212 DANGEES BY STEAMEES. Book II. 
a strong current. At the confluence of these two rivers 
their outer shores are high and form flat hills. 
Towards evening, the western shore of the Missouri 
was formed by a fine wooded highland, at the foot of 
which extends a long low bank of horizontal limestone 
strata. Oaks, locust-trees, lime-trees, elms, sycamores, 
with every description of underwood, shade this rocky 
bank, and numerous springs gush forth at its base. Here 
and there stands some miserable log-house, inhabited by 
Frenchmen of the old Missouri population, whose culti- 
vated land probably lies at the back of the hills, no trace 
of cultivation being visible near the river. 
A thunderstorm obliged us to lay to for the night. As we 
proceeded next morning, the shores of the river rose on each 
side, high and wooded ; in some clearing was occasionally 
seen a house, surrounded by a patch of meadow. The 
bottom-land near the river is overgrown with* poplars, 
sycamores, and willows. The river washes away the shores 
here and there on each side, carrying the old trees into 
the water. At these spots, on the opposite side, sand- 
banks are formed — a new shore — which is soon so thickly 
covered by a young growth of poplars, plane-trees, and 
willows, that at a distance it has more the appearance of 
a luxuriant cornfield than of a young forest. The forests 
on the banks of the river thus being composed of portions 
of a different age, give an agreeable variation to the land- 
scape. 
Jefferson City, the capital of Missouri, which we passed 
at noon on July 2nd, is a small place, consisting mostly 
of scattered houses, built on a high bank cleared of 
trees and furrowed by ravines. The Capitol, a large 
stone building, with a semicircular portico and a tower 
with a cupola in the centre, stands on a green hill, just 
