The Democratic advocate. [volume] (Westminster, Md.) 1865-1972, 1898-04-02
Correspondence of the New York Sun.

Core spondence of the New York Sun.
New ORLEANS, March II. = Old
Father Knickerbocker, who is accustomed
to the diginifed and regular flow Of the
Hudson, would be distracted if he had to
put up with the Mississippi River and its
tantrums The story of this yellow food
is full of romance, of adventure, of catas-
trophe, crawfsh and convicts. This is not
simple ALTERATION; it is fact.
Northerners who have been in New Or
leans this winter have been asking two
questions: Do you think you will have
yellow fever next summer? and, Do you
anticipate high water this spring? The
Sun correspondent was fortunate eneu.h h to
put the latter question to MIR. Arsene Per-
rilliat, a member of the Louisiana State
Board of Engineers. 1t was Mr. PERIL
liat who told of the catastrophes, crawfsh
and conyicts as we'll as of various other in
teresting things.
Even Northerners who have never been
in the South have vague idea that the
river here is walled in by artificial embank-
ments called levees; that these levees are
h ghly important in time Of floods; that
men get out with shot guns and parade
up and down these leeves for some purpose
not very definite to the mind of the ignor-
ant and unleveeed Northerner. A talk
with Mr.. Perrilliat would crystalline these
misty notions into keen realization of the
fact that the levees mean the life or the
death of this section Of the country; its life
hamanly, agriculturally and commercially
speaking.
s'In the first place, said MIR. Peril
liat, ''this river brings with it a large
amount of earthly matter in suspension.
1t and its tributaries pick up this matter
By washing it from the territory they
drain, and so long as the water has sufi :
cient current velocity-is in sufficient mo-
tion-it carries this silt along with it, 1t
is like glass Of water with sediment in it.
If YOU set the water in motion it picks up
the sediment little by little and keeps it so
until you allow the motion to cease Our
theory about the Mississippi is that if we
could keep the water in sufficient motion
it would carry this silt along with it, scour-
ing out It's bed and keeping itself free of
bars TO do this, however, we must con-
fine the water to a certain channel and that
unfortunately, is an exceedingly difficult
thing to do. For the water is not content
with picking up the mud and sand from
its bed 1t borrows material from the
sides also, and, as on these sides
or banks are our levees, built with
our Drawn, brain and money, we cannot
afford to spare them. If the river is per-
mitted to eat into the bank too deeply, it
undermnes and carries in the protecting
leree, and unless this is rebuilt before the
next flood we have a crevasse which per-
haps changes the whole course of the river
and foods hundreds Of square miles Of ter-
rtory. If We had line of levees of per
manent location, we could be guaranteed
against any such danger.
''What is the best levee for the condi-
tons?'
The best leyee is an earthen embank-
ment. At present it is thrown up from
the adjacent land by men with shovels and
barrOws, or with mules and scrapers
These are crude methods, to be sure, but
they will doubtless be superseded by more
effectual mechanical system. Clay, or soil
Of il pasty consistency, is the best for "A
leyee, but we cannot choose our material.
We use the soil which is most convenient
We aim to make our levees follow certain
rules of proportion. The crown, which is
the fiat space on top, should be eight feet
wide, the base should be six times the
height plus the width of the crown That
would give the slope its proper inclination
of about one vertical to three horizontal
We are doing our best to bring the levee
system up to this standard, but it costs
vast sums of money, and there are many
levees which have base only 81 times as
wide as the bank is high. This makes
them entirely too step and very dangerous
Having got our levee into shape, we
plant it with Bermuda grass, which makes
a tough coat, holding the earth together
by its roots, This grass will generally
resist the action of wind waves on the
water, unless a log or an old stump OIL
some floating object be battered into it with
sufficient force to break through the turf
Then, unless the place is protected by a
revenment of planks or something of that
sort, the water eats further and further
into the bank until finally it breaks through
altogether
"There are several ways in which 9
crevasse may occur One is by what We
call sloughing. Imagine this bank Of
earth, the levee, perhaps fourteen feet
high, with the water pretty nearly ever
with the top, and therefore fourteen feet
higher than the land lying back of the
levee. For days the water has been helC
by this bank of earth, but in the mean
time it has been slowly percolating threugf
the soil until the mass of the levee is wet
and soft. Finally, on the landward side
OF the bank comes great crack, not
vertical one, curving down toward the road
The earth has become so soft that bis
section of it has become separated from th'
body, and has slipped down the side of th'