The Charleston daily news. [volume] (Charleston, S.C.) 1865-1873, 1866-07-23
The -issIppt Levees.

A bill has been introduced in Congress for a large
appropriation for the repair and construction of
the levees OF the Mississippi River, the Govern
ment having, at last, discovered, after the de-
struction of millions OF dollars worth Of property,
that they must take MIR. Banvsrds advice, given
i'll a lecture, some fifteen years ago-that is, to
enlarge and strengthen the existing wees. That
one serious crevasse would involve q greater de-
struction OF property than would the cost Of
erecting good and su6stantial levees all the way
from New Orleans to Natchez, has been proved by
the many recent crevasses and the enormous de-
structiun Of property. Again, in paper he read
before the American Geographical .cety. in 1862,
Mr.. Benvard called attention to the Importance OF
the work. Had his warnings been needed in
time, millions of dollars would have been saved.
better the peculiar flow OF the Mississippi, both
practically and philosophioslly, than MIR. Ban
vard
Apropos OF these levees, and as the subject is
before Congress- and the public just now, We ex
tract the following from Banyard's lecture before
the Geographical Society:
"There are number Of other effluxcs
Of the river, which draw off large volumes of the
mississippi water, which time will not allow me to
describe Several of them have been closed up by
having levees thrown across the mouth. to the
very serious damage Of the planters below them;
for it causes body of water to be thrown into the
channel Of the Mississippi, which Of itself is not
| sufficient to contain it's own floods in high water,
and causes the levee to overflow, and creVasses to
form below them 1 am surprised the General
rvernment or the state Legislature, to whom the
authority belongs, should allow their bayous to ue
closed; tor the closing uf them is q manifest in
jury to the property below on the river, as they
draw off the supera bundant water Of separate
channels to the gulf, which, by closing, ls thrown
into thr m in cnannel.
I noticed on the lower rlver-on the sugar
| coast-that the annual floods were constantly in
crrasing in their height, ocrasioned by the river
| being reclaimed from overflow, by new eve. 8
made above, and by the clr,iug Of those bay"us,
81 much that the existing levees had almost
| beuUme inadequate to contain the river, the
planters having to cast up soii in high wat ter as
| temporary protection, or pack planks along the
tops of tin III connection with several Intelligent
planters. l ex3rassed my belief that the entire
| levess would have to he reconstructed very
much enlarged, to prevent crevss-es and inun-
d"tons as the existing levees were entirely too
low, and they have proved to be 80 Of late years,
as many orevasses have taken place aud much
ya'nat 10 property bten destroyed. river
| dykei-or, a. we say. leveed along it's banks-has
tendency to rase its bed, as iB particularly the
case with the river Po, in Italy, where rutIced
that, i'll high water the face of the str
wa a"ove the level OF plain, and thisriver is i'll
significant In comparison t. the Mississippi, yet
are ia leyees three times the magnitude of the
Litter.
khonld the Mi -siasippi elevate it's bod In course
| nf Zine, III the sams proportion the Po has
dons IL will require levees forty feet in height to
protect the balks; the average height OF the pre-
/ sent ltvees dO. \ not excerd five feet. AlthOugh
| tile laws uf Lonisiana r. gardug levees are very
express and stringent, they are not adequate to
| pi event tho orevasses which continually occur
from tho causes jast stated, and, within u few
yedrB the entire lrvers will have to be recon-
stru ted, oi enlarged, to shut uut The annually IN
crras ng fh"ts, now being diverted by every new
j settler who oustB III levce from thu origin al
course INTO the overhowiug channels OF the Mia.
sis,lppi