LIFE OF WILSON. 
CXV 
their respective sides of the channel. I rambled up the banks 
of this river for four or five miles, and in my return shot a 
turkey. I also saw five or six deer in a drove, but they were 
too light-heeled for me. 
“In the afternoon of the 15th I entered Big-Bone Creek, 
which being passable only about a quarter of a mile, I secured 
my boat, and left my baggage under the care of a decent fami- 
ly near, and set out on foot five miles through the woods for 
the Big-Bone Lick, that great antediluvian rendezvous of the 
American elephants. This place, which lies “ far in the wind- 
ings of a sheltered vale,” afibrded me a fund of amusement in 
shooting ducks and paroquets, (of which last I skinned twelve, 
and brought off two slightly wounded,) and in examining the an- 
cient buffalo roads to this great licking-place. Mr. Colquhoun, 
the proprietor, was not at home, but his agent and manager 
entertained me as well as he was able, and was much amused 
with my enthusiasm. This place is a low valley, everywhere 
surrounded by high hills; in the centre, by the side of the 
creek, is a quagmire of near an acre, from which, and another 
smaller one below, the chief part of these large bones have 
been taken; at the latter places I found numerous fragments of 
large bones lying scattered about. In pursuing a wounded 
duck across this quagmire, I had nearly deposited my carcass 
among the grand congregation of mammoths below, having 
sunk up to the middle, and had hard struggling to get out. As 
the proprietor intends to dig in various places this season for 
brine, and is a gentleman of education and intelligence, I have 
strong hopes that a more complete skeleton of that animal call- 
ed the mammoth, than has yet been found, will be procured. 
I laid the strongest injunctions on the manager to be on the 
look out, and to preserve every thing; I also left a letter for 
Mr. Colquhoun to the same purport, and am persuaded that 
these will not be neglected. In this neighbourhood I found 
the Columbo plant in great abundance, and collected some of 
the seeds. Many of the old stalks were more than five feet 
high. I have since found it in various other parts of this coun- 
