Page:Early western travels, 1748-1846 V13.djvu/134

 want of society and of employment induced me to embrace the earliest opportunity of continuing my journey into the interior of the territory, where I hoped to find additional employment and gratification in my researches connected with natural history. For this purpose I again embarked on the river in a large skiff, which was proceeding to the Baird's-town settlement;[98] but as most of our company were fond of whiskey, the only beverage in the country, except water or milk, it was difficult to get them parted from their companions and conversation; however, after many efforts to make a start, we at last got off, though merely to make one or two miles, so as to be disengaged, at any rate, for the morning. Our encampment was a sand-bar or beach, skirted by willows, and though in itself a situation by no means interesting, yet far from disagreeable {91} to him who can enjoy the simple fare of the hunter, and the calm and unsullied pleasures of nature.

On the following day (February the 27th) we proceeded about 21 miles, or seven points up the river, and in some places against a current of considerable velocity, which had been augmented by a southern freshet, communicating a muddiness and chocolate-brown colour to the stream. In the evening, to avoid the attacks of musquitoes, we again chose a sand-beach for our place of encampment.

In the course of the day we passed the outlet of the bayou, or rather river, Meta,[99] which diagonally traverses the Great Prairie, also two Indian villages on the south bank, which continues to be the Quapaw line as far as the