New Orleans daily crescent., 1860-10-08
AN INTERNAL IMPROVEMENT SCHEME.

We early became familiar with, and have since
watched with interest, the progress of very de-
sirable and important scheme of domestic internal
Improvement which is in the hands of " The Bayou
Rapides Navigation Company an institution duly
incorporated by act of the Legislature of the State
and numbering in its association many gentlemen
of note wealth and worth. The enterprise is en-
titled to the most favorable consideration, both for
the reason that it eontempates an improvement of
great Importance and value to the general public,
and because it certainly promises to be in large
degree remuneratiye to those who invest their
means in its stock.
We have now before us a copy of the charter,
regulations and bylaws of the Company, and we
are familiar with the whole subject not alone from
the perusaI of the pamphlet, but by reason that we
have been in person in the locality of the Company
works, where we came to an understanding of the
merits of the undertaking, which we can set forth
in few words. Every business man in New Orleans
| is sufficiently and some of them painfully, ac-
ouainted with the fact that Red river, on the navi-
CATION of which and its bayou tributaries depends
the prosperity of the trade and agriculture of the
fertile valley which it drains, is an exceedingly
capricious and unreliable streams which by its
variable freaks causes much embarrassment and
loss to the interests of commerce. It is to remedy
| some of these disabilities that the Bayou Rapdes
Navigation Company was instituted
Just at the foot of the Falls which are the chief
est stumbling block to the nayigable usefulness o.
Red river, and on the borders of the city of Alex
andria, the Bayou Rapides empties its waters
which it also receives from the river at poin
thirty miles above the Falls. On both banks o
this bayou, from the point at which it leaves tht
|
stream, are many and fertile plantations devoted
to the culture of sugar and cotton. To get thei
crop to market and receive their supplies thu
planters mostly depend upon the bayou, whel
may be navigated whenthe riveris very high. It
ehannel.bed, however, being much more elevate
than that of the river, the water out Of it
soon as the river becomes moderately low, and
is thus usually the that for the greater part
the wear the inhabitants are deprived of means
communication other than by laborious and e:
+ pensiye hauling over bad roads. And furthe
large bodies of fine prairie and other lands a
greatly deprecated in value, and remain unir
proved in consequence of the unreiability of Il
bayou.
This Bayou Rapdes also creumnavigates thrt
varv difficult bars in the channel of the river aboN
the falls as well as the falls themselves, and tn
in the low water season. when Red river becom
: impassabe the improved bayou will afford co
stantly certain and reliable means of transit fl
freight and passengers bound from or to all poin
on the river, alfording most valuable benefit
= the whole population in any way dependent {
l. Red river and to the merchants of New Orleal
interested in the great trade of the country watert
by it. The Improvement contemplated is to NAL
a canal of the bayou by damming it at the plac
Of confluence, that the water may so be retan'
in it at navigable depth, and thus ensuring the a
yantages and doing away with the dsadvantag
er above referred to.
In view of the commendatory features of Il
enterprise which we have briefly noted, and mai
which may be deduced but which We have
space to set forth, it may reasonably be eonclnd
that citizens of New Orleans who are interested
the fruition Of the scheme will aid it and hast
III the proximate result of the Company's efor
Wy About onehalf of the capital stock of the eompa
has already been taken by country subscribe
and we doubt not that the remaining chances