The times., 1897-04-11

| break. Thefe was q Dredk-aDout as Dig
/ as mans body. Capt. Pillow flung his
body into the opening. 1t prevented any
| further darnage till help came.
| Helena has another character, Col. Miles,
| the river prophet known to all from
| Memphis to New Orleans. He is seventy,
| but for that reason all the more the people
! of the little town under the leyee believe
] in him. In 1882, when the Mississippi
| was wilder and freer than ever before,
| Col Miles predicted that this town an6
| that town were i'll no danger at all, be-
| cause, while the river would go higher at
| such and such points, it would not go above
! such a point mentioning the half-inch in
several cases land so, in 1897, when Hele-
! ma and her people trciHbled lest the Father
| of Waters should break his bounds and
| overwheln and drown them, they actually
| slept in peace when 1t was known that Col.
Miles knew Just how high the river would
GO But the river at Helena was, never
theless, above the top OF the ieyce-a foot
in some places, and in some three and even
four feet. The thousands of sand bags
kept the stream within its course, though.
But the Z 1000 souls OF the little city were
as near as that to destruction.
In Mississippi, Greenyille, a prosperous
town Of 10, 600 people. first began to fear
annihilation. For several days the 800
miles Of leyees about the city stood al
most trembling with their responsibility,
between the river and the destruction Of
a thousand people. The great dangers,
however, proved TO be farther down the
river One steamer rescued 300 persons
at ROsedale, where a break above the town
had threatened the whole population. The
whole Yazoo delta. thirteen counties. cover
ing an area $50 miles long and Z 3 miles
wide, and supporting a population Of nearly
200 900 souls, was under water; the ef-
forts Of thousands Of citizens, and Of hum
dreds of convicts, released temporarily for
the purpose, had proved unavaiing to stop
the awful cIevasses or turn aside the
angry surge Of a river as big as the IIud-
SON Still farther down, New Orleans,
hitherto resting securely, now saw the
water within a foot OF the top of her
Ievees Half a million sacks Of earth
were forwa rded with all haste to the points
of greatest danger A thousand convicts
and many thousand citizens worked to
gether literally like beavers Men with
rifles patrolled the banks for miles, 500
feet apart Steamers ran at half speed;
even the swish Of a passing craft was
dangerous The Inhabitants OF the beau-
tiful city by the great delta looked anx
iously for the news that the President
had signed the joint resolution of Con-
gress appropnatng S2500Co for their
relief They worked and prayed as never
before.
The Mississippi floods Of S97, the most
terrible and destructive known, mus surely
draw rene we'd attention to the plans which
engineers have discussed by which they
may possibly be avoided. One proposition
is to build reservoirs in the up-country,
where the rush of waters can be con-
trolled; so that the various large tribu-
taries may be permitted to discharge their
immense volumes of wafer into the general
stream only at the proper seasons. device
of great advantage also TO the dryer por-
tons of the great basin. Another plan has
been to make a comprehensive, safe and
lasting system OF levees; for it is not TO
be expected that the rich alluyial lands
along the river tand equally along its
great trbutariesl will ever be abandoned.
Nor is it strange, as the conditions now
are. that the Mississippi should often break
all bounds and play inCaculable havoc.
Twenty States and Territories constitute
its water shed. Luckily all Of its tTibutar-
les do not discharge their floods into this
common current at the same time. Nature
seems to have provided that poor means
of safety for the dwellers in the 10 " lands;
otherwise whole states might be made I'M
inhabtable.
There have been other floods in the
Mississippi valley almost as appalling
as these In 1874 the high water, never
equalled since then until the present
year, drowned many at st Louis. In 1S49
the floods caused loss Of 100000 at
St Louis and of $40, 900 900 at New Or
leans The year 1857 saw very high water
at St Louis-36 feet inches above the
mean low water line: the record Of 1914
had been IA feet 8 inches above the mean
low water line In 1888 the Ohio rose
So feet inches at Cincinnati and houses ON
the river bank were covered The loss was
$200O,O0O in Cincinnati alone, and in
neiehbOrig counties the loss was So,
0eo,000 Thirty thousand persons were
made homeless In 1884 the water at this
point went still higher ana drowned sixty
persons The Mississippi River floods of
March and April, 1890, inundated miles
of country and isolated cities and towns.
Perhaps the floods of 1892 were still
more terrible. They caused loss Of
100 lives and of 10000, 900 worth of
property.