nts upon his strength and skill. One officer
declared to him that he should try to marry his mistress (a widow) on
purpose to own him.

After beating up for about eight miles against one of three streams
which unite at, and give its name to, Trinity, we turned off to the
right, and got into a large dense swamp. The thicket was so tangled and
impenetrable that we experienced the greatest difficulty in forcing our
way through it; we were often obliged to get into the water up to our
middles and shove, whilst most of the party walked along an embankment.

After two hours and a half of this sort of work we had to carry our
boats bodily over the embankment into a bayou called Log Bayou, on
account of the numerous floating logs which had to be encountered. We
then crossed a large and beautiful lake, which led us into another
dismal swamp, quite as tangled as the former one. Here we lost our way,
and got aground several times; but at length, after great exertions, we
forced ourselves through it, and reached Lake Concordia, a fine piece of
water, several miles in extent, and we were landed at dusk on the
plantation of a Mr Davis.

These bayous and swamps abound with alligators and snakes of the most
venomous description. I saw many of the latter swimming about exposed to
a heavy fire of six-shooters; but the alligators were frightened away by
the leading boat.

The yawl and one of the skiffs beat us, and their passengers reached
Natchez about 9 P.M., but the other skiff, which could not boast of a
Tucker, was lost in the swamp, and passed the night there in a wretched
plight.

The weather was most disagreeable, either a burning sun or a downpour of
rain.

The distance we did in the skiff was about twenty-eight miles, which
took us eleven hours to perform.

On landing we hired at Mr Davis's a small cart for Mr Douglas (the
wounded Missourian) and our baggage, and we had to finish the day by a
trudge of three miles through deep mud, until, at length, we reached a
place called Vidalia, which is on the Louisianian bank of the
Mississippi, just opposite Natchez.

At Vidalia I got the immense luxury of a pretty good bed, _all to
myself_, which enabled me to take off my clothes and boots for the first
time in ten days.

The landlord told us that three of the enemy's gunboats had passed
during the day; and as he said their crews were often in the habit of
landing at Vidalia, he cautioned the military to be ready to bolt int