immediately with the Mississippi is situated fifteen miles above the mouth of the Arkansa,[20] and is about two hundred yards wide. The current is very gentle, and the water deep. Though perfectly transparent, it is of a yellowish colour. The banks are low, and subject to periodical inundations. The soil near the mouth of White river is an intermixture of clay and fine sand, the clay predominating, and the whole of a reddish tinge. Numerous settlements have heretofore been formed on the lands contiguous to White river, and several in the portion above the Chattahoochee mountain on the south side; but all these lands having by treaty been surrendered to the Cherokees, many whites {137} have been compelled to withdraw, and leave their farms to the Indians. The tract of land ceded to the Indians by the treaty above alluded to, is for the most part rocky and barren. Some of the tributaries of White river have extensive and fertile bottoms, but the greater part of the country watered by this river, is mountainous and unfit for cultivation. At MacNeil's ferry, where the road from Little Rock on the Arkansa to Davidsonville, in Lawrence county, crosses White river, the bottoms are wide, and as fertile as any of those on the Arkansa.[21] Here the miegia and the papaw attain their greatest perfection, and the soil is found well adapted to the culture of corn, cotton, and tobacco. At the point formed by the confluence of White and Black rivers, is a portion of land of a triangular form, and bounded by sides about fifteen miles in extent, which, in the excellence of its soil, as we were informed by the surveyors, is surpassed by none in the western country. There are considerable portions of the upland soil of White river, where the profuse supply of streams and springs of excellent water, the elevation and comparative healthfulness of many situations, and the vicinity of navigable rivers and other local advantages, make amends for the want of exuberant fertility in the soil. The same remark is applicable to the country south of the Arkansa, where are extensive tracts of hilly and rocky soils, which seem admirably adapted to the culture of the vine and the olive. In every part of the Ozark mountains, there are vallies, and small portions of land within the hills, having a deep and fertile soil, covered with heavy forests of oak, ash, hickory, and in some places with the sugar maple, and abounding in excellent water. The labour of a few years will be sufficient to convert these tracts into productive farms, but the inconvenience resulting from the difficulty of communication and access to the different {138} parts of the country, will for a long time retard their settlement.