6th. A Mimulus is found here resembling M. ringens, but the leaves are not sessile; peduncle very short, flowers large, pink-coloured, stem acutely quadrangular; Campanula Americana, three and a half feet high.—James.
[122] The name of this river has undergone many changes, appearing as Charleton, Charlatan, Chératon, Charliton, Chareton, and Charlotte; the form Chariton has now become fixed. The origin is unknown.
The town here mentioned, two miles north of Glasgow, was laid out by Duff Green, a famous Jacksonian politician, and other associates. The growth was for a few years so rapid that one settler exchanged St. Louis lots for an equal number in Chariton; but the location proved unhealthful, and was abandoned in 1829. Monticello, on higher ground, a mile away, and Thorntonsburg, at the mouth of the Chariton, were founded in succession, but likewise disappeared. Glasgow, laid out in 1836, was the first permanent town in the vicinity.—Ed.
[123] The Des Moines River. The Illinois Indians called their habitat Moingona. The French contracted this to les Moins, and called this stream la Rivière des Moins. Later the name became associated with the Trappist monks (moines), and by a play on words was changed to la Rivière des Moines.—Ed.
[124] On the Sauk and Foxes, see Bradbury's Travels, in our volume v, note 21. For the Iowa, see Brackenridge's Journal, in our volume vi, note 13.—Ed.
[125] Changes in the river have obliterated the channel here called the Cut-Off.—Ed.
[126] The coal-fields of Missouri have an area of about twenty-six thousand square miles; a line drawn southwest from the mouth of the Des Moines River to Vernon County roughly bounds the district. Northwest of this line every county contains coal, and there are outlying patches on the southeast.—Ed.
[127] Arrow Rock (the Pièrre à flèche of early French explorers) stands on the west side of the river, in Saline County. The first settlements in the county were made in the neighboring bottoms, and the earliest ferry west of Franklin crossed the river at this point. The rock gave its name to a town founded in 1829, which for a time was the county seat and an important shipping point.—Ed.
[128] Le Mine (Lamine, or La Mine) River empties into the Missouri seven miles above Booneville, Cooper County. Renaudière named the stream Rivière à la Mine, in 1723. It is about a hundred and thirty miles long. Salt Fork, here called "saline fork," the principal tributary, crosses Saline county roughly parallel with the Missouri.—Ed.
[129] In 1720 Philip Renault, director-general of mines of the French colonies in America, sent prospecting parties from Fort Chartres, into Missouri and Arkansas, to seek gold and silver. These curious "diggings" are by some supposed to have been made by his men. Charles Lockhart, mentioned in the text, employed a number of men in 1819 in digging over some of these old pits, but without making any important discoveries.—Ed.