Page:Early western travels, 1748-1846 V13.djvu/299

 territory, as well as to the growing town. The herald of public information, and the bulwark of civil liberty, the press, had also been introduced to the Post within the present year, where a weekly newspaper was now issued.[216] Thus, in the interim of my arrival in this country it had commenced the most auspicious epoch of its political existence.

17th and 18th.] I again paid a visit to the prairie, which, as well as the immediate neighbourhood of the town, is in winter extremely wet, in consequence of the dead level, and argillaceous nature of the soil. The interesting plants and flowers which I had seen last year, at this time, were now so completely locked up in the bosom of winter, as to be no longer discernible, and nearly disappointed me in the hopes of collecting their roots, and transplanting them for the gratification of the curious.

On the 19th, I bid farewell to Arkansas, and proceeded towards the Mississippi, in the barge of Mons. Notrebé, a merchant of this place, and the day following, without any material occurrence, arrived at {226} the confluence of the Arkansa, a distance of about 60 miles. The bayou, through which I came in the spring, now ran with as much velocity towards White river, as it had done before into the Arkansa, its current and course depending entirely upon the relative elevation of the waters of the two rivers with which it communicates. The large island, thus produced, possesses extensive tracts of cane land, sufficiently elevated, as I am told, above inundation, as does also the opposite bank of the Arkansa. About 12 miles above the mouth, the site first chosen for the Span-*