Qualla Town, North Carolina, May, 1848.
In coming from Franklin to this place, a distance of thirty miles, I
travelled over a wild, mountainous, and thinly settled country,
where I was pained to witness the evil effects of intemperance, and
made happy by following the windings of a beautiful river. Having
been overtaken by a thunder-storm, I found shelter in a rude and
comfortless cabin, which was occupied by a man and his wife and
eight children. Every member of the family was barefooted, and one
or two of the children almost destitute of clothing; not one of the
children, though one or two of them were full-grown girls, could
read a single word; the mother was sickly and haggard in her
appearance, and one of the little boys told me that he had not eaten
a hearty meal for ten days. I subsequently learned that the head of
this household was a miserable drunkard.
The river to which I alluded is the Tuck-a-se-ja, which empties into
the Tennessee. It is a very rapid stream, and washes the base of
many mountains, which are as wild as they were a century ago.
Whenever there occurs any interval land, the soil is very rich, and
such spots are usually occupied. The mountains are all covered with
forest, where wild game is found in abundance. The fact is, the
people of this whole region devote more of their time to hunting
than they do to agriculture, which fact accounts for their
proverbial poverty. You can hardly pass a single cabin without being
howled at by half a dozen hounds, and I have now become so well
educated in guessing the wealth of a mountaineer, that I can fix his
condition by ascertaining the number of his dogs. A rich man seldom
has more than one dog, while a very poor man will keep from ten to a
dozen. And this remark with regard to dogs, strange as it may seem,
is equally applicable to the _children_ of the mountaineers. The
poorest man, without any exception, whom I have seen in this region,
lives in a log cabin with two rooms, and is the father of _nineteen
children_, and the keeper of _six hounds_.
On my arrival in this place, which is the home of a large number of
Cherokee Indians, (of whom I shall have much to say in future
letters,) I became the guest of Mr. William H. Thomas, who is the
“guide, counsellor, and friend” of the Indians, as well as their
business agent. While conversing with this gentleman, he excited my
curiosity with regard to a certain mountain in his vicinity, and,
having settled it in his own mind that I should spend a week or two
with him and his Indians, proposed (first excusing himself on
account of a business engagement) that I should visit the mountain
in company with a gentleman in his employ as surveyor. The proposed
arrangement was carried out, and thus was it that I visited _Smoky
Mountain_.
This mountain is the loftiest of a large brotherhood which lie
crowded together upon the dividing line between North Carolina and
Tennessee. Its height cannot be less than five thousand feet above
the level of the sea, for the road leading from its base to its
summit is seven and a half miles long. The general character of the
mountain is similar to that already given of other Southern
mountains, and all that I can say of its panorama is, that I can
conceive of nothing more grand and imposing. It gives birth to a
pair of glorious streams, the _Pigeon river_ of Tennessee, and the
_Ocono lufty_ of North Carolina, and derives its name from the
circumstance that its summit is always enveloped, on account of its
height, in a blue or smoky atmosphere.
But the chief attraction of Smoky Mountain is a singular cliff known
throughout this region as the _Alum Cave_. In reaching this spot,
which is on the Tennessee side, you have to leave your horses on the
top of the mountain, and perform a pedestrian pilgrimage of about
six miles up and down, very far up and ever so far down, and over
every thing in the way of rocks and ruined vegetation which Nature
could possibly devise, until you come to a mountain side, which is
only two miles from your starting place at the peak. Roaring along
at the base of the mountainside alluded to is a small stream, from
the margin of which you have to climb a precipice, in a zigzag way,
which is at least two thousand feet high, when you find yourself on
a level spot of pulverized stone, with a rocky roof extending over
your head a distance of fifty or sixty feet. The length of this
hollow in the mountain, or “cave,” as it is called, is near four
hundred feet, and from the brow of the butting precipice to the
level below the distance is perhaps one hundred and fifty feet. The
top of the cliff is covered with a variety of rare and curious
plants, and directly over its centre trickles a little stream of
water, which forms a tiny pool, like a fountain in front of a
spacious piazza. The principal ingredients of the rock composing
this whitish cliff are alum, epsom salts, saltpetre, magnesia, and
copperas, and the water which oozes therefrom is distinguished for
its strong medicinal qualities. This strange and almost
inaccessible, but unquestionably very valuable cave, belongs to a
company of neighboring Carolinians, who have already made some money
out of the alum, but have not yet accomplished much in the way of
purifying and exporting the various products in which it abounds.
