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 which space it has from time to time meandered, and over which it will never cease to hold occasional possession. On the opposite side of all the bends there are what are called bars, being platforms of sand formed by the deposition of the siliceous matter washed out of the opposite banks by the force of the current. These sand flats, sometimes near a mile in width, are uniformly flanked by thick groves of willows and poplars, the only kind of trees which survive the effects of the inundation to which these bars are perpetually subject.

28th.] This morning we passed the settlement called the Walnut Hills,[218] a situation somewhat similar to that of Natchez, consisting, however, of a cluster of hills of 150 or 200 feet elevation, laid out in a chain of agreeable farms. The banks, along the river, though not near so elevated as those of the Chicasaw Bluffs, are still far enough above the reach of inundation, and present a stratification and materials entirely similar: the same friable ferruginous clays, and also one or two beds of lignite, the lower about a foot in thickness, very distinct at this low stage of the water, and about three feet from its margin. The declivity for near half a mile back presents innumerable slips parallel with the river, and in one of the ravines large masses of sandstone were washed out towards the river.

In the evening we arrived at a small town called Warrington,[219] containing two inns and as many stores. The land appeared low, but was secured from inundation by a levee or embankment carried out for two or three miles