attempts, clamber at last into a 

 garden, where they began to uproot the flowers. 

 The steam-boats, which are now sailing close to the 

 bank, will, in a few years, pass freely over the site of 

 the humble mansion where we had been sleeping ; 

 and the geographer, in constructing a map half a cen 

 tury hence, may have to transfer to the State of 

 Kentucky, the spot where I saw a garden flourish. 



I examined the perpendicular face of the bank 

 with some interest, as exemplifying the kind of de 

 posits which the Mississippi throws down near its 

 margin. They differ in no way from accumulations 

 of sand and loam of high antiquity with which the 

 geologist is familiar ; some beds are made up of hori 

 zontal layers, in others they are all slanting, or in 

 what is called cross-stratification. Some are white, 

 others yellow, and here and there a seam of black 

 carbonaceous matter, derived apparently from the de 

 struction of older strata, is conspicuous. 



I next set out on an excursion to examine those 

 districts, where I heard that some superficial effects 

 of the great earthquake of 1811 were still visible. 

 The reader should be reminded that this convulsion 

 occurred contemporaneously with one of the most 

 fatal earthquakes of South America, when the towns 