The scenery upon which this cave looks down, however, interested me
quite as much as the cave itself. From the most comprehensive point
of view two mountains descend abruptly into a kind of amphitheatre,
where the one on the right terminates in a very narrow and ragged
ridge, which is without a particle of vegetation, while far beyond,
directly in front of the cave, rises a lofty and pointed mountain,
backed by some three or four of inferior magnitude. The ridge which
I have mentioned is itself very high, but yet the cave looks down
upon it, and it is so fantastic in its appearance that from
different points of view you may discover holes leading like windows
entirely through it, while from other places you might fancy that
you looked upon a ruined castle, a decayed battlement, or the
shattered tower of an old cathedral. To gaze upon this prospect at
the sunset hour, when the mountains were tinged with a rosy hue, and
the immense hollow before me was filled with a purple atmosphere,
and I could see the rocky ledge basking in the sunlight like a huge
monster on the placid bosom of a lake, was to me one of the most
remarkable and impressive scenes that I ever witnessed; and then
remember, too, that I looked upon this wonderful prospect from a
framework of solid rock, composed of the stooping cliff. It was a
glorious picture, indeed, and would have amply repaid one for a
pilgrimage from the remotest corner of the earth.
The ordinary time required to visit the Alum Cave is two days; but,
owing to bad weather, my friend and myself occupied the most of four
days in performing the same trip. To give a minute account of all
that we met with would occupy too much time, and I will therefore
only record in this place the incidents which made the deepest
impression on my own mind.
Our first night from home we spent in the cabin of a man who treated
us with the utmost kindness, and would not receive a penny for his
pains. So much for mountain hospitality. And now, to prove that our
friend was an intelligent man, it may be mentioned that he is an
adept in the following professions and trades, viz. those of
medicine, the law, the blacksmith, the carpenter, the hunter, the
shoemaker, the watchmaker, the farmer, and he also seemed to possess
an inkling of some half dozen sciences. Now, I do not exactly mean
to assert that the gentleman is a master practitioner in all these
departments of human learning and industry; but if you were to judge
of his ability by his use of technical words, you would not for a
moment imagine he could have a competitor. But so it is in this wild
region, one man has to perform the intellectual labor of a whole
district; and, what is really a hard case, the knowledge which is
thus brought to so good a market is nearly always the fruit of a
chance education, and not of a systematic one.
Among those who spent the night with us under the roof of the above
accomplished man, was one of the idle vagabonds of the country. This
individual, it appears, had met with a singular accident on the day
previous, and amused us by relating it. I regret that I cannot
remember all the singular epithets that he employed, but I will do
my best to report him faithfully:
“Now, the way the thing happened was this, and I reckon you never
heard sich like afore. A lot of us fellers was out in ‘Squire
Jones’s millpond a washing ourselves and swimming. Now, I allow this
pond, in a common way, is nigh on to half a mile long; but at this
time they were draining the pond, and it warnt so very large. Wall,
there was one spot, well nigh the middle—no, not exactly; I reckon
it was a little to the left—where the water poured out into a rale
catarock. The fellers I was with got the devil in ’em, and offered
to bet the tobaccer that I couldn’t swim near the big hole in the
dam without going through. I agreed, for I always counted myself a
powerful swimmer. I made one try, and just touched the outside of
the whirlpool. The fellers laughed at me and said I couldn’t come
it. I knew they said what was not so, and I got mad. I tried it
again, and went a bit nearer, when they yelled out again and said it
was no go. By this time I was considerable perplexed, but I swore to
myself I would have the tobaccer, and I made one more try. But this
time I got into the whirlpool, and couldn’t get out; and, in less
than no time, the water wheeled my head round to the hole, and in I
went quick as a streak. I went through the hole, ’bout four or six
feet long—no, I allow ’twas seven feet—and fell into the surge
below, and, in five minutes or so—perhaps six—I was on dry land,
sound as a button. The joke was on the fellers then, and when I told
’em to hand over my plunder, they said they would, and told me I
looked like a big frog when I come out of the hole into the pool
below the dam.”
