Eastern times. [volume] (Bath, Me.) 1846-1857, 1854-03-02
eastern Gimts.
BATH, MARCH 2, 1854.
From our Mississippi Correspondent
Louisiana in December, 1853.


give description of the "bloody tower of Lon
don," or something of the kind, which has
been already well described a thousand times
IF they would spend the same time and money
in examining the curiosites and scenery of our
own country, we should have less sectional
jealousy, be less dependent upon foreign mar
kets, and have in our school books and maya
zines accurate descriptions of things Of practi-
cal importance as we'll as of the ruins and an
Equities of the old world.
Look in your child's geography for picture
of a sugar house in Louisiana, or cotton gin
in Mississippi, and the representation OF things
that have been out of date for thirty years
Perhaps Won will see something like yankee
cider mill worked by horses, for sugar house,
instead of fine building and apparatus cost
ing thirty or forty thousand dollars.
In real sugar house, instead of horses you
will End large steam engine propelling ma
chinery that presses out the cane juice fast
enough to keep dozen carts with three mules
abreast to each cart, constantly, during the
daylight, hauling up the cane from the ad-
joining field.
The cotton-g gin in the school books looks
more like a small winnowing machine than
like the apparatus that really turns out three
to six bales of cotton per day.
Again the negroes in the pictures l have
spoken of gen orally appear round-shoudered; ;
whereas, in an acquaintance with southern
negroes, of over twenty years, recollect but
one that was decidedly hump backed. These
may seem trifes, but they may serve to ex-
plain what gives rise to some of the complaints
at the south, in regard to northern books.
The river Mississippi has several PECULIAR
ties besides its magnitude and muddness. One
of them is, that the tide seems to rise but once
in twenty four hours, where il is pcrceptible
al all. The bars at the mouths l believe are
common TO all rivers that do not have regular
tides. The number of mouths has some re-
semb.ance in the Rhone, Nile and Niger, but
on none of these are the levecs extended down
the outlets or bayous after the manner of the
La Faurche, Plaquemine, &c.
Some outlets from the Mississippi have been
stopped up. Of this class, the most noted was
like Gen. Scott, not liking 70 have a fire in his
rear, had fat boats sunk in the Bayou Man
Shack, to prevent the British from getting into
the river above New Orleaus. The planters
on the coast, as the river bank is called, find
ing these impcdiments serviceable in keeping
the back water from their plantations, extend
cd their levce directly across the bayou and
almost obliterated navigable stream. Gen.
Jackson's attention was probably called to this
pass or bayou while crossing from Alabama to
the river by way of the lakes, as it seems he
went to New Orleans up the Bayou St. John,
which empties into lake Ponchartrain.
Since then the levee system has been ex-
tended at vast expense, and a crevasse or break
in the levee now is as disastrous as an ice
freshet on the Androscoggin or the escape of
the Kennebec around the Augusta dam. Le-
wees are in progress also in the State Of Mis-
sissippi and Arkansas, although, to some peo-
pie it seems impossible permanently and profit
ably, to conine water that would naturally
spread fifty miles, within artificial banks only
one mile apart. Some practical and scientific
men have condemned the policy Of levees and
contend that the natural outlets should be
cleaned out and deepened rather than OBJ
structed.
Among those who have advocated the latter
doctrine was the present Govern of Louisiana.
He was educated at West Point, and being
employed by the State of Louisiana, as civil
engineer, and by the United States as surveyor
general, made report upon this subject which
was considered very able. The contrary doc
trine, however, prevails in Louisiana, Missis-
sippi and Arkansas, and Ievccs are in progress
which are intended to reclaim millions of acres
of cotton and sugar lands.
These levecs. when the river is low, obstruct
the view of The plantations. from the steam
boats and make voyage on the river in the
fall, rather dull In the spring, however,
when the ice from the Rocky Mountains and
the spring rains swell the Mississippi, the corn
and suSar-canc can be seen to good advantage
over the levees and nothing can be peasantcr
than trip on the river and the Bayou La
Fourche. The Bayou has the appearance of
crooked canal the roads run close to the le-
wees, and the white folks live close to the
roads, so that when the water is up. the steam
boat deck gives you fine view of a country
as fertile as the banks of the Nile. The Afri-
can holds the plough and handles the hoe, but
the Yankee is there with his head work, and
his plough, and his steam engine and his tar
if. Most of the sugar planters believe in a
high duty on sugar, and curse filibusterism.
Laying politics aside, let US turn to the seen
cry.
In December last the river and of course
the Bayou, was unusually low for the season.
Business along the Bayou had descended to
the Creole standard of cordelling, and all the
yankee notions went down the stream and all
the sweetening up the stream in boats drawn
BY Creole ponies. The tow-path being higher
than the boat, and somewhat sideling and ir
regular, the tow-linc or cordclle, is passed
through block at the top of the mast then
extended ashore and sort Of formed A
BOY rides one pony attached to the longer prong
OF the \ and takes the lead and a man drives
another pony on the same track hitched TO the
shorter fork of the Y. This arrangement does
'of iie'Sh'' out the travelling community de-
pend upon the politeness Of Tho r,or,o.. c..
their carriages /; or hire creole pony. or take
the daily stage run by a Yankee ..;.s =
ToDsham Mama y