Sounds like your cassandra server isn't running. Check that the server is running via the task manager or telnet 127.0.0.1 9160
If you get the below cassandra isn't running:
telnet: Unable to connect to remote host: Connection refused
As for the jdbc library, 1st piece of advice, use the DataStax driver (you can just add a maven dependency), second piece of advice... use maven for jdbc too. Add the dependency into a maven project and then used the code page on the wiki.
Dependency:
org.apache-extras.cassandra-jdbc
cassandra-jdbc
1.2.5
