James's Account of S. H. Long's Expedition, 1819-1820, part 4

by Edwin James; Stephen H. Long; Thomas Say

The advancing party of horse came on at full speed, and neglecting the first challenge of the two sentinels stationed at some distance in advance of the boats. When the sentinels cried "halt" the second time, they cocked their pieces, and were in the act of presenting them to fire, when the Spanish squadron halted, and displayed on the beach about one hundred and fifty yards distant. Their officers moved slowly forward, and were met by Captain Sparks, whom the Spanish commandant politely saluted, and a parley ensued, which continued about three-quarters of an hour. The Spaniards being greatly superior in numbers, and expressing a determined resolution to fulfil their orders, which were to prevent, at all hazards, the farther progress of the exploring expedition, the officers of that party reluctantly consented to relinquish their undertaking. The spot where this interruption took place is two hundred and thirty miles by water above the Coashatay village, consequently six hundred and thirty-five miles above the mouth of Red river.[66]

Below this point it appears the river and the country lose, in a great measure, the peculiar characters which belong to the region of recent alluvial lands near the mouth of the river. Swamps, bayous, and lagoons, are less frequent; the forests are more open, the trees smaller, and the soil less fertile and open; meadows more frequent here than below. A portion of Red river above, between this point and the upper settlements,[67] is but imperfectly known.

The average direction of Red river, as far as it has been hitherto explored, from the confluence of the Kiamesha, in latitude 33° 30´, to its junction with the Mississippi in 31° 5´, is from north-west to south-east. Above the Kiamesha it is supposed to flow more directly from west to east. The streams tributary {175} to Red river are comparatively small and few in number. Above the Washita the principal are the Little river of the south and the Little river of the north,[68] both entering near the north-western angle of the state of Louisiana, and both hitherto little known. The next in order is the Kiamesha, rising in the Ozark mountains, opposite the Poteau, and entering Red river about one thousand miles from the Mississippi. The Kiamesha has been explored from its sources to its confluence by Major Long, who first visited it in 1817. The country about the sources of this river is mountainous, being broken into numerous irregular peaks and ridges, of an old ferruginous sandstone, with its stratifications highly inclined towards the south. The timber in the mountainous country is the yellow pine, intermixed with red, white, and mountain oak, the small chesnut, the American box or hop hornbeam (ostrya virginica), the red cedar, &c.

In the low lands, towards Red river, all the forest trees common to the valley of the Arkansa are found, with the addition of the maclura, which is now so rare about the Arkansa that it can scarcely be said to make a part of the forests there. Extensive prairies exist on the lower part of the Kiamesha, some of which command delightful views of the surrounding country. Before you lies the great valley of Red river, exhibiting a pleasing variety of forests and lawns; beyond rises the gentle slope of the Ozark mountains, imprinting the broad outline of their azure summits upon the margin of the sky. At the mouth of the Kiamesha, Red river is about two hundred yards wide. Its course is meandering, forming points alternately on the right and left, terminating in sand-bars, covered with red mud or clay, deposited from the water of the river. In its lowest stage the river may be forded at any place, so that a person may pass along the bed, as in the Canadian, by travelling on the sand-bars, and occasionally crossing the water {176} between them. The soil and climate of Red river are said to be peculiarly adapted to the culture of cotton. The crop sometimes yields twenty-five hundred pounds of seed-cotton per acre, and this of a quality inferior to none, except the Sea island.

Of the Vaseau, or Boggy Bayou, and the Blue river, two considerable streams tributary to Red river, next above the Kiamesha, we have little information. They appear to enter like what are called the north and south forks of the Canadian, near the foot of the western slope of the Ozark mountains. Above these the principal tributary is the Faux Ouachita, or False Washita, from the north, which has been described to us (by Mr. Findlay, an enterprising hunter, whose pursuits often led him to visit its banks), as bearing a very near resemblance to the Canadian river of Arkansa.[69]

We are as yet ignorant of the true position of the sources of Red river; but we are well assured the long received opinion, that its principal branch rises "about thirty or forty miles east of Santa Fé," is erroneous.

