Orleans independent standard. [volume] (Irasburgh, Vt.) 1856-1871, 1866-01-24
Sporting in a Bayou.

Through the morning hours l have
been exploring t he mysteries of a
Louisiana morass, penetrating regions
ofgreen gloom gliding into cavernous
wllds OF tilamentous vegetation. Seat
ed in a canoe of primitive fashion, the
hollow of log, that packs my sides
and limbs in coffin like snugness, |
have ascended miles from camp, under
ghostly cypress limbs and through
Shiny mold ofrank conferve.
Balancing in my "dug-out," | pad
died slowly down the sluggish bayou.
A summer sun rides near its zenith, but
only struggling beams of heat can
penetrate the overspreading cypress
boughs. The temperature is of deli
cious GOODNESS, for shadows lie all day
upon these hidden waters. Profound
quiet brOods over marias and forest,
sometimes for hours, save when the
fiutter of a bird, awakening from a
nOontide dream, or the occasional
plash of alligator slipping off the bank
makes momentary ripples on the still
ness The gray Spanish moss droops
motionless in long festoons, or coils
Enthusiastically over pendant foliage,
shrouding all beneath with a sombre
cerements. Fire-blasted cedar-t trunks,
grim and pallid, look out like ghosts,
at intervals, uplifting spectral limbs.
Small breaks of sunshine tell Of open
ings in the timber, whence come CLEANS
Of emerald turf d glimpses of interior
landscape; lovely bits Of light aud
shade, checkered by wild vines, trelis-
ed over ancient oaks; deep hooks Of
greenery and labyrinths of leafy arch
es, curtained with a gauze of purple
haze and slumbering pools, bridged
over by the cones of cypress bolls.
An alIigatOr's shining crest appears
above the water, scarcely two boats
lengths ahead Of me. The reptile
swims so noislessly that no one could
detect its presence by the ear. Ileyel
my revolver and send a bullet at his
wake. The missile stikes, and glances
from the monsters scalJ hide as if
DETECTED by steel armour. In a mo-
ment all the bayou is alive with saurian
! fugitives, startled by my shot They
show their shining Usrtebr9, here, there,
and all about me. A black corrugated
head has risen close behind my crazy
"dug-out.' . take quick aim at it,
internally shuddering at the prospect
of a sudden capsize into this certain
convocation' of wide.jawed swamp
angels y Whiz goes the bullet, and |
plainly see it penetrate the alligator 5
/ fOre-leg, at the articulation the shOuI-
der. He sinks like log. Meantime
a score of ugly shapes have reached
the bayou margins; some are crawling
over the muddy sedges to gain their
paths to the remoter swamp. These
paths or trails are well defined, and
might be followed were it worth the
while to wade through Shiny morasses.
empty my remaining barrels at the
nearest marks, and paddle towards a
cypress clump to take an observation
from some point that looks like vail
tage ground. But here my fiat keel
grounds upon a ten-teet alligator
that has wedged his long proboscis
between roots and bolls. Ny dug
out" oversets. as the monster flaps his
huge tail, back into deep water. and |
have single moment left me to spring
upon a log imbcdded near the shore.
Here, with a useless paddle and dis
charged revolver, | remain cast-a
way. my "dug-out' half submerged
pushed off some twenty yards by the
retreating alligator.
| find myself in awkward straits
| mentally repent my recent "troubling
of the waters" The log which give:
me foothold swayS like a Mississippi
sawyer" 1t is fast at one end, but
beyond that end, some twenty feet o
morass separate it from terra frma
, The cypress clump is only little isle
near the bayou edge, with sedgy miro
between it and the banks. 1t behooye
} me to extricate myself, ifpossible, from
immediate peril of plunge, neck deer
or lower, into Louisiana subsoil.
: Nv saurians have vanished, ant
!, the bayou is lonesome as before. 1t
1 leaden drapery of swamp moss; it
= wilderness of motiomless leaves; it
+ unbroken shadows and unrippied wa
s ters: all are lapscd into the ietharg
:. of noon. | might stand shouting o
this shaky log till midnight, with n
:, other answer to my voice than muifle
: echoes of the shrouded woods.
t Steadying myself with the paddle,
SHIFT one foot and cautiously essay t
plant it on the cypress boil. Thes
, curious vegetative freaks, the boil
e grow clustered at the foot of cypres
t. trunks. emerging from the watery ooz
in conical shafts, shaped much lik
mimic cartridges. 1t is said that el
It gineers have found them useful a
foundation piles, in roa d maxim
through swamps. However this ma
1t be, | vouch for one thing from my e
a. perience-that to cross a bridge
+, cypress bolls, in military .jack-boot
in is no trifiing effort of pedestrianisl
Hindoo theurgy has causeway ma
row as a sabre edge, for souls to wa
of over hereafter venture to decla
v, that cypress bolls m a Ike caus
C way as precarious for bodily feet
locomote. shiver to recall the sli
and slides, the shakes and quakes, t
he knee-bows and back-crookings viii
nd this journey, over Shiny cypress cone
9" exacted of me ere | reached segme
of the tree base that afforded sol
standing. Hardly was the feat ;
,ix complished ere heard a rustic ov,
or head, and realized, to my horror, tha
~ had enemies to contend with wor
than alliOatOrs or the mud that bree