The springs issue near the foot of the Hot Mountain, at an elevation of about ten feet above the level of the creek. They are very numerous all along the hill-side, and the water, which runs in copious streams, is quite hot. It will scald the hand, and boil an egg hard in ten minutes. Its temperature is considered that of boiling water; but Dr. Andrews, of Red river, tells me that it cannot be reckoned over 200° of Fahrenheit. There is a solitary spring, situated seventy feet higher than the others, on the side of the mountain; but it is also of an equal temperature, and differs in no respect from those below. Evaporation produces a dense fog, which hangs over the springs, and upon the side of the hill, looking at a distance like a number of furnaces in blast. It is probably the condensation of this fog by the cold air at night, which produces such a rank growth of vines on the side of the mountain, where, otherwise, there would hardly exist a sign of vegetable life.
An idea of the beneficial effects of this water is generally prevalent throughout the Territory, and numbers annually resort to the springs. They are found serviceable in rheumatisms, paralysis, pains in the breast, and all chronic and nervous complaints. The method of using the water is various. Bathing and sweating are generally resorted to. It is also drunk as hot as can be borne, and is not, like ordinary warm water, productive of nausea in the stomach. Of the chemical or medicinal properties of the water, little is known, as no accurate analysis has been made. The water appears clear, pure, and beautiful; it deposits a sediment, which is sometimes red, and in other places green or yellow. Some of the springs have a petrifying quality. The warmth of the water, acting along the courses of the streams, has a stimulating effect on the vegetation.
There is abundance of a beautiful green moss growing in the springs, near their edges; and their devious courses to the creek below are only indicated by a more vigorous growth of grass and moss all along the borders, and a brighter green.
The mineralogical character of the country around the springs is highly interesting. Three miles above is a quarry of oil-stone, of a peculiar and valuable kind. It has a very compact texture, is heavy, translucent, and gives a fine edge to a razor. The rock formations here are limestone, slate, and quartz. Veins of white quartz, four or five feet in width, are found running through the slate rock. Fine crystals of limpid quartz are also abundant in the neighborhood. At the cove on Washita river, fifteen miles below the springs, there is a body of magnetic iron-ore; sulphates of copper and zinc, and sulphuret of iron, in cubical crystals, occur in the same locality.
These springs, geologically, exist in a primitive formation, which may be considered the southern termination of the Ozark chain. Ancient volcanic forces have raised the beds of slate, sienite, and greenstone, of the chain, to their present elevations. The waters owe their heat to these long-extinguished, but deep-slumbering fires, which may hereafter break out into new activity.
UNICA, OR WHITE RIVER
In order duly to estimate the magnitude, position, character, and importance of any of our great western rivers, it is necessary to consider the relation they bear to each other, and to the surrounding country. A mere topographical description of an isolated section of country—a mountain, a stream, or a mine—may possess its value; but without a survey, however cursory, of the contiguous regions, it must lose much of its interest to the general reader, and much of its utility to the geographical student. It will be necessary, therefore, to cast a glance at the extensive country in which this river lies, before its individual consideration can be profitably commenced.
In looking on the map of ancient Louisiana, the most striking physical trait presented is the Rocky mountains, extending from Mexico into the unexplored regions north and west of lake Superior, with the del Norte, Red river, Arkansas, Kanzas, La Platte, and Yellowstone, all issuing from its sides near the same point, and uniting (with the exception of the former) at different points in the vast basin below, with the Missouri, the Ohio, and the Mississippi, in whose congregated floods they roll on to the Mexican gulf. Other streams traverse the country; but these are the principal rivers of Louisiana, whose heads rest on the Rocky mountains. Immediately at the foot of these mountains commence the almost interminable plains of sand, or Kanzian desert, stretching from north to south for more than a thousand miles, and with an average breadth of six hundred. To this succeed the highlands and mountains of the present Territories of Missouri and Arkansas, which preserve a pretty exact parallelism, from north to south, with the Rocky mountain chain, and give rise to several rivers of secondary magnitude. This again is bounded by the alluvial tract of the Mississippi, being the third grand parallel division presented by the surface of the soil. Through these, the Red river and the Arkansas hold their unaltered course, and reach the Mississippi without a fall; while the Kanzas, the La Platte, and the Yellowstone, bending northward, reach the Missouri, without meeting any mountains to oppose their progress. The rivers of secondary magnitude, whose origin is east of the highlands bordering the western desert, are the Teche, Vermillion, Tensaw, Washita, Little Missouri, Courtableau, Bœuf, Little Red, Grand, White, Black, Osage, Maramec, Gasconade, and St. Francis rivers. Of these, White river, a stream hitherto almost wholly unknown, or only known to hunters, and which has not received its deserved rank on any existing map, is one of the most considerable. It was therefore with surprise that I found, on travelling into those remote regions, so considerable a stream unnoticed by geographers, or only noticed to attest their want of information respecting its size, length, tributaries, character, productions, and importance. I therefore concluded that a summary of these particulars, as observed by myself during a tour into that quarter, would be an acceptable piece of service, and, with this view, began these observations.
White river originates near the ninety-seventh degree of west longitude, and about the thirty-sixth of north latitude, and, after running in a very serpentine course for thirteen hundred miles, enters the Mississippi fifty miles above the mouth of the Arkansas, and seven hundred above New Orleans. Its waters, unlike most of the western rivers, are beautifully clear and transparent, being wholly made up of springs that gush from the diluvial hills which are found, for more than half its length, within a few miles of, and often immediately upon, its banks. So much of the country through which it runs, is, therefore, sterile and rough; but the immediate margin of the river uniformly presents a strip of the richest alluvial bottom-land, from a quarter of a mile to a mile and a half in width. On this, corn, wheat, rye, oats, flax, hemp, and potatoes, have a vigorous growth; the mildness of the climate, and the fertility of the soil, combining to render it one of the most favorable of all countries for the pursuits of agriculture. Cotton also succeeds on the banks of this river as high up as settlements have extended, and will hereafter be an important item among its agricultural productions. The district of tillable land on this river, like many others west of the Mississippi, is chiefly confined to its banks. Bordering this, is found a chain of hills on either side, which sometimes close in upon the river's banks in perpendicular cliffs; and the adjacent country may in general be considered as sterile. To this remark, all its tributaries are exceptions; for they invariably afford, however small, tracts of the most fertile land, covered with a heavy growth of forest trees and underbrush. The cane is also common to this stream in its whole course, and affords a nutritious food for cows, horses, and hogs, who are fond of it, and fatten upon it. This plant being an evergreen, cattle and horses may feed upon it all winter; and it is accordingly given to them, as a substitute for hay, by the Indians and hunters.