330 BOTANY AND PALEONTOLOGY 



irrigated every year by water running from the ridges of soft porous lime- 

 stone, they are continually furnished with the nutritive elements of a rich 

 soil. But even from the richest soil planters cannot expect a full harvest 

 when they are satisfied with scratching the surface a few inches deep before 

 planting their corn and tobacco. The stronger a ground is the deeper it 

 ought to be ploughed. 



It would be useless to mention again the names of all the species of 

 plants naturally growing on these prairies, and characteristic of their soil. 

 The catalogue gives sufficient indications of all. In the autumnal months 

 their vegetation becomes remarkably rich in splendid forms and colors. 

 The Compositse especially, Button-snake Roots, Throughworts, Asters, 

 Golden-rods, Sunflowers, Rosin-plants, with Indian Plantains, Rattlesnake 

 Roots, Hoary Peas, Bush Clover, Gentians, &c. &c, render them as attrac- 

 tive to the eyes as well-cultivated flower gardens would be. 



The bottoms of the North and of the Middle Fork of White River are, 

 at the point where we crossed them, narrow but fertile, judging at least 

 from the trees which cover them, — large Buttonwood, Honey Locust, Over- 

 cup Oak, and others. The bottoms of Crooked Creek, in Marion County, 

 are also fertile and finely cultivated, like those of Benetz Bayou, producing 

 corn, sugar, tobacco, and cotton. The limestone ridges are also as pro- 

 ductive as in Fulton County, and are cultivated whenever they are not too 

 rocky, and especially where they have some water. 



In the central part of Marion County, magnesian limestone crops out, 

 and forms higher, more abrupt, and entirely barren ridges. Trees are 

 scarce there. Only a few stunted specimens of the Rock-chestnut Oak, the 

 Juniper, the Persimmon, the "Winged Elm, grow in the cracks of humid, 

 decomposing rocks. Some species of herbaceous plants, the Ragweed 

 [Ambrosia polystachya), the flocculent and whitish Croton capitatam, the 

 pretty Stenosyphon virgatum, and the hard and long Beard Grasses, help to 

 cover the barrenness of this formation. These ridges produce nothing. 

 The patches of thin yellow soil, which are here and there attached to places 

 where the water cannot attain them and carry them away, look like half- 

 burnt pieces of brick, which can scarcely be attacked by any kind of vege- 

 tation. On the way from Yellville to Carrollton the alternation of high, 

 steep, and sterile hills of the Magnesian Limestone, with low, undulating 

 ridges of fertile Cherty Limestone, shows a remarkable contrast in the vege- 

 tation, and consequently in the fertility of both formations. On the same 

 road, the sandstone is also exposed in some places, with the same charac- 

 teristic vegetation that we have mentioned before. The highest ridges of 

 Marion County are overlaid by Subcarboniferous Sandstone, and sometimes 

 covered with Pines. 



Entering Carroll County, we went somewhat out of our direction to visit 

 the Huzza Prairie, which is reported as one of the most fertile parts of the 



