June 17, 1911.] 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
929 
east side of both streams. Tw'o miles east of 
Demopolis by rail and six miles above the town 
by river is a big plant for the manufacture of 
Portland cement from the rotten limestone, 
located just here on account of the combination 
of river and railroad transportation facilities 
with an unlimited supply of raw material. 
The rain having stopped by this time, four of 
us landed and spent some time in looking through 
the cement works, the first and as yet almost 
the only one of its kind in the State; then walked 
on to town and called for mail and telegrams 
and bought a few supplies, while the boat was 
going around the six-mile loop and through 
Lock 4. We picked up the man from Birming¬ 
ham who had arrived by rail shortly before, and 
went down to the steamboat landing on the west 
side of town, expecting to find the rest of the 
party there ahead of us, but no boat was in sight. 
After waiting about an hour I started up the 
left bank of the river to seek tidings of the mis¬ 
sing ones, and I had gone scarcely half a mile 
before I met the leader of the party coming 
down the river in a skiff with a negro boatman 
to announce to those waiting at the landing that 
our troubles had begun. 
The boats had passed through Lock 4—which 
is just below the mouth of the Warrior River 
and about a mile above the Demopolis landing— 
all right, but immediately below it the water 
was so shallow on account of the dry season 
and the uncompleted condition of the next two 
locks below that our progress was halted for the 
time being. There seemed to be water enough 
for the houseboat, but not quite enough for the 
launch. Darkness came on about the time this 
state of affairs became known to all of us, and 
after considerable discussion of ways and means 
with the lock tenders, who happened to be 
friends or acquaintances of some members of 
our party, we retired, preferring to survey the 
situation more thoroughly in the morning. 
\\ e were now on the Tombigbee River, a placid 
stream about 200 yards wide, which, although 
not exactly far-famed, has excited the admira¬ 
tion of naturalists and the eloquence of states¬ 
men. At least one oration inspired by it in re¬ 
cent years has become a part of history. On 
Feb. 1, 1907, one of the Congressmen from Mis¬ 
sissippi, in which State the Tombigbee rises, 
made a speech in the House of Representatives 
on behalf of an appropriation for deepening this 
river, and the other members were so charmed 
with his eloquence that they gave him unanimous 
consent to continue beyond the allotted time. He 
is quoted as saying among other things: “I love 
the Mississippi, * * * but the Mississippi, my 
friends, sinks into insignificance in its grandeur 
and its beauty * * * in comparison with the Tom¬ 
bigbee. * * * I have heard its murmuring waves 
as they went singing their beautiful song toward 
the Gulf since early childhood, and they have 
continued to sing along the path of my life and 
have given me inspiration to love the beauties of 
nature.” The New York Times the next day 
devoted three-quarters of a column to this speech, 
its Washington correspondent saying in part: 
“One of the most tremendous speeches in the 
history of that body was delivered in the House 
of Representatives this afternoon. The mem¬ 
bers rose and clapped their hands in gleeful ad¬ 
miration at the eloquence of * * *, who spoke 
as no man has before spoken upon the beauties 
and glories of the Tombigbee River. Poor old 
DeSoto! His bones, washed these 400 years by 
the Father of Waters, were impelled to heave 
in envy and regret that the Mississippi after all 
these years must be laid in the shade by the 
grandeur of the Tombigbee.” 
Saturday morning dawned bright and clear. 
While some of us were discussing plans of cam¬ 
paign, and watching to see if the rains of the 
last two days were having any effect on the river, 
others spent the morning walking about the city, 
sending off mail, or botanizing along the river 
banks. At Demopolis the chalk cliffs of the 
prairie region are seen at their best. They are 
as much as fifty feet high in some places, very 
steep and smooth, and afford no foothold to any 
one who should essay to climb them without 
digging tools or other artificial aid. The rock 
of which they are composed is the rotten lime¬ 
stone previously mentioned (also called Selma 
chalk by geologists), light bluish gray in color, 
and soft enough so that one can dig into it with 
a knife. These cliffs are a favorite subject for 
the local dealers in souvenir cards. 
Shortly after dinner a delegation of three or 
four prominent citizens, having just learned of 
the presence of our distinguished party in their 
vicinity, came out to the lock with carriages and 
offered to drive us around and show us the sights 
while we waited. But we were then nearly ready 
to attempt the passage of the first shoal, and did 
not feel like taking any more time for diversions, 
so we thanked them kindly and dismissed them 
as courteously as possible. 
