our power endeavour to preserve the peace, and promote the due execution of justice. We are your Excellency's most obedient humble servants, (Signed) Don Manuel Gayoso de Lemos, Brigadier" in the Royal Armies, Governor Military, and Political, of the Natchez, and its dependencies, &c. ANTHONY HUTCHINS, BERNARD LINTOT, CATO WEST, JOSEPH BERNARD, Being always desirous of promoting the public good, we do join in the same sentiment with the committee, by acceding to their propositions in the manner following. By the present, I do hereby accede to the four foregoing propositions, established and agreed upon for the purpose of establishing the peace and tranquillity of the country, and that it may be constant and notorious, I sign the present under the seal of my arms, and countersigned by the secretary of this government at Natchez, the 22d day of June, 1797. (Signed) MANUEL GAYOSO DE LEMOS. On the 23d the Governor and his officers left the fort, and returned to their houses. Thus ended this formidable tumult, without a single act of violence having been committed by the inhabitants of the country, during a suspension of the government and laws, for the space of two weeks! The propositions were immediately transmitted to the Baron de Corondelet for his approbation and signature, who agreed to them without hesitation, except to a part of the third; which relates to the transportation of of any inhabitant out of the district as a prisoner. By a royal edict, trials for capital crimes must be held in New Orleans, and to capital crimes only the Baron's exception extended. It was out of his power to set aside a royal edict. This was well understood by the committee, when the propositions were under consideration; but it was thought best to require more than was expected, to obtain as much as was necessary for the safety of the people. As the Governor retired from the fort on the 23d, he called at my quarters where we had a conversation of considerable length upon the state of the country. During this interview the necessity of electing another committee, to aid in preserving good order and the peace of the country, was strongly impressed upon the mind of the Governor, who appeared fully aware of the propriety of the measure, and the day following issued his proclamation for that purpose. The election took place about the beginning of July, when the following gentlemen were chosen. Joseph Bernard, Peter B. Bruin, Daniel Clark, Gabriel Benoist, Philander Smith, Isaac Gaillard, Roger Dixon, William Ratliff and Frederick Kimball. The election of this committee, as was really intended on my part, put the finishing stroke to the Spanish authority, and jurisdiction in the district. The mem bers, with the single exception of Frederick Kimball whose sentiments were doubtful, and who fell below the line, were decidedly republican, and firmly attached to the government and interest of the United States. This committee held their first meeting about the 15th of July, at the house I occupied: all their subsequent meetings were held at the same place, although they were offered the use of government house, they declined to accept of it. Having been very minute, and I fear tedious, in detailing the difficulties which occurred in carrying the treaty into effect, and in the account of the commotion, I shall in the next chapter take up a subject more interesting. CHAP. IV. Containing some account of the Mississippi river—of the settlements, and part of the adjacent country, &c. T 'O say any thing new respecting this river, whose magnitude and importance has for more than a century past, employed the pens of some of the ablest historians, philosophers and geographers of most nations in Europe, as well as in our own country, is not to be expected from me. In following such characters I shall proceed with diffidence, and confine my remarks to that part of this celebrated river, which I had an opportunity of examining myself, and which lies between the mouth of the Ohio and the Gulf of Mexico. The confluence of the Ohio and Mississippi rivers, is in 37° 0′ 23′′ N. latitude, and about 5" 55' 22′′.8 W. from Greenwich, agreeably to the observations in the Appendix to this work: but since those observations were printed off, my friend Don Jon Joaquin de Ferrer, whom I have already had occasion to mention, has determined at my request, by one of Arnold's best chronometers in descending the river from Pittsburgh, to New Orleans, the difference of meridians between the mouth of the Ohio, Natchez, and the two places first mentioned; and by a careful comparison of the difference of those meridians, the longitude of the mouth of the Ohio appears to be 5" 56' 24", which exceeds the determination determination in the Appendix by 1' 1". 2: and by combining this determination with the observations in the Appendix, the longitude of the mouth of the Ohio will be 5 55′ 38′′.1 west from the royal observatory at Greenwich, and which is the position I have given it in the map. I am well aware, that this position differs nearly two degrees in longitude, and 14 minutes in latitude, from our best maps or charts. I have not adopted this alteration without some hesitation, and should still have been more cautious, if I could have found any other authority in favour of the former position, than charts unaccompanied by any observations. Those who are descending the Ohio and Mississippi, and have been pleased with the prospect of large rivers rushing together among hills and mountains, will anticipate the pleasure of viewing the conflux of those stupendous waters. But their expectations will not be realized, the prospect is neither grand nor romantic: here are no hills to variegate the scene, nor mountains from whose summits the meandering of the waters may be traced, nor chasms through which they have forced their way. The prospect is no more than the meeting of waters of the same width, along the sounds, on our low southern coast. These great rivers after draining a vast extent of mountainous and hilly country, join their waters in the swamp through which the Mississippi passes into the Gulf of Mexico. This swamp extends from the high lands in the United States, to the high lands in Louisiana; through various parts of which the river has at different periods made its way. From the best information I could obtain, the swamp is from thirty-six to forty-five miles wide, from the boundary many miles up, (the whole of which is several feet under water every annual inundation) and much the greater part of it lies on on the west side of the present bed of the river. From the mouth of the Ohio, to the southern boundary of the United States, the Mississippi touches but two or three places on the west side that are not annually inundated, and even these are for a time insulated; but on the east side it washes the high land in eleven places. tumn. The swamp appears to be composed of the mud and sand, carried by Mad river into the Missouri, and by the Missouri into the Mississippi, to which may be added, the washing of the country drained by the Mississippi and Ohio rivers, with their numerous branches, which furnish a fresh stratum every inundation. This stratum is deposited upon a stratum of leaves and other dead vegetables; which had fallen the preceding auThese strata may be readily examined in many parts of the swamp, and banks of the river. The thickness of the deposited strata differs considerably, and principally depends upon the duration of the different inundations. In 1797, the inundation was complete by the last of February, and the river was not entirely within its banks till the beginning of September following. But in the year 1798, the inundation was not complete till after the middle of May, and the river was generally within its banks by the first of August. The mean perpendicular height to which the river rises, (at the time of the inundation,) above the low water mark at the town of Natchez, is about 55 feet. In descending the river, you meet with but little variety; a few of the sand bars and islands, will give a sample of the whole. When the water is low, you have high muddy banks, quick-sands, and sand bars; and when full, you might almost as well be at sea: for days together you will float without meeting with any thing like soil in the river, and at the same time be environed by an uninhabitable, and almost impenetrable wilder ness. |