234 EXCURSION TO [CHAP. XXXIII. 



and coal shale lie scattered, which were thrown out 

 of them when they first opened. 



In regard to the origin of this black bituminous 

 shale, so abundantly cast out of chasms in this region, 

 it belongs to the alluvial formation, and is found, in 

 digging wells, fifteen feet deep, or sometimes nearer 

 the surface. It was probably drifted down at a 

 former period by the current of the Mississippi, from 

 the coal-fields farther north. 



Having learnt that still more striking monuments 

 of the earthquake were to be seen in the territory 

 farther to the westward of New Madrid, I endea 

 voured, but in vain, to hire a horse. At length a 

 merchant s widow kindly lent me a steed. To pro 

 cure a guide was impossible, all hands being fully 

 employed. I therefore set out alone through the 

 forest, skirting the borders of a swamp called the 

 Bayou St. John, where I observed a great many 

 fallen trees, and others dead and leafless, but stand 

 ing erect. After riding some miles, I found my way 

 to a farm, the owner of which had witnessed the 

 earthquake when a child. He described to me the 

 camping out of the people in the night when the first 

 shocks occurred, and how some were wounded by the 

 falling of chimneys, and the bodies of others drawn out 

 of the ruins. He confirmed the published statements 

 of the inhabitants having availed themselves of fallen 

 trees to avoid being engulfed in open fissures, and I 

 afterwards heard that this singular mode of escape 

 had been adopted in distant places, between which 

 there had been no communication, and that even 

 children threw themselves on the felled trunks. My 