Most of the afternoon was spent in a strenu¬ 
ous—and successful—attempt to move our boats 
down to the Demopolis landing. But for the 
generous assistance of the lock tenders, who first 
opened their water gates to temporarily increase 
the depth of the water below the lock a little, 
and then piloted us through the dangerous swift 
shallow places, we might have had to abandon 
the expedition there, or wait for the winter rains 
to give the river sufficient depth. The launch 
was taken first with a 500-foot rope attached to 
its stern and paid out slowly from trees and 
stumps on the bank, so as to keep it from swing¬ 
ing broadside to the current whenever the bow 
ran aground. Those who accompanied it had 
to do some swimming and considerable wading, 
not without danger to themselves and consider¬ 
able anxiety on the part of those who had to 
stand and hold the upstream end of the rope 
and could not see plainly what was going on at 
the launch. 
Bringing the launch over the mile of gravelly 
shoals between the lock and the landing was 
finally accomplished in about two hours. Then 
those of us who had stayed with the houseboat 
brought it down over the same course, a com¬ 
paratively simple process, requiring only the con¬ 
stant use of poles to keep it away from the 
banks and shallowest places and pointed in the 
right direction. This took about forty minutes. 
The fourth State geologist had arrived mean¬ 
while bn the afternoon train, and was waiting 
patiently at the landing, hardly knowing what 
the trouble was. By the time he had been as¬ 
signed to his quarters, the boats lashed together 
again, some groceries and gasolene put aboard, 
and the water bottles refilled from an artesian 
well near by, darkness had come on and we 
enjoyed a well-earned rest from our labors. 
As we had been informed that there were still 
some troublesome shoals ahead of us, we thought 
somewhat of leaving our launch at Demopolis 
and engaging one of lighter draft to take us 
down the 1 ombigbee, but we were unable to 
find one to our liking, and finally decided to push 
on with what we had and take the chances, know¬ 
ing that conditions were bound to improve grad¬ 
ually as we approached the next completed lock 
which, however, was still 120 miles away. 
Sunday morning the weather continued fine, 
and after making a few more inquiries about 
the shallow places ahead, we got under way. 
We soon left the chalk bluffs behind and came 
to others of purer limestone, the damp shady 
portions of which were beautifully decorated 
with maiden hair ferns and other comparatively 
rare and interesting plants. We had no trouble 
worth mentioning with shoals that day, but were 
obliged to proceed cautiously in several places. 
Shortly before 2 o’clock we reached Moscow 
Bluff, on the right bank of the river, about fif¬ 
teen miles below Demopolis, where the geolo¬ 
gists found so much to interest them that we 
spent the rest of the afternoon there. 
Just below Moscow Bluff, Sucarnochee Creek 
comes in from the west, bringing a quantity of 
sand and gravel which makes the river very shal¬ 
low (in dry seasons) for several hundred yards. 
At the time we passed one could easily wade 
across. The first thing to be done at this and 
similar shoals was to send two men ahead in 
the skiff to find a channel deep enough for the 
launch. One was finally located which would 
answer the purpose, except for a space of sev¬ 
eral yards near the lower end, where it was 
just a few inches too shallow. A sharp bend 
in the channel near the shallowest part also com¬ 
plicated matters somewhat, but we had to make 
the best of it. This channel being too far from 
either bank for us to make use of trees to fasten 
our long rope to, we drove a stout stake in the 
middle of the river, where the water was only 
a few inches deep, and stationed one man there 
to keep it in place and manipulate the rope. 
Getting the rope in position in the swift current 
was no small matter and consumed considerable 
time. However, the launch was finally guided 
through the crooked channel by the same method 
used at Demopolis and without mishap. When 
the shallowest place was reached, as many of 
us as could conveniently take hold of the boat 
—already lightened of as much of its load as 
possible—lifted it over the bar “by main strength 
and awkwardness,” and then our worst trouble 
was over. The houseboat was quickly made fast 
to the launch again, and at 4:15 we got away 
from the Sucarnochee Shoals. 
Half an hour later we came to Black Bluff, 
on the west side of the river, where the geolo¬ 
gists found enough to keep them busy until night¬ 
fall. Black Bluff is about sixty feet high and 
composed of a dull black shale, which weathers 
into fine soft flakes of the same color, remind¬ 
ing one of the refuse from a coal mine. Scat¬ 
tered through this are many dark ferruginous 
concretions of various sizes and curious shapes, 
mostly flatfish and rounded, some of them look¬ 
ing very much like turtle shells at a little dis¬ 
tance. The fossils in this bluff curiously enough 
are nearly white, and therefore easily picked out 
of the black flakes among which they lie loosely. 
The Black Bluff formation weathers into a stiff 
gray clay which is the characteristic soil of a 
narrow strip of country in Alabama and Mis¬ 
sissippi known as the post oak flatwoods. 
