LIFE OF WILSON. xciii 
a better account of the road than I had received. I passed through many bad 
swamps to-day ; and at about five in the evening came to the banks of the 
Tennessee, which was swelled by the rains, and is about half a mile wide thirty 
miles below the Muscle Shoals, and just below a long island laid down in 
your small map. A growth of canes, of twenty and thirty feet high, covers 
the low bottoms; and these cane swamps are the gloomiest and most desolate 
looking places imaginable. I hailed for the boat as long as it was light, with- 
out effect; I then sought out a place to encamp, kindled a large fire, stripped 
the canes for my horse, eat a bit of supper, and lay down to sleep ; listening to 
the owls, and the Chuck- Wills- Widow, a kind of Wlup-poor- Will, that is very 
numerous here. I got up several times during the night to recruit niy fire, 
and see how my horse did; and, but for the gnats, would have slept tolerably 
well. These gigantic woods have a singular effect by the light of a large fire ; 
the whole scene being circumscribed b3' impenetrable darkness, except that in 
front, where every leaf is strongly defined, and deeply shaded. 
"In the morning I hunted until about six, when I again renewed my shout- 
ings for the boat, and it was not until near eleven that it made its appearance. 
I was so enraged at this delay, that, had I not been cumbered with baggage, I 
believe I should have ventured to swim the river. I vented my indignation 
on the owner of the boat, who is a half-breed, threatening to publish him in 
the papers, and advise every traveller I met to take the upper ferry. This man 
charges one dollar for man and horse, and thinks, because he is a chief, he may 
do in this way what he pleases. The country now assumed a new appearance; 
no brushwood — no fallen or rotten timber ; one could see a mile through the 
woods, which were covered with high grass fit for mowing. These woods are 
burnt every spring, and thus are kept so remarkably clean, that they look like 
the most elegant noblemen's parks. A pi'ofusion of flowers, altogether new to 
me, and some of them very elegant, presented themselves to my view as I rode 
along. This must be a heavenly place for the botanist. The most observable 
of these flowers was a kind of Sweet William, of all tints, from white, to the 
deepest crimson. A superb Thistle, the most beautiful I had ever seen. A 
species of Passion flower, very beautiful. A stately plant of the Sunflower 
family — the button of the deepest orange, and the radiating petals bright 
carmine, the breadth of the flower about four inches. A large white flower 
like a deer's tail. Great quantities of the Sensitive plant, that shrunk instantly 
on being touched, covered the ground in some places. Almost every flower was 
new to me, except the Carolina Pink-root, and Colombo, which grew in abun- 
dance on every side. At Bear creek, which is a large and rapid stream, I first 
observed the Indian boys with their hloic-gnns. These are tubes of cane seven 
feet long, and perfectly straight, when well made. The arrows are made of 
slender slips of cane, twisted, and straightened before the fire, and covered for 
several inches at one end with the down of thistles, in a spiral form, so as just 
to enter the tube. By a puff' they can send these with such violence as to enter 
the body of a partridge, twenty yards off. I set several of them a hunting 
birds by promises of reward, but not one of them could succeed. I also tried 
some of the blow-guns myself, but found them generally defective in straight- 
ness. I met six parties of boatmen to-day, and many straggling Indians, and 
