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.