Memphis daily appeal. [volume] (Memphis, Tenn.) 1847-1886, 1871-08-13
HI LEVEE SYSTEM.
Practical Theory of the Mississippi River
and the Folly of the Levee System.

WRECKING BOATS, August 10, 1871.
Horace Greeley, Esq, Tribune, New
York:
Sir-As the avowed founder of a
great political party, philosopher and
philantropist, I want to talk with
YOU on a subject, that is not only
first in importance to the present day,
but worth more to posterity than all
the political measures discussed or
thought of by public men and writers;
one which will live through all time,
surviving all men and forms of gov
eminent, and containing an Inherent
power that will make and control
governments. / mean the Mississip-
pi river valley and IFS mighty conn
merce.
First, in order to arrive at a cor
rect conclusion, let US briefly examine
the practical theory of the river.
From Cairo to the Balize, a distance
of eleven hundred miles, we find by
survey a practical fall of four hundred
feet, with a valley averaging in width
fully fifty miles, which at some re-
mote period of time was once an arm
of the sea, and filed up by the per-
DElAdl HGLoAAAAE1 HULL kAO EAEdL Ab@
per valley between the SUBMITS of
the Alleghenies on the east and the
Rocky Mountains on the west.
At the Grand Tower on the Missis-
sippi, some sixty miles above Cairo,
we certainly find some evidence of
this theory, for there was no doubt
once a great cataract at that place,
which, like Niagara, damned the
water above, in great lakes, which
finally washed away. The high bluffs,
and Irock-bOund shores up to st.
Louis, prove this as much as do the
rock bound shores below the Mag
ara falls prove that the great cataract
was once much lower down than at
present. And in the course of time
that rock will wash away as did the
Tower rock, and the worlds great
cataract EWill gcease to be. The
lakes above will be drained, a river
will remain; their bottoms will be
the abOdes of men, peaceful homes,
and 1OUrishing towns will JOme day
cover those now watery plains as GER
tainiy as we now see.them in the prai-
ries of Illinois, drained in the same
way by the falls once at the Grand
Tower.
As this slow but inevitable process
of filling went on, the river length
ened, and has run all over the vast
lower valley, for in every direction
we find large deep and beautiful lakes,
retaining the regular courses or bends
of the river. In many instances, in
digging wells, and in the caving or
washing OF the banks OF the Missis.
sippi river, cypress trees have been
found and exposed from a depth of
from twenty to forty feet below the
surface; which have been buried for
hundreds and perhaps thousands of
years.
The most remarkable and generally
knoWnsWas a cypress tree,found, some
two feet in diameter, and in a perfect
state OF preservation, while boring
for an artesian we'll in the city of New
Orleans, in the year 1916, some five
hundred feet below the surface, which,
according to practical Observa-
lions obtained at the Balize, as
regards the frightening or extension
of The river into the gulf,
is 200 feet a year, Or say n mile in
every eight years, or 1000 years, in
extending from New Orleans down 10
the Balize, a distance of about l25
miles.
1t will be safe TO say that this tree
found its deep resting place about the
time the Savior of the World was
on the earth; for it must have
required several hundred years
for the slow process Of filling to have
reached the surface from so great a
depth.
hen the mouth of the Mississippi !
was several miles above the place
where New Orleans now stands.
This lengthening of the river ex-
plains the reason why we find the
river on a ridge, for as it grows
longer, the banks on the sides, as a
natural consequence, have to rise
higher and higher to hold the water,
and as they rise so do the bottom and
should the river be permitted 20 90
on extending out into the gulf
another thousand years, the banks
at New Orleans will have to be
raised to % feet high, or double what
they are now, and as high at the
present Balize as they are at New Or
leans, and so on. Hence you see that
the levee system, backed up by all the
power and money OF the American
people, will be found inadequate to
the task of protecting from overflow
the bottom lands in the lower valley,
so important to the comfort, welfare
any commerce of the whole country.
The constant eaving and washing Of
the banks Is another great obstacle TO
the building OF ievees or artificial
for the fall as Won 90 back from
the river is IA feet to the mile, and as
levees require to be built back In
the same proportion, they have to be
made higher, to be above water level.
And as to the caving or washing OF
the banks, people who have never
seen the river can form no idea. In
q few years-say tent have seen