Four-and-a-Half Months’ Stay in New Harmony
Description of the region – Natural history – Messrs. Say, Lesueur, and Owen – Hunting excursions in Indiana and Illinois – Wabash, Fox River – Illinois prairies – Albion – Black River – Mr. Bodmer’s trip to New Orleans
October 24, 1832
At seven o’clock, temperature of 0°R [32°F, 0°C] or a little above. There was a white frost. Mr. Bodmer and Mr. Hall had gone hunting at four or five o’clock; they returned at ten o’clock but, except for a Loxia cardinalis and a Quiscalus ferruginea Bonap., had not bagged anything new.
At ten thirty, Mr. Say and I took a short walk to the hills, where one has a nice view overlooking the town and toward the river. On the hills grew Liriodendron, Quercus, Ulmus, Cercis canadensis, Liquidambar, Robinia pseudoacacia (here called black locust), Juglans, and several other [kinds of] trees.
Everywhere Liatris, with its dry plants, had densely shot up three feet high and covers those who walk through it with its woolly seeds. Between these plants Cassia marilandica, with its ripe black pods; Bignonia radicans and Rhus radicans creep on the trunks. Quercus macrocarpa also grows in this region.
We walked along the river, which here has a branch. In some places cottonwoods, with rather angular young branches and tightly compressed petioles, form an undergrowth on the bank, behind which there is lofty forest. Beside the river there is a low plain, entirely overgrown with Liatris, on which cattle graze. Here Leontodon taraxacum grows everywhere, and also the Lobelia syphilitica. I shot a cardinal (Loxia cardinalis Linn.) from a tall elm, and in the cornfields we saw flights of blackbirds. A large bird of prey, which was pursuing them, was too wary to be outwitted.
The Wabash is a rather imposing river that flows down through level, wooded regions. In some places it had wide sandbars, and for this reason the steamboats that pass up and down on it could not navigate it. By now the woods have lost their beautiful multicolored appearance. Most of the leaves have fallen; only some of the oaks still have yellow and brown foliage.
This morning Mr. Bodmer had made preliminary sketches of several forest scenes with vines. In the afternoon Mr. Say visited me and persuaded me to call the doctor; therefore, I passed the time until ten o’clock in the evening with my medicine.