Saint could not procure a doctor. The nearest lived twenty miles off, and was seldom at home: this probably saved my life, for had I fallen into the hands of one of these American quacks, I might have prepared for my last journey. Saint happened to have some pills in the house, made by J. Sappington, and gave me one. Whether it was from the pill, or my own good constitution, I was better on the 18th, and could move about the house, and enjoy a little food, after my four days’ fast; I was very weak for a long time. I must ever remember with gratitude the kind interest with which these worthy Americans attended and nursed the poor stranger.
It was by no means agreeable to remain ill in the swamps, having shortly before heard accounts of burials, which left it out of all doubt that some of the poor creatures supposed to be dead had been buried alive. Mrs. S. spoke of one case in particular, on the St. Francis river, where the ground was so wet and swampy, that the man’s comrades, for they were out on a shooting excursion, put the body into a canoe, and brought it down to the place where the Saints then lived, and where the land was dry. On account of the greater heat in the southern States, they do not stand on so much ceremony with a dead body, as is the case in the north: so, as soon as they could after landing, they placed it in a grave, which they dug with the assistance of the inhabitants of the place. Mrs. S. assured me that she had never seen such a corpse. His limbs were quite pliant, and almost warm, and his cheeks still red; but the cold earth soon covered him, and nothing was ever said on the subject.
By the 29th September I was pretty well again, and helped S. to get in the corn from the more distant field; but as it came on to rain, I was none the better for it. On the first October an old man from Tennessee came with his son to the marshes to buy cattle. We mounted to drive them together that they might see them, for at this season, when the grass is everywhere in abundance, the beasts do not remain in one place, but are one day here, the next day there. There cannot be a better place in the world for cattle than the marshes. In summer the woods are filled with pea-vine as high as the knees, as well as with the finest grass, wild oats, and wild rye; in the winter the evergreen canebrakes afford the finest pasture for cattle and deer, and winter grass grows in many parts of the marshes.
We worked our way through thorns and creepers, reeds and forests, and almost impenetrable sassafras bushes, and came back without having seen a single horn. One of the consequences was that I was again laid up, but this time I had a companion in the young stranger, who had thus to pay his footing in the swamps. On the second day he was so ill that his life was despaired of; but at last he recovered.
On the 7th October I rode for the sake of exercise, towards a settlement about twelve miles off. It began to get dark when I reached the house of a Mrs. Lane, who seeing me look so wretched and worn, kindly invited me to rest there. Mrs. Lane might be held up as a good specimen of American women. She was very simply dressed, but in good taste, and every thing in the house, where she lived with her two daughters, remarkably pretty girls, was scrupulously neat and clean.
They listened with pleasure to my accounts of distant Europe, the sort of life people led there, the luxury of the rich and the misery of the poor, particularly in large towns, the general fondness for society, and the good qualities of many of all stations, high and low; they shook their heads and said, “The other side of the great ocean must be a curious place!” It was late when I rolled myself in a blanket before the fire, to sleep sweetly and calmly during the night. In the morning my headache returned, and shivering limbs announced the enemy. There was no time for delay; I buckled the girths with trembling hands, and went in to take leave: the kind folks had some hot coffee ready for me, which might delay but could not prevent the attack. I went on about three miles to the smithy, and explained my wishes, and then turned the horse’s head toward the house of Mr. Dunn: how I got there is more than I can say,—I have a faint remembrance of a piercing headache, and dreadful weakness—that I often lay upon the horse’s neck, when the gentle animal stood still, and did not move till I could sit upright again. Dunn’s house was about three miles from the smith’s; on arriving, I slipped off rather than dismounted. The old man soon saw what was the matter with me, and bringing out a glass of some green liquid, he made me take a good gulp of it: its excessive bitterness seemed to cut me in two, and I asked with horror what was the stuff he had given me. He laughed at the face I made, and told me it was something quite new and his own invention: it was bear’s gall and whiskey, and he was not a little proud of his medicine. I slept well during the night, and returned to S.’s next day. I was very sorry not to have been in better condition on the evening that I passed at Dunn’s, for he was a good old fellow, and very amusing with his dry stories.
On the evening of the 18th October, S. came back from Strong’s, where he had bought a couple of negro children, and brought them home on a led horse. One was a boy about fifteen years old, as black as pitch, and with a regular Ethiopian cast of countenance; as he crossed the threshold, he examined every one present, with a rapid glance of his large dark eyes, and then looked unconcernedly at all the furniture, &c., as if all that was of no consequence to him. The other was a little girl of about eleven, who seemed already to have gone through some hard work. When she saw so many strange faces, a tear glittered in her eyes: she had been sold away from her parents, whom she would probably never more behold, and stood an image of suppressed grief. The boy was from Maryland, had been taken by sea to New Orleans, and from thence brought here. He had been told that he had fallen to a kind master, and his countenance seemed to say that was enough, happen what might.
On the following Sunday, I had another attack of ague, which I could not shake off for some days. In the evening two strangers arrived; and although they came from opposite directions, they seemed to be well acquainted, as they frequently conversed in a whisper. After supper, when we were in the second house, where we all slept, they consulted together about their future plans, which consisted in no less than their travelling about the country, and keeping a gaming table, pretending all the while to be unknown to each other, and so playing into each other’s hands: their designs were to be principally carried on among the Indians, particularly the Cherokees, as they thought they were more easily cheated than the whites. But perhaps the two scoundrels had not been able to agree, for on the following morning they parted, one of them passing off a false five-dollar note on S., who was not a little annoyed when he some time afterwards made the discovery. I was about to ride in the same direction that the other fellow took, and when he saw my horse saddled, he expressed his delight at having the pleasure of my company; but I said dryly: “I am not going to ride with a scoundrel.” At the word “scoundrel,” he flew into a rage, and began to feel for his knife or pistol, on which I quietly brought my rifle to my shoulder: he bit his lip and rode off at a sharp trot. After waiting a short time I followed, taking the route to Cash river to bring home some dogs, for S. and I saw nothing more of him.
Arkansas was overrun at this time with a number of bad characters, gamblers, drunkards, thieves, murderers, who all thought that the simple-minded backwoodsmen were easier to be cheated than the wary settlers in the older states. This circumstance had given so bad a name to Arkansas, that many thought all its inhabitants went about armed to the teeth with pistols and bowie-knives; but I have traversed the State in all directions, and met with as honest and upright people as are to be found in any other part of the Union.
On the 24th October, two heavily laden carts arrived, each drawn by one horse: they contained all sorts of things useful for settlers. Their owners are called peddlers, and they ask high prices for their goods, and are said to make a good thing of it. S. bought only a few trifles.