The Mississippi River, which empties its wealth of waters into
the Gulf of Mexico, is fed by the Missouri, the Ohio, the
Tennessee, the Red River, and indirectly the Allegheny and
Monongahela, and the Yellowstone and the Platte. The Amazon
River drains an area of two and a half million square miles,
or the waters of more than a third of all the South American
continent. The River Nile is almost equally enriched by
tributaries.
But no river is more fed by confluent currents than is that of a life
which draws to itself all resources of knowledge and grace. (Text.)
(1798)