The Louisiana Democrat. [volume] (Alexandria, La.) 1845-1918, 1878-09-11
THE BONNIE LEE AND HER TRIP
LAST WEEK.

Great anxiety was felt in our commu-
nifty lest the Bonnie Lee had, on her
previous trip, left the fearful pestilence
among us, and the issue was watched
day by day with painful anxiety. We
were confidently assured by the repre-
sentatives and friends of the Red River
Company that the Com
pany had too high a regard for the
wishes of our Police jury and our safe
ty, to send another boat through our
midst infected with yellow fever, and
the fears Of Our people were allayed.-
Their surprise and indignation, when
they discovered the Bonnie Lee on last
Monday evening steaming through our
midst, were expressed in no very meas
ured terms, and we think they had just
canse for their indignation. Itwould
have been difficult to have devised an
act Of more cold-blooded avarice or
heartless indifference to the safety of
our people. No enemy, even In all the
hatred Of cruel war, was ever able to
send vessel through our midst so tho
roughly armed for our destruction, and
the apprehension Of its repetition has
produced the feeling of insecurity,
which had caused many Of our citizens
to prepare to abandon their homes and
seek in the outhouses, cabins and tents
of the woods that safety which they
could not have at home. Another week
of painful anxiety must be endured in
watching, before we can know whether
this last messenger of death has laid
his hand upon us. Is this outrage upon
our peace and security to be endured
once week in order that the Pool Line
may make little money and give few
individuals an opportunity to traffic in
disease and death?
It is idle to say that these fears and
apprehensions are groundless. Even ii
they were, the fears and apprehensions
of a people are entitled to be treated
with more regard than an Indifference
that looks very much like contempt
But are these fears and apprehensions
groundless? 1t is idle for steamboats,
to attempt to prove that they are, BY as
surfing our people that the pestilence
cannot be communicated by passing
boat to those on shore. Steamboats,
with yellow fever goods, yellow fever
dead, yellow fever patients and yellow
fever passengers, have heretofore, we
believe, always landed at plantions and
towns and cities, and discharged their
freights or put off their patients or pas
sengers without seeming to be aware
that they had done. anything wrong,
and the fact that they are still running
from New Orleans with infected goods
aud crews and passengers, and landing
and discharging them among any peo-
pie who are idiots enough to permit
them, proves that they have not chang
ed their code of morals upon this point.
Therefore they should not be surprised
that people who have suffered from such
a code Of morals. should not be inspired
with confidence by their assurance that
there is no danger.
Indeed, the question whether boat
infected with yellow fever could COM
mnnicate the disease to people on the
banks, or i'll flats and boats on the
shore, by passing up the river, is at
least an unsettled question, or perhaps
it would be more accurate to say an un-
tried question, and we can hardly meas.
nre the heartless impu.lence which pre-
poses to community that they shall lie
the subject of this experiment, that they
shall be put in its horrible crucible. IL
the experiment should demonstrate that
the boat in passing will communicate
the disease, who pays the cost Of the
truth which the experiment has demons
strated, and in what currency is it
paid? The father, the mother, the son,
the daughter, the brother, tho sister,
the husband, the wife, the widow anil
the orphan will pay 1t in broken and
bleeding hearts, in blighted hopes, in
grief that does not speak, in sorrows
that 90 down to the grave. The lovers
Of science who experiment upon the
contagion and propagation of pestilence
are usually content to try their experi-
ments upon smaller scale and for
nobier purpose than money. Perhaps
those who persist in trying this expert
mont can appreciate their experiment
more clearly by imagining themselves
to be its subject. If the people along
the banks of our river were infected
with contagious and epidemic plague
equal, if possible, to yellow fever, to
which the crew of the boat and its own
ers and agents were liable, would they
think there was no danger in running
their boat through our midst? Would
they be anxious to try the experiment?
We have left unmentioned many eie-
ments of danger in the fearful expert
ment to which we have been subjected,
and which will readily suggest them
selves to the reader. Every one feels
that our almost only danger Is from the
river, and If we have no boat we are safe:
but If we are to risk boat every week
through our midst, our fate is only a
question of time, and we are as doomed
as Vicksburg, Memphis, Port Gibson
and Grenada, and unlike them without
even telegraph, to tell to the world In
our frantic appeals for help, our daily
tale OF horror. B.
BEWARE OF COUNTERFEITS.-
ID WE ARE THE ONLY AUTHOR
lied AGENTS FOR THE SINGER
NEW FAMILY SEWING MACHINE
in THE PARISHES OF RAPIDES,
VERNON and GRANT. FERGUSON
g. SCHNACK, WATCHMAKERS and
JEWELERS..