Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1910-09-14
cuRIosITIEs OF MISSISSIPPI
Remarkable Facts About the World's
Greatest River.

Greatest River.
The longest voyage possible from
New York to any European port Via
one body of water, the Atlantic
Ocean. is less than 1900 miles. But
an American may make longer Voy-
age via one body of water and never
leave the interior of his own coun-
try For the length of our great Mis-
sissippi river, including the Missouri
river, which geographers now consid-
or really the main stream, is 4,2OO
miles.
It is a wasteful river; enough Sood
soil is elected annually from its mouth
TO make a great many farms. III
II were possible to collect and COM
nress this sediment, it would make
q block 200 feet high and one mile
square at the base. Or, think or II
as being n quantity of rich silt sufii-
cient to plaster six inches deep 30O
farms Of 1000 acres each.
And water! Stand on the levee
bank at flood time anywhere below
the mouth of the Ohio, and for every
pulse beat of your wrist there passes
before you 100000 cubic feet oi
water; S4O,OOO.OOO every minute.
Curiously enough, this vast mass OF
water flows up hill to the gulf For
il has been found that the mouth OF
the river is much further from the
center of the earth than is its source
1t is the so-called centrifugal force,
or inertia, produced by the rotation
of the earth that keeps the stream
moving toward the equator. The wa
ter is acted upon somewhat as 1t Is
when you rapidly swing n pail OF II
about your head. If the old earth
should stop rotating, the Mississippi
would flow north; as it is, inertia
throws it southwark.
That is not the only curious effect
for which the rotation Of the earth
is responsible. Another most queer
thing is that the right bank wears
more than the left one, owing to a
westward inertia produced by the
earth's motion eastward.
Any one who has ever had to lie in
bed in one place for long time knows
how trcSome it gets and what relief
it is to make a change. Perhaps
this is why old Father Waters as
the Indians called it, shifts so rest
lessly: for it has been lying in its bed
a long time AS it lies there upon its
mIth its arms outstretched across
great states, it shifts and tosses very
uneasily. Sometimes it grows fretful
from very wearness, no doubt, of ly-
ing in one place; and then it filings it
self right out of bed, for its banks are
low.
These wriggles are tremendously re-
lieving TO the old stream, but they
bring disaster and dismay to farm
ers enscOnccd near by. They feel
deeply aggrieved. not to say annoyed
when the old father squirms out of
bed. They would like for him to lie
quietly. For this reason the banks, or
sides of the bed, have been raised by
"levees," just as the sides of your bed
were built up high when you were
very little and prone to toss about
The tendency of the stream To make
"cut offs" across its multitudinous
crooked tangle of bends is pruduCtiv"
of curious results. For many of these
ncCkS are long and narrow, fifteen to
twenty miles around, and only two or
three miles across. At time OF Hood
the river has q tendency to take the
shortest cut. 1t often rushes across
these narrow neckS, establishing new
and shorter channels
Then Il town which was n river
town" when the sun set will find itself
at sunrise far in the country, miles
away from the river. Sometimes a
planter goes to sleep upon his farm
in one state and wakes TO find himself
i'm anuthcr state and his farm trans
ferred TO the domain of another.
My father left me thousands "i
rich acres" said an old lady to me
down i'm Grcenville, Miss. Il never
transferred them; the Mississippi did
it for me. There they lie, across the
river now. owned and cultivated and
enjoyed by my ncighbOr in another
state"
In all the world there is no stream
mates as the Mississippi. | have left
its upper reaches near st. Cloud.
Mimi. when they We're fast bound in
ice and SNOW, and, travelling by train
to Louisiana. nave stood on its banks
again. two days later, and watched
its waves lay lazily against grassy
lcvc"S i'm the warm sunshine levceS
that lead through green forests of
magnolia and livcOak. scented gardens
and Urang" groves.
The area drained by the Father of
Waters is over 1.245.000 square miles.
or. think of ii another way; think of
il aS an extent of land that is not
only the heart Of the country. but is
almost the country itself for il is only
Il triilc less than thrC"-fOurthS of it.
Viewed from tn" standpoint of the
farmer it comes near being the whole
thing. for the tWcnty-cight states and
territories from which the MISSISSIPPI
pi Valley claims tribute Of drainage
contain 80 per cent of all the imprOv-
ed farm land in the United Statcs.-
st. Louis Globe Democrat.