The Pascagoula democrat-star. (Pascagoula, Miss.) 1878-1920, 1886-09-17
GULF COAST RESORTS.
Belle FOntaine, West PascagOu'
la, Scranton, PascagOuIa,
Moss Point.
The Centre Mississippi Lumber
MilIing-Annual Shipments OF
HL1,OOO.OOO Feet-The Palmy
Days of PascagOula-A
LIVE Locality.
From the New Orleans Times-Democrat.

From the New Orleans Times-Democrat.
PAsCAGoULA, Sept. 4, 1886.
AS one passes beyond Ocean
SPRINGS, on the steel track of the
| L, g. n. r.. r.. traverses the country
living between the historic bays OF
Biloxi and Pascagoula, the first
impression produced is, what a
splendid country for railroad build
ug this is! With level beds and
the long tan2ents which SO delight
the surveyors, the weary rodman s
and the watchful locomotive en9ln-
rer's heart, here the maximum pos
sibiitipS Ot railroad speed are at
taiIable; and with wide throttle,
sDokeless wheel, aud Il trail OF
smoke streaming behind straight
as tail OF Tam O'Shanters fleeing
mare, a fifty or SiXty-lon engine can
Get up and get along like the phan-
tom flight OF the FlNing Dutcbman,
or in a way to reSurrect the sium-
bering spirit o! George Stephenson.
The railroad officials, however,
do not care about attaining the pos
Sibiliiies. They are satisfied TO
drive the iron horse aloDg at some
thirty or forty miles an hour, so
that the passengers may get fleet
inc view of this beautiful stretch OF
country through which their route
passes. 1t is Il broad, grass clad
piece of table land. Tue pine for
ests and dwarfish growth are, fortu
nately, rapidly disappearing. There
are miles aud miles OF cleaIlngs7
whose green swards delight and
rest the eye,
In surveying these magnificent
parks and verdant pastures, one
cannot help iudulging in dreams OF
the imagination as to what region
this Mississippi seacoast might be
made if the thIckets and scrub pine
forests were felled, from the shln-
inc belt of white sands that fringes
the shore with lace-lke frill of
foamy 1pples and wavelets, to the
margins of the winding rivers,
which course like silver bands be-
tween the rising plateaus of the ln-
terror and the sea-swept plains OF
the Gulf frontage.
One OF the artistic effects OF til S
clearing process will be presented,
while the subject is held forth in IA
matelialistic point of view. There
would be belt of country, nearly
or quite 100 miles long, aud from
two TO ten miles broad, where the
practical, Unlimited vision might
always rest upon the crystal-capped
waves of a green sea, and the dim
stretches of distant islands to the
southward; the misty, undulating
outlines of the pine clad bills, tar to
the northward the curVing sweeps
of placid bays to the eastward or
the westward, aud a continuous
park everywhere around, green
with rich grasses, graced here and
there by stately groves, and dotted
everywhere along its front by beau.
| tiful little cities, growing towns and
thousands of elegant summer aud
winters villas.
The beauty of this country would
be so developed by cutting away
the useless growth, which IN SO
many places shuts off the sea view
checks the sweep of the Cult breeze
| aud replaces the natural verdure OF
the ground by a brown coating
of dead leaves, that it would be
come famous at once as Que OF the
fairest spots in all our broad land
Soon it would become crowded will
population; aud large areas OF land
which are now purchasable at al
most government prices, would
raise TO a comparatively fabulous
figure in values. Apparently the
cost of clearing the surface would
be paid by the cordwood which