OF ARKANSAS. 333 



western Carroll County ; the woods which border them are entirely rocky, 

 or the ground is nearly a naked chert. This thinness of the ground is 

 unfavorable to the growth of corn, which demands a deep soil, but cannot 

 prevent an abundant growth of grasses or a good crop of hay. Artificial 

 meadows, on these prairies, are very fine. 



From Osage Creek to King's River, across a high divide, partly of sand- 

 stone, partly of Subcarboniferous cherty limestone, then from King's River 

 up Keel Creek to the head waters of the "War Eagle in Madison County, 

 the general appearance of the country is the same as before, and the vege- 

 tation does not show any material change. The ridges are barren and dry, 

 when they are high, steep, and narrow; but they are fertile and generally 

 cultivated, when they are low with gentle slopes, and thus keep on their 

 summit or their declivities the decomposed particles of limestone, which, 

 on steep and narrow ridges, are easily washed down by the rain. 



The bottoms of Keel Creek, though not cultivated, have a luxuriant 

 vegetation of the species of trees indicating a fertile soil. Even the Papaw 

 grows there, with the Overcup Oak, and, strange to say, with some Pines 

 and Junipers. These last species of trees are brought with the torrents 

 from the top of the highest hills, and become inhabitants of a bottom land 

 contrary to their natural habitation. The declivities along this creek, 

 though steep and rocky, are covered with a great abundance of herbaceous 

 plants, and would furnish good pasture for sheep. 



I have already alluded to the fertility of the soil formed from decompo- 

 sition of Subcarboniferous chert. On the head water of the War Eagle, or of 

 one of its branches, the half-naked, cherty hills have a scant vegetation of 

 Post and Black Jack Oaks, with the Hazel and Ironweed. The ground is so 

 rocky that the soil is hardly seen, except in some coves or depressions. 

 Nevertheless, there are fine and large farms on this kind of ground, and, 

 from inquiries, we heard that the average produce is nearly as good as on 

 the prairies of Fulton and Marion counties. "When the season is not too 

 dry, it gives about forty bushels of corn per acre. Wheat is of course an 

 uncertain production on such a rocky soil, but proprietors have raised 

 twenty bushels of it per acre. 



In the bottoms of the War Eagle, which are fertile and finely cultivated, 

 I saw, for the first time in Arkansas, the Laurel or Shingle Oak, which, 

 like other species that are very rare in the North, become abundant in the 

 alluvial bottoms of the creeks near the Arkansas River. From here, also, 

 the Pines, which until now were seen on the top of the highest ridges of 

 sandstone, become more abundant, and descend even to the banks and 

 bottoms of the creeks. With the Chestnut, they even appear now on the 

 ridges of cherty limestone, affording apparently a proof of what has been 

 said before : that the compactness of a formation or of a ground influ- 

 ences the distribution of some species, even of those that appear truly 



