286 Expedition^ &V. 



Castor and White Water are two beautiful streams, travers- 

 ing the country west of Jackson. They run towards the 

 south, and soon after their confluence, enter the great swamp 

 through which they find their way to the St. Francis. 



The district of the Lead Mines, situate near the sources 

 of the Merameg, the Gasconade, and the St. Francis, has 

 been repeatedly described. The best accounts of it are in the 

 works of Bradbury, Brackenridge, Stoddart, and School- 

 craft.* To those accounts we have to add a few observations 

 respecting the rocks and soils of the region, a considerable 

 part of which we have seen, and examined as attentively as 

 circumstances would admit. But as discussions of this kind 

 have little interest for the general reader, we propose to give 

 a place in the sequel to such remarks as we have had the 

 opportunity to make, connected with the mineralogy of this 

 interesting region. 



* Bradbury's Travels in the interior of America, p. 258. 2nd Edition; 

 Brackenridge's Views of Louisiana, p. 256. Baltimore edition; Stoddart's 

 Sketchesof Louisiana, p. 390. Schoolcraft's View of the Lead Mines of 

 Missouri, pasnm; but the details of mineralogy and geology in those 

 works, appear to us deficient in accuracy. 



