Memphis daily appeal. [volume] (Memphis, Tenn.) 1847-1886, 1874-06-20

into them until the river was run
n ng very high and was Just beginning
to pour over its banks Then the sur
| plus that would form the owe riiOw, If not
taken up, should be allowed to pass in
to those great reservoirs, and be retained
by them until thu flood Eeason was past.
The river, at time Of high waters, dOu-
bles its speed las all streams do under
the pressure of freshets and fiOods). and
should be made to carry off all that it
can with banks brimful, and its current
running at the tremendous rate OF more
than six mile an hour. Thus the MACS
| OF its waters would be hurried to the sea,
| while the dangerous surplus, beyond the
capacity of the river to contain would be
| quietly poured into its immense lake
and swamp reservoirs, and there impris-
oned where it could do no harm. OF
course, after the danger of floods was
entirely past, these waters would be
gradually restored to the river again
through the proper opening st the lower
ends of the reservoirs, having mean
while deposited their sediment. That
process would In the course of ages re-
claim those swamps, which would gra-
dually become new vast areas Of won
derfnl and inexhaustible fertility.
RESERVOIRS WITH LEvEEs, REvET-
MENrs, ETC.
This reservoir system, combined with
the old levee system, and, in clses Of
weak aud crumbling banks, with some
species of Teyetment by faseines, piles,
or otherwise, as practieed in Holland
and other countries, would, l think, be
competent to save the great delta. Nei-
ther system alone L think can do it.
The union of all to some extent is indis-
pensable to perfect success. The prob
lem is too vast and too complicated to
be solved by any one of them unaided
by the others.
RESERVOIRS OLD AS THE PYRAMIDS.
Let no man tell me that the reservoir
system is new and untried. Some
sleepy gentleman near me calls it a wild
dream. So earlier he called the ocean
steamer, the railroad, and the telegraph.
Many years ago Elicit and other able
and gifted engineers, men Of genius, not
mere official routiDists, proposed to
make reservoirs on the tributaries and
head-wsters OF the Ohio, to dam up its
mountain sreams and hold in their
floods, to be drawn from in the dry
seasons of the year, making it always
navigable for the largest steamers. Re-
servoifs wild dreaml Go to India, and
in the midst Of the famine, now decim-
ating her people under British rule,
mark the ruins of her mighty tanks and
reservoirs that ten and twenty centuries
ego caught up the floods and saved the
waters for the dry seasons of the year,
then to be spread over the country by
canals and a vast system of irrigation,
giving fruitful fields and lands smiling
with beauty and verdure and teeming
with plenty, where now too often reigns
the arid desOlation of the dreary desert
SO did the NJ )ors by the same system
make southern Spain many centuries
ago fourfold more beautiful and produc-
tive than it is now, treeless and without
its old reservoirs, prey to the fury of
floods in the spring and fearful droughts
in the summer. New and untriedl Go
to Egypt, and there, older than the pyra-
mids, is lake Moeris, excavated by the
labor Of man thousands of years ago to
receive vast portion of the surplus wa
ters Of the Nile in time of its floods, and
to give them up again in the dry season
to irrigste and refresh the fields, and
drive back he desert that ever mensced
the plains with encircling barenness
and desolation!
OBJECTIONS.
hear but tvVo ohjsotions urged against
great national undertakings on the Mis-
sissippi and its tributaries and to enor-
nous expense, beyond the means and
resources of the government. But in the
first place this bill does not propose for
the government to do anything at pres
ent except to have the whole subject
thoroughly examined by the ablest ex-
perts in the world, and to procure the
verdict of the highest scientific wisdom
as to what is needed for the protection
of the fairest portion Of our common
country from the most terrible calami
ties. Surely no one can possibly be op-
posed tc that. His vote binds him no
further. Is any member afraid to learn
the facts? Gentlemen are fond of " in
vestigating," anything and everything
else. Are they afraid to have the floods
OF the Mississippi investigated?
THE FUTURE COST.
But in the event that the nation shall
at some future time conclude to do its
duty, as great nation should, by its
! suffering citizens of the southwest, there
! is no reason to suppose that the expense
of reclaiming the delta will be enor-
NOUS. Humphreys and Abbot, in their
report made in 1859, estimates the
| amount needed to construct tirst-class
| levees for the whole delta of the Missis-
sipPi to be only SSS, go, 600. Reservoirs,
| if adopted, would increase this amount
somewhat, but not very largely, for then
the levees would be smaller than they
now are. Compared with the immense
national benefits to be attained, this
| sum is but a mere trifie. Each nation
| in Europe large enough to have any riv-
! ers has expended vastly more. France
| has expended hundreds Of millions upon
| the Rhone, the Loire, the Garonne, and
! her other streams. The Adige and the
/ Pc, in Italy, have cost from ten to twen-
| ty times what the Mississippi requires.
| Those rivers have been diked and leveed
| for many centuries. The difficulties to
| be overcome in the old world, where
rivers come rushing down the lofty
slopes of the Alps with the force and
| the fury of the avalanche, were In some
respects far greater than those which the
civil engineer has to encounter in the
valley of the Mississippi. The embank-
ments of the Rhone are far higher than
any dreamed of in America. In Hol-
land, Freisland, and Zealand the dikes
are from twenty-five TO thirty-tive feet
high.
HOLLAND, HER DIKEs AND FOLDERS.
We may learn much in this connec-
ton from the example of little state in
Europe, which in spite of pature has
carved for itself great name in history.
Holland is land lower than the sea,
and reclaimed by the labor and skill and
courage of man from the dominion of
the waters. For many centuries its peO-
/ pie have battled with their rivers, the
| Scheldt, the Rhine, the Mas, the Waal,
| the Lech, etc., and have fought back
the sea. Countless levees, which have
! splendid, we'll paved roads on their tops,
| cOnfine the waters of the rivers and the
| lakes. Enormous dikes keep out the
| sea. Innumerable canals furnish drain
/ age and navigation The finest pas
| lures and meadows in Europe are the
| Dutch polders, so called, the bottoms of
former lakes that were first leveed
around and then pumped into the ocean.
The great lake of Haarlem, ages ago,
was thirteen miles long and six wide.
But from time to time the sea broke in
with its vast waves and raging storms,
/ extending its bounds and devouring the
land till Amsterdam and other cities
were in danger. Then the spirit of the
Dutch was reused as that of our people
should be to-day. They grappled with
the floods, shut out the sea by mighty
barriers, and then pumped the famous
old historic lake dry. And where once
famous naval battles were fought be-
tween the Spanish and the Dutch, CEN
turtles ago, you now behold green past
ures. smiling fields, herds of cattle and