On the following morning we travelled to the foot of Smoky Mountain,
and having obtained a guide, who happened to be one of the
proprietors of Alum Cave, we resumed our journey. In the immediate
vicinity of the cave we came across an Indian camp, where were two
Indians who were out bear-hunting. We were admitted under their bark
roof, and with them spent the night, sleeping upon the ground. We
remained a sufficient length of time to enjoy one supper and one
breakfast; the first was composed of corn bread and bear meat, and
the second of trout (caught in a neighboring stream) and a corn cake
fried in the fat of a bear.
On questioning our Indian landlords, as we sat around our watch
fire, with regard to the Alum Cave, I could only gather the fact
that it was originally discovered by the famous chief Yo-na-gus-ka,
who happened in his youth to track a bear to one of its corners,
where he had a den. Disappointed on this score, I then turned to our
guide to see what he could tell me about the cave that was not
connected with its minerals, and the substance of his narrative was
as follows:
I hav’n’t much to say about the cave that I knows of, excepting one
or two little circumstances about myself and another man. The first
time I come here it was with my brother and two Indians. The sight
of this strange gash in the mountain and the beautiful scenery all
around made me very excited, and I was for climbing on top, and no
mistake. The Indians and my brother started with me up the ledge at
the north end of the cave, but when we got up about half way, just
opposite to an eagle’s nest, where the creatures were screaming at a
fearful rate, they all three of ’em backed down, and said I must not
keep on. I told ’em I was determined to see the top, and I would. I
did get on top, and, after looking round a while and laughing at the
fellows below, I began to think of going down again. And then it was
that I felt a good deal skeered. I found I couldn’t get down the way
I got up, so I turned about for a new place. It was now near
sundown, and I hadn’t yet found a place that suited me, and I was
afraid I’d have to sleep out alone and without any fire. And the
only way I ever got down was to find a pine tree that stood pretty
close to a low part of the ledge, some three hundred yards from the
cave, when I got into its top, and so came down among my friends,
who said it was a wonder I hadn’t been killed.
“I generally have had to pilot all strangers to the cave since that
time, and I remember one circumstance that happened to a Tennessee
lawyer, who caused us a good deal of fun; for there was a party of
young gentlemen there at the time. We had a camp right under the
cave, where it’s always dry, and about midnight the lawyer I
mentioned suddenly jumped up as we were all asleep, and began to
yell in the most awful manner, as if something dreadful had
happened. He jumped about as if in the greatest agony, and called on
God to have mercy on him, for he knew he would die. O, he did carry
on at a most awful rate, and we thought he must have been bitten by
some snake or was crazy, so we tore off his clothes to see what was
the matter; and what do you suppose we found? Nothing but a harmless
little lizard, that had run up the poor man’s legs, all the way up
to his arm-pits, thinking, I suppose, that his clothes was the bark
of a dead tree. After the trouble was all over, the way we laughed
at the fellow was curious.”
Our second day at the Alum Cave (and third one from home) was a
remarkably cheerless one; for a regular snowstorm set in, mingled
with hail, and, before we could reach our horses and descend the
Smoky Mountain, some three or four inches of snow had fallen. We
spent that night under the roof of our good friend and worthy man,
the guide, and it was with difficulty that we could induce him to
receive a quarter eagle for all his trouble in piloting us and
treating us to his best fare. On that night we ate our supper at
nine o’clock, and what rendered it somewhat peculiar was the fact
that his two eldest daughters, and very pretty girls besides, waited
upon us at table, holding above our heads a couple of torches made
of the fat pine. That was the first time that I was ever waited upon
in so regal a style, and more than once during the feast did I long
to retire in a corner of the smoky and dingy cabin to take a sketch
of the romantic scene. At sunrise on the following morning my
companion and myself remounted our horses, and in three hours were
eating our breakfast in Qualla Town.