Raftsman's journal. [volume] (Clearfield, Pa.) 1854-1948, 1859-05-25
WONDERS OF THE MISSISSIPPI.

The difference of level between high and
low water mark at Cairo. is fifty feet /; at New
Orleans the difference is but twelve feet Inc
width and depth of the river from CAIRO ana
Memphis to New Orleans is not materially
increased vet immense additions are made to
the quantity of water in the channel by large
streams from both the eastern and western
sides of the Mississippi. The question natu-
rally arises, What becomes of this vast added
volume of water? 1t certainly never reaches
New Orleans, and certainly does no eyapo-
rate and of course, it is not confined to the
channel of the river, for 1t would rise lar a.
bove the entire region south of us.
If n well is sunk anywhere in the Arkansas
bottom, water is found as soon as the water
level of the Mississippi is reached When the
Mississippi goes down, the water sinks accor-
dinghy in the well. The owner of saw mill,
some twenty miles from the Mississippi, IN
Arkansas dug a well to supply the boilers OF
his engine, during the late flood. When the
water receded his well went down till his hose
would no longer reach the water, and finally
his well was dry. He dug ditch TO an ada
cent lake, TO let water into his well; the lake
was drained and the well was dry again-hay-
ing literally drank ten acres of water IN less
than a week. The Inference is, that the whole
Valley of the Mississippi, from its banks to
the highlands on either side, rests on porous
substratum, which absorbs the redundant wa
terS, and thus prevents that degree OF accu-
mutation which would long since have swept
New Orleans into the Gulf, but for this pro-
vision of nature, to which alone her safety is
attributable.
The fact is if the alluvial bottoms of the
Mississippi were like the shores of the Ohio,
the vast plain from Cairo to New Orleans
would to-day be part and parcel of the Gulf of
Mexico, and this whole valley fresh water
arm of the sea. Were the geological charac-
ter of the valley different, the construction of
levees, confining the water of the Mississippi
to its channel, would cause the rise in the
river TO become so great at the South that
there no sufficient levee could be built. The
current would be stronger and the accumula-
tion of water greater as the levecs are cxten-
ded north of us.
Such results were reasonably enough anti
cipated, but the water instead of breaking the
leyees, permeateS the porous SOIL, and the
overflow is really beneath the surface of the
swamps. Such it seems to US, are the Wise
provisions of natural laws for the safety and
ultimate reclamation OF the rich country south
of us.
We believe that the lcvee system will be
successful, and that the object OF its adoption
will be attained. The porosity of the materi-
al used in making them, has caused most If
not all of the crevasses. Men may deem 1t a
superhumau task to wall in the Mississippi
from Cairo to New Orleans, but our leyees are
the work of pigmes when contraSted with the
dykes of Holland. The flood tide OF the
Mississippi Is but ripple on the the surface
of a CLASSY pool, compared with the ocean
billows that dash against the artificial shores
ofHolland. The country to be reclaimed by our
levees-alI of which will not, for fifty years,
cost the people as much as those of the Dutch
when originally built-would make one,hun-
dred such kingdoms as that over which Bona
parte once welded the sccptre.- Memphis -7r-
dtdnche.