The breadth of the Mississippi river has been much exaggerated. It is
here about half a mile wide. Sometimes more, occasionally less. (This
average width it preserves for more than a thousand miles from its
mouth.) Its waters run at the rate of three or four miles to the hour,
and are of a yellowish cast, with a slight tincture of "red." The
yellow colour it derives from the Missouri, while the deeper tint is
obtained by the influx of the "Red."
Driftwood floats thickly upon its surface; here in single logs, there in
raft-like clusters. To run a boat against one of these is attended with
danger, and the pilot avoids them. Sometimes one swimming below the
surface escapes his eye; and then a heavy bumping against the bows
shakes the boat, and startles the equanimity of the less experienced
passengers. The "snag" is most dreaded. That is a dead tree with heavy
roots still adhering. These, from their weight, have settled upon the
bottom, and the _debris_ gathering around holds them firmly imbedded.
The lighter top, riven of its branches, rises towards the surface; but
the pressure of the current prevents it from attaining to the
perpendicular, and it is held in a slanting position. When its top
rises above the water, the danger is but trifling--unless in a very dark
night--it is when the top is hidden a foot or two below the surface that
the snag is feared. Then a boat running upon it up-stream, is lost to a
certainty. The roots firmly imbedded in the bottom mud, prevent the
pile from yielding; and the top, usually a spiky one, penetrates the bow
timbers of the boat, sinking her almost instantly. A boat properly
"snagged" will go down in a few minutes.
The "sawyer" is a log fixed in the water similarly to the snag, but kept
bobbing up and down by the current, thus suggesting the idea of a sawyer
engaged at his work--hence the name. A boat getting aground upon a
sunken log _crosswise_, is sometimes snagged upon its branches, and
sometimes broken into two pieces by the pressure of her own weight.
Among the drift, I notice odd matters that interest me. Stalks of
sugar-cane that have been crushed in the press-mill (a hundred miles
farther up I should not meet these), leaves and stems of the maize
plant, corn-cobs, pieces of broken gourd-shell, tufts of raw cotton,
split fence-rails, now and then the carcase of some animal, with a
buzzard or black vulture (_Cathartes aura_ and _atratus_) perched upon
it, or hovering above.
I am within the geographical range of the alligator but here the great
Saurian is seldom seen. He prefers the more sluggish _bayous_, or the
streams whose shores are still wild. In the rapid current of the
Mississippi, and along its well-cultivated banks, he is but rarely
observed by the passing traveller.
Alternately the boat approaches both shores of the river ("coasts" they
are called). The land is an alluvion of no very ancient formation. It
is a mere strip of _terra firma_, varying in breadth from a few hundred
yards to several miles, and gradually declining from the banks, so that
the river is actually running along the top of a ridge! Beyond this
strip commences the "Swamp," a tract that is annually inundated, and
consists of a series of lagoons and marshes covered with coarse grass
and reeds. This extends in some places for a score of miles, or even
farther--a complete wilderness of morass. Some portions of this--where
the inundation is only annual--are covered with dark and almost
impenetrable forests. Between the cultivated strip on the immediate
bank of the river, and the "Swamp" in the rear, runs a belt of this
forest, which forms a kind of background to the picture, answering to
the mountain-ranges in other lands. It is a high, dark forest,
principally composed of cypress-trees (_Cupressus disticka_). But there
are other kinds peculiar to this soil, such as the sweet-gum
(_Liquidambar styraciflua_), the live-oak (_Quercus vivens_), the tupelo
(_Nyssa aquatica_), the water-locust (_Gleditschia aquatica_), the
cotton-wood (_Populus angulata_), with _carya, celtis_, and various
species of _acer, cornus, juglans, magnolia_, and oaks. Here an
underwood of palmettoes (_Sabal_ palms), _smilax, llianes_, and various
species of _vitis_; there thick brakes of cane (_Arundo gigantea_), grow
among the trees; while from their branches is suspended in long festoons
that singular parasite, the "Spanish moss" (_Tillandsia usneoides_),
imparting a sombre character to the forest.
Between this dank forest and the river-banks lie the cultivated fields.
The river current is often several feet above their level; but they are
protected by the "Levee," an artificial embankment which has been formed
on both sides of the river, to a distance of several hundred miles from
its mouth.
In these fields I observe the culture of the sugar-cane, of the
rice-plant, of tobacco and cotton, of indigo and maize. I see the
"gangs" of black slaves at their work, in their cotton dresses of
striped and gaudy colours, in which sky-blue predominates. I see huge
waggons drawn by mules or oxen returning from the cane-fields, or slowly
toiling along the banks. I see the light-bodied Creole, in "cottonade"
jacket and trousers of bright blue, mounted upon his small Spanish
horse, and galloping along the Levee road. I see the grand mansion of
the planter, with its orange-groves and gardens, its green Venetians,
cool verandahs, and pretty palings. I see the huge sugar-house, or
tobacco-shed, or cotton "pickery;" and there, too, are the neat
"cabins," clustering together or running in a row, like the
bathing-boxes at a fashionable watering-place.
Now we are passing a plantation where they are making merry--a _fete
champetre_. Many horses stand under the trees, "hitched" in the shade
with saddles on, not a few of which are "ladies' saddles." In the
verandah, the lawn, and through the orange shrubbery, may be seen moving
about gentlemen and ladies richly attired. Music is heard, and there is
dancing in the open air. One cannot help envying these happy Creoles
the enjoyment of their Arcadian life.
Scenes varied and lovely were passing panorama-like before my eyes.
Lost in admiration of them, I had for the moment forgotten _Eugenie
Besancon_.