The Washington critic., 1890-05-16
A SPECIMEN OUTLET.

Perhaps the most remarkable recent
contribution to outlet literature was
communication which appeared some
days ago, over the signature of Mr.. b.
T. Camp. in our esteemed contempo-
Tary the Post, In this communication
Mr.. Camp submitted the fascinating
proposition that channel opened from
the Mississippi River into Lake Borgne,
at point some little distance below
New Orleans, would secJre two valu-
able results:
First. 1t would lower the level of the
river many feet at New Orleans and
points above, and
Secondly. 1t would enable the flood
tides to precipitate great volumes of sea
water into the liver, which sea water,
being much heavier than the fresh,
would naturally tumble to the bed of
the river, and there so pound and gouge
and rowel out the bottom, as shortly to
double the depth of the channel
Thus making everything superlatively
lovely.
This interesting document of Mr..
Camps went on to say that, at the point
fixed for the outlet in question, the
river level is some sixteen feet higher
than that of the sea in Lake Borgne
The fall over the short course of the
outlet channel would, therefore, be of
astonishing violence and of correspond
ing efficacy in reducing the volume of
the water in the river. Mr.. Camp also
stated that the flood tides in Lake
BOrgne often amounted TO as much as
eighteen inches; though just how this
tide of foot and half was TO lift the
sea sixteen feet and drop it into the
channel of the river, he did not stop to
explain. Perhaps he holds, with that
eminent scientific authority, Professor
DeWolf Hopper, that there are things
lis better not to dwell on
But it is not necessary to dissect the
tabby nonsense that has been uttered
in this controversy, when we have such
an array of facts from which to draw
serious and reliable deductions. AL
most at the moment in which Mr..
Camp was floating his powerful mind
in airy land the river itself was giving
us an object lesson in outlets. The
''Nita" crevasse on the east bank of the
Mississippi River, between Baton
Rouge and New Orleans, became en-
larged, within few hours after its oc-
currence, into a tremendous torrent,
three thousand feet wide and twenty
feet deep. This torrent flowed directly
into Lake Pontchartrain, which bears
the same relation TO the Gulf that Lake
Borgne does-both being, in fact,
arms Of the sea. Not one drop of it
could possibly return to the river.
Every drop was, therefore, so much of
relief to the volume of the flood
Through that outlet there flowed, by
actual measurement made by an en-
gineer officer of the United States, more
than four hundred thousand cubic feet
of water each second. At that rate per
second the flow per day could hardly be
enumerated; and yet, after this vast,
This almost immeasurabe outlet had
been at work for days, how much did
il lower the flood level at a point eigh-
teen miles abovef Not one fraction Of
6R inch
These are facts. They are not the
fantastic fgments of anybody's fancy
Captain Kingman of the Engineer
Corps, U. S. A, who was on the spot,
made the observations and the measure
ments, and, as he has already testified to
them before the committees of Con-
eress, he stakes his professional reputa-
ton on their accuracy. He shows, in a
word, that the outlet is merely devas-
tation, not relief, and he proves, If
further proof were necessary, that 1t
viii be much better to continue Messrs.
Camp and Cowdon and Leathers in the
business of producing cheap and art
less fiction and leave the solution of
scientific problems to scientific men.