The Arkansa, below the great bend, becomes more serpentine than it is above, and very much obstructed by sand-bars and islands, either naked or clothed with a recent vegetation; they are but little elevated above the water, and are covered to some depth during the prevalence of floods in the river. At Belle Point, and some distance above, these islands almost wholly disappear, but the sandy shores still continue, and are, as above, alternately situated on either side of the river, as the stream approaches or recedes from the opposite river bottoms. The colour of the water was now olive green. All the red colouring matter, with which it is sometimes imbued, is contributed by streams entering on the southern side. The current of the Arkansa is much less rapid than that of the Platte, but the character of these two rivers, in a great degree, corresponds in their widely spreading waters of but little depth, running over a bed of yielding sand. The rise of the waters at Belle Point takes place in the months of March and early in April, with a less considerable freshet in July and August. But to this place navigation is seldom practicable, for keel-boats, from the month of August to February inclusive, though the autumnal freshet of October and November frequently admits their passage. FOOTNOTES: [1] Chapter viii of volume ii of the original London edition.--ED. [2] It is well known that water, in which carbonic acid is dissolved, has the power of holding in solution a portion of lime, somewhat proportioned in quantity to the acid. In this instance, the water no sooner comes in contact with the atmosphere than it parts with a portion of its fixed air, consequently loses the power of holding in solution the lime which is immediately deposited. The lime may perhaps, in this instance, be derived from the cement of the sand-rock.--JAMES. [3] The "boiling spring" is the site of Manitou Springs, now a famous watering place, from which millions of bottles of the water are annually shipped. Carbonate of lime composes nine-tenths of the mineral matter in solution. From this point the cogwheel railroad ascends Pike's Peak.--ED. [4] Pinus flexilis. N. S.--JAMES. [5] It is related in Du Pratz's History of Louisiana, p. 71, that in the year 1724, a large tribe of Indians, called Padoucas, resided in several villages on the heads of the Konzas river; that they removed thence to the sources of the Platte: here they are said still to exist. See Brackenridge's Views, p. 147. Lewis and Clarke's Map, &c. But these accounts need confirmation.--JAMES. _Comment by Ed._ See volume xiv, note 179. [6] There is some uncertainty as to the peak which Pike ascended. Dr. Elliott Coues thinks he reached high ground between Mount Rosa and Cheyenne Mountain, approaching from the south. See _Pike's Expeditions_, pp. 454, 455, notes 46, 47. These peaks are eight or ten miles southeast of Pike's.--ED.