Several persons have recently arrived at St. Louis in Missouri, from Santa Fé, and, among others, the brother of Captain Shreeves, who gives information of a large and frequented road, which runs nearly due east from that place, and strikes one of the branches of the Canadian, [and] that at a considerable distance to the south of this point in the high plain is the principal source of Red river. His account confirms an opinion we had previously formed, namely, that the branch of the Canadian explored by Major Long's party, in August 1820, has its sources near those of some stream which descends towards the west into the Rio Del Norte, and consequently that some other region must contain the head of Red river. From a careful comparison of all the information we have been able to collect, we are satisfied that the stream on which we encamped on the 31st of August [July] is the Rio Raijo [Rojo] of Humboldt, {177} long mistaken for the source of the Red river of Natchitoches, and that our camp of September [August] 2d was within forty or fifty miles east from Santa Fé. In a region of red clay and sand, where all the streams have nearly the colour of arterial blood, it is not surprising that several rivers should have received the same name; nor is it surprising that so accurate a topographer as the Baron Humboldt, having learned that a Red river rises forty or fifty miles east of Santa Fé, and runs to the east, should conjecture it might be the source of the Red river of Natchitoches. This conjecture (for it is no more) we believe to have been adopted by our geographers, who have with much confidence made their delineations and their accounts correspond to it.[70]

In relation to the climate of the country on Red river we have received little definite information. The journal of the Exploring Expedition contains a record of thermometric observations for thirty-six days, commencing with June 1st, 1806, and extending to July 6th. These were made between Natchitoches and the Coashatay village; and the temperature, both of the air and the water of the river, are noted three times per day, at 6 a.m. and 3 and 9 P.M. They indicate a climate extremely mild and equable. The range of atmospheric temperature is from 72° to 93° Fah. that of the water from 79° to 92°. The daily oscillations are nearly equal, and the aggregate temperature rises slowly and uniformly towards midsummer.

From Lockhart's settlement on the Saline river of Washita to Little Rock on the Arkansa, is a distance about twenty-five miles. As we approached the Arkansa, we found the country less broken and rocky than above. The soil of the uplands is gravelly and comparatively barren, producing almost exclusively scattered forests of oak, while along the streams are small tracts of extremely fertile bottom lands. In some of the vallies, however, the cypress appears filling extensive swamps, and imparting a gloomy and {178} unpromising aspect to the country. This tree is well known in all the southern section of the United States, to indicate a low and marshy soil, but not universally one which is irreclaimable. It is rarely if ever met with north of the latitude of 38°. In many respects, particularly in the texture, firmness, and durability of its wood, and in its choice of situation, it resembles the white cedar[71] of the northern states, but far surpasses it in size, being one of the largest trees in North America. "There is," says Du Pratz, "a cypress tree at Baton Rouge, which measures twelve yards round, and is of prodigious height." In the cypress swamps, few other trees, and no bushes are to be seen, and the innumerable conic excrescences called knees, which spring up from the roots, resembling the monuments in a church-yard, give a gloomy and peculiar aspect to the scenery of those cypress swamps. The old error of Du Pratz, with regard to the manner of the reproduction of the cypress, is still maintained by great numbers of people who never heard of his book. "It renews itself," says he, "in a most extraordinary manner:—A short time after it is cut down a shoot is observed to grow from one of its roots, exactly in the form of a sugarloaf, and this sometimes rises ten feet high before any leaf appears; the branches at length rise from the head of this conical shoot."[72] We have often been reminded of this account of Du Pratz, by hearing the assertion among the settlers, that the cypress never grows from the seed; it would appear, however, that he could have been little acquainted with the tree, or he would have been aware that the conic excrescences in question spring up and grow during the life-time of the tree, but never after it is cut down.