The Appeal. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn. ;) 1889-19??, 1899-02-25
AMERICAS Will DEST SPOT,

raggart, the fate Of the yachting party
= would have remained a mystery.
I The dozen or so party of friends, anna
| teur Yachtsmen and others who assisted
IN the search returned to New Or cans
| thoroughly impressed with the wildness
tnd desolation of the region, they visited,
ana they all agreed that nothing like it
s1sts anyWhere else on the American
coast. Around the mouth of the Missis-
slppd, from the fringe of islands facing
ne Mississippi coast to Grand Isle, a dis
lance of 900 or 800 miles, is a region Of
which tits difficult to say whether it is
land or water, marsh or~island There
are umes When it is all under water.
| times when it is mud. and times again
when 1t Is and.-Its coniguraton is con-
| stantly changing. Here in countless cen,
tur1es the Mississippi has poured it's mile
| ions OF tons Of mud from the upper val.
Icy, and SO filling up the Gulf bottom that
the entire coast Is a, shallow sound. In
! thus sound what are called mud humps
ARISE froHn time to time. They are youl1e
volcanoes due to the gas produced by tina
fermeDting matter in the mud, which
FORCES up the mud in the form of cones
above the sea level.
The mud is baked hard In the tropical
sun, and a few reeds or q little mai sk
grass Grows on it-and 1t is then dubbed
an island. But IL is a most dangerous ists
and. Sometimes 1t Is called prairie trema
blante With the water still lying bea
Meath 1t, 1t IL still q mere superstructura
OF oeoalst wood. canes ETC., upon which
the earth rests. floating raft as It were
anchored by the roots OF the marsh grass
Sometimes it Is a mere Quicksand. some
times a pile Of sticky mud, giving out
, FOUL intoxicating gases. To be lost on
one or these Islands means death, not the
ueath chat threatens tho castaway from
, st4rVauon, out death from being swal-
TN To- 49,
by. the cases. And even q boat will avail
little. The land Ii too soft to walk on.
the water too shallow to row in. More
e1an one amateur fisherman who haa
been caught in his boat in the chaotic
LAND has had to wait hours for a favorin<.
not leave his boat, and the water waa
TOO shallow to allow the skiff to move
Ihen too, mo maze was ever invented
more labyrtnthtan than the bayous and
islands OF the st. Bernard coast All tlhA
islands are henttcal-n1ud and sand spits
bayous are as much ahl1~ as two peas.
YOU may wander for weeks and never
get out OF the labyrinth unless some fish.
er1nan gdveg you the clue. Many have
been the lives lost in this swamp; many
the rople who have gone into it with
confidence. never to find their way out.
The story that castaway from tho
Fanl Jones' was ssen on one of these ISL
ande Is generally credited He was seen
by two fshermen at different times, and
his footprints were clearly traced by the
officers OF the relief boat Zeta, but neither
the man nor his body could be found
when tho island was searched, The ver-
dict Is that he was swallowed up in one
OF the many quag mires or Quicksands.
Such Is the condition of the country un-
der the most favorable conditions. It ap-
pears at it's worst when a Gulf hurricane
q eff Eayo
ters of the Gulf are piled up, and all the
land disappears completely from view-at
Is the Gulf then, and most tempestuors
Gulf, IN which mo ordinary vessel can
live. How many vessels have, been
wrecked off the coast of the Cnandeleur
Islands, the outer islands of the group, it
Is impossible to say. In single storm,
that of March, 1876, as many as thirty
eight were stranded. wrecked or destroyed
there. This fleet Of wrecks is being con-
stantly added to. The fishermen and trap
pers who Live in that region, or rather
who visit it, for no one lives there, have
become so accustomed to wrecks that
they accept them as natural and utilize
them like the wreckers of the Bahamas.
They are quiet, taciturn people. living
away from the world and having little to
do with it, seeing no papers, knowing alb
'solutely nothing of what is going on in
the world-Arabs of the marshes. Thoea
of the st. Bernard swamp, which Is near
est New Orleans, are Fihpinos, Manila
men, as they are called here. Of nearly
pure Malay origin, and speaking Spanish
or Tagal. Those of the Plaauemines
swamp, further south, where the Pau
Jones was lost, are "Austrians," that Is,
Slavs, from the Dalnatian coast OF Aus
tria, speaking Italian. lingua Franca-the
pigeon-English Of the Levant or some
Slavontc dialect. They visit the coast in
luggers of Ilevantine build and shape
with sails stained red and brown, and
are as looking as they can well
be, but they are quiet, peaeeable fisher
men, seldom getting into trouble They
live under patriarc1lal form Of govern =
ment, the affairs of the community and
the administration Of justice being given
over to the elders. They know nothing Of
this country, seldom vote, and it IS doubs-
full whether many of them are even in
cluded in the census. They dig oysters
and catch fish, which they sell to the New
Orleans Dealers but they 60 very seldom
to the city, although they are within sight
of 1t. .,....
Both in its scant, wild population and
its still wilder land the region is an ocean
waste where there Is neither food to eat
nor water to drink and where any one
lost in its WildernesSes has as little hope
Of escape as he would have in the heart
Of the Sahara The passengers of tho
Paul Jones had no idea Of the risk they
were taking ON this voyage, and how
small was their chance of escape il any,
thing happened to the yacht.