The New Orleans crescent. [volume] (New Orleans, La.) 1866-1869, 1869-03-11
CANAL POSSIBILITIES.

| The shoemaker is proverbially lu-snod
| Cooks are the least festive of human beings
The producers of the worlds comforts and
| Injuries enjoy less of these, as q rule, than
the non-producers. Seldom, indeed, is it that
the apparent possibilities or the manifestpro-
prieties of a case are seen to be fulfilled in its
actual circumstances Nothing within the
boundaries of civilization exhibits more glar-
ingly this species of irony than the position
of New Orleans as it actually stands under
multiplied and sufocating infacilities and
distractions of commerce, compared with
what it might be- and should be made by the
intelligent development of its natural posi-
bilities No considerable city on earth has
been more favorably situated than this for
turning water to excellent account in respect
to purposes of navigation, or to pur-
poses of sanitary publication and yet
hundred cities, infinitely worse off
in their photographic situation, have ex-
celled this in the way of utilizing water
both as a commercial and hygienic agent.
The whole delta of Louisiana would seem to
have been destined by nature for reticula-
ton Of canals all having common center at
the Southern emporium of the Mississippi
valley. The canal system of China, even
more than that of Holland, attests the supe-
rior convenience and cheapness of canals
over ordinary roads in countries that are
comparatively fiat, and contiguous to tide
water or large rivers. Foreigners have been
accustomed to regard the great Imperial
Canal, extending from Hangchau to Pekin,
distance of six hundred miles, as the furthest
stretch of Chinese wisdom and industry in
the department of internal improvements.
But this is but one of the main arteries of
canal communication in China, and is insig-
nifcant compared with the aggregate length
of the other canals of the empire. 1t is
equalled in length, according to the state
ment of the Rev. John l.. Nevins, who
speaks from the observations of a ten
years residence in the country, by
the canals within the jurisdiction of
a single Flu city of one of the
eighteenEprovinces, a jurisdiction correspond
ing to that of the counties in one of our States.
In some districts they supersede wagon roads
entirely, affording as they do the cheapest the
most durable, and the most convenient of all
modes of conveyance. In the vicinity of
Ningpo, as we learn from the same authority,
the country is supplied with complete net
work of them, and they often intersect each
other at distances of one or two miles or less.
Farmers frequently have short branch canals
running off to their houses and the farm
boat takes the place of the farm cart or wagon.
Heavily loaded passage and freight boats are
seen plying in every direction. The ordi-
nary rate of charge for passage, at the highest
estimate, would be less than one-half of
cent per mile. In sections where canals are
so numerous the roads are simple foot paths,
sometimes hardly wide enough for persons
to meet without one of them stepping off the
fagstones by which they are almost invaribly
paved. These paths are found running along
the banks Of the canals, or winding about
through the unfenced fields. The ordinary
canals, those that constitute the ramifcations
from the main trunks, are from forty to fifty
feet wide, Bridges crossing the canals are
very numerous, many of them arched, and
some Of them very beautiful. In the coast
provinces of Central and Southern China,
hicles and beasts Of burden and .draught are
almost unknown. Most of these canals are
in regions which offer much fewer natural ia
cilities than are found in the vicinity of New
Orleans. Some of them pass over series of
different elevations. In the Louisiana delta
there is but one canal elevation, the level of
tide water. Here the nature of the work is
about as simple as the plainest kind of ditch
digging. And yet there are wiseacres who
talk with inscrutable sagacity about the i'm
practicability of surrounding New Orleans
with network of canals, or of circumventing
the disastrous distractions at the mouth of |
the Mississippi river by efecting canal con-
nection with deep sea water. |
These sages in finance and photography |
pronounce chimerical and visionary the idea |
of canaling in the rear of the city across an |
almost dead level for the distance of twenty |
five or thirty miles. Why, the most insignif- |
cant town in central and southern China |
would consider such a work the merest trife. |
There is not considerable city in those parts
of the Chinese empire which is not in direct |
connection with fifty times that length of
canal So, these incompatible intellects,
which read impossibility where nature has
plainly written destiny, are at least fifty times
slower than the Chinese whom in their COM
placent conceit they are prone to regard as
people who have scarcely yet advanced to the
confines Of civilization. When shall we get
rid of this intellectual rheumatism and semi
paralysis? Semi-paralS sis we call it, because,
though incapable of progress and improve
ment, it really does possess an almost super
natural power to impede and retard. Herein
is the supreme obstruction to the commercial
greatness of New Orleans In density, and
tenacity, and lumpish obstinacy, the Missis-
sippi bar is almost nothing in comparison.
George II. Stuart and others are going to
give Gen. Grant copy of the Bible. Is this
a hint to the general to abide by the law and
take care of the profits?