Bellows Falls times. [volume] (Bellows Falls, Vt.) 1856-1965, 1893-02-23
THE MISSISSIPPI PROBLEM.
A straight Channel from Cairo to the Gulf
the Only Scientific Solution.


the Only Scientific Solution.
1t Is idle to presume, writes "A South.
ern Engineer" in The Engineering Mag
azine, that great sit-bearing river
| flowing sluggishly through tortuous
channel Of its own making will ever be
able to carry more than very small
moiety of its load to the sea In single
continuous portage. 1t will drop pOr.
ton on the bottom wherever its flow is
retarded, and wherever it is flooded it
must perforce carry another portion
over its banks for deposit on the ada
cent plains, If earth in sufficient guam.
titles Is carted to its shores to prevent
its overflow, it will simply seize all that
1t can undermine and wash out of this
earth on the occasion Of its next food
and make 1t contribute to the elevation
Of its bed. This is the law established
upon every observed principle of geolog-
ical science, and we can no more prevent
its enforcement than we can make the
Mississippi flow UP hill.
But what then? Ii the complete deg
radiation Of the continent is to be the
final end, and If the land Is eventually to
be placed awash with the sea, will we
not hasten the coming Of the second del
uge by shortening the channels Of great
silt bearing rivers and facilitating their
work? Possibly; but as Humboldt esti-
mates the time required to prepare all
the conditions for the catastrophe at
four and a half million years even at the
present ratio Of waste, 1t becomes ques-
ton il the continents will not live as
long as they are entitled to live in any
case. Immortality enters into no theory
Of superficial terrestrial phenomena that
has yet been advanced. And then,
again we should have some confidence
in the wisdom Of natural law. True, the
theory that continents are to be pre-
served by seismic upheavals Is not quite
pleasant to contemplate, and 1t seems
moreover to defeat itse If by its own pos
tulates. The day must come when there
will be no more cooling at the interior of
the earth to produce contractiOns Of the
crust, and then there can be no more up
heavals. But the earthquake is not the
only alternative. Nature must have con-
trived something better. Equilibrium
and peace between the land and sea must
be finally established. When there are
no more precipitous highlands, there
will be no more torrents and floods, and
all the rain that falls will sink quietly
into the ground only to gush forth again
in perfectly pellucid springs and to flow
back to the ocean through the channels
of equally pellucid rivers. 1t will carry
no booty from the hill tops because there
will be no hill tops to despoil. Man, too
may have his resOu ces. In good deal
less than four and half million years
he should learn to distill bricks from tlsa
elements, or, if necessary in order to
keep his head above water, to build
mountains of chemically produced
granite. But, whatever the situation
four and half million years hence, i5
will not be worth while to make the
Mississippi basin uninhabitable during
the next few centuries for the mere pur-
pose OF promoting Wretchedly unscien-
lific system Of engineering.
There is but one treatment for the
Mis.ippi which will be at once scientific
and sensible, and this will be found in
giving it channel as nearly straight as
possible from Cairo to the gulf. The
river itself will do most'of the work as
soon as the needed cut-offs have been
made; and once trained to follow a di-
rect channel running with nearly twice
its pres. Mt velocity Of current it will cal
for comparatively little subsequent ex
penditure. 1t is wonder that the de-
mands Of navigation alone have not
alrt ady compelled this kind of improve
mont